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The Power of a Particular Past

What is getting suddenly ‘hot’ these days for our ex-classmates of  ’69 is the active sharing among us in our Facebook ‘Anthonian 69’ of each other’s ‘old school photos, experiences, stories, views and updates and whereabouts of ex-classmates whom we have had not been in touch since we left school 47 years ago.
The strange thing is many of my ex-classmates are overseas now, having migrated overseas since leaving school. They actually packed their bags and left Malaysia some 40 years to start their lives there. They continued with the higher education, built their careers there, raised their families there and actually have rooted their entire lives there since then.  
But the past we are rediscovering and reminiscing together is about a small part of our lives of about 10 years where we spent in a small Christian school called St Anthony’s in a small ‘insignificant’ town called Teluk Anson.  This limited period was when we were schoolboys of 7 to 17 years old.  
This little period was exceptionally special and powerful to us. We could talk and talk about our times together there, but none of us talk about the many more years on how we have been living our lives as adults and now as ‘senior citizens’!
What is the point am I trying to make?

Just this – there is always a certain ‘captive’ period of our lives that had been the most impactful to us. In psychology, we called this phase of life our ‘formative years’ where our personality, character  and even values are shaped through our early experiences and encounters. In our case, it was the culture of the school, the discipline  of the teachers, the ‘adventurous’ streaks in our classmates and also the puppy love days with the (Convent) girls.  They all have added up and meshed into each other so well that they were able to produce the final outcome which is, ‘what we finally are today’ in us.    

I have many other stories, some perhaps even more exciting than during this captive period, to share about my lives, but somehow they are not as colorful and meaningful like the ones I deliberately want to cherish and enjoy thinking about. The memories of them are so vivid that we all can remember a lot of details that disproved the theory that ‘old people can’t remember much’!  
What about you? What part of it is most impactful for you? Why? Care to share with us? 

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  1. Having attained our Senior Citizen status and struggled to be what we are today, what more can we hope for except for a healthy and lifestyle for the remaining years. At this stage, we must learn to give up and let go our pursue of the materialistic things that we have been chasing all our life. Now is the time to reap our harvest through catching up and missing the things we wanted to do but not have the time. So one of the best pastimes is to catch up with our old childhood buddies and share each life encounters – being successful in life or not. The success in you is not measured by the amount of wealth you gathered but the wisdom we have accumulated and sharing with others.

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