flirting with palmistry

I had my palm read by a masseuse at the shooting location. Background story for non local advertising people: ad agency people are usually treated like royalties during ad shoots here. The production house pampers us with magnanimous amount of food and little perks like massages to keep us from being too much nuisance on the shoot.



The palm reader only allowed us to ask one question and he would read the answer on our left palm. As predicted, the singles ask about love and the non singles ask about money. Whoever says each of us is unique must be shot in the head.

I asked the palm reader this: will I ever be rich?

I honestly don’t care about being rich (though I don’t mind being rich), I just thought it was a fun question to ask in front of everyone. Not that I take palm reading seriously anyway.

He pondered for a while, reading my palm I suppose, or thinking up some kind of interesting fiction in his head that will be entertaining for us all. I really can’t tell.

His answer was this: according to the lines on my palm, I was destined to be a huge success, and that includes financial aspect as well. I will gain the success by working for a company, not by building my own empire. But, in order to fulfill that destiny, I must use all my potentials and at the moment I haven’t used up all my potentials, I’m not yet the best I can be.

Of course after that my co-workers and I joked about maybe I have to plot a plan to take over the company that we work at.

But jokes aside, I started to give it a little more thought. Not the bit about me taking over the company, I can barely manage myself let alone a company, but about how I’m yet to be the best I can be.

Because, on some odd nights when my mind wanders and thinks about what I’ve done with my life sort of thing, as opposed to my usual normal daydreams about how to access my alter ego in the parallel universe (I am obsessed about things like this, it explains my fascination with anything mind altering), I do think whether is this really all there is to it.

I’m not stupid, that I know for sure. I know I’m quick on the uptake, but I doubt if I possess any discernible talents besides sneering and coming up with killer one-liners to shut up people whom I find to be annoying.

Writing I suppose is my one and only strong suit. It comes naturally to me. It’s been my outlet since as long as I can remember. If I have the faintest hope of becoming successful (or rich) I suppose it’s got something to do with writing. I have zero discipline in writing though, just as I have zero discipline in everything. I only write when the mood strikes me. I suppose my inability to give myself a push is the thing that stands between me and my success. Well that, and an almost complete disinterest of anything outside myself.

In my line of work I’ve met lots of wannabe novelists, those who dream about writing the equivalent of “the great American novel” someday when they can find the time. Now, time is never a problem for me. I am one of those freakishly efficient people who can easily multitask and compartmentalize my brain. My problem is that I have yet to come with “the great idea”. I don’t know what to write about.

When I studied creative writing in uni, the professor told us that to come up with something to write, we have to break the bubble, be somebody else, experience life through other people’s eyes. I think it was the best advice for anybody who wants to learn how to write. It has also been my excuse to live several kinds of life and to experience extreme emotions, it’s some kind of research for my unborn novel, because nobody wants to read about a contented person who is thankful for everything.

Will I ever find something interesting to write about and will my writing be my ticket to get out of this life as a downtrodden corporate slave? I honestly don’t know. The bad thing about being totally comfortable living in one’s own skin is that I can really live with my shortcomings such as my complete lack of motivation. I have no problem with that even it does sabotage my future success.

So even though I believe the palm reader didn’t really read palms and that he just made things up from thin air, I believe that at that precise moment the universe chose him as a medium to speak to me, hence gave him the inspiration to say that I haven’t used up all my potentials. He was totally right.

Well I hear you, universe. Here I am religiously writing one post after another. Maybe it’s the beginning of something great, maybe it’s not. One of the good things about being comfortable living in one's own skin is that I never view myself as a failure, even if I don't achieve anything :)