think. visualise. believe. confess.

My eight-hour work shift yesterday felt longer than my five-day holiday in Langkawi/Penang.

I want another holiday please.

I don’t need your help.

I don’t need your money.

Let me in.

Give me a chance.

Should I stay, or should I go?

The rich gets richer and the poor gets poorer.

I want to be rich.

I just haven’t met you yet.

Is it ok to have two dreams?

I’d rather struggle to make ends meet doing what I love all my life, than cling to the promises of practicality and let the pursuit of a stable, comfortable life direct how I live mine.

I’d rather live a life of constantly being not good enough at doing what I enjoy, than be successful in something that doesn’t interest me.

Business/banker/accountant/scientist/engineer ≠ Rich
Rich ≠ Successful
Rich/successful ≠ Happy
Photography and writing ≠ No future

I am scared, but the fear strengthens me, and makes me even more determined.
I am confident I will succeed in what I’m pursuing.

There was a period in my life when I felt so lonely, so alone, so helpless, so lost.
I was never one good with speaking.
Slowly, I felt in love with words, and with language.
Because they are tangible, and real.
They turn my emotions and thoughts into something eternal and definite.
I can take my time to think and write, to ponder and reflect.
A few words can express so much.
Think about ‘god.’
A love so great and magnificent, so wonderful and all-encompassing.
Compressed into three letters.
The beauty of wordplay.
You can’t take back what you said, but you can erase what you wrote.
A friend once told me.

‘You say more in one sentence than you can ever in one paragraph, because of the meaning behind having just one sentence. All the emotion and feeling and thought is bursting out of that one sentence, unlike a paragraph; it’s so dilute, sometimes, it comes across as just words and more words.’

When you feel something, no matter how good or bad it is, feel it as deeply as you can. And remember it. Write it down.
- Anne Jackson

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

- Teddy Roosevelt

I shall have a ‘theme’ for myself this year.

It shall be ‘Listen More, Talk Less.’

I think I’m a good listener, partly because I have trouble finding the right words myself sometimes. But am I a good listener? Or am I just scraping the surface? This year, I wish to be able to really listen, and not just that, but to hear people. To hear their feelings, their emotions, their stands, and their hearts. Partly because I don’t have much time to listen to the people close to me for much longer.

This year, I am going to filter out all the superficial friendships that I have. I am going to end all the pointless relationships that I am part of. I am going to ignore all the unfruitful people in my life. And I am going to focus and build on the ones that are important to me.

I hope I can live up to my theme for the rest this year. I am going to try to keep it in mind when talking to people and making new friendships.

I will be going to Birmingham.
I will be going to so many different countries.
I will get a car.
I will get a bike.
I will get an apartment.
I will see snow.
I will get a job I love.
I will get a girlfriend.
I might get married.
I might have kids.
I might not be in Singapore.
I will be rich.
I might be poor.
I might be useless.
I will be fit and healthy.
I might fall sick and die.
I WILL succeed.

This next decade will be the prime of my life.
In 2020 I will look back at this post, and I’ll reminisce about all I’ve acheived and experienced.

If the previous decade hadn’t been easy for me, then 2009 must have been my worst year yet.

2010.

Fresh start. New beginnings.
I feel so liberated now.