Inevitable Change & Disguisement

"Foul is fair and fair is foul" -  A line uttered at the first part of the story by the three witches in one of the most amazing masterpieces, Macbeth. It's a simple and short quote, but means a lot. A lot of truthfulness and reality. Many of us find it difficult to understand, but I tried my best to explain what the line means to me.

For me, there may be two meanings for the line. The first is that change is permanent and inevitable. Change is within our world, within us. In the story, it means that someone may change for the better or for the worse. Someone may have a fair personality and attitude, but it will eventually change into a foul personality and attitude. Though humans want the change or not, they can't stop it to occur. This happened to Macbeth. At first, he is kind and kindhearted. But when his wife tempted him to do terrible things, he changed. He was aware of the change happening to him, but still, he continued. Because of it, he completely turned into a bad guy. He wanted to refuse, but he cannot. Deep inside, he feels guilt. The guilt of murdering innocent people just to have the throne he's been aiming for.

Another meaning of the quote is disguisement. It means that people who have foul appearance may have a fair attitude or personality. The ones who have fair appearance may have a foul personality or attitude. Throughout the story, fair appearances hid foul realities. When Macbeth started killing the innocent ones in the play, the people thought that he is the good and kind man, that he should be the king. His evil plans were hidden beneath his appearance. Thus, everyone believes that Macbeth's innocent. In the end, he paid the price of his selfishness.

In our life, the quote may be also applied. The people we chose to be friends with does not mean that they are the 'true' and 'real' ones. Sometimes, those people are not the same inside. They may show you good deeds, but you may never know what they are thinking of deep inside. We may also experience changes in our life. But no matter how good or bad the change is, we must still know what path should we take and be responsible enough to accept the change.

A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Climactic Scene

Most stories have their own exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and denouement - or simply sequence of the events. But sometimes, do not have the 'official' or 'made by the author' sequence of events. Oftentimes, the author does not focus mainly on the sequence of events. One best example are the masterpieces of Shakespeare. Specifically, one of them is A Midsummer Night's Dream which is a product of Shakespeare's creativity and imagination. 

A Midsummer Night's Dream has a very, very interesting plot and story. It is uniquely made by the creative imagination of Shakespeare. Because there is no specified climax in the story, our teacher instructed us to choose our own climax of our story. For me, this part was definitely the best scene to be the climax:

When Lysander and Hermia got in the woods, Helena and Demetrius followed them. When the couple, Lysander and Hermia, fell asleep on the forest grounds, Puck poured the love potion to the Athenian youth. (Lysander). Unfortunately, Puck poured it to the wrong person who is Lysander, instead of Demetrius.

The love potion worked in the morning when all of them woke up. Lysander immediately fell in love with Helena and Demetrius also fell in love with Helena. The love story was changed. Now, Helena has two lovers following her, Demetrius and Lysander. Because of this, the anger was built up inside Hermia. She thought that it was all Helena's fault.

The two Athenian men follows Helena wherever she goes. This made Hermia even more angry. She went to Helena and challenged her in a fight. Hermia said that Helena took everything from her. Hermia was obviously jealous of Helena. Their fight was supposed to be physical, but it turned out to be emotional. Demetrius and Lysander also fought for the heart of Helena. The four young people got their lives miserable because of Puck.

That was the part I consider the best climax. For me, this part has a very exciting scene and conversations. The four of them fought, making the story more interesting and exciting.

The Same Way Around

"I do not forgive because I am weak. I forgive them because I am strong enough to forget and understand that people make mistakes."

     Life is full of imperfections and mistakes. Life won't be complete if there are no things such as problems, misdeeds, sins and mistakes. They are given to us so that we can learn something. But sometimes, God lets others commit mistakes to test the person they have hurt. As usual, the hurt ones may feel sad, mad, angry, down, hopeless and lonely. It is normal for them to feel the way they feel. It's part of our life. But if you are on the shoes of the hurt person, will you forgive or forget?

     For me, forgive and forget goes the same way around. Forgive comes with forget. When you forgive, you also forget. When you forget, you should forgive. The best way for forgiveness is the art of forgetting. If someone treated me wrong, I won't avenge. If someone said something bad about me, I won't revenge. To be honest, the first thing I will do is to feel disappointed. I'll also feel bad about myself. I am going to ask myself why did others commit mistake towards me. Then, I'll hate them. It's inevitable for a hurt person to be angry, but the decision I'm sure of is that I will never ever revenge.

     The healing of a wound takes time, but worth it. No matter what and how big their sins are, they are still humans. Humans who are made imperfectly by a perfect God because he wants us to forget and accept each other the way they are. Forget every details of their misdeed and learn how to forgive them completely. Some may think that it won't benefit them, but what they do not know is that forgiving and forgetting have a great benefit for us. It makes us strong and sturdy from any problems we may encounter towards our journey to success. It lets us realize that everyone has in-capabilities. It teaches us a very essential lesson for our life which is acceptance.

Sportiness or Excellence?

If we're given a chance to choose between excellence and sportiness, how will you know which quality has the greater importance?

Excellence and sportiness - two essential qualities for an individual, particularly for teenagers. Each of us has our own choice. It always depends on our interest. If a person likes physical activities more, then he/she will choose to be sporty, rather than being excellent. If a person wants to be academically good and smart, then that person will choose to be excellent. The choice of an individual also depends on their experience. If one already experienced to be active in sports, then he/she might choose excellence to try a new one. The same happens if a person is academically good.

We all have that one choice which was the best choice for us, but the worst for others. One thing that might help us is by learning their advantages and disadvantages. In excellence, a person may be the top of the class, the smartest of all, the most envied person and the one who's well known for his/her academic performance. Other people will idolize you, teachers will give you high grades and your family will be proud of you. Those are the sweetest things in being excellent. Your parents will be happy for you and you'll be able to repay their good deeds. Despite of all those advantages, disadvantages will always bother us. Being excellent could make you a nerd, your friends will go away from you because you're in a higher rank and you won't experience the fun of being outdoors and playing. A person's social life will be very much affected.

In sportiness, an individual may be physically fit, healthy and strong from any physical activities and diseases. A person can enjoy his/her social life and will be able to have so many friends. Other people will idolize you because of your skills in sports. It may give you fame and recognition when you are good in sports. On the other hand, there will be an effect to your academic performance if you'll only pursue your sportiness. First, a student's grades will all lower, leading to more bigger problems. The teachers will get worried, so they will consult our parents. Our parents will feel ashamed, sorry and angry, which break a heart of a son or daughter. To see your parents' sorrow is powerful enough to crush us. The relatives and the whole family will question, ask, blame and judge him/her. The problem becomes worse.

If I have to choose a one quality between the two, I'll undoubtedly choose excellence. I will choose to be excellent because I want to experience the feeling of knowing very well the lessons and the feeling of being able to express or explain your ideas, thoughts, knowledge and opinions. I am not worst academically, but I'll still choose to be excellent because sportiness can be practiced. If you want to be good at a certain sport, then you can train yourself. But if you want to be excellent in every subject, practice is not enough. A person needs to memorize, learn, compute, understand, review and many more. It's difficult to train yourself on how to be excellent in majority of the subjects. The feeling when your parents are proud of you convinces me more to choose excellence. Nothing's more valuable that seeing your parents proud and happy of their child. My parents now are proud of me, but there's still comparison between me and my brother. It's incomplete and unsatisfying. I also see that being excellent has greater importance than being sporty. If you're excellent, you can graduate from the best school, get the best job and live the best life you can have. A person's skills in sports dies and fades away, but excellence never fades.

Each of us has our own choice to defend. But no matter what it is, as long as we know we're taking the right path, we'll succeed in anything.