An introvert diary : how 2020 changed me...

It was near midnight in 2019, television and livestream video around the world were yelling on the streets, shooting fireworks and counting down from 10 to 1 to celebrate after a long-@ss of 365 days Earth finally completing it rotation around the sun, and it will continue to do so until the sun swalllow us in shiny gamma ray. Me as an introvert, thought it was hillarious, these human were screaming in joy for some blue orb spinning around a yellow orb, and then the next day everything would then go back to the way it went. The stock market will keep rising and falling, the ridiculous marketing pages will spam their ads, someone on the internet will use some quotes of some influenced individual and thinking they have reached a higher realm of philosophical thinking. 

In the next days, everything were mostly the same, wake up, go to college, doing presentation i didn't like. I was forced to go vacation of places i didn't like. I was forced to hear meaningless sentences from friends bragging about their feeling were hurt because someone on the internet had ideas that hurt their feeling. It was f@cking annoying, i am living in a time where comfort and materialism has turned most teenagers into a snowflake, crying behind their phone for didn't have what they desire. But then i realized that i was getting angry at some stranger i didn't know because they offended my ideal, so i too became a snowflake just like them. So i did try my best not to give too  attention about them, even though they are outright annoying and full of torment. I had a feeling of superiority above these humans, thinking that they were trivial beings, too occupied in these nonsense in daily life, and that it give me some comfort to laugh at them in my miserable life. 

The news began to filled up with this mysterious diseases in China, and i was extremely bothered by it, so in the next few days i keep update myself with information surrounding the disease. I was also quite keen on Western opinion, so when international organisations said it will be all right, i've had some relief and just continue to live the usual, lavish lifestyle. And boomed! In the next few months, countries were completely under lockdown, some of them even let the nation wide open, and millions were lying on white beds breathing air like their life were depend on it, but some were not so fortunate. 

For the first time in my higher realm of existence of this miserable life, i felt FEAR. Actual fear. I spent most of my life living in comfort, lying in bed while cursing those i saw as lesser than me. The idea of superiority was dominating my entire life without realizing the consequences it made, and the pandemic slapped me real hard on this. When i saw some of the most powerful countries on the world was kneeling down to a submicroscopic weirdo, it shattered the idea that money and power can protect me in any longer. I panicked, searching across the internet to see if i contracted with any symptoms similar to COVID ( i remember when i had a sudden stabbing chest pain, thinking my life is over). I used to have an obssesion of washing my hands too regularly, spraying disinfectant on anything that i or my family touched, and i easily get paranoid when someone coughing. I must have losing my mind.

I was scared, i find myself in deep depression that i think no one have the ability to comprehend it. 

Fast-foward in several months, the country began to go back under control. We've had some setbacks, like some lady developed a tactical escape plan upon return to the country to avoid quarantine, which resulted the second wave. But still, we have actually made it, and it was certainly an amazing journey. 

But that's not the only the thing i am actually proud of. 

15 days of staying at home in nationwide didn't affect me that much, giving that i'm a socially-awkward guy. I just lying around my bed thinking about human existence while the lecturer in the computer is teaching the class how to not fail the course. I took the opportunity to check on some newspaper, cases are still rising, i was panicking, then i saw picture of doctors losing their sleeps just to  make sure their patient still breathing. I saw a picture of an officer had to leave his family at home to make sure all families in the country are living in harmony. I saw citizens are offering help to each other, giving free rice and masks for those are in dire needs.

These images, combined with others blasting events in this year, has reshaped my perspective when i see myself as a person : a twisted, dry, full of vanity of a human. All this years reading dark humor, watching horsesh!t of news from horsesh!t of media has downgrade my empathy and intelligence to almost non-existence. So in a twisted, horrible way of thinking, i'm glad this pandemic happened, as this event has given me a second chance to see myself as a person and to adjust myself not to become better, but to prevent myself to slipping into that dark hole again.

I'm still pretty much the same, still doing assignment, eat food and drink water, put up my headphones to play my calming music while i thinking about the universe. But now i have better critical thinking skills now, i do not blindly follow someone ideas without checking the sources ( You need references in Havard style). I still pretty much a reserved person, but i am willing to open to fresh ideas should it suits for the benefits of the population and for myself. I also love to read books now, which is a groundbreaking development for me, considering that i have shunned boring paper with size 12 font for almost my entire life. More importantly, i have more compassion now, especially for those are struggling to find basic needs for their life. When i get angry at not going to my favorite restaurant, i have always thought there are children out there are not getting their water for their siblings, and this restrained me from doing things so stupid that a high-educated person like me should not be thinking of doing stupid things.