Prioritize what is said

I notice some crowds are keen to hear me out at times. Some crowds have limited bandwidth.

In cases of limited bandwidth, it becomes a decision of

- saying more things that hit some of the right notes - enough to make up for the noise.

- saying less things that have a higher chance of hitting the right notes - this is sometimes by trial and error, sometimes by reexamining what I wanted to say.

Living and Trying and Failing and Failing and Being Alive

Sometimes.
It's easier to just give up. And take the conventional way. To be lazy. To be comfortable.
But no. I must get up. And stop being lazy. Try a different approach. And work hard at the new approaches, with the new lessons and feedback.

Sometimes.
It's easier to be quiet. To not bother about articulating or relating well. To follow "built-in" strengths and weaknesses. To not bother with change.
But then - I'd never be alive.

Sometimes.
I wish there was a certain kind of community of people I could lean on.
And then I realized I had to change the way I recharged.
And people take time to process.

Progress. Time. Money. Budget.

I like to recall.
That time of bold confession.
With no expectation or sense of entitlement.
Felt shy and awkward sometimes.
But worth it for the progress.
For the liberty.
For the truth released.
For failure.
For richer perspective.
For the reframe.
For having lived.

Dead Walker

This was how the sky and sea looked. Clear blue water. Bright yellowish sky.

I was on an expedition with some friends. It was a mixed bunch of girls and guys, Singapore and Malaysia friends. None of my family/sisters were there.

We had to keep on going and going and going in this expedition. I don't remember why we couldn't take a break. We were exhausted but there was nobody wanted to take a break. It's as though we'll lose/die once we stop. We didn't think about it. We just had to go on and on.

Due to exhaustion and injury, some of us half-died/HP=0 but were somehow able to keep on moving. We weren't too bothered about it either. We just kept walking.

There was this last task of swimming about 50 m to a cave, which was like a clothes shop. The clothes inside were arranged like in Padini. But it wasn't a shop. There were no signboards. We had to find and take some things amongst the clothes. I remember searching and searching. And finding some of the things. We were searching as a group. I forgot what were the things. Some 'half-died' here in this clothes cave. I was still alive, but my HP was close to zero.

Then we finally found all that we wanted and left the cave.

We swam back to the shore, where we finished the race (or was it expedition?). Then, a guy who resembles Ryan Seacrest said, "Ok. Done. You have finished. Those whose HP=0 can go/die." I ngam ngam die when I reached. Funnily, no one was upset about dying. We were kind of relieved actually. More at peace.

The shore was not a beach. It was like a swimming pool where you have to climb and pull yourself up to get out. Those who were still alive got out of it. Some of the 'half-dead' decided to not climb over the shore, and instead just float on their backs, face the bright yellowish sky, and die. I decided that I didn't want my body to rot in the seawater. (Okay, I wasn't very good just floating like that either.) So I climbed over the shore and lied on my back and relaxed/slept/died.




Then I woke up.
But an uneasy feeling remained until I typed this dream here.

**
This is the first time I'm typing out one of the weirdest, nonsensicalest dreams I have ever had.
I usually don't die in my dreams.
Then again, I usually don't remember my dreams.

Maybe this is because, while reading a book, I was encouraged to imagine my funeral, and imagine how I would like my eulogy to be - by family/friends/colleagues/strangers. I tried to. This was supposed to help me reveal what I truly valued and wanted in the end. At first, I imagined the nicest things. Then, when I retried, I didn't care what people said of me, it was just blank.

What difference would it make if anyone was dead/alive. Maybe, once we die, we just disappear? What happens to the soul? Maybe it just becomes nothingness, like the way the world (maybe) formed from nothingness. So why bother? How did the idea of heaven and hell come about? How did all the religions form? Why are people so passionate about their beliefs? Why care? Why is there an earth? Why is there existence? How? Why? What made it? What made the answer to the previous question? Oops, it's a recursive question that knows no end.

**

Maybe I shouldn't have read the book. As I was bogged by this, this existential crisis, it made me unable to give any sort of evidence of 'intellectual curiosity' during the interview two days ago.

**
In the end, all those existential questions don't matter while we are alive, because it's not something that we can act on. It's not something that will necessarily make a huge change the way we look at things. So let's not care about how the world came about. We all know we live and we die. We can work with just that.

Among all religions, the Christian one appeals to me with the way life came about, and the way God is the beginning and the end of everything. It's like an answer to this 'infinity'ness. Some people can live without that answer. I just think that since this answer fits the puzzle, even though I cannot prove it is the correct piece, I believe it is the answer. So I'll work with this too. It's even better by a lot.

**

And BTW, I just thought about this -- there's no such thing as 'meaning in life'. Life is a noun, like the way a chair is a noun. There is things the chair can do, like be a place you can put your butt on, or put the computer on, or rock with, or dump all the books at. There is no 'meaning in a chair'. There is no meaning in a tree or a flower or whatever. There is no meaning in people or animals or pets. There is no meaning in life. It's just a wrong construct of words. Life is but something through which we sense, we think, we act, we feel. There is importance of life to each life. There is happiness when we see a life made better. Yup. So it's happiness, or importance of life, not meaning in life.

Okay okay. I just dictionary-ed 'meaning', it also means 'significance' (i.e. importance), it doesn't only mean 'maksud' (I can't find another English word for it, so have to use Bahasa Melayu.). So the 'meaning in life' means 'significance in life'. Okay. Maybe that's like super obvious to some people. But it wasn't for me. It made my mind focus on the wrong angle. So I'll just post it up and remember my stupidity at this point in time.

**

This is just one queer yet amusing post.

Okay. I actually can type sommo wan, I feel like this is an incomplete post. I wanna write sommo wan. But I think can continue later. Because now I wanna go exercise liao. Because now I feel very unfit liao. Hahaha. Okok. Bbye.

Thinking of another as arrogant, is arrogant?

To think of someone else as arrogant, is not to be arrogant oneself. It’s simply thinking badly of that person, like the way one would think badly of a less ethical person (who does not offer old woman his seat, who steals, etc).

I think that humility is about understanding that the way one person is, is due to the factors (parents, friends, surrounding environment, etc) that influence that person, and natural genetics that affects the way one thinks. And God is in control of most of the factors. So to think that one is better than another person when one cannot compare these factors - is arrogance. To think that we are all of equal despite the difference personalities and qualities(after all, we think, feel, and act the way we do due to the factors) - is humility.

Hence, while one thinks that a person is arrogant, think badly of the arrogant quality itself, not the worth of the person. In that sense, one shouldn’t be considered as arrogant.

(This was actually a response to someone's post about arrogance. I remember thinking a lot about this. That's why I put it up here.)

Ignorance, acceptance

Sometimes I wish I was, is, and always will be,
the most ignorant idiot in the world
Then I might be an absolutely happy fool
Then there's no need to mangle myself

But then, that's not human
Half ignorant, half aware
I learn, I realize, I grow
A little bit at a time

It creates mood waves
Love the peaks
Hate the dips

It makes life more interesting eh?
More miserable moments
More funky moments

Then, I give up
the steering wheel,
the burdens,
the judgments,
the thinking,
the everything to God,
the God who created me for His purpose.

Then it feels simpler, calmer and better
Then it all makes sense

And then there's joy.

--

Attempt to write some retarded poetry in the blog #1

New Weltanschauung!

I have a newww idea while I was thinking (or some of you prefer to call 'blur'-ing).
It's got something to do with glass and life.

I hope I will type it out. It will take long. After all, writing is not my thing.
It's got to do with different shapes and types of glass, different liquids being poured into it, and different sources of the liquid.

It's overwhelming.

Maybe I'm just being a nut-case after I finished my uni applications.

Speaking of that, I finished it at 12.00am Eastern Time, 3 January 2009!
AAAAH! I was supposed to submit my last one at 11.59pm Eastern Time, 2 January 2009, or before... But I delayed it. Because I had a new idea just an hour or so before the deadline. So I made a spanking new essay. Because i didn't like my previous one. Annndd, I actually could've made it, if the common app didn't report "Error: Mailing address field 1 is too long, please shorten it." STUPIDED commonapp. Now my entry will be stamped 3rd Jan!! That means, late.

It's destined. Looking at the time I spent on my essays, I probably won't get to the unis I hope to get into anyway. Dang.

Nvmd. Singapore's still good. But that means I have to hope I didn't screw up A'levels as badly as I think I did. (Computing and Econs worries me the most.)


So what I wanna do over the next few days:
1. Write a short fiction, or non-fiction book about the glass and life thingeny.
2. Find the old people's home in my area
3. Go to Tesco to apply for a job.
4. Look for a better job than at Tesco.
5. Get my P license from the driving centre.
6. Really improve on my driving skills, so that I myself (and mom) trust that I won't hit anything while driving, and I get to go to church on Sundays. In the past few weeks, by the way I drove, and some of the things I missed, I really could've gotten into plenty of accidents. Haha. God's really watching over me. Thank goodness.
7. Help my sis get Taekwondo club official-ised in school again.
8. Read the numerology book, a bit, though not that interested, i'm interested in knowing a bit.
9. Partner with my sis for Rick Warren book thingeny.
10. Really delve into the books I wanna read: the Bible (i keep getting bored/side-tracking), Desiring God by John Piper (I read a bit a bit, then reflect a lot and scrutinize a lot, and the next thing I know, I just woke up again.), reread the last part of the Chronicles of Narnia.
11. Settle some unfinished businesses from Singapore; notes, clearing up, stuff
12. This should be number 1 actually: Do all the things I want to do.

Tada.

Different, but equal

**
Removed this post because I think I might use ideas from it for my application essays.