Ever felt like the window closing in on you, your only way of escape cut off? Ever felt like the noose tightening around your neck, choking you and draining your life away? Ever felt that dreaded feeling deep down in your guts, that feeling of inescapable inevitability, of hopelessness and despair? Yes, I may be exaggerating a little, but this "feeling of inescapable inevitability" perfectly describes what I’m going through right now.

And what is causing this sensation? Well, my time is almost up. As I write, I have at most a couple of hours left. My door to freedom is closing in on me. It’s like changing out of your clothes and putting on a set of prison garments. I’m feeling like a bird about to be caged. I’ve had that feeling before. A few years ago, on the plane. I was about to fly back to Singapore. The holidays were over, and it was almost time to start school. Yes, going back to school gave me that sensation. But what I’m enduring now, is much worse.

I can feel the shadows closing in on me. Knocking at the door of my heart, begging to enter and steal all the excitement and passion for life that I had gained over the weekend. The jaws of death are creeping at the outskirts, threatening to invade my mind and snatch away my soul. I, am fighting against it, even as I write.

Tonight I will book-in, back to camp, the regimented lifestyle, the outfield training, and the irritating men. Back to the swearing and hokkien peng. Back to the smell of cigarettes and the dirty bunks, the less than satisfactory cookhouse food and hypocritical superiors. The Army was, and never will be my kind of thing.

A battle goes on in my mind. Which thought will dominate? I, am fighting against that dreaded feeling, the feeling of death that makes living a hell-on-earth. Yes, that dreaded feeling. It is flooding inside me, a violent wave washing over my heart, swelling up inside me. I am fighting it. Fighting the flood, the torrent of negativity and regret, of envy and bitterness. And I do want to win.

I can decide the outcome. How do I want to feel? I can choose to book-in with an air of confidence, an attitute of positivity, and a posture of possibility. I can decide my feelings. Emotion is a choice of the heart, I am told. And so I believe. Maybe tonight I should decide to book-in with a different attitude. A positive attitude. Yes, maybe I should.

But of course there’s such a thing as the Monday blues. My positivity could disappear with a snap of the fingers. I could be robbed in my sleep. Robbed of happiness. Or I could decide my emotions. I could choose to love the life I’m leading right now. I could choose to love the men under me who don’t give a damn about you. I could choose to love the food served up by the cookhouse. Yes, I believe that I am in control, as I write this. I have a choice, and I choose life.