Maybe I've frozen my heart for too long, for I've already forgotten how its like to feel strong emotions.

Maybe, we all are sick people who wish for pain, as it at least reminds us of our mortal existence.

Clinically depressed:

When you feel sad that the world seems to be happily living ever after and you're the only soul that's suffering.

每个故事都会有一个主人公。这主人公在故事里，是无法被代替的。故事就环绕着他，各个脚色在故事里都没他重要。

要是你能在故事里成了主人公，那有多好？

但如果你只是故事里的一个小小脚色，只能妄想当一次主人公，滋味会是如何呢？

我们都想当主人公，我们都想有个美丽的结局，我们都羡慕主人公在故事里美丽的展出。却忘了主人公，也不只是个脚色？再美丽也都是作家的成果，再感人的情节也不都是作家的构思？再华丽的主人公，也只有作家笔下功夫才展现地出来，也逃不出作家的文笔。

这和其他人物，有何不同呢？

Today, its my birthday again. As a practice, I would return here every year on this day if I can help it. For it means a lot to know, somewhere, someplace, I have a sanctuary whenever I need it =).

Perhaps what I should do is to evaluate myself, what I have gone through the past year, what I've learnt, what I've lost?

To begin with, probably is the most obvious loss of freedom through the service of our nation. probably contrary to many's opinion of me, I don't hate serving the country that much. Yes it has its really bad moments, but honestly I feel proud being in green.

Its hard to uphold what I hold in high esteem as compared to what I see in reality.

The real world has so much grey that the black-and-white world with shallow shades of grey I had in mind no longer applies. Perhaps this is the greatest life lesson I've learnt this past year.

Its no longer possible to uphold everything you believe without compromising.

The year spent I've lost many, yet at the same time gained many friends. Unfortunately the lost are more of the female species whilst the gains are largely, if not all males. But even the closest of brothers have innate restrictions.

The past year have also lacked regular/structured studying. I often wonder how I am going to get back to the studying intensity that my peers are going through now. Will I wither and fall away slowly, till it'll never be back?

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

If I were to make a "new year resolution", it would probably have to be survive my next year without making much enemies!

For the me today will never accept the world today.

Army taught me one thing. Even if you aren't happy, wish that others are, and not that they suffer together with you.

Being human, none of us like to be the only one suffering. Whenever bad things happen to us, we wished that it isn't just only us, but have a friend or someone we know to be there, to suffer with us. It kind of makes us feel better that we're not the only one suffering.

But thinking objectively, isn't such a thinking selfish and irresponsible. What you cannot enjoy, you don't want others to enjoy as well. Really mean isn't it?

Since it happened to me so many times, I've really really learnt how to wish deep down that they enjoy what I cannot have, rather than suffer with me together.

有些事情，看透了，就别再想了。

And you begin to wonder how the others are so strong when you are so weak.

欺骗了全世界，始终骗不过自己。

诚心诚意的千言万语不比几句甜言蜜语。

If what you say isn't what others want to hear, nothing will get through.

Only when the accused desired the undesired outcome would blaming be acceptable.

Many a times we point fingers, even if its accurate, we do not stand in their shoes and realise they don't want it to happen either. For in our point of view, their mistake resulted in my loss, when I didn't make any mistake. Therefore they are wrong and we are right.

In life this situation happen all the time. A weak team member in any organisation easily fall victim to such unfairness. The incapability of one, should have been considered before any action is taken. When the incapability of one results in the failure of a project, why blame him/her? He/she didn't want it to happen either, whoever released the leash should have considered the dog's behavior, in the most crude sense.

Now putting in this way seems like the one who released the leash is at fault. But then again, he/she probably didn't want it to happen either. We often fail to see that a failure, isn't a one step thing. It is an accumulation of mistakes, negligence by different parties different people that overall causes things to fail.

While not as obvious in reality, it is made inevitable apparent in games that require planning. I once heard the saying, or something similar to the meaning of "One only wins in chess when the other makes a mistake." Only with small mistakes would we eventually crumble. Yet mistakes are inevitably made by people everyday.

How then, are we supposed to face every situation, the right way?

Life taught me some lessons.

1. Thinking too much does not get you anywhere.
In the battle of waterloo, Napolean hestitated to attack even though he had the larger army, just so the afternoon sun could dry up the battleground to favor the usage of cannons, which he so loved thanks to his family history. Unfortunately, the delay in time allowed the enemy's reinforcements to arrive and subsequently, as we all know, ends a chapter in history's book.

2. Not thinking enough does not get you anywhere.
Personally I don't think there is a need to further elaborate this, since from young, we were educated to think before we act, plan everyday meticulously, think out procedure as detailed as possible.

3. After reading the above, first you will 1, then 2. and end up with 3. Which is life gets you nowhere. It would be better to not think about this problem =).

Its one feeling when you know you are going to disappoint people before you get your results but its another when you know you disappointed people after you get your results.

First of all, sorry for not updating in a long time, if anyone even reads to begin with. Secondly, what I am about to write might have been written before sometime in the past, because it seems familiar to me, as if I've wrote it before, yet, new.

Everyone of us human, carries a ruler. We do not see the ruler, we feel the ruler, however we cannot deny the existence of it, as much as we cannot shrink the responsibility of using it.

Whenever we see someone new that we know we will get to interact more with the future, we use this ruler. We measure them with this ruler, from every single detail that we know about them. Regardless, a conclusion is always made, even if a single sentence has not been made.

Now in society where everyone carries the ruler, the accuracy of the ruler is determined by how observant the user is, or so we thought. We think that the more we see, the more accurate we get to measure other people, while they measure us.

This forms into a really complex situation, where we are often biased against certain people, purely because we measured them "wrongly". For example, some people might condemn one to a lowly level just because he/she has a tattoo, or smokes. The worst of such people are those that condemns natural disabilities, such as the inability to fully utilisize all five of their senses.

In other cases, our ruler measures wrongly because we are misled. Because everyone of us measures every other person in this world, every person in this world knows that every other person is measuring him or her. So instead of presenting our "true self" for others to measure, we tend to cover the bad side of us and just show the good side.

While to some this is "fraud" to most people, it is probably a form of self-defence, for their pride and ego, not that it is a bad thing.

Weirdly, while we measure others using this ruler of ours, knowing that they are hiding their bad side and only showing their good, we still based our conclusion on whatever is measured. Isn't it akin to knowingly getting the wrong readings? Yet we live by those data everyday in our heads.

Perhaps we are naive and think that we see more than what others can hide, but honestly, never measure at first sight and believe you are right. Those one might consider as the scum of society could have a heart of gold, if they are talked to. And obviously those appear to be in the high ranks of society, could have a really bad personality.

How then, I wonder, do we measure correctly? Over time we may tell, but time is never on our side, jumping to conclusion is not a good habit, and yet it allows us to be mentally prepared for the most likely to happen thing.

Therefore, sometimes I wish I could have eyes that pierce right through the pretenses, the facade of others, to know immediately what to expect and sadly I know it'll never happen.

I'm sure, whichever part of the world you currently live in, you would have seen fallen leaves before. Or rather the motion of how an orange-red leaf glides in the air towards the floor in autumn or a brown leaf swaying its way towards the earth. Unless you live in the desert.

Usually, with a brush of the wind, the slight pressure applied causes the already loose leaf to drop off, its graceful movement through the air sometimes brings lots of sentiments to people, for it is slow, not rushed, graceful and seemingly relaxing.

Have you then, ever seen the wave the very same leaf fall, when it is raining?

Amazingly, at least to me, the water droplets that fall from the sky does not affect the falling of the leaf as much as I thought, or imagined. Instead of getting lop-sided due to the weight of the water droplets, it falls probably just as gracefully.

Either that, or spins non-stop.

I don't know much about rain, but one thing I'm sure of is, the water droplets in one area don't fall all at once. Given that, the leaf should have been hit in different rates at different locations.

Yet it remains aloof and graceful. How?

Why can't we be like the leaf? In life, you have no idea what crap it might throw at you, or hit you with, yet if we are what we are supposed to be, then no matter when the hit, at where, we continue our journey, seemingly undisturbed.

At the same time, if we lop-sided, each and every hit in life would turn us around, make us wonder, and in the long run, just like the leaf that spins in the rain. It never ever gets to stop, has no peace in life, for nothing helps its descend with no drag and eah hit seemcs to just continue spinning it.

Its lovely valentines! One day many believes is for love. To confess your love for the apple of your eye, to get together with what already is, and what will continue to be, a partner.

So writing all of that, and the fact that I'm writing, probably already signals to you that I'm alone, in front of the keyboard on such a lovely night. Its one of those days where you feel surprisingly empty, wanting a void to be filled, yet although you know what should be there, you don't know what you really want there.

Then again, I wouldn't really call this an empty night. Rather, its a night full of thoughts and reflections. Its just like the ones where you lie on your bed, unable to escape from reality and all you do is think. Random thoughts? Or heartaching ones?

They are what appears to be closest to the 'you' you don't want to show others.

Its disturbing though, to realise that no matter how much thinking I do, I arrive at the same conclusion, where I cannot forgive myself instead of trying to blame it upon others.

Really, it makes me wonder at times, if I'm suffering from depression.

Haha.

害怕失去，所以宁愿沉默不语。忍受痛苦，在夜里，自己偷偷哭泣？ 虽然逃跑并不是最好的解决方法，但我们都不能发否认它是最快最简单的方法。

到最后，因为不想失去，而逃避，知道不该逃避而困惑，左右为难。矛盾不宜。

真像电视剧。戏如人生，人生如戏。真实得很呀！

Watching a lot of korean dramas(KDrama) recently. And apparently their catch point, or their appeal factor, is those touching scenes where they want their audience to cry.

Pardon my bluntless and lack of tact in expressing that point. But yea, they want the audience to be as emotionally involved as the characters, with preferably tears overflowing.

Now knowing this point, this "motive" of the producers and KDrama makers, and being the egoistic, arrogant me, I decided I'm above them and are not going to fall for it. So suddenly I find myself rejecting the tears. I hold them back, I suppressing my feelings.

And surprise surprise. I don't feel exactly comfortable.

Now that I think of it, isn't this just like how life is? To standby what we know, what we think is correct, more often than not we need to suppress our feelings. Its happens in our everyday life.

As a student, playtime always appeal to us more. Our heart wants it, our brains say no, we need to study. I bet every student had at least had this struggle a few thousands times in their "career". After all, when we force ourselves to study, good results may be reaped, but at that moment in time, we're unhappy.

In work, many a times we need to look at things objectively and forgo personal feelings. Unfortunately we all know that is not easy to do. It is especially apparent in careers like the police, where law and justice stands before feelings for friends or family.

We should all know how to control our hormones. But the truth is, we feel better when our hormones control us.

Even if its for that short period.

Random. But I just wanted to write it down somewhere.

走进一步，你就退后两步。何时才能让我爱着的你，爱回我？

I think that humans are sometimes really naive. We often think in only one direction. We do action A, and consequence A will happen. Little do we consider consequence B happening.

Over the past few days, I've seen/experienced a few of such incidents that led me into thinking that perhaps, if we think of both consenquence A and B together more oftenly, life would be easier.

First of all, this happened to me personally. And that is shaving. We all know it leads to a neat overall appearance that makes one look presentable. Now here's the problem, whenever we shave, we probably only think of that, Consequence A. Ask yourself, how many times have you thought of carefully shaving because you don't wanna have a cut BEFORE you ever got one?

Probably never. And after the first incident, we'll be careful for the next week or so and fall back into the careless routine.

If every single time we shaved we remembered we might get a cut, which spoils our overall appearance that we wanted to achieve, I think that we probably will get cuts dramatically less often.

Secondly, gambling. Rings a bell?

Gamblers more often than not, place their bets only thinking of winning. Especially gamblers who are already in debt. Instead of understanding that there're two sides to a coin, they gamble only see the one side. Which obviously, doesn't happen as much as they want to.

In my opinion, and its totally a personal opinion, not intended to offend anyone or any organization, I feel that only when you step into a "casino" mentally prepared and calculated the amount you are able to afford to lose will you be able to win. Of course this has no scientific basis whatsoever, but one who plays to only win would sometimes miss out important details and have error in judgement due to the pressure and need of winning.

Oddly, some stress-free players seem to win more. HOWEVER!!! I need to emphasize the point that regardless of whether you go in prepared to lose or not, gambling is still a game of luck, and it cannot be trusted, which overall concludes to me discouraging gambling.

But its the festive season and everyone should have some adequate fun =).

While we shouldn;t be always over-paranoid and suspicious of others, it really doesn't harm to take a little more caution. After all, what we do and think today, influence how we are tomorrow. And yes I believed someone else wrote something like that before, it ain't original but I have no idea who wrote it.

Don't be mean to others if you don't want others to be mean to you. Treat others nicely if you want them to treat you nicely.

Then why can't I just be default mean and be nice only when I want others to treat me nicely? We all know the world doesn't work that way, and yet we do not find a suitable reason why the world defies our theory in certain cases.

I guess it all traces down to the instant gratification problem that most of us modern people able to operate a keyboard have. We start to do things only with expectation of equivalent benefits.

Yet somewhere in our minds, we know that is wrong. That would not happen. Why do we only expect good things to happen to us? Why do we always think of ourselves first? Sometimes I really blame the survival instinct, animal instincts that lie deep down. For we cannot erase it, in certain times, are well-guided by it, yet it others, misled by it.

Some call it trustable intuition, others rely solely on it.

How horrible, is this double-edged sword that cuts us along with our enemies. For in life, we cannot hurt others, without hurting ourselves first. We won't know how it is best to harm, if we were never harmed.

Which is why, the most innocent, is everyone, in the few minutes of our life.

Only.

墨守成规。 According to google translation, it means "rigid".

I really wonder if that is a bad thing as its tone suggests. Personally, I do have this charateristic. The way of thinking, doing things in a structured way, less prone to changes. They say I can't think out of the box, others say I think logically.

Is it really that bad for people to stick to what they're comfortable with? Or will we only be really successful when we're willingly to step out of that comfort zone, put something on the line?

Chinese New Year's coming =).

Wanted to share a story I heard from my teacher since I was young. Back then, it didn't feel so meaningful. I guess, when we grow up, we understand things better, the very same dull old things, might actually prove to be jewels we've yet to discover.

So the story is about an orange tree.

An orange tree grew beside a road. The road is used daily by many people and is highly accessible! One day, a boy noticed some ripe oranges on the orange tree. Since the orange tree grew near the roadside, and does not belong to anyone, the boy wanted to climb the tree and pluck a few oranges for his own consumption.

Knowing what the boy is about to do, a wise friend advised him that the oranges on the tree would definitely not be sweet, but instead sour. Unconvinced, the boy pointed out that we'll never know whether those oranges are sweet or sour until we taste it. He then proceeded to climb the tree while his wise friend could only sigh at his lack of insight.

Upon obtaining a manageable amount of oranges, the boy greedily tasted the first one, and as expected, found it to be extremely sour. Puzzled, the boy then asked his friend how he knew the oranges were not to be sweet but sour.

His friend answered, "The tree grew by the road, accessible daily to many people. Had the oranges been sweet, countless people would have already been up there and plucked its fruit. The only reason why we still see the oranges on the tree would therefore be because they are sour and nobody wants them."


Isn't that just the perfect mirror of our complicated lifes? To get the sweet oranges, probably we have to be the ones to sow it. Oranges that can be found by the road would almost definitely be sour, for the sweet ones would long be taken already.

Something really short ^^

Its amazing how the very same phrase, in different tone, can bring out different ideas and intentions.

Do not forget.

A threat? A warning? An advice? A plea?

think of more and post it in the comments if you can =)

Didn't manage to write anything for the whole week because of work! And I guess even though it wasn't the most meaningful or fun work, it definitely has a lot of things for me to learn from!

In business, the customers always wants the best. They will always push for the best bargain, lowest price, best quality. So on and so forth. Its up to the producer to meet such demands, regardless of how ridiculous they are. The only way to reverse the situation is where no one else in the market are able to do otherwise.

In other words, the customers get the first turn, the advantage. Once it is outplayed, things fall back to the producer, even though the customer's got the money. Because every producer would now exploit the customer. And ironically, the customer is at the producer's mercy despite holding on to the chips.

While at work, my supervisor, someone really nice to us generally, pointed out that even though we had nothing on our hands to do, we shouldn't help him with his chores. Reason being we're the educated youth, and should work holding pens instead of a screwdriver or hammer.

Right now, everywhere in the world, governments think that the way to combat poverty in their country is through education. In view of this, wouldn't the majority of the population be relatively higher educated than what we see today? Wouldn't we all work, then, with just pens?

Who's gonna hold the hammer and screwdrivers?

Someone has to do it. Obviously none of the educated ones will want to do it, then labour-intensive workers would be in huge demand. How then will we survive? These are the questions I kept asking during my employment time.

The only answer I came up with is hardly realistic, yet not completely out of the picture.

Robots, machines, you name it.

Objects that are designed to overtake human expertise in the near future. Mass production is hardly avaliable currently, but would probably be in the near future.

I thought I had all the answers. Then I hit another roadblock.

In my employment period, the main assignment was to test and ensure the accuracy of the machine to be sold, such that the customers would be satisfied and trust such machines to take care of mass production. It was nowhere near an easy job. Sure it ain't labour intensive to do testing in a sample, but neither was it relaxing.

Machines, although less error prone as compared to humans, lack the ability to accurately identify their own mistakes and therefore correct them. Do not misunderstand me though, most machines in our current industries have a proof-reading function that allows products that are not produced properly to be separated from the rest.

Problem is, even the proof-read mechanism is a machine. Without real human supervision, nothing can be guranteed. This brings me back, then how can we really survive just on machines and robots in our lifes? The manpower to supervise them would not come from the educated. And again, a shortage of labour would surface.

I really wonder, how the world would change in the next decade or so. Since every politician would term the change as positive. Maybe I should rephrase and say,

I wonder, how the world would evolve in the near future.

The character's too real to be fake.

Its personality is far too similar to mine, its actions, consequences, identical. How did someone make up such a character? Are there many like me out there too?

It renacted how much we prefer to stay back and watch first. Understand before proceeding. Others call it stalking, we name it understanding. Wherever, whenever possible, always looking out, observing.

When asked, feign ignorance, yet at the same time wanting to divuldge. And as accurately pointed out, we speak in a not-very-understood manner where we did not lie, yet did not expose ourselves either.

The common thing is though, the happy ending is never meant for us.

How do you measure the value of your life?

Once, I tried to share my "wisdom"(self-proclaimed) and asked my friends, "Have you ever thought of how many people would attend your funeral(when you're dead, obviously)?"

And they treated it like a joke.

I often wonder if its a good gauge of the value of one's life. An average worker, in front of the desk in an office, would probably have slightly less than a hundred. From colleagues, relatives, family.

Those deeply respected, or feared would definitely have more. Politicians for example, even though we all know they have a dark side, but at their funerals, even the public is allowed to visit. And they do. Foes and friends whom used to interact with the deceased would attend. For them, a few hundred would probably be no problem.

What about each one of us? How are our expectations of life. Would we be loved by those around us the very last time, before we enter the earth or would we face an empty funeral?

Would you want to live your life such that when you die, many would come, to see for the last time, the one that used to be precious, loved?

Then again, back to my original question. How do you measure the value of your life? Is the amount of people who attends your funeral a good way? Is the amount of money donated at your funeral a good way?(chinese custom)

Or is it, at the end of the day, we ourselves would know, and have no need for an external indicator.

New year. Never wrote anything for Christmas. Not that I celebrate it much, since I'm not a christian, nor a believer of santa claus.

What baffles me is how everyone seem to think that the new year represents a new beginning. In fact it probably stem from the popular saying that every ending is a new beginning.

From the commonly known end of life leading to the beginning of the afterlife, to the ending of the education journey that leads to the new journey of life in society. We probably are totally stuck with the idea that with endings, come beginnings.

Really. Just because we begin a new year, doesn't mean we start with a clean white sheet. Stains from the previous year will stay. Some things will never change, and others would probably only get worse, regardless of whether our new year resolution is to improve it.

Speaking of new year resolutions, sometimes I wonder why they actually exist. In simple terms, new year resolutions are aims that people make such that they have a goal and can work towards it. Obviously they aren't really bad. Unless you really wanna find flaws with that.

But my question is, aren't aims to improve ourselves being made, supposed to be made, all the time? The moment we realise we're lacking in some places, shouldn't we already be trying to improve it? Why wait till the new year?

And unfortunately, the only excuse, or explanation I can find for it is because most people, me included, are too lazy to set goals and work towards them in our daily lifes. A new year is akin to the start of a new day. Sure, we haven't forgot what we did yesterday, but what's most important is today.

In case anyone is missing the point, what I'm trying to say is, new year resolutions aren't bad, do set them. But try to set goals to improve yourself in your everyday lifes instead of waiting a year. Constantly reminders and improvement is what would allow us to excel. And working towards that in itself, is already a goal.

And probably my new year resolution =).