Sharing Nugget #30
#30: Everything else looks brighter when you have been to rock-bottom.
I went back to a camp - which I rarely visited - to take my IPPT (fitness test) this morning. The camp is situated in Lim Chu Kang – a nice quiet corner of Singapore where you can taste the fresh air that blows in from the Johor Straits.
When I was jogging pass the rows of hangars, a flood of memories poured in. “I was here!” I remembered. There I was, at that spot, standing in formation, waiting for the fierce instructor to arrive. There I was, right this staircase, that 3 of us hauled 300kg of equipment up 5 stories. That was bloody tough.
I remembered how life was as an officer cadet. I struggled badly due to my fitness. Because of my feather-weight, everything was so much heavier for me. It was painful. I can still remember vividly when I collapsed at the finishing line after the SOC test. I almost fell into unconsciousness. My heart was so over-worked that it might fail anytime. That was a time I really thought I would die.
On my way home from camp, I was chit-chatting with a fellow colleague. We talked about how life was as a regular. Although we are hail from a different unit, we faced the same ugly politics. We agreed never to let ourselves get sucked into it. I thought about the vicious cycle where course-mates were pitted against each other to fight for ranking and promotion; and with battle-lines dug deeper and deeper, the scene becomes a WWI trench-warfare.
I was reminded that I am very fortunate to be thrown a life-line and pulled out of the trenches to come to SMU. After today, I will look at my study and CCA commitments a little bit differently. Everything else looks brighter when you have been to rock-bottom.
I went back to a camp - which I rarely visited - to take my IPPT (fitness test) this morning. The camp is situated in Lim Chu Kang – a nice quiet corner of Singapore where you can taste the fresh air that blows in from the Johor Straits.
When I was jogging pass the rows of hangars, a flood of memories poured in. “I was here!” I remembered. There I was, at that spot, standing in formation, waiting for the fierce instructor to arrive. There I was, right this staircase, that 3 of us hauled 300kg of equipment up 5 stories. That was bloody tough.
I remembered how life was as an officer cadet. I struggled badly due to my fitness. Because of my feather-weight, everything was so much heavier for me. It was painful. I can still remember vividly when I collapsed at the finishing line after the SOC test. I almost fell into unconsciousness. My heart was so over-worked that it might fail anytime. That was a time I really thought I would die.
On my way home from camp, I was chit-chatting with a fellow colleague. We talked about how life was as a regular. Although we are hail from a different unit, we faced the same ugly politics. We agreed never to let ourselves get sucked into it. I thought about the vicious cycle where course-mates were pitted against each other to fight for ranking and promotion; and with battle-lines dug deeper and deeper, the scene becomes a WWI trench-warfare.
I was reminded that I am very fortunate to be thrown a life-line and pulled out of the trenches to come to SMU. After today, I will look at my study and CCA commitments a little bit differently. Everything else looks brighter when you have been to rock-bottom.
posted by Zheng Renjie at 10:45 PM
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