i wearily click on the submit button and stare, half-awake, at the little progress bar indicating my last assignment for the semester is making its way to Perth, Australia byte by byte.
i realize, to my annoyance, that i have a headache; and that my chest hurts from hunching over the laptop all day.
everything about school appears like a blot in my peripheral vision; i know it's there but i can't focus on it. what have i been doing?
i close my eyes, shut out the throb, and it all starts to materialize: the demoralising in-class role-plays, the disasterous placement interview, the panic at being client-less, the overnight assignment sprints and now this pointless dawning that i didn't make this semester count very much.
the assignment reaches its destination safely. i hope i will, too.
there have been occasions where i have been presented with the question, "what is normal?"
it's a difficult question to approach, perhaps because i'm so deeply mired in the concept itself - that unspoken social conditioning that 'normal' thought expends itself best on the pressing challenges of, say, sociatal or corporate ladderism.
part of my current training, however, gleefully nudges me into the murky depths of philsophical and existential debate; which led me to ponder: isn't normality, at the end of the day, a product of social construction; sets upon sets of mores and values that owe their existence to popular culture and mass attitudes?
is it wisdom, then, to place so much emphasis on a value which alters according to an unyielding rhythm of time and space?
in my efforts to be more aware of the tendency to attach labels to the experiences of others, i have come to realize how easily unique realities can be thoughtlessly marginalized and conveniently categorized as deviant or requiring professional help.
this also helps me understand why i've always hated the idea of the bell curve which attempts to create neat descriptions to slot performance into. those who fall in the extreme ends of the curve are either extraordinary geniuses or hopeless underachievers. the bulk, though, sit nicely in the bulge right in between.
that's normal, right?
i still have no answer to the question; but i'm learning that perhaps a greater respect for the complexity and vastness of human experience will lead me closer to finding one.
i conducted my first bona fide counseling session today, a full two months after my posting.
it is more than a little disconcerting to realize how much time has snuck by so quickly since; but i am grateful, nonetheless, to be able to finally begin my clinical practicum.
i've always thought that i would make a half-competent actor but it seems nothing could be further from the truth.
part of the class this past weekend involved developing various personas for mock counseling sessions with each other. the challenge involved was to pretend to embody a whole other person, and to bring him/her to life as a way for us fledging counselors to practice our feeble magic on.
some of my classmates were able to sink deep into their psyches to haul out copious amounts of fraying raw emotions and intense korean drama serial-like existences.
i, on the other hand, can't do much more than be low-key and simmeringly subdued with a petulant scowl which astute readers would immediately identify as me being me.
however, i discovered something new over the weekend, and that is acting isn't about pretending to be someone you are not. it is about allowing someone within to emerge.
which begs the question: who is this person and why is he/she kept hidden away? 
what is the honest and complete self? is it not the totality of everything that we try to forget, to hide and to bury; everything that makes us weep, rage and laugh; everything that brings us pride, shame and fear; everything that leads us to hope, despair and love?
i can understand, though, that it is far easier to don a mask, any mask, because acceptance is so rare a gift that no one allows themselves to expect it. isn't that the saddest truth of all?