The World’s A Little Blurry: July 21

I’ll talk about the moment when someone else’s dream reminded me of my own.

I just came home from the laboratory.

Earlier today, we held a simple farewell for one of our colleagues. For the past two years, he has worked alongside us in the laboratory, processing specimens, sharing night duties, and carrying the quiet weight that comes with working in healthcare. Soon, however, he will be trading his lab coat for another chapter of his life—medical school.

As I listened to everyone share stories and wish him well, I realized something about myself.

It fills me with genuine joy to watch people dream—and then choose to chase those dreams with everything they have.

There is something deeply beautiful about witnessing someone take a leap of faith toward the life they have always imagined. Instead of envy, I feel hope. Instead of comparison, I feel inspired.

Perhaps that has been one of the quiet changes in me since I turned twenty.

Somewhere along the way, I learned to celebrate other people’s victories as though they were my own. I learned to clap sincerely when someone reached a milestone. I learned to admire courage whenever I saw it.

Maybe it’s because I know what it feels like to work relentlessly for a dream.

I know what it is like to stay up late studying while everyone else sleeps. I know the exhaustion that comes from chasing something that no one else can fully understand. I know the silent prayers whispered before examinations, the disappointments that never made it into conversations, and the countless moments of wondering whether all the effort would eventually be worth it.

Perhaps that is why I celebrate people so wholeheartedly.

Because behind every success is a story no one else sees.

Watching him leave the laboratory awakened something that had been quietly resting inside me.

It reminded me of another dream.

Medicine.

Not as a passing thought, but as a dream that has patiently waited in a quiet corner of my heart for years.

At the same time, it reminded me of another promise I have made to myself—to finish my poems, complete my stories, publish my books, and finally give the younger version of me the ending she had always hoped for.

Sometimes, all it takes is watching someone else become brave to remember that we, too, once had dreams waiting for our own courage.

I have another friend who dreams of becoming a doctor.

Listening to her plans, hearing her excitement, and watching her prepare for that journey somehow awakened the same desire sleeping inside me.

It wasn’t because she convinced me. Her courage simply reminded me of what my own heart had been whispering all along.

There are moments when that whisper grows louder.

Whenever I walk through the hospital hallways.

Whenever I step inside the emergency room.

Whenever I perform venipuncture and carefully collect a patient’s blood specimen.

Whenever friends or relatives ask me questions about their laboratory results or seek advice on what they should do next.

Those moments gently remind me that perhaps my story in healthcare is not yet finished.

Yet dreams have a way of colliding with reality.

The opportunities for Medical Technologists here in the Philippines are limited, and the salary—especially in many private institutions—is often difficult to build a future upon.

Like many healthcare professionals, I once looked abroad.

When I invested in my future back in 2023, I genuinely believed that after gaining enough clinical experience, the path overseas would gradually open.

It seemed like a straightforward plan.

Gain experience.

Apply abroad.

Build a better life.

But life rarely unfolds according to our timelines.

Hiring slowed. Agencies began laying off applicants. Many employers froze recruitment because of changing policies and restrictions. Doors I thought would eventually open remained closed.

For a while, it felt as though the future I had carefully planned was quietly dissolving before my eyes.

And so my thoughts wandered back to the dreams I had set aside.

Medical school.

Opening a small café.

Publishing the books that have lived inside my laptop and notebooks for years.

Building a life filled not only with stability, but with purpose.

Sometimes I wonder if this is what people call a quarter-life crisis.

Or perhaps this is simply adulthood.

Maybe growing older means realizing that life is less about following one perfect roadmap and more about learning how to keep walking whenever the road changes.

There are nights when I stare into the darkness and wonder where all of this is leading.

There are nights when I cry quietly before falling asleep.

There are days when I spend too much time living inside my own thoughts, imagining futures that may never happen and grieving versions of my life that have not even come to pass.

The mind can become a noisy place if we allow fear to speak louder than hope.

But I have learned something about myself.

When those familiar voices of fear begin whispering that I am too late, too uncertain, or too lost, I no longer entertain them the way I used to.

I acknowledge them.

Then I let them pass.

I have already spent enough years imprisoned by fear, by overthinking, and by believing that uncertainty meant failure.

I refuse to return to that cage.

The future still looks blurry.

If I’m being honest, I still don’t know which dream God will ask me to pursue first.

Medicine.

Writing.

Business.

Perhaps something I have not even imagined yet.

But for the first time in a long while, not knowing no longer terrifies me.

Because I have begun to understand that hope does not require complete clarity.

Sometimes hope is simply choosing to take the next faithful step, even when the rest of the road remains hidden.

Tonight, as I think about my colleague beginning a brand-new chapter, I realize his farewell became a quiet gift to me.

His courage reminded me of my own.

His dream reminded me of mine.

And somewhere beneath all the uncertainty, beneath all the unanswered questions and unfinished plans, there remains a small hope resting deep within my soul.

A hope that has survived every disappointment.

A hope that continues to whisper that God is not finished writing my story.

The world may still be a little blurry.

But I know this much with certainty—

God has never failed me before.

And I believe, with all my heart, that He never will.