On Life, Crossroads and a Fear of the Future — if any.

I can assure you that I’m a brilliant chap. I’d place my last bet on myself to prove that any day. I’ve known this since the day I could successfully call my mom "mma". I promise this is not uppity, just one of those moments. It’s no accident. My dad is who he is because of his brilliance. At an early age of four, he started nurturing and guiding me towards the man he’d want me to become: a better version of himself. All 20+ years of my life, I’ve been surrounded by knowledge. It isn’t any mistake or serendipity. It has always been deliberate. Before I’d reach puberty, I was cognizant of who I am and what I represent.

Planted on the coast of my memories is an incident I reference whenever I talk about my father’s place in my life. I love that man. We have our disagreements—some of which I still hide from him—but I’d lay down my life for him; whenever, wherever. At a tender age of eight, I remember he held my hand tightly with loving angst and dragged me into his bedroom. There, his ridiculously humongous bookshelves stood in glory. He took me before those. There, he ordered me to raise my head and analyse all the books stacked on there. "You see all these works, " he quizzed rhetorically. "They’re all yours. You’re going to own and read everything on here eventually. You can’t be a child of mine and not be obsessed with knowledge," he said. When he noticed tears drop from my eyes, he wiped them, knelt down and reassured me saying: "It is knowledge that made me. That is what will make my children, too. You better prepare yourself for such a life. That’s all I can give you."

Throughout my years of study, I've grown to appreciate such moments. They shaped my psyche. They still do. I know I'm no where near my destination, but whoever I am today is due to the presence of this man in my life—and I pray he stays long enough to see me make something out of myself.

I'm at crossroads presently. I'm that kid who can do multiple things, has multiple interests, wields staggering amount of knowledge of different disciplines but doesn't have the luxury to play with time. I'm growing. Scratch that. I'm grown. I can't gamble with my future—my present. Days ago, I received my transcript from my alma mater. If you have no idea, I spent four years of my life studying numerous Islamic Sciences at a tertiary level. Such a beauty! How I wish this could earn me money someway somehow. For eight semester's none of my averages was below eighty five. I do this thing effortlessly. I love it, but truth is, it can't pay any bills. I'm not in that position to pursue this fulltime so I put it on the side.

Back in the ring. A struggle between myself and life. So unsure. So insecure. So fragile. What is my next move? "Here, give engineering a shot. Remember you'd always discussed with Vandyck how you guys will go study that in UMaT?," a voice in my head quizzes. "Fair enough. Let's give this a shot," I retort.

Fast forward, I've been here for two years. That's half of the journey. To be honest, I have never given my best. Divided attention. Divided labour. But I know my way around this. Somehow, I succeed at making impressive grades most often. I'm afraid. Is this it? Is this all I will do?... So many questions but I find no answers. I'm a boy genius but I'm saddled with an ambience of Imposter Syndrome. It has my all. It scares me. What if I'm not enough? The journey continues but I'm at a crossroad. What next?

This journey scares me. I've encountered people who fueled my flames; gave me the hope I desired. In a strange way, they leave before I'd know it. It's not them, honestly speaking. It's me. The object of assistance here so I bare all the blame. I don't care if they think otherwise, but if you ever walk out on me, I know I'm the cause. That's the only language known to me. I want to become a better person. I want to be the man my dad envisioned years ago. It's hard but I've got this.

God, despite all the wrongs I've done You, please come through for me. I'm sorry. I need You bad. You know better than I do how much undeserving I am of Your mercy, O Lord. I am at crossroads. Please save me. Don't shut the door in my face. Please.