Midnight Memories

“I can't change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination”-J.Dean

It had been a long time since the last time I wrote something on this blog. We all know how challenging it is to balance college life and get hold of different bunch of things at once, some of ways are to abandon little things such as hobbies, mine are writing. Before we get started, I just want to let you know that this writing does not necessary act like all my other writing so I hope who ever read this can read with ease and I hope I did not turn this into serious comprehensive writing :).

          This time I would like to take you while back into the first time I become freshmen again for college, which was going to my oldest-dream’s university and it was not all hype as I picture it way then. It was hot evening like always in Surabaya, at that time I was one of the delegation for civil engineering when I found out that I was accepted. So much drama involved at this year-round decision making process that I remembered all of them but I will tell you only the main part.

“There will come a day for both of us”

          Never fails, not even once defined who I was. When I was I high school, things seems to go as plan if I try harder and harder. I succeeded every time, almost flawlessly. It hits me and change my perception on things when I failed for the first time, which was going for the first time to this somewhat-overrated institute. So many high hopes were shattered that time and that was probably one of my lowest time of my entire life so far. I lost everything, everyone and one person that keeps me up every time I fall. People come and go indeed, and that was my first lesson. When I was wearing white-grey for uniform, I tend to hold on to people. I was so bound to them until it scar me until now. People drove my emotion, mood and everything. Now people sees me like this powerful figure that don’t care about anything except myself but actually I’m not. I am still that person that will probably use lot of emotion in every action I take no matter how hard I try to cover it. All the critics I got from becoming a leader will be my future’s guidelines on how to be a better person, but I will get to that in the moment.

          The quote above will be one of my favorite quotes. If you are a dreamer just like me, then this quote suits us. I tend to dream first, day dreaming I supposed. I like to picture things the way I wanted even if it seems impossible. But what can I say, all my dreams are one-by-one coming true aren’t they? Dreams indeed without action are just nothing but it will never too late to start. People will tell you different things on how to achieve it but personally, I like to start by dreaming. Imagine all the details of it and when its done you can take action. Yes there will be cancer people that stand in your way and yes there will be some obstacle to it, but where is the fun in that if there is no difficulty? Keep believing in it and try as hard as you can while keep no one stand in your way.

There will come a day when all your dreams will turn into goals, goals turn into achievement, and by that time, you will live out your dreams the way you put yourself to sleep. All those sleepless night will certainly pay off by your success oh how you executed your mission of mind.

Pak Ketu and his “Crew”

          I never pictured myself as the leader of anything. At that time, it was only a fantasy. I guess it was the day that I have to be a leader for once. It wasn’t easy as I picture it to be, FTSL had it’s ups and downs but im glad we all got through it together. A lot of things I got from this and it would take time if I mention all of it.

          Respect everyone with all their capabilities and interest. People came here with different interest and specialties in which they used as an asset to grow. Personally, I oversee this and successfully guide them to be the most active faculty. At first until my last, I respected everyone to be whatever they wanted to be only on the condition where they have to considered FTSL as their family and place called “home”. Many hardship goes by and one thing I learn is that no matter how powerful you are, you cannot control people that doesn’t bound to anything. FTSL are not formal organization or community, it just bunch of people with their own idealism on things. I cant blame them or myself, that’s why FTSL isn’t the way it should be because I tend to chase civil engineering as my major and other focuses. Again people come and go and why shouldn’t they? I limited myself on people because im that person that will easily get attached to things.. yes bahasa alay-nya adalah gue baperan but that’s just the way I am. It is a good thing though to be “baperan” because most of your action will be carefully planned before you execute them. Bringing people into your world means you let their world be yours and so are your world. I respect those people that easily going with everyone’s things and I envy them. Someday I will let people in but it will certainly takes time. I hope they appreciate little things just like I do, see the world in different angle and mature in every way necessary. In this way we could be together just as you promised me.

          Know when is the right time for everyone. To be honest, I don’t understand people in my crew. We are all FTSL and all the majors are seems to be interconnected with each other, yet.. AMBIS SEMUA LIKE CIVIL IS THE ONLY THING. All my majors are closely related not like FMIPA in which some of those majors have total difference courses in them. the next step after you respect  your priorities, people’s priorities and the connection between them, then as a leader you can set expectation range in which must compile. Knowing the right time for everyone including yourself is the most challenging one. you need to balance the time for what you want, what you need, and what people need. You know best on things that you wanted and needed, you somewhat knows what other people needs based on your guesses but you cant control what other people expectation towards it. You make your own policy for them based on what you believe in and it is normal that some people go with them and the rest will try to bring it down. As long as you have the data and the support you need, you will be fine.

         

“Gua Mungkin Seorang Prajurit, Tapi Jiwa Tetep Seorang Mahasiswa”

          After all the first-half-semester-fun-time gone, it is time to serve one of my commitment for choosing one and only unit. I never believe myself enrolling this type of things and why should I? I rarely follow command and I am not discipline at all. 2 weeks training with one of the hardest test for my body and my soul but again I got through it. It changed my life. It fixed my soul.

          At first, it was complicated to complete all the specification and when it was time for holiday and all the New Year’s celebration, I can only watch from the cold dark forest in which I was hold up. First couple of days we spent on military barracks to receive first formal training. It was hard to adapt, to all the self-righteousness, discipline and executing commands and the part that I hated the most was meal time. But wait? Isnt it the easiest thing to just eat with your buddies? Hell nah, you gotta eat monster-sized meal within 3-4 minutes or you and your buddies suffer the consequences. Im not going to talk about this, maybe I will write it later in another entry about my adventure becoming a “soldier” or careless people say “satpam kampus”, no but I want to talk about the fundamentals that I got from this and their application toward my past daily life.

          NEVER GIVE UP and JUST DO IT. Yes indeed the first and most thing that popped into my mind was this. I learned true meaning of never give up when our platoon are commanded to just simply walk for almost 70 KM. it was a simple task isn’t it? I mean.. we all walk our body to places everyday right? What’s so hard to just keep walking? Now let me connect this to our ways on seeing how to get civil engineering easily. Walking is the same as studying, it seems all just too simple. But if we considered 70 KM is our ultimate goal and from this distance and getting civil engineering by just “walking” and “studying” seems a little hard now isn’t it ? We all know that so many variables needed to be add before we assume all this. Other additional variables such as units/KM, play-time with the boys, Organic chemistry and random grading from different lecturers is just the same as how I picture them as my heavy world-war-II weapon, or heavy equipment that I needed to bring on my 70 KM journey. They all play important roles on how you reached the final goals. All the activity that you are involved in during the early phase (TPB) and the passed struggles will eventually take you to your ultimate goals, just as my weapon and my equipment took me to look like this bad-ass soldier for my parent to see. Both achieving Civil Engineering and be a part of The Battalion are just unforgettable for me. all you need is to pay a little attention on little things. Be grateful on what you have and be patience on what you want. We live in the era of super-fast live style, in which if you blink the day will slipped through your hand that simultaneously. Being able to appreciate little things and just take a moment to see what most people cant see will make your day slower and eventually make you a better person on how you decide things.

          Many of my experiences came to haunt me whenever I feel low. Whenever I was so lazy to just pick up a pen and study, those 2 weeks indeed haunts me. No matter how hard the equation is or how complicated organic polymers can be, I remembered something worth doesn’t come easy. People think that Im willing to ate dirt, drink sweat, bleed and trained myself to kill and be better than anyone for one purpose only, just to prove myself worth of such fragile purple barrettes and uniforms? NO… to better than the person I was, that is the key to be successful on executing all my dreams to be my achievements. People don’t know what you’ve been through, that’s why all they can do is judge you with their basic knowledge. Once again, you cant blame them, is in our human nature. Respecting their thoughts and believing in your own will should be enough to keep bad vibes away and keep fulfilling your dreams.

          I would love to keep going but I got a flight to catch early tomorrow. For now all I can say is that, be the person willing to make a sacrifice to be a better person and learn to overcome fear to try new things. Just like I did for my past achievement and gone for spiritual journey instead of being keamanan OSKM lol. Sometimes putting family first over your personal shit could be the key…

Kalo emak pengen umroh bareng mau gamau cabut kan ………

Happy holidays y'all... Minal Aidin wal faizin....

This is my story, where’s yours -Nigs