To Find Korea

     In four weeks I will be leaving the city I've called my home for the past 21 years. I will be flying across the world in search of personal meaning. I don't know who I am—I am still undefined. Korea is more than a fantastical flight, it is an abandonment of all I've ever known. I am searching for happiness. I am searching for love—adulation. I am searching for understanding. I don't know where I'll find those attributes, but I know that it isn't here.

I feel like I'm tripping and falling to the finish line. The closer I become to leaving the more loose ends I find in my life. I know as soon as I'm on the plane my heart will relinquish my past life, but I may have to be bound and tied to get that far. I will be moving to Gangnam, which is a district of Seoul. 26 million people live in metro Seoul, which is over 50 times as many people who live in Halifax. I want to feel lost amongst the crowd to gain humility and let go of the egocentric idea that my life in any form is special.

     Over the last year I have faced a thousand tribulations of personal identity crises, and have dived into literature to try to solidify my understanding of the universe. From the likes of Orwell, Tolstoy, Poe, and Hemingway, Dostoevsky I've come to adopt a nihilism philosophy where all my life goals seem to be meaningless. And as depressing as that concept may sound, it has actually been a freeing revelation—for no matter what happens I can laugh, because it truly doesn't matter. I have been happier for it. All meaning is subjective... Then why is it that there are certain societal pressures that contort the viewpoints of nearly every Western citizen who has ever been born? There seems to be a certain stigma of success which goes as followed: get though university as quick as possible, land the most profitable job possible, meet a suitable mate who is genetically sufficient, get married, have kids, and then work hard 50 weeks for a two week vacation a year. To me, personally, this paradigm sounds like a paradox of flawed expectations. And as much as I hate to admit it, I have spent the majority of my life on this Disney-ed path. Although I would like to get married someday—and maybe even develop something resembling a paternal instinct—I refuse to accept it as the primary purpose of my life.

     If I learned anything from reading Anna Karenin, it's that life without religion can be a dangerous venture. This cannot be an esoteric stigma, as many men before I must have come to the same conclusion. I have great respect to anybody who can maintain belief in any deity, but it has never been a part of my life. Leo Tolstoy came to the conclusion that life without religion could not possibly have meaning, but I tend to disagree. I think that, although it is a difficult path to walk, meaning can be found. Dan Millman's “Way of The Peaceful Warrior” is a book I draw great inspiration from. In essence, it's about letting go of egocentricism and realizing that happiness comes from within, not from chasing goals. A big part of my decision to leave Canada came from the concept of trying to differentiate my true self from my idealistic self in order to regain true perspective. Because right now I feel like half a person, and the only way to become whole again is to make peace with my flaws and realize that my goals do not define me. They are subjective.

Something that I need to learn to let go of, and what most people struggle with, is differentiate what I want from what is expected of me. I just graduated with a Bachelors degree and I have already written the GMAT and am studying for the LSAT in order to prepare for my next degree because I feel like if I don't go to law school, business school, Med school, get a PhD, ect. I will be viewed as stupid. I can't go back to school to get a BA in creative writing because then I wouldn't have a piece of paper to prove that I was intelligent enough to join an elite group. It all comes down to humility. My way of thinking has shifted greatly over the past year. Above all else I would like to find “Ultimate Understanding” and to find it I would like to become better versed in philosophy, literature, psychology, and physics. I feel like becoming versed in this fields will keep my mind in equilibrium.

I am terrified of leaving my life behind, mostly because I am scared of the perspective I may come across. At the same time I am incredibly excited to be drawn out of my comfort zone and be thrown into mass confusion, which seems inevitable with 26 million people and a language barrier...