We reach certain points in our lives when we feel that everything becomes routine; that we are just passing through each day. Routine, as per the definition of the term, puts emphasis on the phrase “regularly followed.” Once something becomes the usual course of action, it becomes tedious, a single and similar cycle repeated over and over again. Just like this part where you had to read a lengthy paragraph, when what I was trying to convey can be summarized in just one word – BORING!
When we veer towards dreary drills, we actually stop growing and learning. A sudden stop of learning and experience becomes a frightening dead end for wisdom. Luckily, we get to choose whether or not we submit to torpidity.
My life started to become plain and simple. But then came HIV, and new challenges and adventures ensued. Thus, my routine was finally broken into pieces. Not only was there a new life, but there were also new things to be done.
I started writing a few weeks after my diagnosis with the sole vision of documenting this eventful experience and journey. My writing was to be my personal diary.
But then I had a vision of going further. I thought of suitably exploiting this platform to inspire other people living with HIV or those in the quandary of unbridled emotional turmoil.
TO AID. TO INSPIRE. TO MOTIVATE. These became the three underlying aims of my writing. Because indeed, every one of us is bound for something better.
I am no stranger to writing. In the past, I was tapped to be an editor. But on those times, I was only given the opportunity to have a column of my own, limited to only 400 words. I would like to believe that I was able to surpass that struggle of maximizing my thoughts in a limited number of words.
But gone are those days for me now because I can write lengthy pieces that could bore you as much as any slow pacing Filipino series would.
When I started blogging, I noticed the low number of hits in my blog. This made me doubt my substance. I was thinking of two possibilities: (1) My grammar went wrong somewhere amid my entries, and (2) There’s a lack or absence of substance in whatever I was writing. But there were a few who kept on reading my pieces; some people I didn’t know were spending some of their time for my blog.
One day, while browsing my Facebook account, an Englishman sent me a message, suggesting for me to consider sending at least one of my entries to PositiveLite, a Canadian HIV online magazine. It wouldn’t hurt if I get rejected, I thought. After all, I already had a lot of hurting. I was startled, though, when I received an email of confirmation that my story was to be published a few days after I sent them my entry.
A few weeks before I submitted my entry for PositiveLite, I also sent an e-mail to Outrage Magazine about my interest to write for them. I received a reply, but it took a few weeks before I got a chance to see my own entry being published. I thought I was bound for another rejection. I was becoming an assumptive pessimist.
A day after my debut in PositiveLite, my introductory entry for Outrage Magazine was also published. I was in awe. I know it may sound overstated, but every frustrated writer would know how I was feeling at that time. I finally saw my work in their pages.
There can be no greater reward in life than realizing your self-worth.
I have been struggling as a student all through these years. I struggle from the terrors of the academe. Demoralized after indignantly and willfully robbed of my confidence – that summarizes my days inside the premises of our school.
Then I was diagnosed HIV-positive. There was a short period when I thought of it as a confirmation of the vacillating premises that my professors had cast upon me. Until I managed to regain my composure and planned a life ahead of me.
I got through those days that I doubted my capacity because I am certain that I posses the necessary aptitude to pass through not only in school but in the bigger academe that is life per se.
It was through my diagnosis as HIV-positive that I have validated my capacity. It was through this that my frustration to be a writer materialized. It was through this that my daily unimaginative pattern was replaced by vivacity.
There is not only a life after HIV, but there’s also a realization of dreams after HIV.
A somniatis continua!
I am made to conquer!
