My daughter emerged from my womb into the warm pool. The hebamme guided her gently into the surface of cold emptiness and then straight into my warm, exhausted arms. Nothing else matters then except that it’s done—I’ve brought a being into this world.
When I looked into her dark brown eyes later, unusually wide open, I wondered, “What do you see, little one? What are you thinking? Do you know who I am? Do you know who you are?”
Whenever I look back on my childhood, I only have scraps of memory before age five. Having lived with my nanny and her family till then, I found it easy to sort out which memories came before and which came after. I have a few vivid ones, and they are so precious. Sometimes, I dare not access those memories because I am afraid of losing the true memory through my reconstruction of them each time.
And then I look at my daughter, who is now almost five, at the age when I was taken from my first home. I wonder if she will remember our every hug and kiss. Will she remember how the room light peeked through her bunk bed curtains? Will she remember the small plastic baby bathtub she still squeezes into for her bath?
*
I recall having a “Who am I?” in my stable yet lonesome second plane of life between 6 and 12. The question accompanied me through my days of poring over books and lying on the cool marble floor staring into space.
Who am I? Why am I here? Where do I come from? What am I doing here?
I asked this question of my cousin, who was visiting during the holidays, and he gave me a look I will never forget—the what kind of question is this look. “We are made by God, of course”, he said with utter conviction of someone who is only 2 years older than me.
I was taken aback not only by the answer but also by his certainty. I kept asking and asking him about this new secret of life and was, in the end, disappointed when he couldn’t answer, “Where did God come from?”
Everyone must come from somewhere.
And so I laid this question of origin to rest. Two years passed, maybe three or more, my aunt came over to my place one day while she was visiting my Ah Ma next door. She asked me a question that had clearly been bugging her: “Do you believe in the soul?”
I shot her the what kind of question is this look and replied, “Of course, we have a soul.” She was like, “Ok, so you believe in God then.” But that was not the reason I believed in the soul, me being, what was in vogue then—a freethinker. I was so sure then that there was something inside me that transcends the physical body I use to interact with this world. I can sense it.
Is that consciousness?
Growing up, we did not have that much agency. Not when you grew up in a Chinese family, where children are to be seen, not to be heard. And “I told you so” is one of the best answers you can get to life’s mysteries or inconsistencies.
I was told to study hard and get good grades, work hard and be successful—earn a lot of money. And for a while, I was walking this path, chipping my soul away bit by bit, like hacking at a mountain.
I was living on autopilot—woke up late, sped 45 minutes to a multinational company, worked for 8 hours, got stuck in traffic for over an hour on the way home, had a late dinner, then spent hours online, refused to go to bed, as if searching for my lost soul, and slept late to start the cycle again.
Half a decade later, I quit my job. I woke before sunrise in my studio apartment, full of adrenaline, and sat on my beanbag watching the sun rise over Kuala Lumpur. My first and last from that studio. This is how it feels to be alive. To be so afraid of doing something unscripted, yet feeling so much life from it.
I have been chasing this feeling I call conscious living ever since.
*
And then life laughs.
Two years ago, I was mindlessly scrolling Instagram, looking at yet another special home activity to do with my kids instead of just being there with them. So I quit.
Then there are the daily demands that are easier to handle on autopilot. Wake up, get the kids up, make them breakfast, pack their lunch, get them ready, and send them off, and then go to work without noticing how you got there.
But I want to choose to connect with my son again every morning before sending him off to school. I want to give my daughter my full attention before kissing her goodbye at the kindergarten.
I strive to be with my kids like I am with my kids. To be fully there. But I still get swept away by worries of work, by thoughts of what to cook later, by boredom, or by lack of energy.
Social media took my attention; now AI takes my thinking.
I opened the AI chat on my phone to ask it to generate ideas for my dinner. Then I heard my daughter acting silly in one of her shows—the ones she regularly creates to entertain her family. My fingers hovered above the screen.
I looked my daughter in her eyes, now unusually wide from a clown look, and asked, “What would you like for dinner?”
Such a sweet story, Rachel. Thank you for sharing it.
I had a maid that was like a nanny, until I was 2 or 3 - so I actually don't remember her and can only speculate about how that's impacted me (eg. do I have abandonment issues and is that why?!). I can't imagine what it would have been like if "mui cheh" had raised me until I was 5! Was that pretty normal for your friends and family growing up?
After we moved to Australia, I very much felt that my parents were present. Mum was always home, Dad was always home for dinner and across who I was friends with and what was happening at school. I'm grateful for that. Being present is so much harder these days with social media, AI, just noise everywhere, and more so if you're a working parent. I think it's a noble and important goal to try and be present for your kids. Maybe there's no perfect way to do it, but if they grow up knowing you tried, that in itself seems worth it :)