Post Asian Games break

Hi,
haven't written much in a long time but i'm back to just make a log! Pardon my writing but im just gonna put down whatever comes to mind now and its pretty messy structure wise and i dont think i'll bother to write it nicely.

Asian games ended well and it was an amazing experience. Hoped to have done abit better than my 9th place but i'm still pretty stoked with the result. Now i'm coming to the end of my 3 week break after the games and it was good on the mind and body to have some rest from all the training. Finally i have some time to just relax and enjoy my time and not constantly think about how i have to do the next training and how i conduct myself everyday to ensure a good performance at the race. Finally i can just wake up or stay up late and do whatever i want.

With all this time, suddenly thoughts about what i've done thus far come in and out of my mind. Sometimes i do wonder to myself if its worth it? I have never, ever questioned myself before in all my years paddling and i think its something that just comes naturally with 'age'. It could be because of societal pressures, people asking me why i'm still at it after so many years. As some random passerby once asked me, "still playing canoe?"

Its a valid question. Technically yes - still playing canoe. Canoe/kayaking is after all a leisure activity first and foremost. This question maybe comes at a time when suddenly all the remainder of my (non-kayaking) friends are entering the working world(the guys mainly because the girls have been working for ages!). I also think that this question imposes itself on me even more so now because to make it to the asian games was a dream for so many years. And for so many years i did everything to get to where i am today. Now that i have reached the goal, what happens next? Do i try for another 4 years? Am i still living the dream, where does my ability run dry and i have to take a step back and think "hey, that's really all i can do?" What about the other aspects of my life that i have 'neglected' for all these years since i got really serious in this sport? (i started being really serious in 2005-its been 9 years).
Do i keep sacrificing everything to try to be professional like i have done for the past 9 years?

There's alot of questions and i dont think i'll be able to find an answer very soon. Its easy to commit time when you are 15years old and life a breeze. But at 25, the realism tends to set in alittle be more. I still view myself an idealist, but the hard fact of the world is that there is no ideal situation - at least for the majority of us. The dollars start to come in and bug you alot more!

I cant answers the questions about the future at the moment. But i definitely know one thing is that i dont regret the past 9 years of committing totally to paddling. i had a blast and been around the world! met lots of new people. seen alot of new things. did alot of crazier things.

"When work and play become so indistinguishable, that's when you know you love your job". I heard this somewhere, i dont really remember but it sums up how i feel about how i have spent my last 9 years. i really love it.

So yes, still playing canoe. We'll just have to see how long more, i dont really know..

Another thing i do know is that i do want to try other things. I want to see what life's like in the 'working world'. Its different. The people i will interact with is also gonna be different. Truthfully im not keen on the work, but really who loves work? I'll probably have go at a normal job to see if i can fit in somehow.

Well. That's all for now...maybe i'll have time to write another post again soon. Maybe something not related to paddling for a change will be interesting. End off with my favourite poem. It's kept me on track for so many years. Hope it will for whoever reads this too!

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;	5
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,	10
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.	15
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. Robert Frost