Fragments of the Quiet Mind

When the sun stands directly overhead and everything should be clear, why does the world feel most unfamiliar? At noon, shadows don’t disappear—they condense. Curl under benches, nestle beneath feet, cling like quiet facts. We confuse their stillness for absence. But absence, too, has weight. It doesn’t speak, but it hums. I saw a man once try to outrun his shadow. He sprinted down a sunlit boulevard like maybe speed could erase shape. But the shadow held. Didn't chase. Didn’t stretch. Just clung. Like guilt. Or memory. When he stopped, it returned—spilled calmly outward, patient and precise. Noon shadows aren’t dramatic. They’re honest. They don’t try to impress you. They simply say: you exist, and you interrupt the light. The brightest light doesn’t erase us. It outlines us. At noon, clarity sharpens into distance. Shadows don’t touch. Buildings stand apart. Trees withdraw their reach. Each object keeps its own darkness. Aphorism: Light doesn’t always illuminate—it isolates. The ...

There was a time I thought saying “maybe” meant you didn’t know what you were doing. Like certainty was the mark of competence. You’re either in or out. Yes or no. Pick a side. Now I see “maybe” as resistance. A quiet refusal to be rushed into clarity. A pause in a world that demands immediacy. People ask: "Are you sure this is the right path?" Maybe. "Do you know what you want?" Maybe. "Is this who you want to be?" Maybe. I’m not indecisive—I’m just unwilling to pretend complexity fits neatly into binaries. Most things aren’t clean. Most choices aren’t final. Most truths shift when you look at them twice. I used to think “maybe” was the space between two stronger words. Now I think it’s a full sentence. A boundary. A breath. The courage to say: I’m still becoming. I haven’t arrived. I don’t want to promise anything just to feel safe. We’re taught to pick a lane, plant a flag, define the relationship, be sure. But maybe “maybe” is the most hones...

I remember the night clearly—the kind where the city hums low, and every door is shut tight except mine. I was alone in the apartment, sitting on the edge of the bed, and the silence pressed in like a weight I hadn’t noticed before. I began to speak—not to anyone, but to the empty room itself. Words I’d never dared say aloud poured out, honest and unfiltered, like a confession whispered to shadows. There’s something strange about talking to empty rooms. They do not judge or interrupt; they absorb. The quiet becomes a canvas for the parts of ourselves that people seldom see—the raw, unfinished edges we hide behind smiles and scripts. In that silence, I found the courage to be more truthful than I ever was in company. Honesty is rarely a gift we give others. More often, it is a debt we repay to ourselves—spoken quietly, without expectation. These confessions don’t seek applause or agreement; they simply demand acknowledgment, a witness in the absence of another. When I spoke to that e...

It started in line at a coffee shop. The guy behind me kept brushing my backpack with his tote bag, not enough to be aggressive, just enough to be noticeable. I turned slightly, made eye contact, gave that tight-lipped smile — the one that says, “We're both human, I forgive you, please stop.” He smiled back. And did it again. So I let him. I didn’t move. Didn’t say anything. I just stood there, rehearsing twenty polite versions of “Could you please back up a little?” in my head — none of which I actually said. When I finally got my drink, I thanked the barista too brightly and left too fast. That’s the thing about politeness. It masquerades as kindness but often performs silence. It applauds itself for not causing conflict — even if that conflict is the only way something real can happen. At some point, we learn that to be "nice" is to be inoffensive, which slowly mutates into being invisible. We trade boundaries for harmony, truth for tone, self-expression for soci...

I used to own this small potted plant I kept by the window.  I don't remember its name—some hardy, leafy thing they said wouldn’t die easily. I believed them. That was the first lie. Or maybe the first faith. I never really watered it. Not on purpose. Not out of malice. Just... I got busy. Or I thought the sunlight was enough. Or I told myself I’d do it tomorrow, and tomorrow kept moving without me. Strange, how we forget to care for the things we once chose. Eventually, the leaves curled in, quietly. No protest. No drama. Just a slow folding, like a secret being buried alive. And still, I left it there. Watching.  Witnessing.  Me, in all my distractions. And it makes me wonder—what else have I left thirsty? What else did I promise life to, only to offer absence? Sometimes I think about legacy—not in the grand, carved-in-marble kind of way, but in the intimate, quiet ruins we leave behind. The forgotten promise to a hopeful person that we didn't really gave much thou...

Tutal normal na lang ata ang humilata pag weekend at mag surf, manood or magdownload sa phone no? isang sabado, habang nagsusurf I decided to download some android games ( babala: wag magdodownload ng pirata– suportahan natin ang mga mukhang perang mga kapitalistang manufacturers at game programmers sa over priced games nila ) so pumunta ako sa isang sikat na forum para sa mga hackers.  Pagkatapos nakakita ng games , shift to super download mode at salamat sa PLDT dahil PAGKABILIS BILIS ng connection nila 😑😑😑.  While waiting, nag browse at napadpad ako dun sa literati section. Dahil wala namang magawa, inaliw ang utak sa pagbabasa ng original pieces na gawa ng mga tao dun sa forum. May mga poems, short stories at talaga namang mawawala ka sa realidad habang binabasa yung mga gawa nila. Ang nakakatuwa pa ay yung mga comments ng mga netizens at narealize kong sa comment pa lang pala, maaari mo ng masilip ang part ng personality at kung paano ang takbo ng utak ng bawat for...

Over rated na ang relationships…   As usual, nakatambay nanaman ako dito sa isang tahimik na coffee shop/bar na hilig kong tambayan pag nais kong magsulat. Mag iisang oras na din ako sa kinauupuan ko nung narinig kong nasabi ito nung babae dun sa katabing table. Isang grupo sila ng mga college students (I think) na mukhang inumaga na sa celebration. Alas 7:00 palang and either it’s too early or too late depending on how you see it, the point is, nag iinuman padin sila. Madami dami din ang boteng nakahilera sa kanilang table at madami na din ang naipong walang laman dun sa ilalim ng table kasama ng mga upos ng sigarilyong kung saan saan na lang itinapon. Hindi naman sa chismoso ako at nakikinig sa kanilang usapan, pero kung ang mga katabi mo ay nakainom na, di maiiwasang di marinig kanilang pinagsasabi. Ganyan siguro mga lasing, akala mo nakalunok ng megaphone at kung magsalita animo’y nasa kabilang bundok yung mga kausap nila. Tatlong babae at dalawang lalaki ang nasa kabil...

Ang hirap magpakabait, o magkunwaring mabait.  Pero bago humusga, di ko naman sinasabing saksakan ako ng sama.  Tao din naman ako, may pakiramdam at sa pakikiramdam, dito ko nararanasang mairita paminsan minsan sa mga taong pilit nangingialam sa mga bagay bagay na di naman dapat pinakikialaman.  Ang husay at talento ng isang tao ay nakikita sa kanyang gawa at hindi sa salita – at more than this, di dapat ipagpilitan ang kaalaman sa isang taong di pa nalalaman ang syang bagay o ideyang alam mo na. Dapat ganito – di dapat ganyan… ano nga ba ang nararapat? Di bat may kanya kanyang paraan ang mga tao sa paggawa ng isang bagay?  E ano kung mas gusto kong unahing hugasan ang pinggan kesa sa baso? Kanya kanyang trip lang yan at sa bawat trip ay merong rason na sila lamang ang nakakaalam kung bakit.  E ano kung jacket ang tawag ko sa ‘bolero’ o kaya anong pakialam mo kung ‘tights’ ang tawag ko sa compression pants?  Ang pakikisama sa ibang tao ay isang art – at...

Maybe the cure for anything isn’t grand. Maybe it’s not found in redemption arcs or second chances. Maybe it’s just this— Music. Coffee. Smoke. The holy trinity of the broken who still try to feel. I don’t go a day without them. Music drips through my veins like morphine. It doesn’t ask anything from me—just lets me be. I keep Korn on repeat—yeah, I know, not everyone gets it. Their sound is abrasive to the polished, but to me, it’s a mirror. Every note, a scream I’ve been too tired to let out. They’ve kept me alive longer than some people have. Angst. That beautiful, shapeless thing. It doesn’t tell you whether you’re okay or not. It just sits with you in the in-between. You’re not sad. You’re not fine. You’re a suspended breath. A body between pulses. It’s not even pain, not really. Just the haunting suspicion that you’ve felt too much and nothing all at once. And when that feeling builds—when it claws up my spine and fogs my thoughts—I write. Not for applause. Not for people. J...

There’s a quiet shame stitched into the seams of wanting. Not just wanting something—no, we’ve learned to be bold about ambition, about goals, about the curated dream lives we post in digestible squares. But the wanting to be chosen? To be someone’s definite yes in a world of soft maybes? That kind of wanting, we tuck under polite detachment. We make jokes. We pretend we didn't notice when they hesitated. We apologize with our silence. With sentences that trail off. With the way we say “no worries” too quickly when someone forgets to show up, as if our worth is measured by how little space we occupy when disappointed. When did needing connection become a flaw? When did the ache to be seen—fully, wildly, without edit—become something we felt the need to shrink? I used to think I was too much. Too sensitive. Too intense. Too honest in a world that taught us to blink away the truth with emojis and distractions. I learned to wrap my needs in disclaimers. “I know this sounds clingy...

Bracing myself as I picked the guitar Ravaged memories left with a scar. Echoing a tune from a weakened heart, Assuaged by a promise that you broke apart. Thinking how can honesty be betrayed? Hoping to find answers, but there’s none I’m afraid. In as much as I want to play our song, Notes don’t simply come along, Going back to how things went wrong. Heaven help me, please stop our melody, Oh let me have the strength to forget our story, Putting down this guitar, trying to break our music, Esoteric dreams turned to a nightmare so tragic.

There are things I have never said—because I couldn’t, because words fracture the weight they try to hold. You see, some truths do not fit inside syllables. They are too wide for vowels, too wounded for grammar. I carry them not in my mouth but in my spine, in the slight curve of a shoulder that remembers who left, in the tension of a jaw clenched too often in silent rooms. This body—this soft machine of survival—has become a vault of truths I was too afraid or too inarticulate to name. And maybe that’s what we forget in our obsession with expression: that not all honesty is verbal. Some of it is kneeling on a cold floor after another sleepless night. Some of it is the hesitation before a touch. Some of it is how you flinch when the world comes too close. I have smiled while dying. Laughed while disintegrating. The world only sees what sounds pass through the lips. But what if I told you the real monologue was happening behind the eyes, under the skin, in the thousand micro-movements...

I’ve never been good at it. Small talk. Idle words traded like pocket change, meant to buy just enough silence to keep us from slipping into something too real. “How’s your day?” “Busy.” “Weather’s been weird lately.” “Yeah, climate change or something.” No one means anything they say. Not really. And yet we say it anyway, like incantations to ward off the ghosts of intimacy. I find myself participating out of habit. Not because I enjoy it, but because I don’t know how not to. Because answering “How are you?” with “I don’t know, I haven’t felt like myself in months” is too much honesty for a hallway or a checkout line. But what is small talk, really? A dance? A mask? A form of mercy? Maybe it’s all three. We’ve been trained to speak without saying, to connect without touching. Politeness as performance. Distance as default. We ask about the commute, not the chaos. We mention the new restaurant, not the quiet ache in our chest that hasn’t left since December. Sometime...

All I ever wanted was to find a place where happiness wasn’t just some distant idea—where it felt real, close enough to touch. A life where what I dream at night isn’t so far from how I live by day. I wanted to grow stronger, to be better tomorrow than I am today. And maybe that’s what happiness really is—the mirage you keep chasing until you learn how to walk without it. Dreaming keeps me steady. It’s like breathing for my mind. I’ve read all the theories, but theories never capture the weight of what a dream leaves behind. It’s not the images or the story—it’s the feeling that stays. It reaches some part of me that words can’t. Maybe that’s selfish, to live in something that’s not real, but it’s the only way I know how to hold on to what I can’t explain. Sometimes I think dreams don’t lie—they just refuse to explain themselves. But trying to be happy, honestly, sometimes feels pointless. Because if chasing what lights me up ends up hurting the people I care about, then what’s the c...