One pedal is processing your grief. The other pedal is empowering yourself.

You can’t step on one pedal and expect yourself to be moving forward. You need both.

When I watched my mum take her last breath, I wanted to get my life together. I searched online for resources but found that many articles focused on the first pedal but not the second.

I was desperate to know - how do I find meaning in my life again?

My confidence and identity were anchored on my mum. She told me what she believed I was, and I trusted her with my whole heart. She told me I was kind, I was hardworking, a good student - and so I was. Without her, I wondered who I was and what I should do in my life.

When someone you love leaves, you may be overwhelmed by a gaping void - one that you can't really express in words. It's like an excavator that doesn't stop digging. Perhaps it already started at full speed the moment they fell ill.

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Think about the first time you rode your bike. It was new, you didn't understand how balance worked. These moving parts: existence, mortality, significance, guilt.. they are the different parts of your bicycle.

On Existence

How do I confront my mortality?

You wonder where they went. You wonder what happened to them - how can they just disappear like that? They seemed so real a moment ago. Does their life just end like that? That’s it? I struggled with these questions. I wondered what happened to my mum after she disappeared.

I sunk into a pit of loss - are we even real anymore? I wondered if life was simply an illusion. I wondered if The Matrix and Inception were in fact truths.

I remember asking my ah mah, “阿嬷, 如果生命是假的怎么办?” (Ah mah, what if life is fake?)

She frowned at me and said, “难道你现在吃的肉是假的meh?” (Do you think the meat you are eating now is fake?)

I couldn’t stop laughing. Then I focused on eating the braised pork she cooked for me.

I realised that before my mum's illness, I never really contemplated death before. It just seemed too far-fetched and scary to think about. But right then, I had no choice but to ask myself: "What happens next?" Till today, I don't have my answers.

On Significance

I wondered about the meaning of life - what’s the point of living if we are going to die?

What if none of this matters?

I am just one human trying to convince myself of my significance, when in fact I am simply insignificant in this grand scheme of things. I am just 1 human who will only exist for maybe 80 years. If our universe existed 13.8 billion years ago, think about how insignificant these 80 years are. I struggled with believing that there is a point in these 80 years.

When I realised that I was in fact insignificant, I asked myself:

ok what now?

Just because I am insignificant in the grander scheme of things doesn’t mean that life has no meaning. I learned that they can be separated.

You don’t need to be significant to create meaning in your life.

On Meaning

I experienced periods of existential crisis when I couldn't find the motivation to do anything. This inertia stemmed from my lack of meaning - it was too strong to overcome. After all, as Viktor Frankl details in Man's Search For Meaning (one of my favourite books),

“Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible.”

I realised that I didn't have answers, and so my search for meaning had begun.

On Purpose

Mankind is intrinsically driven by purpose. Though I did have people and things I loved - I wondered about the point of loving if we were all going to disappear. Finding a purpose - such as loving someone - just felt like a feeble attempt to justify the meaning of our existence. So what if I love or don't love? Does any of that matter at all?

As you can guess, I spiralled down such thoughts - trying to find the explanation for everything. My mum's death implanted in me an unquenchable thirst for answers - I needed and wanted to know.

On Guilt, and a Determination To Live

Though I was steeped in doubt about all these possible explanations, I was also fully aware that not everyone gets a chance to live. I was riddled with guilt - that my mum's life was taken away, not mine. This determination to live for her fuelled me through these crises.

I told myself that I cannot conclude that life is meaningless until I have given myself a shot at life. And to me, that meant trying everything that life has to offer. It meant giving myself a chance to see meaning in life. To experience fully what it could mean to be human. And only when I have done that and I still find no point, can I conclude that life is meaningless.

Till then, I would go out there, and live a good life -that's the best I knew I could do.

On Reality

So alongside the larger existential questions, I needed help to live my daily life. I wanted to know how to live the fullest life I could. I needed answers.

I began to devour articles and books. How to communicate, how to make friends. The psychology of relationships and learning. The art of emotions and thoughts. I grew intrigued by everything and anything. The more I learned, the more I realised I didn't actually know anything. I needed more time.

So I developed a strong interest in productivity - I wanted to create 25 hours in a day.

I threw myself into everything I could get involved in. I love people - watching them, observing them, understanding them. I love conversations and the art of asking questions to find out what makes their hearts sing. I love learning about their vulnerabilities, about what makes them *them*. I love talking to old people - they grant me access to priceless life lessons. I love kids - they remind me of the simplicity of life.

With each conversation, questions germinated in my head. I wondered why people thought the way they do. I wondered why they felt the way they did. I read up more about psychology and philosophy. I read about how our childhood impacts our outlook on life. I read about personality types and core beliefs.

As I drew links between these theories, I saw the rich value of knowledge. It helped me to become a better daughter, a better friend, a better human being (I hope so). I learned to question my own assumptions, to break down the mental models I carry into each situation.

I learned that life is the greatest teacher. Each moment presents something for me to learn - about myself, about my universe.

Knowledge empowered me to make sense of life.

The more I experienced, the more I wanted to experience. I could not get enough of life.

And soon, I began to realise

it's not about what life can offer, but about what I can offer to life.

My meaning and purpose come from the contributions I can make in this one lifetime. While yes, 80 years is insignificant in the larger scheme of things. But 80 years is significant to these 7.9 billion people on this earth with me today. I read this quote from 12 Rules for Life, and it spoke to me:

Any idiot can find a frame of time in which nothing is significant

On Self-condemnation

I struggled with expecting myself to be perfect. I condemned myself for the mistakes I made, I was hard on myself for my imperfections.

I didn't manage to save my mum. I condemned myself for not doing more and being more for her. I tried hard to control something that was way beyond my control. I blamed myself for not curing her of her cancer.  I knew that I was no doctor, but still, I felt like I should have done something - anything. Maybe deep down, I just wanted some explanation for her passing, so I placed responsibility on myself.

Here is how I understood my bike. You have your own to get to know. But as always, you don't have to discover it alone.

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With you,
En

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