Managing.

The 2016 SPM results were released today (or yesterday, I guess, since it's past midnight as I type this). I have no idea how either of the secondary schools I attended performed, but the lack of good news, particularly regarding the one in Rembau, is probably a sign that the world hasn't exactly been set alight.

I still retain great affection for Semesra, as the two years I spent there were two of the best years of my life. I genuinely want it to do well, though the downward trend in academic results since the heady days of my batch seems to indicate that it's unfortunately set to be going the way most other SBPs have. The slide is quite saddening, and it's something I hope to be able to address someday.

A former lecturer of mine, who I consider a good friend, has a son who got his results today. He did very well, considering he's from a non-boarding school (albeit a good one). His mother was "ecstatic", as any mother would be. I was reminded of back when I got my own SPM results, almost exactly six years ago - as if I ever needed reminding. It's something that I still think about from time to time.

Most people will have moved on by now; I can't say I fully have. Can I really be blamed for that? It was a significant, watershed moment in my life, being the first time I'd ever had that kind of expectation put on me, which I subsequently failed to meet. I know most people would have been overjoyed with those results, but most people did not set themselves the same target I did. What most people consider to be excellent, I consider to be insufficient.

I remember the hollowness I felt. I remember having to hide my dissatisfaction. I remember accepting well-meaning congratulatory remarks the same way you'd accept a gift you neither want nor have a use for. I had fallen short of the expectations I'd placed on myself, and, to me, that was no success. Those were not good feelings. Anyone who thinks I'm a bit precious for still being hung up on my SPM results six years on is missing the point. It's not about the results, it's about me failing to deliver. It's about me being brought back down to earth from the lofty pedestal I'd been put and had put myself on. I did not ask for it to have had such a big impact on me, but it did and here we are.

In the battle of heart vs head, the fact that you have to constantly remind yourself to use your head just shows that the heart is stronger. And maybe that's why bad memories don't go away; you might forget a person's name or face, but you don't forget how they made you feel. I don't remember precisely how the day I got my SPM results went, but the emotions have stuck around.

I've learned over time that emotions should be confronted, not ignored or repressed. Feeling happy? Show it. Feeling sad? Show it. Feeling angry? Show it. All through the proper channels, of course. Emotions need to be let out, not boxed up. I was guilty of doing the latter for much of my early life, but I'm a lot better at managing my feelings now. As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm more emotionally stable than I've ever been, and that's mostly down to learning how to manage my emotions properly.

Things have worked out for me, of course, and looking back, I wouldn't change a thing. If I had gotten what I'd aimed for in my SPM, life would have turned out a lot differently. In an alternate reality, I could have turned out a very different person. As it is, I quite like this reality, the one I'm currently living in. I quite like the way it's actually turned out. There's still always that "what if" that lingers in the back of my mind, though, and maybe there can never really be any way to get rid of it. All I can do is manage it the best that I can.