Your Brain is 53.33% Female, 46.67% Male

Your brain is a healthy mix of male and female You are both sensitive and savvy Rational and reasonable, you tend to keep level headed But you also tend to wear your heart on your sleeve

  ¶ 6:35 PM

  Night in NUS

I made a trip to NUS just now. Need to hand up my draft to Dr Goh by tomorrow morning, but I couldn't reach school so early... so I decided to submit it tonight.

When i got off the stuffy bus 96, a wave of fresh air came rushing towards me. And it was a smell which was vaguely familiar to me. Its the smell of NUS at night... if there is really such a smell =P

Anyway, that smell brought back lotsa memories of the SWAPS events in NUS...

Night cycling, when I raced down the road with wind rushing into my face.
Bazzar, when I stayed overnight to "jiaga" the stuff.
The late night meetings in school, where occasionally we would go down to Fong Seng.
My 1st FOC, when I walked along the road, to get to the forum for my 1st finale night.
My last FOC, when I was the King, and Ruldoph the Queen, and we danced in TH. (Programs, thanks again!)
AGM, which inevitably stretched beyond the stipulated timing.

I think i getting sentimental... must be the soon-to-be-graduated syndrome... Sniff sniff.

On a side note, don't you think the night is a better timing for intimate conversations? I always feel that at night, people tend to open up, and you could get to know each other better.

Too bad I can't stay longer last nite... If I didn't need to do thesis, I would want to stay longer.

Its been a long time, since SWAPS have such a big grp outing, where ppl felt reluctant to leave.  ¶ 10:43 PM

  Letter to myself

To Counselor Desmond,
I feel like all that I have imagined myself to be…. Is crumbling within this semester…. It seems like I was never confident before…. How come I thought myself to be capable, confident and responsible? Am I experiencing cognitive dissonance? What should I do?

Its soo… difficult to understand myself now. It seems that my capability is just so-so. Will I be able to handle the demands and expectations when I go out to work?

I can’t present myself confidently. I can’t think critically. I don’t prepare enough for my work. I slack. I do not hand up my work on time. I can’t think fast enough on my feet. I stammer. I stumble on my words. I scramble to find the correct words to express what I mean. And people misunderstand me all the time. What does this all means? Is all these a sign of what is to come?

Did I overestimated myself? So much so that I not putting as much effort as before?
Demoralized Desmond
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Demoralized Desmond,
U were never really a smart person. Remember the days in HCJC? Now those were the smart people. You were the one with average intelligence, fairly good understanding skills, and ok critical thinking skills. But you did try to work hard. Now that was something you should be proud of. That you willing to work hard.

Being dumb is not that bad. How did you get up to where you are now today? Through working hard. Through persistence work.

Being unconfident is not all that bad. Remember what you tell yourself…. That confidence is a liability because it makes people less humble. And remember the TS1101 module, which you have to learn to act within one semester? You acted well! Even though acting is not in your genes, you acted well (and got an A, don’t you forget), because you put in effort in learning from shiyun and shengying.

You were never really outstanding to be with. And isn’t it good to revise your over-cocky self-perception now before you take a great fall in the work environment? You did learn all those skills, critical thinking, presentation skills in NUS. You can bring those skills over to your work place too. But you have to remember that what is most important to your identity, is not about being smart (which a lot of people has been saying to you, in your family, SWAPS, psy class) but rather your willingness and persistence in working hard.

Remember your days in SWAPS? When you started out as someone who’s all shy and quiet, to someone who speaks up and mediate conflicts.... that was not because its your nature. That was because u were willing to put in effort to learn from the people you respected. You learnt, how to present your ideas. You learnt, how to listen to people and understand their feelings. You learnt, how to manage people’s feelings while working towards the group objective. Remember that you learnt all these, either from group dynamics textbooks, with people, or from yourself through experience.

Please remember all these, Desmond. There will always be people out there who are better at presenting themselves. There will always be people out there who are smarter than you and can criticize your ideas. What you need to remember, Desmond, is that no matter your environment, no matter how good the people around you are, it can’t take away the fact that you are willing to put in the effort to learn. And if you willing to put in the effort to learn, you can change yourself and adapt to any situation. That is your strength. Please do not lose sight of it.  ¶ 8:16 PM

  Trying my best to stay afloat..... admist the waves of projects......

Heard a lot of complains from my fellow honours classmates too... looks like a lot of them are drowning too. Ha.

Scant consolation.

Float, float, float...  ¶ 7:13 PM

  Existential perspectives on death

Doing a presentation of existential approach to counselling. They make certain assumptions abt the nature of human existence. Their assumptions abt death provides me a direction to resolve my fear abt death.....

Death gives meaning to life.
If one can lives forever, there is no motivation to live life to the fullest.
If there is no death, people can afford to spend an eternity pursuing their goals.
Impending death provides a finite "expiry" date of one life. And because there is an "expiry" date, people are motivated to continously "enhance their product" (living life).

One can only appreciate life by understanding death.

A scene from my one of my favourite comic, dragon quest:-
小孩，何布，哭着问：“为什么人会死？为什么人不能一直地活着？”

母亲把何布抱在怀里，温柔地答说：“因为人类会死，所以人才会努力地活下去。”

I could now better understand the significane of her reply....  ¶ 9:21 PM

  One phone call makes my day.

Thank you Ruldoph!  ¶ 9:41 AM

  Went thru my 2nd job interview. Felt that i performed better than my previous interview. But was shivering throughout the whole interview. Its so apparent that one of the interviewers asked whether it was my 1st interview. Hope I still managed to make a good impression then.....

When i reached home, i checked my school email and received a "disappointing" news. No, its not rejection email, cant be that fast rite? Its a mass mail by my professor to all the honours classmates, informing them of the job vacancy. Sigh, and i was discussing with jl regarding of the possibility of getting hired. We thought that not all of our classmates have applied, so our chances would be 2 out of 15 (2 job vacancies out of 15 applicants). With that mass email, the job applicants should more than double... sigh, chances of getting the job is even lower now.
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Last episode of channel 8 drama, 二分之一缘分

So sad that it has ended. It has given me 1 hour of laugher every weekday.... I would sure miss the characters in the show, esp Meili!!!  ¶ 11:51 PM

  "You complete me"

A famous line from the show Jerry Maguire (which I like a lot).

Its a romantic idea isn't it? Finding your soulmates that complement you, or makes your life whole.

But here's an alternative view (which I got from sherry's blog) on the "completion" idea:-

Dr. Love said that too often people view relationships as “one-half plus one-half equals one,” which implies that people have to “complete” each other to feel whole.

He suggested that couples start modeling their relationships based on this equation: “one times one equals one.”“Only when you are able to be a happy single, you can be in a happy (relationship),” he said.
  ¶ 9:11 AM

  Sweat the small stuff (by Chua Mui Hoong, in Lifestyle, ST, 13 Mar)

I never understood the meaning of that hackneyed phrase, "count your blessings" until I had cancer.

Life was life, full of boon and bane. Why count the blessings?

Then, when going through chemotherapy three years ago,I understood what it meant.

Literally counting your blessings--- thinking of something good that happened that day, naming the blessing--- sets off its own chemistry of well-being.

You don't have to count many blessings. Just one a day.

That's what I did during chemo. I created a separate category for blessings in my journal. Each day, I wrote down what had given me pleasure.

It could be a meal I enjoyed despite the onslaught of chemo drugs which is well-known to cause appetide loss. Or the fact that I could eat all the ice-cream (only Ben & Jerry's please) I wanted during chemo and still lose weight.

Or a visit from a friend.

The joy of flowers blooming in spring. An email from someone who cared about me. July 4 fireworks over the Charles River in Boston. A day at a summer cottage of a newfound friend made at the hospital.

I could go on. I remember those blessings--- but only because I recorded them. When I look back on the months of chemo, I don't see only the darkness of fear and pain. I see the glow of grace and joy, the many blessings I received, and the shining light of the web of friendship and love that my generous friends surrounded me with.

I always managed to find something to be thankful for each day.

Just writing down the blessing put me in a more positive frame of mind.

I marvelled at the wisdom behind the old sayings: Count your blessings.

I discovered recently that my instinct to start a blessings journal was the right thing to do.

Recent research on what makes people happy suggestes that there are some happiness boosters that work.

University of California psychologist Sonia Lyubomirsky says that those who consciously set time aside to count their blessings are happier, more satisfied people.

The top three happiness boosters:-

1. Count your blessings, for example by keeping a weekly "gratitude journal", writing down a few things that cheer you.
2. Do something kind for someone, whether a friend, stranger or relative.
3. Smell the flowers.

Take time to savour the little pleasures of life: the scent of flowers, a good joke, the feel of the sea breeze in your hair.

A fascinating feature in the Feb 28 issue of Time magazine looks at "the science of happiness", quoting several psychologists who did research on what make peopl happy.

Genes play a part. But factors like one's life circumstances (income, marital status, religion, education) contribute only minimally to one's feelings of happiness.

A 1978 study of lottery winners apparently found that the winners did not end up happier than ordinary folks.

How many of us often think: I would be happy, if only I had more money, a more fulfilling job, some other lover, a bigger house, more friends.

But maybe we forget the things that we do have. Maybe we have the full range of our physical and mental faculties. We may have a job. We have a family to love and to love us. We have a network of friends who care. But we take our blessings completely for granted.

One study found that even after a terrible accident, people bounce back and resume normal life and happy activities.

The quote that struck me most in the Time article: "Everyone is surprised by how happy paraplegics can be.

"The reason is that they are not paraplegic full-time. They do other things. They enjoy their meals, their friends. They read the news. It has to do with the allocation of attention," said psychologist Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel-prize winner.

So, now you know the secret of happiness. Count your blessings. Start today.

My blessings today? A prata breakfast with a friend, a great start to a workday.

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  ¶ 12:45 PM

  Found this on the maple forum which i frequent.... Felt that it's meaningful and should share with my friends.
__________________________________________________________
Solutions to Heart Matters
If you find yourself in love with someone who does not love you,
be gentle with yourself. There is nothing wrong with you.
Love just didn't choose to rest in the other person's heart.

If you find someone else in love with you and you don't love her/him,
feel honored that love came and called at your door,
but gently refuse the gift you cannot return.
Do not take advantage, do not cause pain.

How you deal with love is how you deal with you,
and all our hearts feel the same pains and joys,
even if our lives and ways are different.

If you fall in love with another,
and she falls in love with you,
and then love chooses to leave,
do not try to reclaim it or to assess blame. Let it go.
There is a reason and there is a meaning. You will know in time.

Remember that you don't choose love.
Love chooses you.
All you can really do is accept it for all its mystery when it comes into your life.
Feel the way it fills you to overflowing, then reach out and give it away.

Give it back to the person who brought it alive in you.
Give it to others who deem it poor in spirit.
Give it to the world around you in anyway you can.

This is where many lovers go wrong.
Having been so long without love, they understand love only as a need.
They see their hearts as empty places that will be filled by love,
and they begin to look at love as something that flows to them rather than from them.

The first blush of new love is filled to overflowing,
but as their love cools, they revert to seeing their love as need.
They cease to be someone who generates love and instead become someone who seeks love. They forget that the secret of love is that it is a gift, and that it can be made to grow only by giving it away.

Remember this, and keep it to your heart.
Love has its own time, its own seasons, and its own reason for coming and going.
You cannot bribe it or coerce it, or reason it into saying.
You can only embrace it when it arrives and give it away when it comes to you.

But if it chooses to leave from your heart or from the heart of your lover,
there is nothing you can do and there is nothing you should do.
Love always has been and always will be a mystery.
_______________________________________________________________

Would you be able to let go when love leaves?

Comments anyone?  ¶ 8:58 PM

  Read nana's latest blog entry.

She commented tt she has cut down on her blogging (reading and writing) because there is nothing much to write and read (ppl not updating their blog).

Me too. Though there are loads to write, just cant seem to find the energy to sit down and type (haha, so this is a rare long entry! REJOICE ppl! =P). And when ppl dun update their blogs, blogging becomes less interesting to me.

Its a daily routine for me to click on my friends blog and scan thru them for new entries. Even then, I dun click on all of my friends blog, but only those who have a higher probability on updating (hah, i guess i belong to the low probability grp for u ppl out there! =P).

Kinda sad actually.... cos with the lack of contact, blogs become a form of "contact" with my friends for me.

A discussion forum for some interesting thoughts, with comments flowing freely. An update of the latest happening for the friend.

And when this "contact" stops, i feel... less connected with my friends.

Which brings me to a related point on nana's entry: withdrawal from social contact.

I noticed that my last sem in NUS resembles my 1st sem in NUS. I go to school, attend classes, then rush home (if no more lessons) or rush to library to do research. No more lingering ard in school, waiting for ppl to come by and crap/chat.

No more cold jokes.
No more "intellectual" discussion (abt gender equality, r/s, life).
No more social contact.

Sure, i could have stay ard swaps table to talk to the juniors. Can get to know them better, and develop new friendships.

But I feel old. And tired.

All the energy that I have mustered in putting up a crappy and cheerful front for the past 2 years are drained away. Reason? Don't know.

Some of the swaps juniors might have the impression that I'm a loud, jovial and crappy person. Yup, that's one of my personality.

But I'm have the quiet side of me too. In fact, the jovial side was cultivated in swaps. My nature self is a quiet person who stays by the sideline in a discussion, listen attentively to ppl, and contributing some of my thoughts at times (hehe, wonder how many of you ppl believe that!) Its true!

I remembered Ruldoph telling me abt how much effort the swaps senior (like mao, HJ and ben) make to be sociable. And sometimes how they feel that they are taken for granted; ppl think that their sociable self is their personality. And now i can really understand how they feel, when in their twilight years (in NUS =P), they still have to make the effort to talk to ppl.

I've tried to do that. But now, I have no more extra energy to go the extra mile.

There are no more weekly meetings for me to meet ppl.
There are no more familar faces for me at the swaps table.
There are no more late night Fong Seng outings.
There are no more spontaneous fun outings.

I'm not the active person who organise outings (like jl), or the sort who call ppl to chat (like wf or Ruldoph). I'm the sort who let interaction opportunity comes to me, and take it. I don't create opportunities to interact.

After talking so much abt my personality (which is a bit out of point =P), my point is that:

I feel lonely.
Lack of Social contact.

Ok, I do talk to Ruldoph almost everyday (and I enjoy it!) over the phone. I meet her every once a week too. I also get to meet jl for every lessons, and get to talk to her during break time or travelling time.

But it is different from the times when I was involved in swaps comm. Maybe bec its juz not enough.

Thats why the unplanned lunch meeting with hy was very enjoyable. And the inpromotu lunch meeting with aud. And the lucky lunch meeting with hy, nana and zs. And the occasional lunch meeting with sherry (wait a min, how come all lunch? now then i noticed....)

Come to think of it, maybe why I don't feel sociable, why I don't make an effort to talk to ppl
is bec those ppl which I feel comfortable with are not ard.

Kinda sad huh?

I guess I'm in my twilight years too (in NUS lah!)  ¶ 1:18 PM

  二分之一缘分

“舍得”
要先“舍”,才能“得”.

我觉得很有意思.  ¶ 10:07 PM