A Parade and A Prayer

Written post-commissioning, on the Monday (11th) after.

Joint term happened at the start of lent. This was in mid February to 9th March 2024.

And it’s back at SAFTI, which means that course warrants are going to be hounding, checking bunks at random, and I definitely could not have brought in my computer and used it liberally if I didn’t want to get caught.

Gor came and left within the one week that I was around at home all week (it felt really good)— we caught up, spent time having meals together, going for our prata run, explored some new trails that he liked (hopefully) and discussed about why it was worth strategising and thinking about what I wanted to do in this year.

Time passes really quickly, and I’m already nearly 25% done with this year. Which also means that I’m 25% closer to ORDing, also meaning that I’m 25% closer to beginning another round of college applications, etc. But it also means that there is going to be less time for me to get good at things that I want to get good at.

I think having been out of school for at least a year now, there definitely have been some traps that I’ve fallen into. I keep complaining that I don’t have time to do this or that, or I’m not able to block out time to do this or that, but those are probably just lame excuses for me not wanting to hunker down, focus, and put in the work.

My interest is drawn to so many different things, and I’m distracted by so many different games (literal or otherwise), and I really need to focus. I’ve found that jumping around trying out different hype cycles don’t really work, although it might be necessary for “boosting my profile” in AI.

And so I’ve found it hard to concentrate, but I’m glad that things are winding down for me to finally focus on things that I’ve told myself to do.

The cut on my face which I sustained during the march to the first parade rehearsal also put me out of action quite suddenly for me to care less about running, and more about the day to day things that I truly cared about. And not that much learning can be done with a handphone, hence the following.

One of them which I want to continue doing is reflecting—not in any conventional sense, but a spiritual way. I mentioned that lent started in early Feb, and it coincided with me being free from my distractions (apart from my phone, which I feel is a less immersive device than my computer, which I could probably stare at for a long time and make myself feel productive), so I decided to embark on a Journey to the Cross, reflecting about 1) the dire nature of my sins and how depraved I am personally and 2) how Jesus’ redemptive work truly saves and redeems.

It was tiring to do so. Reading on my phone, after a long day of parade rehearsals, and seriously considering how wretched and depraved I am took extra mental energy out too perhaps. But I still did it anyway, and come away with some things (or questions to be answered) that I wrote down in the black little handbook.

Here they are:

From Day 8

• Would my friends characterise me as someone who is spiritually self-sufficient, or as one who knows the blessing of spiritual poverty, and am I satisfied with the answer to that question?

Day 11

• How true is “Thou my best thought by day or by night, waking or sleeping my presence thy light?”

Day 14

• Sin blinds, and blinds us to our blindness.

Parade rehearsals are mindbendingly boring and tedious. Uniformity is a necessity, yet your individual effort of staying still in sedia position isn’t recognised by anyone, nor your aching arms relieved by any external praise. But praise itself is hard to come by. Sometimes I cracked jokes—often derisive—to lighten the mood on the back row of the left side of contingent 1, but my reflections from the previous days will hit back hard, and soon I’ll shut my mouth.

Spot me, lol.

It’s in those moments that I realised the best thing I could do when I had no stimulus in front of me was not to think of any abstract AI concept or how to best improve running made simple or things I should be optimising for my data display for Strava, but really simple prayer.

I realised how much I didn’t pray. Even in those short few minutes of standing still, it made a difference. It took my mind off the strain and fatigue (those aching arms and incredibly sore feet); I could fix my mind on something more than my suffering.

This revelation was reinforced by one particular portion of the parade where the “9 religious leaders of the …, …, Christian, … faiths will now pray for blessings…”. It seemed insane—this was a military parade, there were generals and chiefs of staffs and ministers in the stands, but a whole minute was set aside for prayer. Yet I couldn’t find time during the entirety of my day to do it?!

Sure our multi-religious culture is part of our Singaporean identity, but there was something deeper than that; it struck me personally.

So even as the colours marched out of the parade square and we marched in with our new ranks and all, I’ll think back to the time that I earnestly prayed, which was at the start of the year just at the stroke of midnight. For God to guide me and lead me in this year, because I just don’t know how it’s going to pan out, but he does. And a reminder for me to seek him earnestly in prayer.

And though I could never foresee some of the terrible things that are going to (or have, think: stitch) happen, I know that He will keep making me.