Values

Hold, Don't Squeeze

I have to say that the last few days at home has been anything but pleasant. I don’t understand how he has to be in so much control of my life. How he thinks he knows everything and he knows me better than I know myself when in all honesty he got so many things wrong. That’s killing me and that’s putting a huge barrier between me and him. He thinks he can read me, he thinks he knows me. He doesn’t know that since the age of  6 I’ve been keeping things down to please my parents. Why? Because that was the easiest way to avoid punishments.

If you haven’t figured who him means. It’s my dad.

I pray I won’t turn out like him. Character traits are handed down both genetically and via influence and I know my dad has been pretty influential in my life. That’s how I turned into a debater, an analytical and observant person. I must not push over the limit where I think I know others better than they know themselves. Where I trust my own instincts more than I trust others. It’s dangerous cause I know what it is like to be under such and I don’t want to do the same.

If you love your child, then build the foundations. Once its there, let him grow from it. Stop trying to continually tweak a building when it has reached its 22nd storey. It doesn’t work that way. The building will crumble if you continue trying.

Live and let live. Sometimes the lesser you meddle, the more beautiful it becomes.

Share on Facebook

This state of nirvana is hard to attain yet everyone craves for it and do countless things to achieve it. Some believe that a financial windfall would trigger this out-of-the-world feeling, some even look to pills to feel light and happy.

But what really fills a person with joy is a complete heart. One that has the full-ness of love which simply leads to joy thus providing happiness. You can search for all eternity for replacements to plug the hole in your heart but as long it isn’t perfect to fit your heart’s most longing need, it’ll never fill it.

And if it isn’t true agape love, it’ll never be a perfect fit.

Short, curt and ambiguous. You gotta hate the way I write.

Share on Facebook

Holy hell, here’s my first go at posting about love. This is gonna be written in stream of consciousness (at least what my stream of consciousness is like)

You know the teenage years when your parents suddenly become distant objects. And that is actually built up from your younger years when you didn’t like certain things but you were too small to say NO to your parents. Suddenly you hit 14 or 15 and hey, you’re halfway to adult hood, your teachers make you feel important and you’d like to stamp some authority at home.

Oh yea, the rebellious years. The nights I spent arguing with my dad to the last point until he just mutters “you’ll learn next time” and goes away. (That was like every other night).

I’d be honest, family was like bottom priority. I did the duties of the only child, especially an only child to two handicapped parents. Helped around, did the chores, got extra jobs, be the arms and legs of them. Anything willingly? Not really. It was like a chore to complete and if it did not resurface, even better.

But you know how they always say – “You’ll be different after 20″. Hell yes, they’re right.

I always dreaded family outings. Because Mom would get all whipped up in a frenzy about being on time. Dad will want to take 101 photographs at each turn. And I was like the main engine of 2 wheelchairs that had two really noisy occupants (that were on a normal semi argumentative state, they like doing it for fun). Worse, their jokes were out of my age range and so were mine to them. So I did my duties in outings.

Things changed.

We had an outing just a few days back. Jack’s Place, Omni Theatre, Botanical Gardens. Nothing exciting except this time I was the cameraman. This time I played half the role my dad used to. Well, I realised that it wasn’t how fun the place was (Botanical Gardens pretty boring, even the flowers are dully colored) but how fun the people wanted it to be. My mom as usual, loves to be negative. But this time, I helped my dad out with the “make-things-fun” portion. That changed things. We got my mom to do sporting shots in the park and even though we never covered the whole park and I was sweaty like a pig pushing 2 wheelchairs uphill/downhill/etc, everyone had fun. I look back at the photos and there it was, valuable time spent well.

I got home that night and told my dad, “Hey, we should do this more often.” Never thought I’d ever say this.

I think May Day finally changed my view about my family.

It’s not how much you have or how good the situation is, its how much you are willing to give and sacrifice wholeheartedly that matters. And I think, that’s the very basic foundations of love that has brought many families and relationships thus far.

Share on Facebook

At some point you have to choose, to take one and leave the other. To weigh the options at hand and to pick the better one. It’s always hard to have to drop the second best, but its necessary because the best would leave if the decision is lengthily dwelt upon.

I think such decisions come more often then we think, whenever we choose, we automatically weigh and automatically discard. I’ve seen friends who bought products based on their outward appearances only to be furious to find out that more research would have given them a more value added purchase. I have done the same in another way and learnt my lesson through much pain.

It is funny how things are usually unbalanced, so much of one and so little of another. So in the end, one must decide which is more important and stick to that. Forgoing is painful, because as humans, we love to have the best of everything. But as the word “choice” suggests, one has to be left out because not everything can be taken in together.

As the realist I am becoming, I have to face emotions I have been avoiding and correct them. Take them under my wing and bend them to the flow. It’s time to be stop being stupid.

Not everything is worth its weight in gold, unless they prove otherwise. And then only, would they deserve a second chance.

Share on Facebook

1. They think they can swim

2. They think they can float, thus pretending to swim

3. They think they are deficient if they cannot swim at the deep end.

4. They wanted to try (at the deep end).

5. They were given help. But they were too good to accept it.

6. They never bothered to check the sign that said “Deep End”.

7. The Lifeguard jumped in to help, but they struggled and kicked so much, the Lifeguard was shoved away.

8. Their swimming instructor did not teach them well enough, even though the rest of the class did fine.

9. The currents (in a swimming pool) were the one that pushed them to the deep end, or away from the guiding walls.

10. It wasn’t their fault, the deep end was too deep.

Take this literally?

Share on Facebook

Don’t you love telling others what you think?

Some take it a step further and want to impress their views upon others. Some go to the extreme and stop at nothing until others believe in their opinions.

Now this is fine until we go into the realm of giving advice. Not many understand the magnitude of this task. Not many realize the delicateness of this position. Some continue to spew out information they think it is fitting. Some destroy lives with such advice they give with little thought.

The core problem is how advice is given. Many go by what they feel, or even worse, speculate. Emotionally driven advice. Brilliantly stupid.

Remember, this is about giving advice, so I’m going doubly hard on it. Call me an arse if you like.

I’ve a couple of friends who gave advice on the fly. “<Insert name of victim>, I think you should not do that… I think… I think…” Now the best question to ask, if you are on the receiving end, is “Why”; and watch what kind of backing the “adviser” has to say about his / her advice.

Advice must be given based on factual grounds. Don’t lead a person if you yourself are partially blind. Do you understand the person you are giving advice to? Do you fully comprehend the problem at hand? I could get into intensive details about understanding a person and comprehending a problem, but lets keep things simple. If, you do not know the person’s deepest strengths and weaknesses, seen it played out in various real life situations, seen how his / her character morphs into various forms when meeting different people; then you might not know him / her well enough. If you have observed but cannot make a consistent assessment throughout, it means you are FAR from understanding the person enough to be an adviser. Comprehending problems? You better know the issue from ALL sides, fully understand how the problem was conceived and that means doing more homework than talking to just one person.

If you have accomplished everything above, then you actually care enough to be an honest adviser. It then boils down to how the advice is given. Its just like writing a book. You may have all the brilliant ideas, but if you can’t phrase it and deal it out in proper doses, your ideas are as good as trash.

The final point is often ignored. Are you a testimony of your advice? There are so many doctors that cannot swallow their own pills.

I’ve seen so many “advisers” jumping to give others a piece of their mind and that irks the hell out of me.

It’s not supposed to be a game. You’re dealing with a life. Get your bearings right.
If you have to walk blindly, don’t drag another person into the same pit with you.

Share on Facebook

Isn’t that why you worry?

Worry about tomorrow, the next week, following month, next year, next stage of your life, etc. After living more than 2 decades on this earth, the one thing I’ll probably always crave seriously is stability. That’s down to the fact that stability grants happiness in my case.

Don’t get me wrong, I love surprises in life, but not ones that continually tease the foundations that you’re built on. I think it has become my style of handling all sorts of projects, requests, etc that come my way. I look to provide the requester stability and then work my butt off to solve the issue to maintain that stability. I don’t like to see people rocking on the high seas probably because I’d hate it if that happened to me. It has become so much part of me that it comes as second nature to anything that I deal with.

I’m writing this vaguely because I know people are looking at this. I have pretty much built myself from ground up to withstand storms. But if you happen to know that there’s a part of me that is not cemented yet, and you have the solution, let me know.

Thanks.

Share on Facebook