Kepo

There are people whom I wish write more in their social media.

Because I want to know more about them. I want to know how they are doing and what's on their mind. What are their concerns. What they think about things.

Sometimes I wonder if anyone wants to know more about me. How I'm doing and whatever-thing else. But it kinda creeps me out. Now I kinda get the sentiment why some people whom I wish write more in social media don't write more, hehe.

But I guess I too, don't share a lot of things. But I do share things. But more than anything, I share them for my convenience and interest. Like this blog, for example. I have long forgotten why I made this blog, but I am keeping it and keep writing on it for my sake. It's a nice thing. It's nice to write, you know? It's nice to write and know that it'll be read by yourself some time in the future, letting her know she's going through, how she changed, and what makes her changed. This blog hasn't been around that long and I see that I have change plenty. Sort of.

Other than that, writing always ease thoughts and feelings I think. Wording what's inside is a very good way to see or assess them more clearly. It's not once or twice that I found answers for my own questions just by putting them into paragraphs (which I previously intended to only be a paragraphs of questions). Then again, you can write anywhere-it doesn't necessarily have to be social media or whatever else accessible to people hm. Oh well.

Anyway, yeah. Even though I get why these people-whom-I-wish-write-more-in-their-social-media don't write more often than they already did, I kinda still wish they do.

Fear

I went and spent a whole weekend with horses a few weeks ago. I had a really great time.

I did a lot of things with horses. One of them had me falling from one. He almost stepped on me (because there was a print of his hoof on my stomach) but he was kind and alert enough to not let it happen. It didn't hurt (except where my chin bump into his hoof), I suppose the amount of falling and bumping into hard things in my life has made me immuned to that sort of thing. But I guess it's also because I thought of falling and I wasn't really afraid of the idea. So when it really happens, I wasn't really... shaken or anything (not that I expect that to happen).

If I were scared to fall from the horse, to get wet from the rain, to be dirty from all the mud--I wouldn't be able to learn nor do things with these horses. If I were scared of risk of me doing things, I wouldn't be able to do anything.

But I guess that's what has been holding people back from doing things. Fear. Mostly fear of getting hurt.

I suppose it's fair: most people don't like to feel pain. So when people don't want to pet puppies because they're afraid of being bitten, or play rugby because they're afraid of being squashed, or fall in love because they're afraid of heartbreaks, or doing bad deeds because they're afraid of getting thrown into a pit of everlasting fire... it makes sense, because people don't like pain.

I don't think fear is bad though. They're great. Fear is what keeping people alive. It makes sure we don't get into things that can be the death of us. So I don't think people should stop being afraid. I think people should stop letting fears prevent them from doing things all the time.

It's cool for people to be afraid of getting hurt, but I think people should risk it if it has certain advantages that worth getting hurt for. Like, I'd risk myself of getting clawed in the face, because I want to bond with my cat and getting clawed in the face is worth my cat knowing that I never meant him any harm. But I totally won't risk me got bitten by a venomous snake since I don't particularly get anything from it. It's also cool for people to be afraid of not doing things the right way, but I also think they should do it if they can be a better person by doing so. I guess it comes to rational assessment--knowing which fear to listen to, and which one to put aside. But fear and rationality aren't really a match from heaven, so a lot of people find it hard to think straight when it comes to things they're afraid of. That doesn't mean they can't try, though. Knowing why you're afraid of one and not another, knowing why you choose to indulge in one or face the other--it's a power on it's own.

What I'm trying to say is that it's ok to be afraid, and it's ok not doing things because you're afraid, but to be mindful that there are things that you're missing from not doing things because of fear. And to be mindful that facing your fears doesn't always make you the wisest person in the room.

Bravery is not mutually exclusive with stupidity.

Random Life Updates (sort of)

A lot of things happened recently. Sort of. My weekends are eaten by activities that... are... not I really expected to happen on weekends. Because my weekends usually consist of me lazing around. (Will still continue hopefully till next week).

But I guess that one weekend where my foot was sprained fulfill my usual weekend agenda (it was not very pleasant though).

But lately I'm a little bit disoriented. I'm confused, but I don't know about what. I want to talk to several people, but they're busy. I want my plush to be dry-cleaned, haven't done it (can't rely on other people, really). I want to go to toy stores and bookstores, but I'm too lazy to go anywhere else but home. I'm hungry most of the time, but I can't eat in each and every of those time. (I don't use to get hungry this often). The last one frustrates me the most.

It's weird because at one time, I'm disoriented, but not long afterwards, after putting it into words and draw something that has nothing to do with it, I don't feel so disoriented anymore. Seeing my awkward drawings I realize I really need to practice more often. The last time I was drawing very seriously and consistently were the time when I made a picture book. This is one of my favorite pages:

(I didn't color that well either)

I tried to give pictures of dreams that I have in my dream journal too, but I have dreams to write but not a lot of time to draw so I neglected that one too. I want to play tennis again, haven't been playing for so long. When I was in junior high, I played every week. After a load of work in high school, I put it to rest. Same as piano. Though with piano, the lesson every week was stressful. I cried in class a lot. Still played at home afterwards, but too lazy to practice in recent years. It's not very easy, to see what you like and what you want to do with your life. I tried music and sports and art and studying and although I enjoy doing it (and able to do it, some I did--like sports and studying--pretty well) none I found so interesting that I passionately want to be very good at it, or enjoy it enough to do it every other day (or at least regularly). But I guess that's ok, I have long made peace with myself about this kind of things. Guess it's still trial and error for me.

Maybe I'll draw some more for my dream journal.

(Later.)

Irang

(Her appearance isn't depicted in a very obvious way, here is what I imagine.)

Read her story here.

p.s. she's not mine, and by no means this visualization is even close to her actual design

Sexuality, Marriage, and Islam

Disclaimer: This is a personal interpretation and deduction from what I've learnt from living. I wanna say religion instead of Islam but I can't because I have no real reference in other religion. And by 'Islam', it actually really meant 'Islam in my perspective' and if there's any inaccuracy in things I said about it, feel free to say so, but please be mindful it's not intended as it's merely a fruit of deduction from whatever I learnt so far (which is, to tell the truth, not a lot).

I am cutting the case really short: I don't believe that it is wrong to love anyone or anything. It's a very natural thing to have a feeling of affection to anyone (or anything really). I always believe that it has never wrong to have feelings, however nasty they are, as long as they are not actualized in actions (x).

And with that saying, I think it's perfectly fine for people from the same sex to like each other.

I also don't believe that it's forbidden by my religion. Which is Islam.


Before getting to how the heck I come to that conclusion, there are a few things that have to be explained first.

That is, Sex and Marriage in Islam.

Sex, like every other aspect of life, is regulated in Islam. Sex, as I understand, is only permitted in two conditions:
1. It is reproductive sex
2. It is done by people who are married

It has to be reproductive sex, as non-reproductive sex is banned and seen as perverted. From what I get, the purpose of sex in Islam is strictly reproducing. Non-reproductive sex is an act of sin. Even when it is done by man and woman. But it has second condition: it has to be done by people who are married, so people who did reproductive sex but aren't married are also sinful.

But marriage itself, seen from my very simplistic point of view, is an institution that are legitimated by Islam to (1) track bloodlines and preserving species, and (2) socialize and perpetuate Islamic traditions and values. (But really, it's not just 'marriage' and 'Islamic norms and values', people use the unity of people through any institution for any norms and values).

I guess there are other purposes as well but I see these two as the most fundamental. Why? Because reason (1) is the reason why people who can marry are only people that can engage in reproductive sex, which is man and woman. To put it simply, if they can't reproduce, then the purpose of marriage is DEFEATED. Why such strong word? Because in Islam, you really CAN (and to some extent, encourage to?) have another marriage if you can't have children from the one you previously have.

Without children, you can't make little people who are supposed to be internalized with the previous value you have (in this case, Islam) which is actually the reason (2). I am saying so because preserving and spreading Truth in Islam is compulsory for muslims, and the easiest thing to do that is to build a family. How? Through marriage.

So that's how I deduce the purpose of marriage in Islam into two.

Which is kind of what leads me to think that the problem in Sodom and Gomorrah is probably not because men are loving men and women are loving women: but because they're engaged in non-reproductive sex.

As I said, non-reproductive sex is banned in Islam. And there's no way for two people from the same sex to have a reproductive sex, that's why sexual engagement between them is prohibited. (And that's why they can't get married, because they can't fulfill the purpose of marriage.)

But it doesn't mean that loving people or anything other than people from different sex are banned. We are encourage to love and spread love. There are even phrases like "I love you because of God" exactly because we can love anyone or anything based on a very basic thing like principle-differences be damned, as long as we have something important in the core of ourselves that we share together. Islam encourage its believers to be kind and full of love; the Prophet himself is depicted in a very loving, affectionate, and kind figure. And he doesn't really do that strictly to woman. Or muslims. He did so to every living being on earth that he encounters.

So no.

Feelings of affection towards anyone is not wrong. Or prohibited. (It shouldn't even be seen as one.)

What is prohibited (or "wrong" in its sense), I believe, is unregulated sex.

Which we have to admit, implies that homosexual people who are romantically involved cannot ever have sex (according to Islam). But that is totally doesn't mean that they can't love each other anyway.

(And it also implies that, the "act of sin" that is mentioned ever so often is not exclusively done by homosexuals or the like.)





And that's how I come to that.

(I'm very open to discussion.)



note: I prepared the similar notion for speech in class back when I was in 10th grade, arguing that not just that it's not forbidden in religion and not a mental illness, bullying and discrimination againts it shouldn't be happening. But I was thrown for a fact that apparently (despite what I was explaining) homosexuality is rejected in every religion. I guess it was my fault because my initial purpose was to argue not to bully LGBTIQ, so I didn't explain the RELIGION part very thoroughly (though I was pretty sure I'm convincing enough in "mental illness" department)-and she doesn't really care about my point (anti-bullying) but more to the fact that I accept homosexuality even though I'm a person with religion. I learnt my lesson, so here it is: an argument why me accepting homosexuality isn't betraying the fact that I'm a believer.


(x) This is also supported by the fact that in Islam, bad intentions are not sinful until it's done, albeit good intentions are already counted as good deeds, so when it's actually done you kinda get two times the rewards (if you don't then you already get a reward from your intentions alone).