Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass... It's about learning to dance in the rain.
Sometimes I really wonder if anyone in this particular organization is in a similar state as I am. I believe I’m some of the very few who hop around so often, if this continues I’m very sure you can call me the “Jumper”.
Looks like my previous posts which harp on my rite of passage to seek redemption will be my very last. Life is pretty paradoxical I guess. At a point of time, I desperately want to run away from my fears, but now when I’m ready to face them and destroy them for good they just disappear.
You know, in life some of us reach a state of pseudo-enlightenment. Meaning, we get enlightened for a period of time but when a similar situation hits you, you just stumble and fall into dire straits. I had a terrible night yesterday. I couldn’t sleep because this new arrangement that god has for me has thrown me into confusion again.
I really wonder why life throws us into such madness. Imagine yourself pulling you hair, laughing and crying at the same time. That’s how I felt and I guess it won’t be the last. Well I guess life is like an automated tennis ball launcher, except it tosses obstacles. Life often throws us into a state of pain, it could manifest itself in many forms for instance things that irritates you and makes you angry. Imagine this, if your surfing, would u ride with the tide or would u ride against the tide? Well the answer is pretty obvious, we really got to take a breather and smile at anything that life that life throws at us. You got to trust god …
“Child of My love, fear not the unknown morrow,
Dread not the new demand life make of thee;
Thy ignorance doth hold no cause for sorrow
Since what thou knowest not is known to me” – Exley
This is a passage I like a lot, it is written on the 21st October issue of the daily bread.
“But all is shifting and changing these days; I’m being led out, away from familiar surroundings and into a vast unknown. What new limits will overtake me in the coming days? What nameless fears will awaken?
We may well be dismayed at what life has for us this year and next, but our Shepherd knows the way we’re taking. And he goes before. He will not lead us down paths too dangerous or too arduous where he cannot help us. He knows our limits. He knows the way to green pasture and good water; all will have to do is follow.”
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Recently, we had a magazine talk and I’m really a sucker for it, but not this time. These magazines always cause me to feel very insignificant. There’s like so much out there in the world that I don’t know about, so much that I desperately want to find out.
The colossal misunderstanding people have of me is that I’m a studious guy who reads a lot. Unfortunately sorry to disappoint you but I’m exactly like cloud from final fantasy 7. Unlike Zack I’m no hero but I’m trying so hard to be one. I’m always pushing myself to read more because there’s so much that I don’t know.
My new job, what can I say? Some people envy it, some people love it and some others hate it. Well, I guess when you are forced into a situation similar to ours, you would probably understand that no matter what you do, it’s still shit and like all others kinds of shit they all stink. Except this stink bomb is really potent, a minute passes like how an hour passes, and an hour seems to take days, and just 1 day takes forever.
To forgo a life which many subjugate themselves too, I have decided to make good use of my time to find out about so many things that I don’t know about, for instance history of many countries, how stocks work and perhaps catch a few copies of fortune magazine.
Ever since I hurt my ankle, I haven’t been playing basketball. It’s been nearly a month and the half and I’m still not fully recovered. My soul hungers for the game. Whenever the thought of not playing for the week kicks in, I get really angry with myself.
----------------------------------------------
I once thought that as long as I followed the principle of “to not unto others what you don’t want others to do upon you” it would be fine. However, I’ve come to realize that perhaps I haven’t been sensitive enough, sometimes what might seems ok for us might not be ok to others.
Tenderheart, rings a bell? It’s the care bear with the love on it’s tummy… actually we humans are all tenderhearts, it’s just that we live in a very cold world. The things that society do, the small uncaring and selfish ways cause our hearts to harden. I’m not trying to be a saint because I’ll admit that I am influenced greatly by the world too, so much that I fear myself.
Maybe that’s why we go to church to let god mould our hearts. This is gonna sound random but I’m currently reading “The Lost Symbol” and there’s this part that make me wonder if I’m just a delusional fool. There’s this part that talks about noetic science and how human thoughts can actually alter reality in a form of altering matter itself. I wonder if prayer works the same way, afterall it is said “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”
I always believed that praying was about being sincere and telling god about it.
[ Stay Happy =D ]
the origin.8:46 PM
Rite of Passage (Continued…)
Chapter 5: When we’re All Superheroes
Ever wondered what the world would be like if it were to be filled with superheroes? Well, I believe all of us are superheroes, not in the aspect that we fight crime with our superpowers. Rather I meant it in the sense of being in a masquerade party.
Maybe superheroes aren’t as strong as we thought of them to be. Or at least not many people would know about what lies behind the mask. For Peter Parker there was Mary Jane, For Bruce Wayne there was Rachel Dawes. Ever wondered who would unmask you?
Perhaps in our lifetime, we’re all waiting for that special someone to unmask us. To understand us and to love us for whom we are. However, often when the mask is removed it not necessarily leads to a chain of happy events, sometimes when unmasked you might actually get to see the ugly side of a particular super hero. Many people get frightened and run off at the true sight of certain heroes. In my opinion those people aren’t the real ones that are destined to unveil your mask.
Love isn’t exactly milk chocolate; it’s more like dark chocolate. Bitter-sweet, get what I mean? It consists of tolerance, understanding, sacrifices and all that. Sometimes, I fear that dark chocolate can get too bitter.
Chapter 6: And just like that Woofie, Teddy and Banjo went missing
Things happened too fast even though I was told beforehand. When I reached home 2 days back during my weekend book out, things were no longer the same as it used to be. The air was intoxicated with loneliness, I guess things will never be the same as it used to be. On the 21st October 2009, my sister left Singapore to further her studies in Australia.
Despite the 6 years age gap, me and my sister got along really well. We would talk about school, games and almost everything else. We shared the same room for many years, even though we fought over many stuff like the snacks, the massage chair and the computer but still we are still as close as ever and I love my sister.
I wasn’t a good brother; I did many mean things to her when we were younger. I was the over-conceited, domineering, scheming, arrogant, Sore-loser, tyrannical and selfish brat. If you knew me when I was a kid, I was totally badass you would have called me the little tyrant king. Currently, many memories flash by me, memories that strike me with sadness. I recall the pillow fights, the slamming, the ice cream man, the airport, Duchess, the times when she got scolded, the times when she asked “Why are you guys” fighting.
As a kid, my sister was what you would call the perfect little girl that every parent would want. She was extremely cute, well behaved, sensible, kind hearted, hard working and she never held a grudge with anyone and she loved drawing! Imagine an older brother cheating his 6 year old kid sister of her $5 savings to buy ice cream. Pathetic isn’t it? She would ask her parents, “Why are you guys fighting? It’s scaring me.” Imagine a K2 kid telling her parents that.
If anyone were to be blamed for who she is now, it would be me, or at least that’s what I think. She’s conscious of her weight and it’s my fault because I was a glutton stuffing the both of us with endless bags of potato chips when we were really young. If anyone were to complain that she was a tom-boy, it would probably be because she had a brother who influenced her to play the computer too much. If anyone were to blame her for being so rebellious it would be because you people don’t understand what it means by “circumstances mould you to become who you eventually be”.
Despite how badass I was, there too were times when I really wanted to be a good brother. For instance when I threatened to beat up the kids who bullied her at school, calling up the bully at school and talking them and their parents, to comfort her when she was scolded by mom or dad, to buy her gifts with most of my left over money I had during primary school, playing G’s, exploring all the fun stuff like what camping would be like, to teach her the right moral values that will enable her to draw a fine line between right and wrong.
(The first time I called home during BMT, I felt a great sense of homesickness, but it wasn’t talking to mom or dad that made me felt like crying. It was talking to you. You were more than a best friend, you are what I call a sister.)
Going to Australia would do you good. At least that was what everyone said. It was time you grew up to become who you have to be, to become the independent, well mannered, confident adult whom would eventually outshine her brother. I wonder if we would ever talk as much as used to do, I wonder if we would ever play consoles together again, I wonder what effect time would have on us.
Even though I am extremely sad that she had to leave, but I guess the one who would be filled with even greater sadness would be dad. After all that Wednesday would probably be the last time he would ever see her again.
(In case you were wondering who Woofie, Teddy and Banjo were, they’re the names of some of the soft toys that my sister keeps by her bed.)
the origin.12:50 AM
Rite of Passage:
I’m not sure if this is true but for every shortcut that you take, it often comes with a price tag “Guilt”. I took some shortcuts not too long ago, and even though I do feel guilty at times however I would still term it as a wise decision.
Not everyone in such a situation receives a chance to redeem oneself. Often if you seek the path of redemption you would have to go through what you call a “Rite of Passage”. I’ve been given an opportunity to redeem myself, and so it begins …
Chapter 1: There Is No Benchmark
Whenever you’re in dire straits, you’d wonder why such shit happens to you. Some people might say … “Every Cloud has a Silver Lining”. I often choose to ignore such phrases simply because it has no impact on me. Alternatively, if someone were to tell you “It’s always good to know that there is someone worse off” you’d be feeling pretty much better. When I was in primary 3, I’d always been glad that I wasn’t rock bottom and there were fellow companions who did just as bad as I did. At least you would know you’re not the only one standing up being punished.
Do you envy people who are in a better “state” as compared to yourself? Well sometimes I do, and sometimes we not only hope that there were people worse off than we were, but we do wish that we were in a state better than them. Perhaps this is what you call greed, but don’t forget the saying that there is always a mountain higher. If you were to compare all the time, when would you be done comparing? I’ve learnt lately that sometimes greed corrupts people and we have to suppress it.
Chapter 2: Why night insects are attracted to light
Ever wondered why certain insects are so attracted to light that some might give their life up for the sake of it? Well I don’t know but there has got to be a reason why …
Ever felt weak and wanting to give up? We all do. Some of us often claim that night is the hope and morning is the beginning of a hell hole. On certain days I struggle with myself, I often wonder why I chose such a route when there could be an easier way out. But there is a reason why some of us have to go through shit. You’d have to go through shit to know how smelly it is.
I thought of an analogy of the chin ups, some people could do it and some others like myself can’t. It’s somewhat like being unable to bear you own weight. Some people can bear their own weight, some others have to depend on others and they can’t shoulder their own responsibilities. Perhaps going through shit is a form of shouldering your responsibilities.
I often wonder what being an adult is all about, because I couldn’t imagine myself as a fully fledged adult. If a man doesn’t earn enough to feed his family, is he deemed unfit to be an adult? If a parent is unable to provide the emotional support that a child needs, is he or she unfit to be a parent? I once yearned for a book called “how to become an adult” and I too once asked a friend of mine what it takes to be an adult. Was it about being able to drive, understanding how credit cards work, earning loads of money and knowing what the hell is going on in other countries around the world? He told me it was about being “responsible”. I’ve come a point to think that his absolutely right. I recall a movie “I am Sam”, it was about a retarded man who fights for custody of his child, even though people doubted his abilities to raise a child, but I felt he was an adult one that deserves respect because he fulfilled his duties, he was able to bear the heavy load on his shoulders; one known as “responsibilities”.
When studying medic knowledge, we were shown grotesque pictures of injuries and I wonder if one day if I were really to be a doctor and a patient was in a bloody condition, could I save him calmly and sadly the answer was a no … I didn’t believe that I could, I felt that it was a responsibility too heavy for me to bear.
I carried out my first IV session not too long ago, when I did it I was very afraid of hurting my friend and so I did it slow and panicky, instead of reducing the pain I made it worse. I even required help from the instructors. What made me felt really guilty was how much I complained of how painful it was when my partner jabbed me and on the other hand when he was jabbed, he kept silent.
(Something cool but random that I encountered. “To understand is not to sympathize, to empathize is not to sympathize. A letter of condolence to our society, sorrow applied to our national Apathy”.)
Chapter 3: For good or for bad?
I once told myself that humanity was dark and dangerous, and I lost confidence in them. But I’m starting to wonder if I was really afraid of how dark humanity was or was it myself whom I feared. The caged beast that is within me concealed from others, one that I struggle so hard to suppress.
I talked to my friend once about ego, something that we all have. My senior Wayne once appointed me as a leader because he felt that my ego was the lowest amongst the members and I wouldn’t abuse my power. I’m not too sure if he felt that I had none, but I would say that I too have my own ego.
When I discussed this with my friend, I told him ego was evil it made arguments and strife among people. My friend on other hand said it was essential for the improvement of mankind. Even though I would say his right to a certain extent, events that took place lately pointed to me otherwise. When someone does something to hurt you, you would flare up and fight back. Lately, I have been unable to keep my cool, I keep asking myself why is it that others can hurt people and get away with it, why couldn’t I do the same and be mean to those who do wrong to me. [That’s why I have the potential to become a terrorist, a psychopathic killer like the joker]
I told my friend, I would rather people hurt me than let myself hurt others because that way I would still be able to sleep peacefully at night. It’s what you call guilt-free. The bible tells us this …
“But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” - Matthew 5:39
Many would mock and laugh at this, I too couldn’t understand it well not until a few days back when silly arguments heated up and grown men started to behave irrationally. From this day on, I’ll try to suppress my ego and pride, let others trample on me and not do the same because if I do, I’m no better than them.
“Forbid it Lord, that I should be
Afraid of persecution’s frown;
For you have promised faithful ones
That they shall wear the victor’s crown” – Bosch
Chapter 4: Finding the needle in a hay sack
Something that astonishes me has taken place, if you are asking me how I feel like at the moment; it’s somewhat like how a geoscientists would feel. Geoscientist who monitors seismographs for 10 years of his life, assuming that nothing’s going to happen and one fine Sunday morning when he’s slacking off his job eating his donuts and he suddenly screams “holy mackerel”. The seismograph suddenly shows readings of an earthquake.
I lost something pretty important to me around 3-4 weeks back. I thought all would be the past but all of a sudden, the past crosses with the present. I’m pretty unsure myself, I was once the knight who was ready to slay the dragon, but now I’m no knight. I’ve thrown my sword into the grave of swords. I’ve got to search within the graves to see if it’s still there …
the origin.11:05 PM
Yesterday, I watched the movie “Knowing” with my family. The movie wasn’t really under the genre “horror” but the mysterious aspects of the show really creped me out. At first, I thought the movie was trying to prove the fact with regards to what John (Nicholas Cage) was trying to explain to his class. That is … whether events that take place were just purely random out of chance for instance mutation etc… or were they linked to a series of events.
But as the show went on … I realized that the movie was more or less trying to depict the “Last day” described in the bible in terms of analogies and symbols. Anyways … I felt that the movie was a wake-up call to remind myself how “ready” I was if the day were to come. FYI, I’m totally not ready.
I believe most people know me as a not so confident type of guy. Well it’s true; I would say that the inferior complex syndrome within me kicks in quite often. Lately there’s this singer whose voice penetrates my heart, one that fills me with sadness, regret, guilt and inferiority. But this isn’t always a bad thing, her voice makes me want to change myself. Change myself into someone who would be more “Eligible” to my future dream.
If you’re kind of similar to me and you feel inferior to others at times, think about in what aspect do you feel inferior and act upon it, that way the next time you think about it ain’t no ICS gonna kick in.
the origin.11:26 PM
You know, some ink fade away pretty easily. Couple of weeks back, I reached out into my pocket to get my wallet and I found an old piece of paper. It’s a wonder why the ink hadn’t faded away yet, it’s been almost 9 months already. I guess certain things don’t fade away that easily as compared to the ink on that paper. But today, I lost an object pretty important to me, something we’d call a sentimental object. I guess maybe it really is time to say goodbye …
the origin.10:16 PM
Previously I talked about confidence and believing in yourself. Well there’s something else to it that I forgot to mention. You’ll probably get the message after watching this video …
Did you catch what I left out?
Ray Allen: “My confidence in my games comes in just my preparations.”
Gilbert Arenas: “My Dad was always told me that if you wanna be good, you know you got to keep at it because while your resting someone else out there is working in the world”
There’s this anime that I like a lot, It’s called “Hajime No Ippo!” It’s about boxing and there was this particular part where the middle weight boxer Takamura went into the finals against the world champion, surprisingly by round 5 he was in a state of semiconscious and the particular thing that kept him going was the basics, those long tiring days of doing the same thing again and again. His vision was compromised; he couldn’t hear his coach yelling at him, all he could hear was the crowd cheering. Despite all that he was able to execute his moves because it has been drilled into him. Likewise, if you want to be good at something, you’ve got to work extremely hard to an extent that it gets drilled into you. Just like what Ray Allen said, I believe that the only confidence that I will have is in my preparations.
3 weeks back, I thought about this and thought of a different way in training myself. I practiced a lot be it in terms of physique or technique. All those hard work paid off today. Every Sunday, me and my friends would play 5v5 full court basketball and at the end of each of those days, we’d end up defeated utterly by those older more experienced guys, despite so I’d always tell my friends that those guys on the court weren’t gonna win for long. We’ll defeat the next time. Week after week, time after time I’d say the same thing and guess what? This time, the day ended without me saying the same thing because we finally won and it was no fluke, we did it twice in a row.
I realized that after I flared up and exploded on one of my friends, people started to take things more seriously and we changed our style of playing. We played what’d you call basketball formations where there is a movement pattern that we have to adopt. It took us time to learn it, it started off quite ugly but as time passed we got good at it and it certainly helped us clinch our victory today. Set aside the formation, another determining factor was will power or rather FIGHTING SPIRIT! Fast breaks in basketball really require a lot of energy, you’d have to sprint with all your might and get to the other end before the defense returns and today we all ran like we’ve ran before.
I feel that lately we were playing more like a team and it gave me the feeling of what’s it like to play in a real basketball club. It’s always been my dream to play in a basketball CCA in school where we get to enter competitions, stay over-night for camps, understand one another and appreciate each other. I hope I can realize this dream when I get to Australia. Whenever I tell my friends that I can’t stand physical activities in the army but yet if it were to be basketball training and even if it were to be 2 times tougher, I’d go all out. They will always highlight this as sheer irony.
[It’s all about fun, and I really love it very much.]
the origin.12:39 AM
If you’re a big fan of Slam Dunk like I am, you’d probably recall the big misconception everyone had when we saw picture 2. When many of us read this part of the story, we were damn sure Sakuragi was going to confess his love for Haruko. But damn were we wrong, instead of telling her that he loved her, he told her something that I feel strongly at the moment, he told her he loved basketball.
Ever since primary school I have watched this anime, till now I would have watched it at least 7 times and yet I will never get bored of it. In fact, I would say this anime kick started my love for basketball.
Basketball is something very special to me, it brought meaning and joy to my life. I recall during secondary 2 when I first started, I was so weak that I couldn’t even shoot the ball at point blank range. It didn’t even hit the rim. Me and 2 buddies went to the nearby neighborhood court and started challenging others, we weren’t too good initially but after 5 months or so we familiarized ourselves with the good players and we made sure that they familiarized themselves with us, and we certainly did. Each day when I went to school, I just couldn’t wait for the day to end and it was basketball for the next 3-4 hours. Day after day, there was this fire burning in my veins. The fire … the hunger to defeat someone better. I wanted to make sure that the “entire list” of well known players were beaten by me. It went pretty well and when I was about to complete ¾ of the list everything just went poof.
2 weeks ago, me and my mates went to another court to challenge some Pinoys for a couple of 5v5 full court games. Knowing how my stamina sucks, I was the first to pant frantically. Despite trying our best we lost all 3 games 6-11. The thing was that they weren’t playing at their very best
The difference between Singaporean players as compared to the Philippino’s started to become way clearer. They were huge and athletic whereas we were smaller in frame and less “Active”. It was somehow a mismatch akin to asking a featherweight boxer against a heavy weight boxer. I started to question whether some of us were destined to do some stuff while some of us aren’t. It’s like playing RPG games where things get typical, the mage always has high intelligence , the rogue always has high dexterity and the warriors always had high strength. The problem would be what if you had a high intelligence but you wanted to be a warrior instead of a mage? I started to question where my talents were, was I really that huge and overpowering in the paint? Apparently not, I’ve been challenging players who are like 188-194cm lately, and when the big boys rolled in hell did they teach me something about huge and domineering. I started to think maybe I just wasn’t cut out for certain things.
When I was in Secondary 2, my friend once said that I was going to become “Kaede Rukawa” for “Haruko’s” sake. I’m pleased to inform him that I have finally grew to become like Rukawa in 1 aspect. Unfortunately that is not basketball but sleeping. During my days of forced labor, I’ve learnt the different techniques of relaxation and dropping dead like a log when there isn’t much to do.
I recall Haruko-Akagi once telling me that I shouldn’t keep looking downwards and I should be more confident. Not that we talked much, but if there was something serious that she told me that went deep into my head, it must have been that.
I talked with one of my friends not too long ago about “Confidence”. Knowing that I don’t like to be too cocky, but I believe that we need a certain degree of confidence. This reaches out in all aspects be it work or play. But let’s talk about my favorite topic, basketball.
“Perry Rebound!”
“Perry pass out, don’t use brute force”
“Perry pass to … don’t take shot”
“Stop using your reversed shot it’s not that accurate”
“Shoot properly, don’t ally-opp”
I know that some of my friends comment on my play a lot because there really is room for improvement. But I exceptionally hate it when the original purpose becomes distorted. Just because I’m usually “Soft”, quiet and easily pushed around. It doesn’t mean I’m fine with being a scape goat where all the blames is pushed. Sometimes if you become too critical on a friend, you can seriously dampen his confidence.
Lately, I realized that it wasn’t the lack of opportunities that made my aggressiveness die down but it was my confidence. It was broken and shattered all over the place. In the past an encounter with a good player would only make me more confident and I was going to prove he wasn’t as good as everyone says, but what happens now? When I meet a stronger player I get scared and my hands get shaky and I miss a lot of my shots. In the past when the score was 10-2 (if the opponent scores one more point it would be over. Most street games are played 7 or 11 balls.) I wouldn’t give up, I would explode despite how tired I am and much to many people’s surprise it always ended up 10-11. But what happens now? When things get ugly, I start worrying and even though I try my best I always hoped that there would be someone out there who can pull us out of this shit. But why didn’t I believe I could have been that guy?
But there was this faint light within the darkness, if there was something I was proud of it would be my tenacity and guts. I wouldn’t hesitate to jump and contest the shot made by a 6 footer even if it meant “clash of the titans”.
As my confidence started to waiver, I recalled a scene in Naruto during the chunin exams. When Neiji lost, he made a casual remark that the shadow clone technique must have been Naruto’s favorite technique and his forte. However on the contrary it was his worst and he failed the ninja examinations 3 times because of it. My point is … ? I don’t have to be the best dribbler, or the sharpest shooter or the biggest man on the floor. I just got to believe in myself and play with all my heart. If I do so, I’d probably be the unstoppable juggernaut.
[Never stop believing in yourself]
the origin.12:11 AM