mum's gone
6/14/22at 2:19 AM
she's dead. gone.
earlier I was playing the chopin's nocturne op 9 no 3 and thinking of mum. I had shared a video analysis of the piece with her earlier in the year when she was still well, and she seemed amused for a bit, but later she lost her concentration because she must've been tired from the cancer.
I have not practised more since she got sicker. I feel like I don't even want to improve. when I miss her, I don't want to improve. I just want to stay the way I was.
I never had the courage to say goodbye properly to her when I still had the chance. I don't know if I can say that I tried. but I feel like I did. every day was a struggle. I had a hard time facing her mortality and my own. I think it'd be fair to say I was distracted by my sudden realisation of my own mortality from the pain of losing her. the potentially career-ending om complaint came at the wrong time. the diagnosis of tarlov cyst and lower body weakness/numbness came at the wrong time.
I don't think I've ever realised how difficult life could be until 2021. going by past trajectory, it never gets easier or more manageable. this must be why adults self-medicate with alcohol, drugs and caffeine.
even lj has lost its privacy. I would write about something hoping it'll help as some form of catharsis then people just go there to express their pity. I didn't expect anyone I know in real life to read it. it's appalling that it's now out there. but it's not really about how I care about what people think of me, not really. it's not that. it's more of the irritation at the fact that I let myself be vulnerable in front of people I didn't care about and not realising entirely what I was doing it for at the time.
I hate the old witch so much for setting me up. I know by thinking this way it would lead me down a dark road. this is a dead end.
it was hard as it was with the shit and drama from xy, then the old witch had to set me up and I had to be distracted enough to let it happen and lose focus, then I had to deal with the weird spinal canal cyst diagnosis. plus with the potential svt hanging over my head, I just couldn't.
I'm sorry mom. I couldn't let myself feel the full breadth of my emotions and let myself get out of all this mess. I couldn't bring myself to say goodbye to you properly apart from making myself stay there for as long as possible and try to live each day as it came, watching you be alive or fight to be alive.
it really didn't help that you and dad were cruel to me a good proportion of the time and didn't make me feel like you wanted me there for reasons other than practical ones. but I mean, you were only unenlightened humans.
I'm blaming everyone but myself. I tried to be enlightened but all I ended up becoming was detached.
feels good to be so bloody negative. don't think we have got enough outlets these days to allow ourselves to be this way. it's fucking hard. we're all fucking alone.
I can feel myself slowly giving everything up because I know I can never keep all of this stuff. I'm but a speck of dust in this universe, my life less than a flash in the grand scheme of time, and everyone, even the greatest of the great, dies. everyone. some more painful than others. and it's rarely up to us.
it was so easy being this brat when mum was alive. I could always be this brat.
and now, I have to steel myself and get stuff done, when thing start to brighten up. sadghuru says, beware, beware of the dead living through the living. I must keep that in mind.
7/30/17at 11:40 PM
Wow. The last time I posted anything here was a year ago.
I randomly thought of my blogspot today (possibly an aftereffect from having gone through a whole stampede of memories last night on my Chinese blog), so I am here.
It has certainly been a while. I kind of understand why DH and AC stopped writing blogs (or letting the public have access to their blogs) now. You're older now, and have some sort of professional image, and probably just don't have enough time or energy to sustain a public emotional outlet on the internet. Filtering has become key.
Luckily for me, I don't have too much of a public or professional profile.
I randomly thought of my blogspot today (possibly an aftereffect from having gone through a whole stampede of memories last night on my Chinese blog), so I am here.
It has certainly been a while. I kind of understand why DH and AC stopped writing blogs (or letting the public have access to their blogs) now. You're older now, and have some sort of professional image, and probably just don't have enough time or energy to sustain a public emotional outlet on the internet. Filtering has become key.
Luckily for me, I don't have too much of a public or professional profile.
7/27/16at 2:39 PM
Why should she give her bounty to the dead?
What is divinity if it can come
Only in silent shadows and in dreams?
Shall she not find in comforts of the sun,
In pungent fruit and bright green wings, or else
In any balm or beauty of the earth,
Things to be cherished like the thought of heaven?
Divinity must live within herself:
Passions of rain, or moods in falling snow;
Grievings in loneliness, or unsubdued
Elations when the forest blooms; gusty
Emotions on wet roads on autumn nights;
All pleasures and all pains, remembering
The bough of summer and the winter branch.
These are the measure destined for her soul.
-- Wallace Stevens, Sunday Morning
5/18/16at 12:27 AM
I dug Auntie Mei's cruise ticket out of
her purple purse, buried it in a
a picture book, snuck out of the
room almost in relief,
clouded by a smaller desperation than
when I first began.
I knew the cruise ship was leaving at 19:00,
still begged her to stay, her tall
neon-green platform slippers moved
a little, then the room cracked
with a cry of surprise.
The adults' ticket-hunting began
soon enough and I stood
in front of the book shelf where the ticket
remained hidden, my eyes
burning into the small patch of the tile
where I had misplaced my integrity
for the first time in my life.
"Where is it?" Mum asked, having
caught a whiff of my guilt.
"It's here," I said, pointing to the book
shelf, loaded with a hundred books
at least. "But I can't remember which one,"
I added, hugging my soft toy frog tighter,
crossing my half-honest arms.
her purple purse, buried it in a
a picture book, snuck out of the
room almost in relief,
clouded by a smaller desperation than
when I first began.
I knew the cruise ship was leaving at 19:00,
still begged her to stay, her tall
neon-green platform slippers moved
a little, then the room cracked
with a cry of surprise.
The adults' ticket-hunting began
soon enough and I stood
in front of the book shelf where the ticket
remained hidden, my eyes
burning into the small patch of the tile
where I had misplaced my integrity
for the first time in my life.
"Where is it?" Mum asked, having
caught a whiff of my guilt.
"It's here," I said, pointing to the book
shelf, loaded with a hundred books
at least. "But I can't remember which one,"
I added, hugging my soft toy frog tighter,
crossing my half-honest arms.
5/17/16at 10:55 PM
I will write, at very least, about one new truth I've learnt each day.
5/14/16at 1:38 AM
I know I probably should write some of this down, or I'd forget. But I'm so tired so I'll keep this short! Some stuff from networking tonight :)
- Read outside the law. Fiction. Non-fiction. Read Dickens. Read poetry. Poetry and literature should be compulsory for law students.
- Always think of what the other party wants when negotiating. Don't forget it's not always about you. One tends to be too intent on getting one's way and forget that others are motivated by different things from you. Dig deep and find out what they are.
- Drafting. Always dump the legalese. Always think from the perspective of a layman. Rephrase what you've been taught. Not "detrimental reliance". Think of your target audience.
- Be professional. Take the high road. Don't harbor grudges. Be grateful. Know your place.
5/12/16at 1:03 AM
A room for honesty. That is what everyone needs. Adults are too judgmental and I have become one of them. Who am I kidding. I've always been judgmental. But now that I have more self-awareness, it's like as if I have grown to hate myself more for being so judgmental and yet at the same time unwilling to wiggle out of it.
4/7/16at 12:10 AM
“No one can build you the bridge on which you, and only you, must cross the river of life. There may be countless trails and bridges and demigods who would gladly carry you across; but only at the price of pawning and forgoing yourself. There is one path in the world that none can walk but you. Where does it lead? Don't ask, walk!”
― Frederich Nietzsche
― Frederich Nietzsche
12/3/15at 1:32 PM
Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.
Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into
the conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.
-- "Everything is Waiting For You", David Whyte
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.
Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into
the conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.
-- "Everything is Waiting For You", David Whyte
11/4/15at 12:46 AM
not the first time k helped me with groceries home. but in that ordinary moment when he urged me to quicken my steps, I found a sudden feeling of wanting him to always be in my life amongst the ordinary suburbia that I've become so used to I can hardly imagine being happy in a concrete jungle again.
we still have bad days. but when he's here on our good days, I can hear the old songs for what they were. that makes me happy.
we still have bad days. but when he's here on our good days, I can hear the old songs for what they were. that makes me happy.
10/26/15at 10:31 PM
More and more I have come to admire resilience.
Not the simple resistance of a pillow, whose foam returns over and
over to the same shape, but the sinuous tenacity of a tree: finding the
light newly blocked on one side,
it turns in another.
A blind intelligence, true.
But out of such persistence arose turtles, rivers, mitochondria, figs—
all this resinous, unretractable earth.
-- Jane Hirshfield, "Optimism"
Not the simple resistance of a pillow, whose foam returns over and
over to the same shape, but the sinuous tenacity of a tree: finding the
light newly blocked on one side,
it turns in another.
A blind intelligence, true.
But out of such persistence arose turtles, rivers, mitochondria, figs—
all this resinous, unretractable earth.
-- Jane Hirshfield, "Optimism"
Labels: poem
at 10:22 PM
Never, never, never, never, never.
— King Lear
Even now I can’t grasp “nothing” or “never.”
They’re unholdable, unglobable, no map to nothing.
Never? Never ever again to see you?
An error, I aver. You’re never nothing,
because nothing’s not a thing.
I know death is absolute, forever,
the guillotine—gutting—never to which we never say goodbye.
But even as I think “forever” it goes “ever”
and “ever” and “ever.” Ever after.
I’m a thing that keeps on thinking. So I never see you
is not a thing or think my mouth can ever. Aver:
You’re not “nothing.” But neither are you something.
Will I ever really get never?
You’re gone. Nothing, never—ever.
-- Meghan O’Rourke, "Ever"
— King Lear
Even now I can’t grasp “nothing” or “never.”
They’re unholdable, unglobable, no map to nothing.
Never? Never ever again to see you?
An error, I aver. You’re never nothing,
because nothing’s not a thing.
I know death is absolute, forever,
the guillotine—gutting—never to which we never say goodbye.
But even as I think “forever” it goes “ever”
and “ever” and “ever.” Ever after.
I’m a thing that keeps on thinking. So I never see you
is not a thing or think my mouth can ever. Aver:
You’re not “nothing.” But neither are you something.
Will I ever really get never?
You’re gone. Nothing, never—ever.
-- Meghan O’Rourke, "Ever"
Labels: poem
at 10:19 PM
Nobody hurt you. Nobody turned off the light and argued
with somebody else all night. The bad man on the moors
was only a movie you saw. Nobody locked the door.
Your questions were answered fully. No. That didn't occur.
You couldn't sing anyway, cared less. The moment's a blur, a Film Fun
laughing itself to death in the coal fire. Anyone's guess.
Nobody forced you. You wanted to go that day. Begged. You chose
the dress. Here are the pictures, look at you. Look at us all,
smiling and waving, younger. The whole thing is inside your head.
What you recall are impressions; we have the facts. We called the tune.
The secret police of your childhood were older and wiser than you, bigger
than you. Call back the sound of their voices. Boom. Boom. Boom.
Nobody sent you away. That was an extra holiday, with people
you seemed to like. They were firm, there was nothing to fear.
There was none but yourself to blame if it ended in tears.
What does it matter now? No, no, nobody left the skidmarks of sin
on your soul and laid you wide open for Hell. You were loved.
Always. We did what was best. We remember your childhood well.
-- Carol Ann Duffy, "We Remember Your Childhood Well"
with somebody else all night. The bad man on the moors
was only a movie you saw. Nobody locked the door.
Your questions were answered fully. No. That didn't occur.
You couldn't sing anyway, cared less. The moment's a blur, a Film Fun
laughing itself to death in the coal fire. Anyone's guess.
Nobody forced you. You wanted to go that day. Begged. You chose
the dress. Here are the pictures, look at you. Look at us all,
smiling and waving, younger. The whole thing is inside your head.
What you recall are impressions; we have the facts. We called the tune.
The secret police of your childhood were older and wiser than you, bigger
than you. Call back the sound of their voices. Boom. Boom. Boom.
Nobody sent you away. That was an extra holiday, with people
you seemed to like. They were firm, there was nothing to fear.
There was none but yourself to blame if it ended in tears.
What does it matter now? No, no, nobody left the skidmarks of sin
on your soul and laid you wide open for Hell. You were loved.
Always. We did what was best. We remember your childhood well.
-- Carol Ann Duffy, "We Remember Your Childhood Well"
Labels: poem
at 10:17 PM
"I gave up poetry in my youth.
Why?
(1) I gave up youth.
Why did you give up youth?
(a) I was no good at it. Have your youth later, I said, when you are better equipped...
Poetry stood for order, rule, and regulation, didn't it?
Not in my mind.
-i- It represented riot and wilderness and inner regard.
-ii- It represented fire, war, wonderment, and faithful dedication.
-iii- It stood for what might, what could, what would, what should essentially Be. It was written as if from the future. It saved with praise whatever was passing, while history hurried it along, and lowered life into its grave with solemn pontification. An event enters history because it is over; dead, it is buried in blame like a pigeon on its own shit or a gull in its guano. It should be clear -- plain to any person -- open to any eye -- that historical chronicles are chronologies of crime, and that any recital of the past constitutes an indictment.
You appear to hate history.
I love History because I hate Time and all that Time contains."
-- William H. Gass, "The Tunnel", p. 84
Why?
(1) I gave up youth.
Why did you give up youth?
(a) I was no good at it. Have your youth later, I said, when you are better equipped...
Poetry stood for order, rule, and regulation, didn't it?
Not in my mind.
-i- It represented riot and wilderness and inner regard.
-ii- It represented fire, war, wonderment, and faithful dedication.
-iii- It stood for what might, what could, what would, what should essentially Be. It was written as if from the future. It saved with praise whatever was passing, while history hurried it along, and lowered life into its grave with solemn pontification. An event enters history because it is over; dead, it is buried in blame like a pigeon on its own shit or a gull in its guano. It should be clear -- plain to any person -- open to any eye -- that historical chronicles are chronologies of crime, and that any recital of the past constitutes an indictment.
You appear to hate history.
I love History because I hate Time and all that Time contains."
-- William H. Gass, "The Tunnel", p. 84
Labels: poem
Either an epiphany about an actual fear or a friendly relevation from consequentialism
at 10:03 PM
What if the perfect life I truly want is but the most believable lie?
(The only solution being that perfection is not real. Likely: the bigger the lies are, the more believable they are.)
(The only solution being that perfection is not real. Likely: the bigger the lies are, the more believable they are.)
Choosing the bad stories
at 8:49 PM
I might have to take a break and settle for a muted
existence for now even if my love may be muted until my heart could be unmuted
again. It pains me to do an assignment and not aim for anything much. It pains
me to be with someone who does not consume every inch of my heart. In view of
what I had done wrt A, I might not have learnt anything from my 25 years of
existence. One teaches oneself to be mature. When one chooses to preserve
child-like qualities, could it mean that maturity might only be made up of
temporary choices? Could it mean that people could tell?
What happens to the ones who take the road of poise and sophistication? Will adventurousness be a mere accessary? What are the things that become mere accessaries? How much caution must we take and how much spiritedness are we putting at risk by taking caution?
I can only mute the heart for now. But I'm not happy about that. I cannot write. I can hardly tell a coherent story. I never told a coherent story without looking back. Sometimes I wonder if looking back is the only way to preserve a memory in its real image. Surely I'm missing out on something. Surely I'm hiding from something. Surely my fear of my own mortality should find a better way out. Surely there is a bigger beauty worth fighting for. Surely not every moment is about fighting but most of the good ones take decent struggles. Surely there are easier questions to ask on a Monday night. Easier on the heart.
What happens to the ones who take the road of poise and sophistication? Will adventurousness be a mere accessary? What are the things that become mere accessaries? How much caution must we take and how much spiritedness are we putting at risk by taking caution?
I can only mute the heart for now. But I'm not happy about that. I cannot write. I can hardly tell a coherent story. I never told a coherent story without looking back. Sometimes I wonder if looking back is the only way to preserve a memory in its real image. Surely I'm missing out on something. Surely I'm hiding from something. Surely my fear of my own mortality should find a better way out. Surely there is a bigger beauty worth fighting for. Surely not every moment is about fighting but most of the good ones take decent struggles. Surely there are easier questions to ask on a Monday night. Easier on the heart.
I aver
10/19/15at 8:30 PM
1. Warren Buffet's advice on everything takes time.
2. Destiny is bullshit - even if wasn't, you wouldn't know if something was destiny until you've closed a chapter of your life/were nearing the end of your life. Things can take a radical turn. I have had moments with some people that never made me doubt if we would always stay that close. Then we don't talk much anymore. Then I try, but we don't talk at all.
3. Old days slip away even if you revel too much in it or not. Either way, they leave. You can play and old song, and and realise unexpectedly how most intensities are lost, no matter how much faith you had in that song's memory-preserving abilities in the past. If my life was to ever be about finding the perfect preservation method for memories, I'd have to always live in the past.
4. The temporary advantages earned by physical attractiveness. I should say these advantages are more malleable than temporal - they're sometimes affected by time, sometimes by what you do, sometimes by what other people do, and otherwise completely randomly. It's quite lovely to revel in it sometimes - physical beauty. And we should, while we are young, revel in whatever physical advantages we have from time to time. But we must always remember our lives are far more than easy gains and minimising pain.
5. I still deeply believe everyone has a core and does not change, no matter how malleable mindsets can be.
6. The good thing about kevin is probably that when he feels a certain way, it is easy to tell. It was cute when things first started, but it is also painful to see how things are now changing.
2. Destiny is bullshit - even if wasn't, you wouldn't know if something was destiny until you've closed a chapter of your life/were nearing the end of your life. Things can take a radical turn. I have had moments with some people that never made me doubt if we would always stay that close. Then we don't talk much anymore. Then I try, but we don't talk at all.
3. Old days slip away even if you revel too much in it or not. Either way, they leave. You can play and old song, and and realise unexpectedly how most intensities are lost, no matter how much faith you had in that song's memory-preserving abilities in the past. If my life was to ever be about finding the perfect preservation method for memories, I'd have to always live in the past.
4. The temporary advantages earned by physical attractiveness. I should say these advantages are more malleable than temporal - they're sometimes affected by time, sometimes by what you do, sometimes by what other people do, and otherwise completely randomly. It's quite lovely to revel in it sometimes - physical beauty. And we should, while we are young, revel in whatever physical advantages we have from time to time. But we must always remember our lives are far more than easy gains and minimising pain.
5. I still deeply believe everyone has a core and does not change, no matter how malleable mindsets can be.
6. The good thing about kevin is probably that when he feels a certain way, it is easy to tell. It was cute when things first started, but it is also painful to see how things are now changing.
What's in a name?
4/30/15at 4:42 PM
That which slips southwards through
a foreign tongue, builds a frightful
whirl of white, brushes the only skies
we can bear looking up to;
that which rings the semblance of
a lost embrace, a resolute tenderness,
a harsh word spoken softly;
that which coaxes a flowering plant into
touching its blooms, promises covertly,
then peters out cowardly,
leaving but a barren stalk.
that which drives itself haphazardly into the
closest glow, howls to protect the flickering
stem of warmth, puts it out nevertheless.
that which rides a dream the size
of a deathless longing, the brink of your fear,
the coolness of my untouched song
carefully unsung and unwritten;
that which brings muddied snow
to the frozen bird who rests her wings for good now,
her legs still holding up high.
that which sets out to wreck the nameless woods,
hopelessly jealous of their freedom
to be still, shaken by a rootedness
that wandering gusts fear and cannot fathom.
a foreign tongue, builds a frightful
whirl of white, brushes the only skies
we can bear looking up to;
that which rings the semblance of
a lost embrace, a resolute tenderness,
a harsh word spoken softly;
that which coaxes a flowering plant into
touching its blooms, promises covertly,
then peters out cowardly,
leaving but a barren stalk.
that which drives itself haphazardly into the
closest glow, howls to protect the flickering
stem of warmth, puts it out nevertheless.
that which rides a dream the size
of a deathless longing, the brink of your fear,
the coolness of my untouched song
carefully unsung and unwritten;
that which brings muddied snow
to the frozen bird who rests her wings for good now,
her legs still holding up high.
that which sets out to wreck the nameless woods,
hopelessly jealous of their freedom
to be still, shaken by a rootedness
that wandering gusts fear and cannot fathom.
4/29/15at 7:49 AM
this is still bad-loser behaviour - cutting a guy off because you've put them first but they haven't. how on earth does anyone find someone who puts them first. you can't. so the only way is if you don't put yourself first and put God first - but the Christian idea is that if you put God first, that's like tonnes better than putting yourself first because of the self-explanatory omniscience. then you will be on the search for someone who also puts God first.
sounds like a stupidly naive feat to me. cos it doesn't really help to eliminate the idiots who claim to put God first and hurt you. I just don't understand and don't care for it anymore. I'm so sick and tired of pretending.
sounds like a stupidly naive feat to me. cos it doesn't really help to eliminate the idiots who claim to put God first and hurt you. I just don't understand and don't care for it anymore. I'm so sick and tired of pretending.
I'm not ready
4/28/15at 11:31 PM
1. what will you do if I came back?
"nothing. just go with the flow." lie. unwilling to be vulnerable at all costs.
2. okay singapore. do you have any concrete plans on transparency?
I didn't. searched up some random info by some random african nation and used it. took all the energy to convince the guys to give in. they finally did out of niceness, not as a result of how excellent my arguments were.
3. justice AG's email asking me what he should write on.
I didn't know. crapped up some amorphous shit that made me seem like a nice person but really it just looked like I don't have any concrete plan.
not ready. always fucking not ready. got to fucking stop.
"nothing. just go with the flow." lie. unwilling to be vulnerable at all costs.
2. okay singapore. do you have any concrete plans on transparency?
I didn't. searched up some random info by some random african nation and used it. took all the energy to convince the guys to give in. they finally did out of niceness, not as a result of how excellent my arguments were.
3. justice AG's email asking me what he should write on.
I didn't know. crapped up some amorphous shit that made me seem like a nice person but really it just looked like I don't have any concrete plan.
not ready. always fucking not ready. got to fucking stop.
words/things/people that are making me very happy
4/11/15at 12:43 AM
- "I say confidence, not certainty." - sg minister dude in parliament, 2013
- "shut the fuck up and get on with it" - RSOTyler
- suspicion that crush was flirting with me/ is actually nervous around me. suddenly developed strange confidence to somehow ask crush out
- almost non-existent obsessive behaviour when it comes to stephen
- rocking debate today, despite having been shot down by various nation delegates who were simply mean. but it's okay because I've tried my best, have failed upon trying my best, and actually fully accept that I've tried my best and failed and honestly feel 100% good about it. it also makes me smile when I think of afghanistan and how encouraging he has been.
- believing in myself again and being reminded of how important kindness and support are
4/6/15at 3:14 PM
reminder to self: having a great time with anyone is easy. but it's when you're having a hard time that you realise how the other person is really like.
don't be the person to put another one down when you're feeling upset. don't take things out on the person you care about - but instead, express your vulnerability with them occasionally and tell them how much they mean to you. don't attack people you care about when you are upset with your own things.
don't be the person to put another one down when you're feeling upset. don't take things out on the person you care about - but instead, express your vulnerability with them occasionally and tell them how much they mean to you. don't attack people you care about when you are upset with your own things.
3/25/15at 9:56 PM
longest break I've taken in a while from writing. I'm scared to look inward these days. I'm in some sort of a transitional whirlpool and taking every form of awkward. so art is a fantastic outlet. but wait, there is no time.
what is with this tremendous desire to be good and absolutely good? I want to go on a little adventure and do some things.
what is with this tremendous desire to be good and absolutely good? I want to go on a little adventure and do some things.
1/27/15at 10:00 PM
I'm not rich enough to know how money corrupts but I'm afraid this is one of those things that eats into your insides when it happens to you; that is irreversible; incorrigible; hopeless; silent as it grows; eating more terror as it erupts.
at 9:44 PM
We mourn this senseless planet of regret,
droughts, rust, rain, cadavers
that can’t tell us, but I promise
you one day the white fires
of Venus shall rage: the dead,
feeling that power, shall be lifted, and each
of us will have his resurrected one to tell him,
“Greetings. You will recover
or die. The simple cure
for everything is to destroy
all the stethoscopes that will transmit
silence occasionally. The remedy for loneliness
is in learning to admit
solitude as one admits
the bayonet: gracefully,
now that already
it pierces the heart.
Living one: you move among many
dancers and don’t know which
you are the shadow of;
you want to kiss your own face in the mirror
but do not approach,
knowing you must not touch one
like that. Living
one, while Venus flares
O set the cereal afire,
O the refrigerator harboring things
that live on into death unchanged.”
They know all about us on Andromeda,
they peek at us, they see us
in this world illumined and pasteled
phonily like a bus station,
they are with us when the streets fall down fraught
with laundromats and each of us
closes himself in his small
San Francisco without recourse.
They see you with your face of fingerprints
carrying your instructions in gloved hands
trying to touch things, and know you
for one despairing, trying to touch the curtains,
trying to get your reflection mired in alarm tape
past the window of this then that dark
closed business establishment.
The Andromedans hear your voice like distant amusement park music
converged on by ambulance sirens
and they understand everything.
They’re on your side. They forgive you.
I want to turn for a moment to those my heart loves,
who are as diamonds to the Andromedans,
who shimmer for them, lovely and useless, like diamonds:
namely, those who take their meals at soda fountains,
their expressions lodged among the drugs
and sunglasses, each gazing down too long
into the coffee as though from a ruined balcony.
O Andromedans they don’t know what to do
with themselves and so they sit there
until they go home where they lie down
until they get up, and you beyond the light years know
that if sleeping is dying, then waking
is birth, and a life
is many lives. I love them because they know how
to manipulate change
in the pockets musically, these whose faces the seasons
never give a kiss, these
who are always courteous to the faces
of presumptions, the presuming streets,
the hotels, the presumption of rain in the streets.
I’m telling you it’s cold inside the body that is not the body,
lonesome behind the face
that is certainly not the face
of the person one meant to become.
-- The White Fires of Venus, Denis Johnson
droughts, rust, rain, cadavers
that can’t tell us, but I promise
you one day the white fires
of Venus shall rage: the dead,
feeling that power, shall be lifted, and each
of us will have his resurrected one to tell him,
“Greetings. You will recover
or die. The simple cure
for everything is to destroy
all the stethoscopes that will transmit
silence occasionally. The remedy for loneliness
is in learning to admit
solitude as one admits
the bayonet: gracefully,
now that already
it pierces the heart.
Living one: you move among many
dancers and don’t know which
you are the shadow of;
you want to kiss your own face in the mirror
but do not approach,
knowing you must not touch one
like that. Living
one, while Venus flares
O set the cereal afire,
O the refrigerator harboring things
that live on into death unchanged.”
They know all about us on Andromeda,
they peek at us, they see us
in this world illumined and pasteled
phonily like a bus station,
they are with us when the streets fall down fraught
with laundromats and each of us
closes himself in his small
San Francisco without recourse.
They see you with your face of fingerprints
carrying your instructions in gloved hands
trying to touch things, and know you
for one despairing, trying to touch the curtains,
trying to get your reflection mired in alarm tape
past the window of this then that dark
closed business establishment.
The Andromedans hear your voice like distant amusement park music
converged on by ambulance sirens
and they understand everything.
They’re on your side. They forgive you.
I want to turn for a moment to those my heart loves,
who are as diamonds to the Andromedans,
who shimmer for them, lovely and useless, like diamonds:
namely, those who take their meals at soda fountains,
their expressions lodged among the drugs
and sunglasses, each gazing down too long
into the coffee as though from a ruined balcony.
O Andromedans they don’t know what to do
with themselves and so they sit there
until they go home where they lie down
until they get up, and you beyond the light years know
that if sleeping is dying, then waking
is birth, and a life
is many lives. I love them because they know how
to manipulate change
in the pockets musically, these whose faces the seasons
never give a kiss, these
who are always courteous to the faces
of presumptions, the presuming streets,
the hotels, the presumption of rain in the streets.
I’m telling you it’s cold inside the body that is not the body,
lonesome behind the face
that is certainly not the face
of the person one meant to become.
-- The White Fires of Venus, Denis Johnson
ignus fatuus
12/27/14at 12:27 PM
I think everything is playing out well. I am starting to wonder if there were only three kinds of men left: the ones without heart, the ones with but are not for you, and the mad ones.
lessons must be learnt immediately. I think writers are control freaks - they need stories to play out in a specific manner or direction. I know I do and agonise for days on end when I say the wrong things at the wrong times, both of which I more than often do at once.
it is quite ludicrous to think there could ever be the remotest possibility of a future with a person who writes "eats, shoots, leaves" about himself and who makes it a point to execute it perfectly, if not ludicrous enough that he thinks "she's married" would be a good reason to justify the deepness that he does not feel for a woman, for whom he wears jewellery close to the heart every single day.
making meaning out of banalities - that is what I do. I do not consider myself as one who fantasizes very much, but I do suffer the imaginations of how people I remotely care about do not ever leave, even given my subliminal understanding of how leaving is the only thing life throws upon you, should you not be the one to leave first. of course these grand illusions only last for a little while, until the mind clears up. meanwhile, fantasy is for the ones who are mad enough. the ones truly mad can have delirium for as long as they can afford to live.
I do not know when it became okay to have muddy delineations of good and evil, although it has become quite necessary. on the other hand, I do not see how forceful religious impositions of what is good and evil could truly shield us from evil, if it would not shield us from life and its stubborn fidelity to death as well, if shielding was all that mattered. in effect, there is no shielding at all, only realities we choose to live. it is therefore quite wicked to tell another person what reality he or she should subscribe to, unless asked of it with a clear head, which one could rarely have in moments of weakness and despair.
lessons must be learnt immediately. I think writers are control freaks - they need stories to play out in a specific manner or direction. I know I do and agonise for days on end when I say the wrong things at the wrong times, both of which I more than often do at once.
it is quite ludicrous to think there could ever be the remotest possibility of a future with a person who writes "eats, shoots, leaves" about himself and who makes it a point to execute it perfectly, if not ludicrous enough that he thinks "she's married" would be a good reason to justify the deepness that he does not feel for a woman, for whom he wears jewellery close to the heart every single day.
making meaning out of banalities - that is what I do. I do not consider myself as one who fantasizes very much, but I do suffer the imaginations of how people I remotely care about do not ever leave, even given my subliminal understanding of how leaving is the only thing life throws upon you, should you not be the one to leave first. of course these grand illusions only last for a little while, until the mind clears up. meanwhile, fantasy is for the ones who are mad enough. the ones truly mad can have delirium for as long as they can afford to live.
I do not know when it became okay to have muddy delineations of good and evil, although it has become quite necessary. on the other hand, I do not see how forceful religious impositions of what is good and evil could truly shield us from evil, if it would not shield us from life and its stubborn fidelity to death as well, if shielding was all that mattered. in effect, there is no shielding at all, only realities we choose to live. it is therefore quite wicked to tell another person what reality he or she should subscribe to, unless asked of it with a clear head, which one could rarely have in moments of weakness and despair.
11/21/14at 10:42 AM
since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don‘t cry
- the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids‘ flutter which says
we are for each other; then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life‘s not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
-- E.E. Cummings, "since feeling is first"
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don‘t cry
- the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids‘ flutter which says
we are for each other; then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life‘s not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
-- E.E. Cummings, "since feeling is first"
11/5/14at 11:25 PM
I am an idiot. but I guess this is God's way of telling me to get over this one.
there really is no such thing as loss
11/1/14at 4:06 PM
legitimately speaking, there is no futility to speak of. it's only a lack of trying that will be a problem. the only question is: is he worth it? how can I know. no one can ever know anything for certain.
my mind wanders when he talks, but very much less so than when I talk to most people. I'm still self-indulgent. being physical with anyone at all still affects me emotionally, but for some bizarre shit fucked-up reason, in a hypothetical world, I don't even mind sleeping with him should circumstances arise. but I won't, because one ought to guard one's heart. I don't know anything about this man, other than that he is kind and smart and listens so well and things feel right and the rest of the world is still when we're together and the way he kisses and the way he pulls me back and how much the thought of him leaving hurts. I might get to see him one more time, tops. then I won't see him for at least a year, or maybe, that will be the last time.
I can see how this could possibly develop in future. he could meet someone beautiful, and they could have a family in London and never be back. I could leave this place. and I must know better than to let this develop further. I must not break my own heart.
or we could try and make this something while it lasts. because life. because the possibility of love. because we know hurt and have been hurt. because we could mean something to each other. because we make each other laugh. because he is a beautiful, gentle human being. because he has a heart. because he makes me happy.
my mind wanders when he talks, but very much less so than when I talk to most people. I'm still self-indulgent. being physical with anyone at all still affects me emotionally, but for some bizarre shit fucked-up reason, in a hypothetical world, I don't even mind sleeping with him should circumstances arise. but I won't, because one ought to guard one's heart. I don't know anything about this man, other than that he is kind and smart and listens so well and things feel right and the rest of the world is still when we're together and the way he kisses and the way he pulls me back and how much the thought of him leaving hurts. I might get to see him one more time, tops. then I won't see him for at least a year, or maybe, that will be the last time.
I can see how this could possibly develop in future. he could meet someone beautiful, and they could have a family in London and never be back. I could leave this place. and I must know better than to let this develop further. I must not break my own heart.
or we could try and make this something while it lasts. because life. because the possibility of love. because we know hurt and have been hurt. because we could mean something to each other. because we make each other laugh. because he is a beautiful, gentle human being. because he has a heart. because he makes me happy.
because self-contradictions
10/22/14at 12:15 PM
I still remember how much I enjoyed the writings of Gertrude Stein when I was nineteen or so, even though I had absolutely no idea what she was on about. (and all I remember from whatever I've read of her essays is a single word "buttons", which says so much. laughable.) I might know why I was drawn to her now: because her writing was such a poignant-sort-of incomprehensible: inoffensively and unobtrusively so, but still intriguing enough to be sustainable in one's imagination. is honesty the only thing that makes writing good? but of course not. with every shade of honesty there has to be three, four, or twenty more shades of craft.
and what is craft? how does one find a balance between craft and truth, between fact-avoiding and honesty and the practical limitations of one's written word? one ignores the last one usually, in order to move forward with the sheer attempt of writing. writing is heavy-duty -- there is a lot of madness that goes into it; one has to be in a lot of self-denial and character-awareness to create on paper. I cannot simply afford to do anything of that sort, or so I've been telling myself, because there are debts to be paid, because there is a self to be found, because there are people I cannot afford to disappoint further by lapsing into hobo-hood, because the heart is terrified of trials and tribulations, despite the necessity of it all.
and what is craft? how does one find a balance between craft and truth, between fact-avoiding and honesty and the practical limitations of one's written word? one ignores the last one usually, in order to move forward with the sheer attempt of writing. writing is heavy-duty -- there is a lot of madness that goes into it; one has to be in a lot of self-denial and character-awareness to create on paper. I cannot simply afford to do anything of that sort, or so I've been telling myself, because there are debts to be paid, because there is a self to be found, because there are people I cannot afford to disappoint further by lapsing into hobo-hood, because the heart is terrified of trials and tribulations, despite the necessity of it all.
To be
at 12:08 PM
what is it that I must be? to be informed but not so much that I become smug with the illusion of certainty. to be completely honest but not so much that I lack the self-denial to maintain my sanity. to know madness but not so much that I traverse down that path of no-return. to judge only in good humour and kindness but not so much that it drives the self into reclusiveness. to know style but not so much that I forget at the root of it is pretense and vanity and subconscious hoarding.
"You don't write fiction the night before a final exam"
10/16/14at 7:05 PM
God is either here or He is not, so
I cannot know for sure.
Freedom is only made up of moments of absence, so
we seek it in the roles we believe in.
Dictionaries put words in order, so
we invent haphazard stories.
They raced the lost years and never won, so
we live as though we could never lose again.
Sugar is bad for you, so
we have cupcakes for breakfast.
Life has its false certainties, so
we go out and forget we could be touched.
Ebbing blue hues fell into curious blackness, so
that was the furthest road we had taken.
People are watching us, so
we cried in a stadium filled with more people.
Anyone falls and falters, so
we sing a little louder.
These are wonderful times we live in, so
we leave.
A final exam is happening tomorrow, so
I write a poem today.
I cannot know for sure.
Freedom is only made up of moments of absence, so
we seek it in the roles we believe in.
Dictionaries put words in order, so
we invent haphazard stories.
They raced the lost years and never won, so
we live as though we could never lose again.
Sugar is bad for you, so
we have cupcakes for breakfast.
Life has its false certainties, so
we go out and forget we could be touched.
Ebbing blue hues fell into curious blackness, so
that was the furthest road we had taken.
People are watching us, so
we cried in a stadium filled with more people.
Anyone falls and falters, so
we sing a little louder.
These are wonderful times we live in, so
we leave.
A final exam is happening tomorrow, so
I write a poem today.
10/15/14at 10:16 PM
Don't make me laugh or I'll miss you
at 7:27 PM
There is a hush now while the hills rise up
and God is going to sleep. He trusts the ship
of Heaven to take over and proceed beautifully
as he lies dreaming in the lap of the world.
He knows the owls will guard the sweetness
of the soul in their massive keep of silence,
looking out with eyes open or closed over
the length of Tomales Bay that the egrets
conform to, whitely broad in flight, white
and slim in standing. God, who thinks about
poetry all the time, breathes happily as He
repeats to Himself: there are fish in the net,
lots of fish this time in the net of the heart.
-- "Fishing in the Keep of Silence", Linda Gregg
and God is going to sleep. He trusts the ship
of Heaven to take over and proceed beautifully
as he lies dreaming in the lap of the world.
He knows the owls will guard the sweetness
of the soul in their massive keep of silence,
looking out with eyes open or closed over
the length of Tomales Bay that the egrets
conform to, whitely broad in flight, white
and slim in standing. God, who thinks about
poetry all the time, breathes happily as He
repeats to Himself: there are fish in the net,
lots of fish this time in the net of the heart.
-- "Fishing in the Keep of Silence", Linda Gregg
10/12/14at 12:39 AM
"One should never take sides in anything, Mr. Kelvil. Taking sides is the beginning of sincerity, and earnestness follows shortly afterwards, and the human being becomes a bore. However, the House of Commons really does very little harm. You can't make people good by Act of Parliament, - that is something."
--Lord Illingworth from "A Woman of No Importance", Oscar Wilde
Some food for thought
10/11/14at 2:14 PM
EM: I'm in the same environment, I'm in the same place -- and why bother? Who cares? And just...I mean I was recording books, I had started teaching at a university. I mean I was doing nice things.
JF: And from outside, people are like, “Oh she's moving on with her life”.
EM: Oh yeah, yeah. And that's what everybody wants to. Moving on. You do that. And I always think – the idea, to me – ‘moving on’ is that I’m heading off from something before whereas you’re actually continuing you’re already on. You’re just maybe not aware of it in a different way. And I got back from Ecuador, a month later I booked a ticket to Kenya. And it wasn’t because that did something for me – I just went, “Why the hell not?”
...
EM: And now to the point that I'm accepting that I am that sadness. And that sadness actually depicts the level and depth of my love as well. and that those two things are not separate. I mean, they kind of are -- but they flow together. That I can love with love with my sadness. And that I can love and I can be compassionate because of how much I miss Stafford. And that I can open myself up to love again -- which was also a strict requirement of his. (laughs) Because I don't have to hold packages around everything anymore. I can just be the mess and kinda go in and move away from the city like we had planned to do -- like I had planned to do. And try to figure out how to live through these different permutations of life instead of having that single definition of 'I'm an actor. I am a yogi. I'm doing a singular career.' I could just, I need to find all and everything all the time. Because I know now that it's just -- it's so fickle (laughs) to not live authentically in every moment that you possibly have. And to live with(out) compassion is a waste of everybody's time and energy.
JF: Do you feel like sadness is still there? Do you feel like it's something that will never go? Do you feel like it's okay if it never does that you can still live a good life but it's just a part of who you are?
EM: There is this idea that sadness is something we should try to avoid. Or tiredness. Or boredom. Or these negatively connoted states of being. And certainly if you look at Eastern philosophies, we're not. And I don't think I am. Being aware of what sadness is and being aware when I'm feeling it -- that's a great thing to be aware of and to cultivate. Because then I can be happy about the little things. It doesn't all have to be symphonic. Joy and happiness is not symphonic. It's the acceptance of our failures -- when we do that, whatever failure means in and of itself semantically -- in that moment, we give ourselves hope; and hope is actually potentially what happiness is. [It's not euphoria that comes when your baby is born.] It's those tiny moments. That is the living, and it is the sadness as well. To avoid it is inauthentic. I can't avoid it. Doing and holding onto it to define myself by it? No. Is it always going to be there? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Because it's a horrific thing. The sense of memory and trauma that I had gone through will never not be part of who I am. And if I go forward with that in mind, the level and depth of my compassion, and therefore my interactions with people -- which is kind of what we're doing, otherwise we won't have tribes -- it has a chance. Cos I can't see you if I can't know my sadness. But I don't need to hold onto it. And it will go through many different stages I'm sure. And this new Erin -- the new person that I am -- walks beside a rabbit hole -- the black vortex that is that depth of sadness that I've never known in my life. And I was wide open, all about love and everything's going great, always bright, open and positive person. And I am still. I just have a really big rabbit hole now that I can fall down to the bottom of. And then I can climb my way back out and meet whoever that's gonna (laughs) reach a hand down, you know?
(...)
I can start to dream the potential of my life instead of the future that we had planned which was so beautiful and filled with such gorgeous dreams and if I'm going to let go of anything, it's not letting go that we had those dreams, but it's letting go of me living those dreams cos I can't without him.
I chanced upon this on YouTube today. Definitely struck a chord in me. This could be what true eloquence (coupled with positivity) is -- "an astonishing sense of awareness", JF says. Damn right. The interview is so raw, and nothing like phoney soap dramas or overplayed/scripted interviews by some fund-raising charities or conventional churches that are just so eager to brainwash. It is ever-so-rare to see gentility, eloquence and complete self-awareness all in one person.
People rebel (in the most civil construction of the word), court misery, go to new places to feel out-of-place (as I've seen in HONY) so that they may write and understand who they truly are inside and listen to other people -- all in search of eloquence (and charisma). I feel. And charisma or eloquence does not come without an acute sense of self-awareness and acceptance of how we are and understanding of how the world is.
Her language/word choices were also very striking -- mostly "and"s, and minimal "buts". There is a natural flow and ready acceptance of the ups and downs even in a situation where one would imagine could only consist of dilemmas. And when faced with a tragedy of this magnitude, she calls it "the rabbit hole", and "the vortex", tops -- nothing that exaggerates but perhaps even downplays what she has been through from an outsider's point of view like mine.
It has become clear now, more than ever, how much I've grown up with misanthropy and mistrust against fellow human beings. And I see this struggle every single time I talk to the parentals. The toils of work and demands from society have worn out the bulk of their compassion. They are kind people, but they do not encourage us to be kind, because kindness (to them) is synonymous with vulnerability and weakness. At the same time, they do not encourage us to be unkind as well. The situation becomes very tricky if we took their words to heart. It also does not help how deception is so rampant in typical Asian communities and even in families. I mean, if you're East Asian, chances are that, behind closed doors, your family elders would have talked bad behind other people (whom they've just met and smiled at and might even be pretty good friends with). I don't see any of that in close friends whose families are from anywhere else but East Asia. And so many of these 'elders' are justified in having been rat racers (if they end up being winners - having a house, a regular income, a stable pension fund, etc.) and terrified of us [the younger generation] for 'not fighting/winning enough', so they drill the heck out of us.
I'm still trying to break out of sober reservedness. I don't trust people easily -- but once I do, I become a little bit too trusting sometimes, especially when grey areas come up. It is difficult but hopefully attending settings that encourage openness (without consequence) [i.e. gallery openings, one-off art shows, etc.] helps to smoothen my transition into adulthood -- the kind that is more about nourishing our inner sense of wonder and curiosity unique to homo sapiens than sliding into a self-indulgent, self-righteous sort of sordid sophistication.
10/10/14at 12:21 AM
Stop Screen-sucking
For every hour we experience 20mins of unplanned interruptions???
Default response - "let me get back to you on that"
Never worry alone
Cultivating lilies and getting rid of leeches [do not stay due to inertia or guilt] - too many worthwhile projects crowd out each other's growth, and none of them flourish
short term
long term
For every hour we experience 20mins of unplanned interruptions???
Default response - "let me get back to you on that"
Never worry alone
Cultivating lilies and getting rid of leeches [do not stay due to inertia or guilt] - too many worthwhile projects crowd out each other's growth, and none of them flourish
short term
- catch up with lecture recordings
- catch up with tutorials and tutorial recordings
- do next week's tutorials.
- do dishes before sleeping
- get on top of law school
- exercise and get fit
- sleep early
long term
- be aware of what I'm doing
- minimise screen time
- do not go onto youtube aimlessly
10/9/14at 4:13 PM
I was done being passive because I didn't have the patience or faith
of a rock that new waves will always come crashing. Waves do not rest
whilst rocks do nothing but rest and wait in stillness and immovable
deaths.
I am more of wave than a wave-rock now. When you're a wave, you get to be raw and ready for the the world. There's always an influx of newness and unplanned unisons. I'm almost there: my own wave -- rocking up the shores, terrorising bad swimmers, holding up skeletons of shellfish and carrying living sea creatures who are in for a ride once in a while. I am a wave. I am my wave.
I will have time to be a good old solid rock one day. And when I'm one, you bet I'd be rock solid for whatever waves that come at me. I will also have good stories, as older ones often do. And then I'll tell them: we really aren't that different after all.
I am more of wave than a wave-rock now. When you're a wave, you get to be raw and ready for the the world. There's always an influx of newness and unplanned unisons. I'm almost there: my own wave -- rocking up the shores, terrorising bad swimmers, holding up skeletons of shellfish and carrying living sea creatures who are in for a ride once in a while. I am a wave. I am my wave.
I will have time to be a good old solid rock one day. And when I'm one, you bet I'd be rock solid for whatever waves that come at me. I will also have good stories, as older ones often do. And then I'll tell them: we really aren't that different after all.
at 3:43 PM
yknow, when you create characters out of the heart, they become the best form of therapy. they reveal how you've confused your own identity with someone else's. they reveal how you've confused your own dreams with someone else's lack thereof. I'm not sure if I'm wrong to even think that that does not make it love, but I'm sure as hell that when people lose themselves in love, love leaves them too.
I feel like we skipped way too many steps before the heartbreak came. we were too afraid of being hurt. he did not know love. and I do, I do. I only could not love someone who could not love me but someone else, who doesn't even love him back.
I feel like we skipped way too many steps before the heartbreak came. we were too afraid of being hurt. he did not know love. and I do, I do. I only could not love someone who could not love me but someone else, who doesn't even love him back.
10/8/14at 3:03 PM
"不出户，知天下
不窥牖，见天道"
"At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want."— Lao-Tzu
I took things very literally when I first read the Chinese version. I mean, prima facie it just looks like it's okay being 宅 [a homebody] (cos there's the internet and all and also there are millions of people camping at home and reinforcing the homebody culture). But nope. That's not what Lao-Tzu meant. This translator blew me mind.
不窥牖，见天道"
"At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want."— Lao-Tzu
I took things very literally when I first read the Chinese version. I mean, prima facie it just looks like it's okay being 宅 [a homebody] (cos there's the internet and all and also there are millions of people camping at home and reinforcing the homebody culture). But nope. That's not what Lao-Tzu meant. This translator blew me mind.
short reminder before I hop off to essayland
10/5/14at 10:48 PM
I feel like the three or four relationships of mine collapsed under some form of tactless pursuit of 'figuring one out' -- when one person tries too hard at figuring the other person out, it usually leads to problems. they/I should've been more inconspicuous.
one also must train one's face to express only what is necessary.
one also must train one's face to express only what is necessary.
at 5:42 PM
"With so much reading ahead of you, the temptation might be to speed up. But in fact it’s essential to slow down and read every word. Because one important thing that can be learned by reading slowly is the seemingly obvious but oddly underappreciated fact that language is the medium we use in much the same way a composer uses notes, the way a painter uses paint...it’s surprising how easily we lose sight of the fact that words are the raw material out of which literature is crafted."
― Francine Prose
the road to self-acceptance
10/3/14at 4:46 PM
this video is life-transforming. and it reminds me of something: one day I tweeted/lj-ed on how I believed the day I considered myself "grown-up" to be: and that is when I'm utterly unapologetic; when I've stopped apologising for all that I do and all that I am, as I know I am living my 100% and being the person that I know I am.
sometimes the balance is thrown off when we try to fuse what we think of the world with what unknowing people impose their standards on ourselves. we see how incapable, imperfect and helpless we are, and we're careful to remember how sometimes we just get one chance and not more. we're also afraid of what people would say to us if they saw us when we are imperfect. we're afraid of being hurt, so we need our private enclosures and friend-locks on livejournal. it's hard to fight judgment. and it's like what people say, the bigger the game you play, the more criticism you get -- and it's only how much you're able to fend yourself against non-constructive criticism that determines how far you go. I was always confused as to how the creator of flappy bird got so apologetic about his creation, and how we couldn't take the hate. and I'm never more amazed every other day when I meet people who were not raised in a traditional asian background, where we've been taught (indirectly, in some way or another) to be apologetic for almost everything we do.
we have to stop being apologetic. this struggle with being overly apologetic is so real that it drove me to a meltdown a few days ago, when I sat in complete darkness and talked to myself out loud for a good half an hour. what happened a day before that was, I had missed the last safety bus (because the uni safety bus people had changed the timetable completely without informing us) and so I got the security car to drive me back. the female driver had such a strong attitude, was disgruntled about driving me off campus and drove really recklessly to my house. she kept emphasising on how "she doesn't do this" and "this is the last time" and blaming me for missing the last bus. so I thought I had to explain, although she still didn't quite get me at the end. throughout my whole ride, I just gave the typical Asian, meek, apologetic explanations. it was then no wonder that by the time I got home, my confusion and discontentment escalated. I feared conflict so much that I had to deliver my message in a way I would not have done if given a second chance to it again.
and meanwhile in law school, I'm always apologetic for not knowing enough. I know the only way to solve this problem is to actually sit down and get my readings down the gut like it's the good stuff. and I will do that once I'm done writing this.
I have to take my time and money more seriously and not give things away easily every time.
here's the thing with names. I remember I used to hate history because of all the names and dates we had to learn. I knew they were supposed to be meaningful but I just never had the patience or empathy to sit down and understand things. but being in law school and going through some YouTube channels have allowed me to connect the names and stories to actual lives of people. being away from home has taught me empathy. but strangely enough, whilst my mum applauds me for being kind, she hates it for me to be 'excessively' empathetic. it's only a couple of weeks ago when we had a discussion about pregnancy and how women could suffer so much when giving birth and she (very unsurprisingly) chastised me for feeling for these women for 'suffering', because 'they were not suffering one bit' (in her words). it bothers me how my mum almost never gets things and how I always need to take ten extra steps to get my message across or hear what she has to say because I feel like all she knows is toughness and all that toughness has muddled up her willingness to be candid with other people and herself. she is never comfortable with sharing her insecurities and even as she shares, she shares them in an angry tone, just so that she would sound more assertive and less vulnerable. I'm thinking of the time when she talked to me about her past relationships and her recently ruined friendships -- and she still had the voice and anguish of a highschooler in that context. we know that is not how things roll, but she doesn't. it's almost as if she was locked up in a time capsule and lived her life after high school as some sort of stunted adolescence. and my dad's love for her being that way (and my birth) stifled her personal transformation. this is how much sacrifice women make for their children, and the sacrifice is so shocking because they do so much and they aren't even aware of how much they're doing. they forget themselves.
I wanted to study law because I wanted to take words seriously as they are. I refused dust myself up with flowery embellishments or pomposity the way they do in business school. I also did not want to have myself not taken seriously, just by virtue of the fact that I was doing a flimsy arts degree. so I chose law, at the expense of a lifetime of struggle my parents had to go through for the sake of this education that I am getting.
it's only when I've come to Australia that I discovered the shocking amount of prejudices and judgments that I've accumulated over the years in Singapore. occupational discrimination was very real in my head (and it still is, but I'm struggling to change my mindset - especially having spoken to Ina's bf, who's a waiter [and who euphemistically "works at an Italian restaurant"] ). another thing I grapple with is age discrimination -- and people who are not actual kids but are younger than me still get me on my nerves. cindy too, has taken odd jobs. lucy as well. some of these European people just leave house and find their own freedom and overcome their own fears all by themselves. last night, Ina's bf wants to have his own restaurant in future. Halfway through the conversation, he asked me in his Italian-accented English, whether I felt like I was "running out of time". I thought he was being platitudinous and so I gave an equally platitudinous reply and asked if he meant he wanted to have more hours in a day. "no no", he shook his head emphatically. "I meant I wanted to get my restaurant ready by 28 or 29, and now I'm already 26, so I only have a few more years to go." I was stumped. I have no plan. I have no goal. I had no self-deprecating jokes that are funny. so I nodded and changed the shift of the conversation to him, which is the thing I do now (and the thing I've learnt from zh on our night out at MDS). listening is key anyway. at least I get to come back home and think so that I will have the right things to say with other people next time. preparation is paramount in all things that we do. effortlessness is but a farce that only ignorant beginners see.
other than my disinterest in politics in general, I think the main reason I don't do social advocacy is that I think it would be utterly hypocritical to advocate any cause when I'm not as much of an egalitarian as I would like for myself to be. I've just got so much to work on and I would very much prefer working in the backdrop until I'm ready. I'm not hiding. I just need to work on my inner state of mind.
you know what, I think I will stop using wechat/skyping my parents. I will write to them, once every month. if being away from home and support is what it takes for me to get complete independence, this has to happen. I have to bear with loneliness and not turn to home. I have to outgrow this old shell and shake off this part of me that cannot make me relevant in the new century. I have to recommit to self-love and continue this journey of self-discovery.
sometimes the balance is thrown off when we try to fuse what we think of the world with what unknowing people impose their standards on ourselves. we see how incapable, imperfect and helpless we are, and we're careful to remember how sometimes we just get one chance and not more. we're also afraid of what people would say to us if they saw us when we are imperfect. we're afraid of being hurt, so we need our private enclosures and friend-locks on livejournal. it's hard to fight judgment. and it's like what people say, the bigger the game you play, the more criticism you get -- and it's only how much you're able to fend yourself against non-constructive criticism that determines how far you go. I was always confused as to how the creator of flappy bird got so apologetic about his creation, and how we couldn't take the hate. and I'm never more amazed every other day when I meet people who were not raised in a traditional asian background, where we've been taught (indirectly, in some way or another) to be apologetic for almost everything we do.
we have to stop being apologetic. this struggle with being overly apologetic is so real that it drove me to a meltdown a few days ago, when I sat in complete darkness and talked to myself out loud for a good half an hour. what happened a day before that was, I had missed the last safety bus (because the uni safety bus people had changed the timetable completely without informing us) and so I got the security car to drive me back. the female driver had such a strong attitude, was disgruntled about driving me off campus and drove really recklessly to my house. she kept emphasising on how "she doesn't do this" and "this is the last time" and blaming me for missing the last bus. so I thought I had to explain, although she still didn't quite get me at the end. throughout my whole ride, I just gave the typical Asian, meek, apologetic explanations. it was then no wonder that by the time I got home, my confusion and discontentment escalated. I feared conflict so much that I had to deliver my message in a way I would not have done if given a second chance to it again.
and meanwhile in law school, I'm always apologetic for not knowing enough. I know the only way to solve this problem is to actually sit down and get my readings down the gut like it's the good stuff. and I will do that once I'm done writing this.
I have to take my time and money more seriously and not give things away easily every time.
here's the thing with names. I remember I used to hate history because of all the names and dates we had to learn. I knew they were supposed to be meaningful but I just never had the patience or empathy to sit down and understand things. but being in law school and going through some YouTube channels have allowed me to connect the names and stories to actual lives of people. being away from home has taught me empathy. but strangely enough, whilst my mum applauds me for being kind, she hates it for me to be 'excessively' empathetic. it's only a couple of weeks ago when we had a discussion about pregnancy and how women could suffer so much when giving birth and she (very unsurprisingly) chastised me for feeling for these women for 'suffering', because 'they were not suffering one bit' (in her words). it bothers me how my mum almost never gets things and how I always need to take ten extra steps to get my message across or hear what she has to say because I feel like all she knows is toughness and all that toughness has muddled up her willingness to be candid with other people and herself. she is never comfortable with sharing her insecurities and even as she shares, she shares them in an angry tone, just so that she would sound more assertive and less vulnerable. I'm thinking of the time when she talked to me about her past relationships and her recently ruined friendships -- and she still had the voice and anguish of a highschooler in that context. we know that is not how things roll, but she doesn't. it's almost as if she was locked up in a time capsule and lived her life after high school as some sort of stunted adolescence. and my dad's love for her being that way (and my birth) stifled her personal transformation. this is how much sacrifice women make for their children, and the sacrifice is so shocking because they do so much and they aren't even aware of how much they're doing. they forget themselves.
I wanted to study law because I wanted to take words seriously as they are. I refused dust myself up with flowery embellishments or pomposity the way they do in business school. I also did not want to have myself not taken seriously, just by virtue of the fact that I was doing a flimsy arts degree. so I chose law, at the expense of a lifetime of struggle my parents had to go through for the sake of this education that I am getting.
it's only when I've come to Australia that I discovered the shocking amount of prejudices and judgments that I've accumulated over the years in Singapore. occupational discrimination was very real in my head (and it still is, but I'm struggling to change my mindset - especially having spoken to Ina's bf, who's a waiter [and who euphemistically "works at an Italian restaurant"] ). another thing I grapple with is age discrimination -- and people who are not actual kids but are younger than me still get me on my nerves. cindy too, has taken odd jobs. lucy as well. some of these European people just leave house and find their own freedom and overcome their own fears all by themselves. last night, Ina's bf wants to have his own restaurant in future. Halfway through the conversation, he asked me in his Italian-accented English, whether I felt like I was "running out of time". I thought he was being platitudinous and so I gave an equally platitudinous reply and asked if he meant he wanted to have more hours in a day. "no no", he shook his head emphatically. "I meant I wanted to get my restaurant ready by 28 or 29, and now I'm already 26, so I only have a few more years to go." I was stumped. I have no plan. I have no goal. I had no self-deprecating jokes that are funny. so I nodded and changed the shift of the conversation to him, which is the thing I do now (and the thing I've learnt from zh on our night out at MDS). listening is key anyway. at least I get to come back home and think so that I will have the right things to say with other people next time. preparation is paramount in all things that we do. effortlessness is but a farce that only ignorant beginners see.
other than my disinterest in politics in general, I think the main reason I don't do social advocacy is that I think it would be utterly hypocritical to advocate any cause when I'm not as much of an egalitarian as I would like for myself to be. I've just got so much to work on and I would very much prefer working in the backdrop until I'm ready. I'm not hiding. I just need to work on my inner state of mind.
you know what, I think I will stop using wechat/skyping my parents. I will write to them, once every month. if being away from home and support is what it takes for me to get complete independence, this has to happen. I have to bear with loneliness and not turn to home. I have to outgrow this old shell and shake off this part of me that cannot make me relevant in the new century. I have to recommit to self-love and continue this journey of self-discovery.
10/2/14at 2:51 PM
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
― Theodore Roosevelt
“Be courageous, but not foolhardy.”
at 12:31 PM
the nose-tip-handphone-over-game, when I truly tipped over
post-existentialist-rant-in-darkness epiphany
10/1/14at 11:43 PM
just realised something about keeping our authenticity. I must know in what ways I'm different from the rest (while recognising our similarities) and not drown in either our similarities or differences. even if I don't know all of it, I must know most of it.
be predictable, not so much so that I'm boring. (ha I will never have to worry about that. I think)
be unpredictable, but not so much that people think they can never figure me out no matter how hard they try (although I really cbf most of the time when I meet new people - but maybe I should care more).
I should have the freedom to be whoever I want to be and be more independent and talk less to my dad on whom a lot of my sanity depends.
I can deal with being with myself and hearing the better voices in my head.
be predictable, not so much so that I'm boring. (ha I will never have to worry about that. I think)
be unpredictable, but not so much that people think they can never figure me out no matter how hard they try (although I really cbf most of the time when I meet new people - but maybe I should care more).
I should have the freedom to be whoever I want to be and be more independent and talk less to my dad on whom a lot of my sanity depends.
I can deal with being with myself and hearing the better voices in my head.
reminder to self
9/28/14at 10:00 PM
Oscar Wilde
Steve Jobs
"When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and you're life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money.
That's a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.
Once you learn that, you'll never be the same again."
Sex and the City, Season 2, random episode where Miranda's dating a dude who's addicted to porn while having sex with her
Slavoj Zizek
Life
- "worst slave-owners were those who were kind to their slaves"
- "aggravation of the problem"
- "it is immoral to use private property in order to alleviate the horrible evils that result from the institution of private property"
Steve Jobs
"When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and you're life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money.
That's a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.
Once you learn that, you'll never be the same again."
Sex and the City, Season 2, random episode where Miranda's dating a dude who's addicted to porn while having sex with her
- "look, I've been involved with some of these women for years"
- read: imaginary attachment > actual physical presence of a woman who matters
- "acting in bad faith"
Slavoj Zizek
- "there is a certain type of misanthropy which is much better as a social attitude than this cheap, charitable optimism"
Life
- recognise masochism when you see it and don't feed it
- recognise your loved ones' masochism
(incomplete post)
at 9:42 PM
"I have a best friend of 18 years." was always something I took great pride in saying. LMJ is so incredibly genuine, intelligent, non-judgmental and patient. We used to talk perhaps once or twice a year, and would only get to see
each other every three or four years because of the geographical
distance -- my family had left our home country when I was about eight. Despite this, every time when we saw each other, it was as if we hadn't spent a day apart; we could still talk about everything under the sun, update each other on the small things and we were there for each other, even when we weren't talking. The last time I visited her, she had commented on how it was both
bizarre and comforting that it was as if nothing had changed.
I've been doing this thing for the past year: randomly checking up on old friends; and these were the good friends -- the ones whom I've had great conversations and exchanged many personal moments with [the obligatory squeals and "tell me everything" that come with every new teenage romance, the even more obligatory boy-bashing through every break up, the all-nighters where we grow more existentialist and incoherent than anyone alive, etc.]. It has never occurred to me how futile most of this effort was until recently, when I suddenly realised LMJ and I are no longer talking. Most of my attempts at creating some semblance of connection with these friends of the past usually does not end with anything substantive anymore. I'm a woman of self-denial most of the time, and self-denial strikes again with regards to this. And yes to Christopher Hitchens. “A melancholy lesson of advancing years is the realisation that you can't make old friends.”
I've been doing this thing for the past year: randomly checking up on old friends; and these were the good friends -- the ones whom I've had great conversations and exchanged many personal moments with [the obligatory squeals and "tell me everything" that come with every new teenage romance, the even more obligatory boy-bashing through every break up, the all-nighters where we grow more existentialist and incoherent than anyone alive, etc.]. It has never occurred to me how futile most of this effort was until recently, when I suddenly realised LMJ and I are no longer talking. Most of my attempts at creating some semblance of connection with these friends of the past usually does not end with anything substantive anymore. I'm a woman of self-denial most of the time, and self-denial strikes again with regards to this. And yes to Christopher Hitchens. “A melancholy lesson of advancing years is the realisation that you can't make old friends.”
a slight rant to self
9/22/14at 1:27 AM
australia is starting to give me mixed feelings. (and australia = brisbane in this context). on one hand, I love the vastness of the land here and how empty most places are. I like how I can walk to uni on a sunday and sing to myself without a care at all because there's no one around. friends can choose to communicate by shouting across the road to each other.
on the other, I miss the food and how easily accessible and available practically EVERYTHING is in sg. the sun in aussie, as I've mentioned, is becoming quite a major turnoff. as is the weather etc. that's making my skin so fucking bad I can't even. anyway, I shall really sleep earlier.
it's a fact that I feel more comfortable with yearning and perhaps just general wistfulness -- simply because I've grown up with them all along. but okay, I'm not always depressed. I laugh so damn easily at everything, even though I never get much of a chance to write them down. maybe I just don't have the vocabulary for the good and happy things in life, yet.
people are really not my thing; only my people are -- and unfortunately, I've cut out more people in my life in this year alone than I've ever had in the years preceding it. some people have also left because of circumstantial reasons, not out of my own will.
dealing with new people is still a challenge. dealing with new people when you're in your hole-ly pyjamas on a sunday night coughing and allergic and red and post-diarrhoea is just not exciting. informing only one hour in advance that a horde of church people are coming on a sunday night is not really the same thing as informing in advance. esp not when I'm not feeling so great and need my space.
s, one of my current housemates, is such a moron. she whines, has her bf over every day (but they don't do anything in her room, thank God). she judges my spirituality/faith, tells me not to 'believe' in science. and now I also discover that she's incredibly homophobic. God, it really is hard to love someone like her. and ironic enough, she's the only one in a stable relationship in this house. maybe I'm missing out on something. haha. perhaps I simply need to keep in mind that stupidity is not a sin -- even though there's some alliterative action going on.
another thing we learn only by experience: be acquaintance-y with housemates. once they feel they're close enough to you, they keep delaying rent by a month and think it's okay to keep doing it and then you have to pay for them in advance because you're in charge of paying rent for the apartment. I don't think we're that close, sister.
on the other, I miss the food and how easily accessible and available practically EVERYTHING is in sg. the sun in aussie, as I've mentioned, is becoming quite a major turnoff. as is the weather etc. that's making my skin so fucking bad I can't even. anyway, I shall really sleep earlier.
it's a fact that I feel more comfortable with yearning and perhaps just general wistfulness -- simply because I've grown up with them all along. but okay, I'm not always depressed. I laugh so damn easily at everything, even though I never get much of a chance to write them down. maybe I just don't have the vocabulary for the good and happy things in life, yet.
people are really not my thing; only my people are -- and unfortunately, I've cut out more people in my life in this year alone than I've ever had in the years preceding it. some people have also left because of circumstantial reasons, not out of my own will.
dealing with new people is still a challenge. dealing with new people when you're in your hole-ly pyjamas on a sunday night coughing and allergic and red and post-diarrhoea is just not exciting. informing only one hour in advance that a horde of church people are coming on a sunday night is not really the same thing as informing in advance. esp not when I'm not feeling so great and need my space.
s, one of my current housemates, is such a moron. she whines, has her bf over every day (but they don't do anything in her room, thank God). she judges my spirituality/faith, tells me not to 'believe' in science. and now I also discover that she's incredibly homophobic. God, it really is hard to love someone like her. and ironic enough, she's the only one in a stable relationship in this house. maybe I'm missing out on something. haha. perhaps I simply need to keep in mind that stupidity is not a sin -- even though there's some alliterative action going on.
another thing we learn only by experience: be acquaintance-y with housemates. once they feel they're close enough to you, they keep delaying rent by a month and think it's okay to keep doing it and then you have to pay for them in advance because you're in charge of paying rent for the apartment. I don't think we're that close, sister.
meme situation
9/20/14at 2:56 PM
- randomly checked up on long-lost friend and exchanged the usual how are yous
- sees her emo overly-romanticised existentialist tweet on feed
-_-
(this totally reminds me of why we stopped talking)
- sees her emo overly-romanticised existentialist tweet on feed
-_-
(this totally reminds me of why we stopped talking)
now I'm really unoriginal #nobodycares #butIdo
9/18/14at 7:46 PM
this needs to stop happening. double irony. double jinx. just saw natalie tran's new vid.
the pains of being 'unoriginal'
at 4:07 PM
so...I've copied things here and there when I started out writing. no shame in that, as I'm sure everyone has done it in one way or another at some point in their lives. but it really gets me on my nerves when I come up with something that I believe to be very original and then find it elsewhere - usually on the www.
and this is one of the moments when I read something new (by some published person in taiwan, long-dead Shakespeare, or an established novelist in the states) and suddenly realise I've written about it before in the same light. but too bad. now I find it's already been taken. I'm no longer original. shocker. life is a trick.
“Each day, we wake slightly altered, and the person we were yesterday is dead. So why, one could say, be afraid of death, when death comes all the time?”
yes. yes. yes.
if getting published was nirvana, this will be nadir. the pit's bottom. or bottom's pit. or anything related to bit and bottoms. damn.
[edit: pit* and bottoms. I'm actually keeping the typo cos I amused as much I confused meself]
[edit: pit* and bottoms. I'm actually keeping the typo cos I amused as much I confused meself]
9/17/14at 9:42 PM
I believe I used to call myself "gullible" in 12/13 when really, I meant "impressionable". just needed to clear that up.
BUT MATH IS IMPORTANT AND NECESSARY
at 8:19 PM
me: skype this saturday (GMT+10)?
p: I'm GMT - 5 so I'm pretty confused.
me: it means we're 13 hours apart.
p: so sat 10am my time that's like sun 11am your time?
me: .......your math is like, so bad
me: oh wait shit 10 + 5 = 15 hahahah
me: oh God my math is as bad as yours
this cracked me up so much.
9/16/14at 9:36 PM
it is very wonderful when someone sees a piece of art and thinks of you.
at 1:48 PM
here's something that you need to do to avoid being pulled down by memories:
- not all of memory is about loss. some of it helps reinforce your present and future. not all things are dead in the memory. not all things are gone. the only wisdom is in knowing the difference between what you should keep and what you must let go of.
- not all of memory is about loss. some of it helps reinforce your present and future. not all things are dead in the memory. not all things are gone. the only wisdom is in knowing the difference between what you should keep and what you must let go of.
Reminder to self
at 1:11 PM
Speak
because you already know what to say.
Let yourself grow
and you will always find better words.
Always love, but
always have enough self-respect to leave when the time comes.
Leaving is not not loving.
Staying is not not growing,
but stagnancy is dangerous enough.
because you already know what to say.
Let yourself grow
and you will always find better words.
Always love, but
always have enough self-respect to leave when the time comes.
Leaving is not not loving.
Staying is not not growing,
but stagnancy is dangerous enough.
life is hard, but it doesn't get easier along the way, so you might as well laugh about it
at 12:35 PM
will not be going back to toowong at night for a while. please do not do that for sanity's sake.
also need to go offline from facebook/tumblr/twitter till finals are over. need to disconnect. self-control. yada yada. same old drill.
need to get back on the treadmill. the track. anything. to just get moving. and to exercise the homesickness (and any need for self-validation) away. I don't want to see exercise as something that prevents me from being sad/something that makes me happier. I want do it because I love it. the well-known pattern is that it's always shit when you start out in the first week -- and once you get over that, you'll be hooked and you'll truly enjoy it for what it is.
it would be much easier if we could say the same thing about love and human relationships. it didn't take too long before I started hating the sun in brisbane -- it's fucking bright and the brightness is white, not the happy kind of yellow. but this was one of the first things I loved about brisbane when I first came here. what am I to do if I loved someone, and suddenly decided I didn't love them anymore after a while? what are we to do when that happens? do we just leave? how could we? why does this happen?
some questions are terrible because they don't even get clearer with age and time. yes life is not about the answers but the questions. but we still try to fight for some semblance of certainty and absoluteness in the things we do -- get certificates, build monuments, imagine footholds and permanence while we inhale, exhale and repeat.
reaching out hurts your pride sometimes when you get hit, but things don't get better when you retreat. your odds of finding happiness does not increase as a result of retreating and sulking over things.
I wish I said more things I meant and less of what I didn't mean. but even false promises seem sweeter than hollowness and silence (if we weren't careful enough). we even lie to strangers for no apparent reason. this bubble needs to stop expanding and come to its own end.
my memory has such wayward ways of working. sometimes I wonder if adults work to distract themselves from their own thoughts. I mean, it's great because you get money too. I just really need to work for these extravagant spending habits of mine. consumerism is evil: exhilarating and short-lived.
also need to go offline from facebook/tumblr/twitter till finals are over. need to disconnect. self-control. yada yada. same old drill.
need to get back on the treadmill. the track. anything. to just get moving. and to exercise the homesickness (and any need for self-validation) away. I don't want to see exercise as something that prevents me from being sad/something that makes me happier. I want do it because I love it. the well-known pattern is that it's always shit when you start out in the first week -- and once you get over that, you'll be hooked and you'll truly enjoy it for what it is.
it would be much easier if we could say the same thing about love and human relationships. it didn't take too long before I started hating the sun in brisbane -- it's fucking bright and the brightness is white, not the happy kind of yellow. but this was one of the first things I loved about brisbane when I first came here. what am I to do if I loved someone, and suddenly decided I didn't love them anymore after a while? what are we to do when that happens? do we just leave? how could we? why does this happen?
some questions are terrible because they don't even get clearer with age and time. yes life is not about the answers but the questions. but we still try to fight for some semblance of certainty and absoluteness in the things we do -- get certificates, build monuments, imagine footholds and permanence while we inhale, exhale and repeat.
reaching out hurts your pride sometimes when you get hit, but things don't get better when you retreat. your odds of finding happiness does not increase as a result of retreating and sulking over things.
I wish I said more things I meant and less of what I didn't mean. but even false promises seem sweeter than hollowness and silence (if we weren't careful enough). we even lie to strangers for no apparent reason. this bubble needs to stop expanding and come to its own end.
my memory has such wayward ways of working. sometimes I wonder if adults work to distract themselves from their own thoughts. I mean, it's great because you get money too. I just really need to work for these extravagant spending habits of mine. consumerism is evil: exhilarating and short-lived.
9/15/14at 6:14 PM
I should really write this down before I forget: do not be afraid of embarrassment now that you're still in uni. you can make mistakes. as long as you try, you get an opportunity to be heard. that does not happen on a daily basis when you're at work. sometimes, your attempt to voice your thoughts may be stifled by petty politics. sometimes that simply happens. but in uni, the worst you can get is mockery from people who see more of their own possession of knowledge than your lack of it. these are the people who don't understand that all questions are equal. and you don't even have to think twice about what they think. do know that not knowing everything is not a crime -- it only becomes one when you pretend you do when really you don't. it's not your job here to act like you know everything in class. it's not your job to act like you're completely put together. but neither should you act as though you don't know anything, because you do, and you know quite a bit once you've put enough effort into things. so don't dumb yourself down. don't overestimate your abilities. take one step at a time. it will be fine.
9/14/14at 11:04 PM
this is a post that has come about as a result of having my abs (that looks like belly but really it's abs, as I desperately explained to my mum) protrude in a photo.
do we stop telling people our stories when they show disinterest? what if we still went on? does that make us unaware, obstinate, a fool? just a thought.
I just saw something very wonderful on portraits of america, and thought, yes: the fairy tales matter. I think of the happy prince, and the little match girl. (it is also quite noteworthy that when I read the happy prince when I was 5 or 6, I had no idea that it was wilde who wrote it. hence when I grew to discover and appreciate wilde in my late teens, that story became all the more precious.) these tales make poverty and death and life and love and yearning as real as can be -- that poverty brings us closer to (the literal) death if not for compassion of fellow human beings; that therefore compassion is paramount; that death is permanent and real (and perhaps the only kind of permanence that is real); that death happens in spite of the human will sometimes; that sacrifice could mean a quicker death, and one dies weary but satisfied. as far as I could remember, as a child, I had asked my dad if I would die. my dad said I had the strength/spirit of life [生命力 shēng mìng lì ], and therefore would not die -- that only people without it would die -- that the stronger your spirit, the more you will live on. yes it has become clear later on in life that death can be as sudden as fuck, if you aren't careful. but one has to admit that my dad's response back then is way better this one:
onto another topic: there were these close friends, legit friends, friends whom I could talk to about anything and everything at probably any time and they would be there. but now we have to arrange, book an appointment, all that nonsense - because suddenly time has to be cut out in blocks. there is little spontaneity to speak of. if there be anything I want anyone to appreciate me for who I am, it would be this - this part of me that has still stayed over the years - this need to run to places some day without a plan. not blaming friends. just missing the joys of disorganisation/general irresponsibility that has no real consequences.
more suddenly, uncertainty is a sin. but this is the only context where the sharing of uncertainties and insecurities is okay: between the closest of hearts. we do not (and certainly cannot) show the least of our vulnerability at parties. we do it in this context that matters. we do not share about those things just to have another person tell us we're the best/not as bad as we think. we share because we want the other person to know where we're at, as who we are. we don't want judgment. we don't want sympathy. we don't want comfort, perhaps only the comfort of camaraderie and understanding that someone is there listening to us and only that. that means a lot. and not having someone to listen to us, is a terrible loneliness.
it may be much simpler (and more productive) just reaching out for God or reaching in to the spirit. to clear the mindless clutter that loneliness builds. I was also thinking, what is this, with civilisation and modernity? should we be poor, would we ever have to care about how we look? would I ever have to hoard all this makeup and skincare and dresses that cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars and still worry about looking fat in them? today, I've spent one fucking day organising my skincare and makeup so as to minimise having to look for everything or not using enough things. I've officially become a mask hoarder - I've got a whole TUB full of masks waiting to be used. and these sophisticated skincare treatment machines. if I worked on a farm everyday and ran miles and miles to fetch water, would I still have to deal with acne? perhaps other potentially crippling infections. perhaps things way worse, that would not be only insecurities.
I remember there was a time when p told me about her depression through teenagehood, and that depression is only a disease of affluence. and I nodded then, but I hadn't had much thoughts since. after all, I've always seen poverty as something that strengthens and toughens the heart and mind. only stories of strength reach us. the others don't surface at all. poverty degrades, and anything undignified but not titillatingly so are rarely shared on the media. people want heart-warming stories and stories of struggle but always a happy ending. they recognise the struggles, but the light is constantly shed on the people who have 'gotten out'. but poverty, most of the time, doesn't end that way. it's a constant battle with fate and you need to have a deep and persistent will to survive. that kind of survival is nothing like the battle for a corporate job. it's survival against death and living without sustenance. for some people, it could even mean begging and stealing when things get bad.
when you're poor and are physically healthy, you don't have time to be depressed or not do anything about the fact that you're poor. you work and make yourself useful and keep yourself alive, and that is one heck of an achievement worth respecting.
there perhaps is no point in talking about depression amongst the poor. it doesn't appeal to or help anyone is that was talked about. but as far as there is the lack of data on whether depression affects the rich(er) as much as the poor, I think modern affluence has brought about diseases of its own due to sin; affluence may take away the physical suffering, but if the mind is not in the right place, discontentment and struggles against the devil will still pervade our lives in every way. if anything be the disease of affluence, I say it would be insecurities - about weight, acne, height, hair, size of nose, single eyelids, etc. and insecurities have only got to do with the surface. I remember reading somewhere about how consumption is about feeding and selling feelings [ a German newspaper interview shared by audrey ho perhaps] - so essentially, we're in a vicious cycle and working hard for things that don't enrich our inner lives.
I don't have a lot of abs left anymore. I have to run. and be skinny. clear my skin. and get a flat stomach. because I am really vain as fuck.
do we stop telling people our stories when they show disinterest? what if we still went on? does that make us unaware, obstinate, a fool? just a thought.
I just saw something very wonderful on portraits of america, and thought, yes: the fairy tales matter. I think of the happy prince, and the little match girl. (it is also quite noteworthy that when I read the happy prince when I was 5 or 6, I had no idea that it was wilde who wrote it. hence when I grew to discover and appreciate wilde in my late teens, that story became all the more precious.) these tales make poverty and death and life and love and yearning as real as can be -- that poverty brings us closer to (the literal) death if not for compassion of fellow human beings; that therefore compassion is paramount; that death is permanent and real (and perhaps the only kind of permanence that is real); that death happens in spite of the human will sometimes; that sacrifice could mean a quicker death, and one dies weary but satisfied. as far as I could remember, as a child, I had asked my dad if I would die. my dad said I had the strength/spirit of life [生命力 shēng mìng lì ], and therefore would not die -- that only people without it would die -- that the stronger your spirit, the more you will live on. yes it has become clear later on in life that death can be as sudden as fuck, if you aren't careful. but one has to admit that my dad's response back then is way better this one:
onto another topic: there were these close friends, legit friends, friends whom I could talk to about anything and everything at probably any time and they would be there. but now we have to arrange, book an appointment, all that nonsense - because suddenly time has to be cut out in blocks. there is little spontaneity to speak of. if there be anything I want anyone to appreciate me for who I am, it would be this - this part of me that has still stayed over the years - this need to run to places some day without a plan. not blaming friends. just missing the joys of disorganisation/general irresponsibility that has no real consequences.
more suddenly, uncertainty is a sin. but this is the only context where the sharing of uncertainties and insecurities is okay: between the closest of hearts. we do not (and certainly cannot) show the least of our vulnerability at parties. we do it in this context that matters. we do not share about those things just to have another person tell us we're the best/not as bad as we think. we share because we want the other person to know where we're at, as who we are. we don't want judgment. we don't want sympathy. we don't want comfort, perhaps only the comfort of camaraderie and understanding that someone is there listening to us and only that. that means a lot. and not having someone to listen to us, is a terrible loneliness.
it may be much simpler (and more productive) just reaching out for God or reaching in to the spirit. to clear the mindless clutter that loneliness builds. I was also thinking, what is this, with civilisation and modernity? should we be poor, would we ever have to care about how we look? would I ever have to hoard all this makeup and skincare and dresses that cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars and still worry about looking fat in them? today, I've spent one fucking day organising my skincare and makeup so as to minimise having to look for everything or not using enough things. I've officially become a mask hoarder - I've got a whole TUB full of masks waiting to be used. and these sophisticated skincare treatment machines. if I worked on a farm everyday and ran miles and miles to fetch water, would I still have to deal with acne? perhaps other potentially crippling infections. perhaps things way worse, that would not be only insecurities.
I remember there was a time when p told me about her depression through teenagehood, and that depression is only a disease of affluence. and I nodded then, but I hadn't had much thoughts since. after all, I've always seen poverty as something that strengthens and toughens the heart and mind. only stories of strength reach us. the others don't surface at all. poverty degrades, and anything undignified but not titillatingly so are rarely shared on the media. people want heart-warming stories and stories of struggle but always a happy ending. they recognise the struggles, but the light is constantly shed on the people who have 'gotten out'. but poverty, most of the time, doesn't end that way. it's a constant battle with fate and you need to have a deep and persistent will to survive. that kind of survival is nothing like the battle for a corporate job. it's survival against death and living without sustenance. for some people, it could even mean begging and stealing when things get bad.
when you're poor and are physically healthy, you don't have time to be depressed or not do anything about the fact that you're poor. you work and make yourself useful and keep yourself alive, and that is one heck of an achievement worth respecting.
there perhaps is no point in talking about depression amongst the poor. it doesn't appeal to or help anyone is that was talked about. but as far as there is the lack of data on whether depression affects the rich(er) as much as the poor, I think modern affluence has brought about diseases of its own due to sin; affluence may take away the physical suffering, but if the mind is not in the right place, discontentment and struggles against the devil will still pervade our lives in every way. if anything be the disease of affluence, I say it would be insecurities - about weight, acne, height, hair, size of nose, single eyelids, etc. and insecurities have only got to do with the surface. I remember reading somewhere about how consumption is about feeding and selling feelings [ a German newspaper interview shared by audrey ho perhaps] - so essentially, we're in a vicious cycle and working hard for things that don't enrich our inner lives.
I don't have a lot of abs left anymore. I have to run. and be skinny. clear my skin. and get a flat stomach. because I am really vain as fuck.
boys, what's new? I mean men
9/11/14at 11:12 PM
random super-important epiphany as a result of cramming for trusts:
when looking at a potential partner, get your basics right. don't overlook health (both mental and physical hereditary illnesses), height [negotiable], views on family, heart for children and a general positive outlook on life. sense of humour and cuteness come after. literary sensitivity comes even after. yes the factors are still valid. "follow your heart" is the shittiest advice anyone can give about looking for a partner. yes, "follow your heart" when everything basic has been fulfilled. but otherwise, stick to the basics.
it's really kind of the same thing as when you're writing an exam. don't go in with all the flowery details. if you don't apply the basic cases right, the flowery cases are not going to take you from a 13/20 to a 18/20. (quote stephen) stephen is so remarkably intelligent and friendly and even though he bullshits it's okay because his voice is about the most attractive one I know. I have a friendly crush on my tutor.
when looking at a potential partner, get your basics right. don't overlook health (both mental and physical hereditary illnesses), height [negotiable], views on family, heart for children and a general positive outlook on life. sense of humour and cuteness come after. literary sensitivity comes even after. yes the factors are still valid. "follow your heart" is the shittiest advice anyone can give about looking for a partner. yes, "follow your heart" when everything basic has been fulfilled. but otherwise, stick to the basics.
it's really kind of the same thing as when you're writing an exam. don't go in with all the flowery details. if you don't apply the basic cases right, the flowery cases are not going to take you from a 13/20 to a 18/20. (quote stephen) stephen is so remarkably intelligent and friendly and even though he bullshits it's okay because his voice is about the most attractive one I know. I have a friendly crush on my tutor.
9/9/14at 9:37 PM
“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
-- Dune, Frank Herbert
writing
at 3:16 PM
poetry doesn't only reflect something. it brings out every aspect of an event. the best poems are those that erupt out of your gut without embellishments. it has to be honest -- it doesn't have to be brutally so, but it has to be honest, untainted by half-hearted desires and certainly not unknowing vanity. a poem pulls truths from radically different concepts and lay them out side by side. a poem swallows sounds all over.
9/7/14at 10:02 PM
Memory is not exactly memory. It is more like a prong, upon which a calendar of similar experiences happening throughout the years, collect. A memory, once clearly stated, ceases to be a memory; it becomes perpetually present -- because every time we experience something which recalls it, the clear and lucid original experience imposes its formal beauty on the new experiences. It is thus no longer memory but an experience lived through again and again.
-- On "Notebooks of the Mind: Explorations of Thinking"
twenty four and still figuring things out
at 8:13 PM
I can't talk to friends about this. I have to deal with this by my very intelligent self and get out alive without assistance. so I'm relying on my past september selves and surely there is a pattern:
there is certainly a recurring inclination on cutting one's hair [getting a boy-short pixie hairdo]. nuff said
there is certainly a recurring inclination on cutting one's hair [getting a boy-short pixie hairdo]. nuff said
at 6:44 PM
this is a hella harder than I had thought.
another reflection anyone other than my future self will not be too concerned by
at 12:52 AM
[all this constant rethinking at different stages of my life = so that I won't learn the wrong lessons from the bad experiences. also, I've got a really good memory with respect to people and fruitful conversations generally.]
it's okay dude. it's okay, you learn. you learn to not get lazy in all aspects of life. and as with all things in life, you get better over time as long as you try, as long as you do not stay lazy. it's okay that this thing happened because you learn to kick your insecurities aside and even if you hadn't succeeded at that, at least you know now that you need to make it a point to seriously eject them and keep calm with your imperfections - no one is perfect; so oversaid and overused that you forget how true and important it is to remember this only when you're being too harsh on yourself. at least now you know regardless of what happens, you must not lose self-respect.
how could he even have had the audacity to say,"but I've known her for longer than I have known you." how could you have accommodated that. you completely lost your head there. you were too busy blocking out the desire to say,"then go the fuck to her", instead of reminding him who his girlfriend was at that point in time. well, in any case, I probably stopped handling it smartly the moment I decided to act against my best judgment after he had told me that he had had prayed for us. that was the moment I lost it. anything thereafter wouldn't have been pretty.
it's okay, dude. at least you know now that you have got a soft heart for God, which is important.
at least you know now that you've got a heart for disbelievers who turn to God. so build upon that heart, and don't lose heart. it actually is not necessarily a bad thing that you let God take charge and that things ended. remember that. remember why you two would not have worked out anyway. remember God's love above all things.
it's okay dude. it's okay, you learn. you learn to not get lazy in all aspects of life. and as with all things in life, you get better over time as long as you try, as long as you do not stay lazy. it's okay that this thing happened because you learn to kick your insecurities aside and even if you hadn't succeeded at that, at least you know now that you need to make it a point to seriously eject them and keep calm with your imperfections - no one is perfect; so oversaid and overused that you forget how true and important it is to remember this only when you're being too harsh on yourself. at least now you know regardless of what happens, you must not lose self-respect.
how could he even have had the audacity to say,"but I've known her for longer than I have known you." how could you have accommodated that. you completely lost your head there. you were too busy blocking out the desire to say,"then go the fuck to her", instead of reminding him who his girlfriend was at that point in time. well, in any case, I probably stopped handling it smartly the moment I decided to act against my best judgment after he had told me that he had had prayed for us. that was the moment I lost it. anything thereafter wouldn't have been pretty.
it's okay, dude. at least you know now that you have got a soft heart for God, which is important.
at least you know now that you've got a heart for disbelievers who turn to God. so build upon that heart, and don't lose heart. it actually is not necessarily a bad thing that you let God take charge and that things ended. remember that. remember why you two would not have worked out anyway. remember God's love above all things.
Epiphany at 8pm
9/6/14at 8:09 PM
you know, if you only do things that make you uncomfortable for a short period of time (in hopes of changing/challenging yourself to grow or seeing the slightest part of you change), all you're gonna end up with is a less meaningful recount of how you've done things that have made you uncomfortable and that you've made a whole lot of other people uncomfortable. the only way this could effect change is to keep at it, and fight bugs that make you cough for an extended period of time, and fight homesickness, fight lovesickness, fight any sickness at all.
at 5:28 PM
inexpressiveness is the biggest bane of all time.
9/5/14at 8:41 PM
friday nights. great for poetry.
highlights from law school this half of the semester:
1. DJ's trusts lectures. holy grail. DJ's journal articles. hands up DJ. even though he no longer teaches in uq.
2. maitland's equity lectures. another great pick-me-up
3. when prop lecturer zoomed into a shop front on google maps and called it "salubrious"
4. when karen [remedies lecturer] read "obstreperous" in her perfect aristocratic British accent. when I saw "obstreperous" in the hypothetical, period. then I fantasised about shouting,"you're being obs-tre-perous!" at my future kid (who might be a boy) who's hypothetically in the middle of his tantrum -- and for a moment I imagined he would calm down just out of sheer wonder and (mostly) confusion over what's been tossed at him. confusion throws us into disarray and therefore reduces us to silence, does it not? but I've not been a kid/been around kids for too long. on second thought, confusion is more likely to encourage kids to throw bigger tantrums. I think. my mind, my mind.
highlights from uni:
1. we get married/engaged couples taking their wedding shots on campus. so much. have I mentioned before? I must have. but today something hit me when I caught a glimpse the bride's draped wedding dress -- ordinary, heavy, stiff white fabric scraping across the cement floor. perhaps I saw the bridesmaid's dress first; it was a very pretty turquoise but really more blue than turquoise. I wonder if there will come a day when I will have a white dress painstakingly picked out, and then leave it to scrape across the untamed surfaces like that. and for whom? perhaps it won't matter as much if he paid for the dress. I kid. or not. no really.
2. once I think someone is crazy, then his extensions are all suddenly crazier. his hair. his outfit. his nationality. that perhaps is not unusual. but it bothers me slightly that there really is quite little we can do once someone hits the "crazy" mark -- or worse, the "disgusting" mark. then everything about him is fucked up.
highlights from law school this half of the semester:
1. DJ's trusts lectures. holy grail. DJ's journal articles. hands up DJ. even though he no longer teaches in uq.
2. maitland's equity lectures. another great pick-me-up
3. when prop lecturer zoomed into a shop front on google maps and called it "salubrious"
4. when karen [remedies lecturer] read "obstreperous" in her perfect aristocratic British accent. when I saw "obstreperous" in the hypothetical, period. then I fantasised about shouting,"you're being obs-tre-perous!" at my future kid (who might be a boy) who's hypothetically in the middle of his tantrum -- and for a moment I imagined he would calm down just out of sheer wonder and (mostly) confusion over what's been tossed at him. confusion throws us into disarray and therefore reduces us to silence, does it not? but I've not been a kid/been around kids for too long. on second thought, confusion is more likely to encourage kids to throw bigger tantrums. I think. my mind, my mind.
highlights from uni:
1. we get married/engaged couples taking their wedding shots on campus. so much. have I mentioned before? I must have. but today something hit me when I caught a glimpse the bride's draped wedding dress -- ordinary, heavy, stiff white fabric scraping across the cement floor. perhaps I saw the bridesmaid's dress first; it was a very pretty turquoise but really more blue than turquoise. I wonder if there will come a day when I will have a white dress painstakingly picked out, and then leave it to scrape across the untamed surfaces like that. and for whom? perhaps it won't matter as much if he paid for the dress. I kid. or not. no really.
2. once I think someone is crazy, then his extensions are all suddenly crazier. his hair. his outfit. his nationality. that perhaps is not unusual. but it bothers me slightly that there really is quite little we can do once someone hits the "crazy" mark -- or worse, the "disgusting" mark. then everything about him is fucked up.
at 6:02 PM
I've begun to notice how frequently I lie to strangers. on small things. on clothing preferences. ("your scarf is beautiful. I never wear scarves.") on what I'm about to do.
it's still never a habit of mine to read everyone I come across the moment our eyes meet, even though I'm likely to be fully capable of doing that, if only I worked my consciousness a little harder. it's much easier to read someone when I like them, or realise I needed to impress them because I had an ulterior purpose -- such as in the case of lecturers, lawyers, possible future employers, etc. this sort of selective reading certainly doesn't help sharpen my reading skills. I'm supposed to make every person/stranger I meet a reading resource.
dear God, this journey to self-love is difficult and painful but I know it doesn't matter. this is a pain that brings growth, and I am so fortunate to be able to go through this pain and reap fruits from it. I just need to learn to stick to my principles while being generous and thinking the best of people around me. also need to pick out the principles that clash with those ideals. and alter them so as to fit the model. something must be done.
it's still never a habit of mine to read everyone I come across the moment our eyes meet, even though I'm likely to be fully capable of doing that, if only I worked my consciousness a little harder. it's much easier to read someone when I like them, or realise I needed to impress them because I had an ulterior purpose -- such as in the case of lecturers, lawyers, possible future employers, etc. this sort of selective reading certainly doesn't help sharpen my reading skills. I'm supposed to make every person/stranger I meet a reading resource.
dear God, this journey to self-love is difficult and painful but I know it doesn't matter. this is a pain that brings growth, and I am so fortunate to be able to go through this pain and reap fruits from it. I just need to learn to stick to my principles while being generous and thinking the best of people around me. also need to pick out the principles that clash with those ideals. and alter them so as to fit the model. something must be done.
8/27/14at 10:36 AM
the
biggest problem is that you don’t do what you know is best for you. d was damn right. people aren’t all manipulative,
calculative, selfish. aren’t you as well? you do less, so you hide it better
like that. but you grow less.
the thing with c ended more badly than anticipated because I knew it would eventually end but I couldn’t
leave.
I was and am still drawn to
representations. symbols. signs. not people for who they really are. maybe. sometimes. I can’t overlook small flaws. the way he walked and slumped to one
side. the way he curled in bed. the way he mirrored my decay. I’m consumed by
my distasteful vanity, which is founded upon nothing but stolen minutes and hours
from the people who care about me the most.
but who really makes me happy when they’re so close? I can’t even stand myself up
close occasionally. although, I have to live with myself, or I won’t live at all.
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