Vanity Fair.

I have been sold to the American Dream. My eyes have glowed hopeful to the thought that one day, I'd rise up in the ranks. Some rank, somewhere. But when does the American dream become the American Nightmare?

Why does something so appealing grow to be so nauseating? I once read in Alain de Botton's book, Status Anxiety, that it is precisely because of increasing social mobility throughout the ages that we now have such intense cases of status anxiety pervading every stage of our lives. Children are beauty queens, movie stars, singers, auteurs and savants. Teenagers are writers, thinkers, movers and shakers. Adults are fighting tooth and claw to make it to the top where there is finally fresh air; a piece of sky. When once we resigned ourselves to what status, what rank, and what vocation we were born into, we now each have a gargantuan task at hand. To discover the inward sea, and then to eke out the path that we are to walk upon. Each baby, with such promise, such weight.

It didn't start out this way for me. I believed, as a little girl, that one could only be one of three things: a doctor, a teacher, or a lawyer. This came from the flash cards that we were shown in pre-school. I ruled out the doctor option from the get-go, which only left the teacher and lawyer option for me. And actually, for the longest time, I held onto this. I only discarded the idea of being a lawyer when I went into highschool.

I was never fed the idea that you can be anything that you want to be, you can do anything that you want as long as you put your mind to it. My later misspent youth before the television is where I source the origin of these ideas. The American Dream, blaring across to Asian minds, thousands of miles away.

And now, at this point in my life, where my university career is at its imminent end, I feel as an actor would, just as they are about to perform. The trouble is, I have not rehearsed any of my lines, I do not know which play I am acting in, and I haven't met any of my co-stars. I know not my rank or place. In present or future.

I am only ever ill at ease, however, when I hear of the movements of my peers. Although none of our lives are and will ever be comparable, society has us believing that we're all on the same ladder anyways, and it is precisely this feeling that brings me any anxiety. Am I not trying hard enough? Am I not applying myself? What can I do to 'make it'? What can I do to 'get there'? What is the expected position that I am meant to be in at this stage? How does my life compare? Despite my supposed reputation of being outré and indifferent to social status or money, I am given to bouts of such vanity.

The chorus of my different selves are all singing at once. And they're not harmonising.

In answer to the previous questions, I retort: How would one know if they're 'there' anyways? What is 'there'? What are my values based upon? What is precious, and what is worth applying yourself to? How can people of different backgrounds, goals, and positions ever be compared? Who is looking at you, and what are you doing this for? What is your joy? Will money, power, and position make you happy? What is it that you're running towards, and do you know which way you're running?

Meanwhile, hiphop bootyshaker rappers are rhyming on.

Let me upgrade u.

I see the seeds of my faith flower into fruit, and that is my joy. I see people worshipping, and that is precious and above all, beautiful. I see people getting saved, pulled out of darkness, and that is worthy. I see people being loved and shown their true worth, and that is good. I see my life amongst others, and as much as other lives are unreachable, so is mine so lonely, unique, and defined.

My faith calls for me to radically re-evaluate everything that I have ever placed my hope in. Where I've made a wrong investment in a blue chip stock and everything's crashing down. My faith tells me that the one that I have given my life to was a carpenter for 33 years despite who He actually was, being fully God as well as fully man, and then to become the greatest preacher ever known but still humiliated unto death. Jesus Himself waited for 33 years, and although His sacrifice for us is the greatest thing that has happened in all of history, although that one moment defined everything past, present, and future, it still does not reflect fully who He actually is and nothing on earth truly encompassed the full glory of who He is. He is that, He is the sacrifice, He is the cross, He is love, but that's not all. That's not all.

Where then, is the value of being oneself in amidst the din of the American Dream? In the spirit and words of Fight Club, you are not your job, you are not your furniture, you are not your relationships, and you are not the clothes that you wear. At the end of the movie however, you find out that you're not even yourself. This hope falls short. My hope does not. I look back at the Bible, and it can't be clearer that thoughts of the American Dream is utterly contrary to Jesus.

My faith is not perfect, and I am by no means comparable to Christ, but it is at this moment that I am reminded of living for something greater.

Something more.