In February, I went back to Singapore to revisit my past life, and it was where I started programming 10 years ago. In April, I was back in my motherland ever since the pandemic started, and it was the place where I spent my childhood. In July, it was my third visit to Japan to meet my Ryuta’s aniki once again since 2019, and it was always a special place for me.

Trip to the past

My trip to Singapore, I wanted to revisit my past and forget about it. Life was too miserable back then. I wasn’t happy at all, I guess that’s why I spent most of my life programming. That’s why I am good at it now. Well, not even that good to be honest. This is after I went all in.

Back when I was in Singapore or before I went to Singapore, I always wanted to visit Japan one day. That was my dream. It came true in 2018 when I went for a short winter program in Kyoto. That’s the happiest month so far in my entire life.

Funnily enough, when was I that happy before?

“I”

For a very long time, I never wanted to admit the fact that I was a proud hacker once. Well, it’s never right to hack other games no matter what. However, if I can simply ignore everything, did I really enjoy it? The answer is yes, absolutely.

Even though I wanted to cut ties with my past in Singapore, the more I think about it, everything just keeps coming back. No matter how I disliked my hacker’s experience. It helped me significantly in critical thinking and also debugging. They are important skills for a programmer. My past has greatly influenced who I am today.

However, it was never that easy to accept it after all these years not until that day, when I came back from my Japan trip in August.

Trading

In January, I started trading because I always wanted to. I really want to share more about my journey, but it was quite boring due to the timezone. Yeah, I was also just tooo lazy to write anything.

Before my trip to Japan, I had a major success, when my account flew to the moon. This is the magic of the market. It was in a loss of 20%, and the next day, I was at 170% from -20%. I thought I was good, not until that fateful day in August.

I

I was wrong the moment when I entered the trade that day. The next day, my account went down from 170% to 110%. At that moment, everything connected. Many had happened in my mind. I accepted all. Yeah, just like that by losing merely $2,500.

All were scattered. My ego, my pride, my worry, my past and everything were gone. I finally met my naked self. For the past 10 years, I never admitted my mistakes. Excuses, and other excuses. There was always something to blame. Never was I 100% wrong.

At that moment, I realized I was wrong, so wrong after 10 whole years. I never broke free from my past. I didn’t know why many good things came back to me at the same time, so warm and enlightening. It overtook all the negatives, and I felt like I was reborn again and surpassed myself after all these years.

Epilogue

2023 is ending soon. It was a special year for me. I revisited many memorable places, especially Singapore. This is also my tenth year of programming, a major milestone. Also, I started trading. This is more important because I finally started exploring another world. I am still very naive, but I am having a plan for the next year.

Lastly, I was able to break free from my past and move on along side it. I cannot say I fully accepted all my weaknesses, but I am getting there slowly and surely. It may seem everything just happened at that moment, but it happened because of everything until that point. There were also just too many things happening, I guess I can write more later or never.

Life is a journey filled with mistakes and regrets. One may focus too much on the negatives and forget what’s great. Face the past, accept it, and let’s move on with it.

Happy New Year!