I borrowed this book called "Burn This Book... and Move On with Your Life" It talks about some plaguing thoughts and bad habits that we might have. There are a few which i think are applicable to me. So, these are a few reminders to myself.
- I will let go of the need to be perfect.
- I will break habits that are harmful to my health.
- I will remove unhealthy friendships from my life.
- I will put off procrastination. (.... I'll try... :p)
- I will resist the urge to please at the expense of my own needs.
- I will let go of my need to prove myself to others.
- I will replace prejudice with compassion.
- I will reduce the number of buts and ors in my life.
Are you down to earth or is your head in the clouds? Are you naughty or are you nice? Are you wrong or are you right? Unfortunately our culture isn't very comfortable with paradoxes. Most people feel like they must be one thing or another, which leads to confusion. We live in a colorful world, so it doesn't make sense to make everything black or white. Don't limit yourself.
My grandma Miriam always says that the beauty in life comes from the ANDS. You can be down to earth and have your head in the clouds. You can be both naughty and nice. You can even be a psychologist and a go-go dancer. Likewise, you can lose your buts without quitting smoking or spending hours on an exercise machine. The ways we often use the word "but" is the same way we use "or". It is exclusionary. For example, instead of saying "I like your art project, but i think it could use more blue," say "I like your art project, and i think it could use more blue." Discover the peace of mind that comes from accepting the ands in life.
- I will knock down the walls that separate me from others.
(While on the way to the temple): Everybody is different. Everyone is unique. Everybody have their own dreams, beliefs, thinking, behavior.. Don't force yours or what you think is right, on anyone. Some people have a different way of handling the same issues.. Some people go on a different path towards the same objective... If they have the same objectives, and even if they might travel on the same path, but some might walk, run, crawl or even skip :s The amount of conflicts will be reduced if we can understand and accept.. And, we must remember that doing these two acts, doesn't mean that we approve of what is being done...
(While watching Heroes :p): Nobody can be good or evil. Everybody is good and evil. Intentions and actions...
- Good Intention + Evil Action =Evil? ( gr's ans: Good )
- Evil Intention + Good Action = Evil? ( gr's ans: Evil )
i did my smile again :p someone said that i'm acting cute... :/
It's true :o The rule of thumb of preparing food for a large group of people, is to prepare half the amount that u initially wanted to prepare.
I learnt a few things from morning till now..
- The dark blue personnel that we see at the MRT train stations or on the trains are actually from the police side, not the civil defense side.
- My tutee's dad shared a bit of history with me while he was driving me to the train station. During the 1960s, in Singapore, the British took care of almost everything for the citizens. Mothers only have to stay at home to do her job. If anyone need to go to any hospitals, there will be buses fetching them to either SGH or KK or.. don't know where.. :s You could just go down to the British Office for anything. If you have a damaged lightbulb, you could just bring it down and they would exchange a new one for you. The life was so good then that when Singapore wasn't under the British Rule anymore, some people immigrated to Britain. A lot of Indians and Bengalis who lives in London now, were actually from Singapore... Anyway, my tutee's dad is an Indian. I don't really know whether this is true anot, but his story made Singapore's history a bit more.. "alive" for me. It's very different hearing it from teachers and from people who have really been through that period.
Why Subservience Is Always Dangerous
- Those who want to control everything and deliberately choose someone with weak ego-strength are sure to reap a bitter harvest. The subservient partner or friend becomes increasingly unhappy, less and less fun to be with, less interesting, less lovable, and - most significantly - less able to love.
- The best friendships, marriages, business partnerships and parent-child relationships are those that strive for balance. The connections work because each person is getting some needs met, and it is a fairly even swap.
- For such mutuality to occur, three things must happen. First, the two unashamedly enter the friendship with the hope that some of their desires will be answered, and second, both listen carefully to the data their friend is feeding them about what is desired from the friendship. Finally they both throw themselves into meeting as many of those desires as possible.
- We would like our friends and our mates to be so attuned to us that they know our desires instinctively, but that does not happen often; we cannot assume that our partners can read our minds.
- You take risks if you become open about your longings. Once in a while the other person will not respond. But it is sad if you stop expressing them because of occasional disappointment and thereby bed down with disappointment as your constant companion.
- Is usch raw animal passion wrong? Some theologians and other thinkers believe so, calling Eros, "I-love-you-because-I-need-you." He is, in one psychologist's words, "seeking self-gratification by means of another," and with such a definition the writer supposes he is pointing out how evil pure erotic desire is. But it is not evil when rightly used: it is wonderful. It is I-love-you-and-I-need-you.
Self-Worth: A Requirement for Intimacy
- "Friendship is seldom lasting but between equals.... Benefits which cannot be repaid and obligations which cannot be discharged are not commonly found to increase affection. They excite gratitude indeed and heighten veneration, but commonly take away that easy freedom and familiarity of intercourse without which... there cannot be friendship. - Samuel Johnson "
- We can't have a very positive self-perception if we're not loving and being loved. And we can't be good at love unless we have healthy self-worth.
- a good relationship will help build self-image, but you cannot depend on others for nearly all your sense of worth. It must come from within you.
- the better we can know ourselves the better we're going to feel about who we are - the more at peace we'll be.
- Self-acceptance doesn't mean that we'll like all we find within, or that we'll stop working to improve our faults. There is a difference between encouraging the sinful tendencies within us and accepting the fact that they are there.
- it is also essential to get a grasp of your hopes, your desires, your particular pleasures, what you like, and how you're different from others in these needs.
- how could they reveal their needs and desires to their close friends and mates if they didn't know what they wanted?
The Art of Adaptation
- just as it is important to ascertain your desires, it is crucial to bend to the desires of your friend.
- If both have strong reasons to stick to their guns, then they try something else. Negotiation. Compromise.
--- quoted from "The Friendship Factor" by Alan Loy Mcginnis
Loyalty - The Essential Ingredient
- Those who are rich in their friendships seem to be those who believe in lifelong relationships, who stay with their companions through thick and thin, who weather the dry spells.
- There are people who are chronic failures at all their intimate relations and who are always on the move - lurching from one marriage to the next, from one friendship and into another, thinking all the time that the trouble has been with their friends. They suppose that their hope for happiness lies in finding better people somewhere in the world. Often estranged from their relatives, they also carry on feuds with their neighbours and coworkers. But sooner or later, you must learn to hang on when the going is tough.
- In any permanent relationship, there are going to be periods when your friend is not functioning well and consequently the friendship is not functioning well. The test is whether you can stay and wait.
- others have periods when they need the support and guidance or people who love them.
- The demand for complete reciprocity all the time can hurt a friendship.
- in all relationships there is a movement. It is like a dance - at times moving toward each other, and at times apart. The secure friend does not panic during a phase of withdrawal.
- most fulfilled people do not have to shove and push. They do not worry about intimidating others; they have a certain confidence that comes from giving to others.
Rejection and Its Aftermaths
- To succeed at intimate relationships, you need a certain freedom to fail.
- Most experts at friendships have gone through a few ruptured relationships that remained broken, and they realize that it will happen again. They do their best to prevent it, and to provide good maintenance for their current friendships and family connections, but if something goes wrong, they do not automatically assume that something is wrong with them.
- Friendships, like plants, can die natural deaths. People move away from others in interests and inclinations.
- Lifelong relationships may be wonderful, but they are quite rare.
- When we have had a good friendship for a few months or a few years, we can be grateful for the time we had together rather than lamenting that it did not last forever.
- The mark of success - ability to handle rejection
- If they are cowed by failure with a few customers, they'll never hit the big time. But if they can endure rejection and keep trying, confident that they will eventually find a customer where everything clicks, there's no stopping those kind of people.
- the inescapable fact is that not everyone will like you. When they do not, it is not necessarily a reflection on you. The chemistry simply is not right.
- "A man, sir, must keep his friendships in constant repair. If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone."
--- quoted from "The Friendship Factor" by Alan Loy Mcginnis.
Why Relationships Go Bad
- If you realize that every long-term relationship will have its difficult times, you'll not be as likely to jump ship when your friendship is yawning and pitching.
- if you have invested heavily in a deep relationship - a friendship or a marriage - don't junk it too quickly. It probably can be fixed.
- Consider a relationship which you feel could be satisfactory yet leaves much to be desired. Take the bull by the horns. Simply ask the ... person,"What do i overlook in our relationship which is obvious to you?" Listen attentively to the answer even if you do not agree with it. Take time to think about it.
- You must have a certain moral certitude to admit you are wrong. Because relationships are the most difficult things we attempt in this life, of course we will make mistakes in them. And when we do, we can save ourselves considerable misery by apologizing.
- If your relationships seem to be shorting out regularly, you might do well to ask if your neurotic patterns of relating are causing the problem.
- For instance, we sometimes see others through the filter of past memories. A person reminds us of someone we once knew, or we get flashbacks to some failure in a similar relationship.
- Each of us has a craving for emotional nurture, and along the way each of us has acquired a bagful of tricks for getting it.
- survey your relationships to see if old neurotic patterns, which once worked with someone else, have now become counterproductive.
Creative Forgiveness
- faltering relationships can usually be salvaged. Occasionally you realize you're in a poisonous one, where for your sanity you must withdraw, but most often, broken relationships stay broken for the lack of a patience that will let the other person go through a period of temporary insanity.
- the dangerous thing about bitterness, slander, wrangling, malice, and the whole cargo.... is that these attitudes eat away at us like acid. Not only does our own bitterness slop out on those around us and corrode our relationships, it also eats away at our own souls.
- You can't be free and happy if you harbor grudges, so put them away. Get rid of them. Collect postage stamps or movies posters or coins, if you wish, but don't collect grudges.
- It is curious what a short memory we have for our own mistakes, and what a long one we have for the mistakes of others.
- If we are to forgive freely, we need a tolerance of others as generous as that tolerance we display towards our own errors.
- Someone has said that we judge others for what they did and ourselves for what we intended.
--- quoted from "The Friendship Factor" by Alan Loy Mcginnis
Steven woke up with a killer hangover after attending his firm's
>
> > Christmas Party.
> >
> > He didn't even remember how he got home. It's 8.30. What day is it? Thursday. His wife must have gone to work.
> >
> > As he struggled into consciousness through the fog of a pounding headache, his stomach plummeted as he wondered what the hell he did last night.
> >
> > He forced himself to open his eyes, and the first thing he saw was a couple of aspirins next to a glass of water on the side table. And, next to them, a little vase of sweet peas, freshly picked from the garden.
> >
> > He sat up. The bedroom was clean and tidy, - there was no trail of drunkenly abandoned clothes, fresh air was coming in through the window and all was serene. He stumbled to the bathroom, also pristine, and, squinting gingerly into the mirror, saw that he had a black eye. This was not a good sign, but no memories were returning.
> >
> > As he concentrated hard on getting the world into focus, he saw a post-it note stuck on the corner of the mirror. It was written in red, with little hearts on it and a kiss from his wife.
> >
> > 'I'll ring your office and tell them you won't be in today. Breakfast is in the oven. Try to eat something and go back to bed for the morning. There's snooker on TV this afternoon. Take it easy today, hope your eye doesn't hurt too much. See you tonight. I love you, darling!
> >
> > He stumbled to the kitchen and sure enough, there was hot breakfast, steaming hot coffee and the newspaper. His teenaged son was sitting at the table, eating.
> >
> > Steven, bracing himself, asked his son what happened the previous night.
> >
> > 'Well, you came home after 3 A.M., drunk and out of your mind. You fell over the coffee table and broke it, and then you puked in the hallway, and got that black eye when you ran into the door. '
> >
> > Confused, he asked his son, 'So, why is everything in such perfect order, aspirins by the bed, a nice note from Mum and breakfast waiting for me?'
> >
> > His son replied, 'Oh THAT!... Mum dragged you to the bedroom, and when she tried to take your trousers off, you screamed, 'Leave me alone you slapper, I'm married!!'
> >
> > Broken Coffee Table £250
> > Hot Breakfast £3.50
> > Two Aspirins 20p
> > Saying the right thing, at the right time......PRICELESS'
Next time, if someone ever tells you that you're not being yourself, you can tell him/her, and also remind yourself that you're still being you. There may be times when you don't behave or think the way you usually do, but you're still being yourself. Even if you think that you're copying someone else's style or way of behavior, that's still you.. the person who copies other people's style or behavior.. :p You're always you :o
And... I think the phrase "finding yourself" might be a bit over-rated... because... you've never and you can't possibly lose yourself. "Finding yourself" is just a process of you knowing and accepting who you are... i think... :p
i did my smile again :p someone said that i'm acting cute... :/
