The Next Step

Hi there, cyberworld.

I hope you've been fine.

I have an exam tomorrow. To be honest, it's the one I'm most worried about. I did okay in the assignments for this subject (tiny bit above average). Definitely enough to pass with credit (hopefully) but I'm worried about the exam. The essay section is daunting. Hmm.

I have stuff mind mapped, though. This is helping me more that I thought it would. I read a chapter and highlight important details. After that, I mind map the entire chapter. Then I read the mind maps as a refresher. It's good. My mind mapping skills are abysmal because I use lots of words and no pictures at all but it does work for me, so I'm happy.

Anyways, I realised today that talking really helps. I mean, I've always known this but I guess I forgot. After talking to Pete today, I remembered and I feel a lot better. Less.. heavy. Y'know? I think having a sounding board - someone other than yourself to talk to, a different perspective - really helps. It's like the fog is cleared away a little more and I know what needs to be done. I have no idea where I'm going still but I know what the next step is and really, that's all you need, isn't it? The next step.

So I know my next step and I shall move forward with it.

For now, though, it's Christmas. I have a list of gifts to get and I shall get them all this year. I don't know what kind of Christmas it's going to be this year but I'm pretty sure it'll be memorable.

Which reminds me, I have to read that chapter on memory now. Happy Christmas, y'all! :)

The Selfish Little Happy Bubble

These past few days have been good. Well, they didn't start out as good but they ended well. Mum and I drove all around trying to get a manicure but almost every place was fully booked. One place told us to come back later but we were really frustrated by then so we just headed home.

We spent so much time just driving around for 3 days but accomplished nothing. We were really frustrated. I reached a point where I didn't want to do anything. We ended up sleeping the days away. Finally, today, our luck changed. We got ourselves manicures and pedicures! Now we know better; make appointments, don't just walk in. So, today was good.

Yesterday was pretty good too. Went shopping with Claudine. We didn't find what she was looking for but we had fun. It's nice to spend the day with Claudine. She's a smart one. Makes me feel like I should read some non-fiction, thought-provoking books just so I can be on her level.

Anyway, we had a bit of an adventure too. As we got out of the monorail, Claudine's glasses fell. So basically, we left the train but the glasses decided to stay. Anyway, the couple that were sitting next to us picked it up and was waving to us through the window. Two seconds later, the train left the station.

Claudine and I decided to head to the next station. We though, hopefully, that they would leave it at the counter. Though, we couldn't be sure which station they were getting out or if they would even give it back. Anyway, we headed there but no luck. So, on to the next station.

We asked the lady at the counter and she was nice enough to call the other stations to check if anyone had handed the glasses in under lost and found. She said we should check back at the station we first got off. We went back and amazingly, the glasses were there. The couple had probably gotten off at the next station and turned back so they could give us the glasses. That was really nice of them. To take time out of their day to do that. So, yesterday was a good day too.

Now, on to the personal segment.

I don't like it when people are always sad. Or always angry. I feel like, I'm happy and I do not want anything to dampen my happiness. And yes, that is very selfish of me.

Sometimes, I just don't want to deal with sadness. Some people are always sad. Bad things always happen to them and sometimes, they're just to hard on themselves and they stress themselves out too much. I'm a positive being and the whole aura of negativity really brings me down. I don't want that right now. So, when there's sadness near me, I just shut down and retreat into my little bubble.

I like being happy and carefree. I love being simple. I'm content. And I'm really happy that I'm feeling this way. Sometimes, I really get down on myself. I've been really sad for not reason. There have been times when I was just constantly sad or angry. I don't know if I was depressed. That seems a lot more serious but perhaps it was a mild form of depression. Anyway, I've been there. But now, I'm in my Happy phase and I want to stay here as long as I can. So, naturally, I try and stay away from the opposite.

I do want to be there for my friends when they need me but at times like these, I feel like I can't talk about the happy moments in my life because it seems more than a little insensitive. Like, I can see the look of, "Well, glad you had a good time, really. But I'm suffering. So, can we focus on the bad for a minute?". That's what it feels like and I don't want to be insensitive towards other people's sufferings. I mean, I want to inhibit the frame of mind you are in so I can offer some real empathy, you  know. Really be there for you in the way you need me too. But right now, I do not want to surround myself with that. I want to be able to have fun with people. I want to be able to talk and joke and make art and laugh.

So, today, this week, I chose to put myself first. I chose to stay in my own little world and avoid the sadness because I'm not ready to let it go.

It hurts me to see people who I really care about be constantly upset. I can't remember them being just happy and carefree. They're in there somewhere but nowhere to be found, not just yet. And I'm tired of it. And I feel really guilty about what I'm feeling, about putting myself first.

But this is it. This is what I'm doing. I need this now. I will not go back to that dark place. And that means I can't be there for people who are in their dark place and I hate it. But that's my choice and I will live with it, I have to.

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On another note, that has nothing to do with what's written above, I've always wondered what it's like to date an actor. Hmm....

Somewhere Between Mammoths and Stock Markets, We Lost Something...

It seems that my brain cells prefer to put in some over time just before it shuts down for the night (leaving only the most essential systems running, of course).  I usually take about 30 minutes to fall asleep on normal nights (which isn't good, if I remember correctly) and in those 30 minutes, I come up with my best, most philosophical, sometimes even bordering on absurd yet quite thought-provoking questions and stuff. That's terrible since I won't remember half of it when I wake up.

Well, don't expect much of that here, though, because my brain is still far from shutting down for the night. Fret not, for at times when I'm fully conscious with no expectations of falling asleep, I do come up with some ridiculous thoughts in a spectacularly messy way :) (meaning, my brain likes jumping around topics like a cartoon Lima bean).

Ok, I was going to write something about social pyramids. Something along the lines of how the huge egos of humans are what created this world that seems to be ruled by social hierarchy. I had an impressive argument, starting off with the Egyptian Pharaohs and stuff but then I got side tracked by a thing or two..

Here's the first: Cameron Mitchell. For those of you who do not know (you unfortunate little beings), he's the amazing guy from The Glee Project. Now, if you have not heard him sing, you have missed something truly beautiful. Trust me, your ears will be grateful. I know mine are:)

My two favourites from him are Blackbird (a Beatles cover) and Lost (an Aqualung cover). This guy has a beautiful voice and the way he sings is just something out of this world. I could listen to him sing all day long. I actually stopped typing when I heard his rendition of Lost, and therefore losing the whole social pyramid train of thought.

Note to self: Do not listen to Cameron Mitchell when writing/typing.


Anyway, I just wanted to express my love of Cameron Mitchell's singing voice.It's makes me go all googly and weak at the knees. Swoon-worthy, for sure.

Now, the next thing that derailed my original thought was this: What is wrong with the world? Specifically, the people in it. I know that this is a very general question which can lead to tons of different debatable answers, so let me narrow it down to what I mean at this moment in time. When did human beings lose our innocence?

Of course, the religious argument would be Adam, Eve and a sneaky snake as well as Cain, Abel, some weird smoke and an axe. I've heard the stories before a dozen times but I'm not dumb and neither are you. The stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel are exactly that; stories. They're not real. It's just something the old timers came up with to explain our existence in this world, and of course sin, from a religious point of view (and by 'old timers' I mean those who wrote the book of Genesis).

So, that brings us back to the question. Where did our innocence go? Somewhere along the way, from being  hairy two legged creatures eating raw meat to the cave men that discovered fire and invented the wheel and then becoming the suit wearing, money hungry, power crazed people that we are today, we lost it. The most important part of our humanity got lost in translation while we were busy procreating. This then led to the worst part (to me) of modern history, the Holocaust.

Where, in between killing mammoths as the means of survival and harvesting rubber to fuel the industrial age did we drop our love of life? Not just the love of our own lives but that of others as well? How on Earth did we become these creatures that we are today?

Here's a breakdown of what we have become:
We are simple creatures who spend most of our time trying to earn enough money to get by. We live our entire lives trying to be someone; score well in school to get into a good university which, then, leads to more studying so as to get god grades and a good job. All that because we need to earn money to be able to feed ourselves and provide for our family. We keep reaching for more and when we get that, we reach further because that's all we know. We're explorers, discoverers. We keep going further and further. We want more. We never settle, we don't want to.

That's what we are.

There's good and bad, of course, in what we are today but I do feel like the bad is winning at the moment. We talk about beauty all the time. We talk about how pretty a rose is or how sweet honey tastes. We go on about love like it's the key to heaven on earth. We speak of music and philosophy, of politics and economics, of the beauty of life.

But how many of us truly appreciates these things? Whenever I walked in the tube stations of London, I saw a few specially designated spots for musicians to set up and play. For them to offer some beauty in the dull underground stations.Sadly, no one stopped. Sure, one or two people dropped some change into the musicians waiting guitar case or hat as they passed by but not one person took time off their busy schedules to stop and just listen, even for a second, to the beauty emanating from these musicians. Doesn't this prove that we're missing something? That, in our quest for 'more' and the great unknown, we have lost our sense of life? Our sense of real beauty?

If we can't take time off our days to stop and smell the roses, taste the honey and listen to some simple, original music in a dull subway, I think we're missing a huge part of life itself. Don't you believe that if everyone, and I mean everyone, from the Wall Street broker to the thief down the road, would just pause for a moment each day and realise how much real beauty our world holds, that the world would be a better place? I think so.

I think if everyone would just stop trying to out do each other, this world would be bliss. There would be no Hitler or mighty Pharaohs killing millions of slaves just to build a tomb. There wouldn't be any Pyramids either but I think I could live with that. I think this ideal world is entirely possible.

Here's the hard part; not everyone is going to jump on the bandwagon. Not everyone wants a world of beauty. And so we're stuck on this huge orb, all trying to survive and all looking for the great unknown. That better 'something' that is guaranteed to give us happiness. And while we're doing that, we try not to miss the blooming roses or the buzzing bees.