The MCP, whom I last saw a few days after my birthday last month, cautioned me, "Don't take on too much. Make sure you get enough rest and stuff."

I assured him I would, then went off and added more activities onto my schedule.

I think I'm compensating for the time I wasted the last five years. I keep thinking if I don't take all the opportunities that are coming my way now, I will never find myself, I will not reach anywhere near my full potential. I haven't experienced enough, I haven't developed enough, I don't know enough. I won't be able to relate, I won't be able to evolve, I won't be able to write.

I'm being driven to do everything that I can possibly squeeze into my schedule within two years, by my own stubborn will, up to the point where my own personal spiritual development has lapsed somewhat. I won't even mention the relationships that I am allowing to fall by the wayside because I'm so focused on the things I have to do, have to accomplish by the end of the two years. I'm on some kind of fatalistic run, "Do it, or else. If you want to get ahead, you must do this and this and that and this," and I can't seem to stop.

I'm leaving a lot of people behind as I rush towards something. They can't keep up, but I can't wait for them. It kills me to realise that I may lose some of them, but I can't stop, not even for them. It feels like this is my only window of opportunity, that there wouldn't be a window like this for years to come. Logic insists that I grab the chances as they come my way, but Instinct cautions me to take care lest I burn myself out.

So what can I do? Try to achieve some kind of balance?

At the end of the day lies this fundamental need to write. But what do I write if I have not lived? What do I write if my eyes are not opened? How do I share, how do I relate, how do I touch, how do I speak, if I have not walked in your shoes?

There is some method in all the madness, some reason to all the frivolities. I see it, even if you don't.