Bubbles

We are secretly brand whores!

Ah but RJ is a pretty pink little bubble where almost everyone is forced into the same mould, and eventually we are around like-minded people who judge for the same things, criticize for the same things and unconsciously stand by the same actions. We are happy because there’s common spirit to excel, common spirit to break the ceilings that bind us… and who knows, by the time we leave RJ, we may continue to graduate into an even prettier, bigger, pinker bubble.

I’m not saying I hate this culture; well honestly sometimes I do, yet certainly in many ways more than one it has shaped my character, determination and spirit. But then eventually I realise maybe it’s not so much the culture… competitiveness can be good, striving for excellence can be good. What more of compassion, of kindness? Sometimes we are too apathetic and concerned with where we ourselves want to go to be bothered to pop the pretty bubble we’re in.

Outside of the bubble, I’ve seen children with broken families, abandoned children, lonely brothers and sisters, people who struggle with sexual addiction, people who regret the moment they lose their virginity to someone they thought loved them, people who’ve tried so many times they’re close to having no hope, people who lost faith in life, people who hurt for revenge or pride, people who fail by the world, people who are bullied, children who have lost tempers and almost killed their parents, lost people who feel the most secure when they are alone by the cemetery…

And I know these people, or have friends that know them, not just know in passing like how we read them on newspapers, feel the momentary tinge of remorse (or even lament, tsk) after which we put the newspaper back down and continue on with our myopic lives! Right now you are not just reading about these people whom you know obviously exist, right now you’re reading about the real world that we’ve been pretty naive about, the real world that you don’t know! And it’s not something that you want to know so you can spice up that GP essay or research paper! And it’s NOT just something you angst about in a blogpost so you can sound more justified about the angst, because if not all you’re doing is simply stating a statistic!

I really have to grow in love, mercy and compassion, and I gotta do that because I want to be different and set apart from all this apathy in the pretty pink bubble. I don’t ever want to say something about how chasing grades is meaningless because there are so many lost souls out there; I want to say it and live my life untangling a real burden for these people.

To those lost souls who have forgotten to believe in the immensity of love, those outside and inside the pink little bubble.

Hah, Brand New Eyes

well one tree hill is a pretty awesome show i gotta admit… for all my previous prejudices against it. the sort like grey’s anatomy, one tree hill’s got the whole narrative inspirational tendencies but even closer to heart. it’s a hellhole of great quotes and nuggets of insight if you’re not one to entertain philosophizing – though i wish they could be a little less hocus pocus about life. just a little interesting line i heard off one of the episodes of season 5… interesting play on the beatitudes.

Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken.

- Albert Camus

Another from Camus:

I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn’t, than live my life as if there isn’t and die to find out there is.

Albert Camus won the 1957 Nobel Prize For Literature.

On a side note, I was blessed by my CLM mate for A’s… with bubble tea and kinder joy. Very encouraged and motivated by the motivational chat we had. Thank you, I will not forget to bless someone else too!

Reflections

I’m annoyed, so I end up annoying people.

If you haven’t already identified with that, maybe I could go on to tell you that this is actually bad and immature behavior! Everyone wants to keep their moments because they are selfish… to dwell in anger, pity, condemnation or denial a little longer. But I always try to shorten that phase… because any one moment longer, someone gets hurt one more time.

I think I said once at CLM about hope people having genuine hearts and authenticity… yea that’s right, we may be hypocrites more often than we permit ourselves to be; our patience may break, our mercy and compassion may fail time and time again, but everyone here has a genuine heart to change and to bless others by being better people.

Proverbs 17: 27 – 28

A man of knowledge uses words with restraint, and a man of understanding is even-tempered. Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent, and discerning if he holds his tongue.

Do not pass judgments nor look down on us simply because we fall short of your worldly standards. He may not have as many friends, she may not be as skilled at handling people, or he may not have as glib a tongue, but if I can see through all the imperfections and appreciate the genuine heart that wants to change the world for the better (or for God?), then God Himself will surely reward these people who are what the world mocks as indoctrinated fools. Do you have that heart? If you do, then I appreciate you. If not, do not then hasten to despise us.

I am not perfect, but in my life I invite God to chisel some of the baggage and deformities away. It is painful and scary, but it is a life I choose. This does not mean we are simple-minded!

There are 2 equally viable possibilities for a madman: he is either sane or insane. How do you ever know you’re dreaming unless you wake up from the dream?

All I’m saying is, the life you are living now, does it make sense? The labourer’s appetite works for him, his hunger drives him on. This is how people are living their lives now. Is it how you are living yours? Driven by appetite? The people in RJ, the people outside, the people in the world. The suit on a man says nothing and covers more than skin; it could be covering the black primitive heart deep inside. However far your ambitions take you, it could take you farther and farther away from your better self, with all your willingness to acquiesce akin to a mad dog’s chase for the frisbee. It could take you farther away from humanity, till the day I won’t be able to recognise you anymore, or worse still, I recognise your name by the newspaper headlines reading some terrible embezzlement scheme or whatnot you just got caught for.

And then I wonder which lie, if at all, is better to live by/in.

The Bridge

Pilfered this while browsing through FB profiles… I cried watching this |:

On The Rebound

and not looking back, though with excess and the taste of blood in my mouth

Leona Lewis – Here I Am

Yushan sang this for Daixuan on her 21st yesterday… ah so touching, I wanna sing this to someone soon ((:

What can I say

POLO BOYS just makes me wanna…

swim everyday of my life :O

The Tudors

The synopsis of the upcoming drama series:

Bypassing the typical costume drama for a more scandalous take on the times, The Tudors will focus on the rarely dramatized, tumultuous early years of King Henry 8’s nearly 40-year, omnipotent reign of England.

How scandalous a take is questionable, but, this is exactly the thing to spice history up eh? Scandals, almost like the Da Vinci Code except in a historically dishonest way. Honestly, I’m not a history student and it doesn’t matter much to me how much of that history is twisted (not now at least) but it’s fascinating how we inexhaustibly look for things to hype up… and the concept of palace intrigues and the character of Anne Boleyn etc is too attractive to pass.

I’m just sincerely hoping it’s unlike the current ones running around that are overly corrupted with explicit sexual scenes or I’m going to get upset about American drama series becoming un-watchable… After A’s, i swear i’m going couch potato on West Wing, Boston Legal, Burn Notice, Moonlight, The Tudors, Supernatural and the list goes on.

These are ALL just causes for MOREE.

ps. don’t forget the sexy Rhys-Meyers drawl haha and pardon for the disgusting hangshot on the youtube video.

Thoughts running and running, Running to God

1. i dont have alot to offer… think today was one of the other days where one too many revelations come pass and you’re just too shocked to take it in and make sense of it… one of the stark moments where the layers of work, daily life and mundaneness are peeled away to reveal something that otherwise needed time to work at. sometimes this wonderland that you stumble upon is a door opened by someone else’s hands, or mouth, or white noise that silence and vacuum churns up
2. we all hate the idea of essence… and the concept of reality. we’re probably very good at filling empty pockets that either get infinitely larger or leak indiscriminately… we hate the idea of ‘at the end of the day’, the idea of ‘and it all boils down to’, we colour between the lines so we won’t have to see that before it was bland, we pick and choose the colour we want and work to buy that precious shade of golden that you always wanted for the hat that your caricature wears. we wander around and try to wander as far and as much as possible so it feels like as if we’ve seen everything at least once; stopping would be a crime because someone might get there first. or we try not to stop so we won’t, in the silence, suddenly realise that reality is still as reality is, unchanged and oblivious to our presence or our efforts
3. we don’t want to belong to anyone, but we want to be sure of our identity… we want to be brave and free, but we want insurance and surity… we want to test and challenge, but we want to have the hard cold truth… we want our individuality, but we crave to be part of something bigger, what do we want and how do we ever decide
4. happy times dont mean that you’re in the spirit… applies to both secular and ministry wise.. in fact the spirit may be more real in times of trouble and testing. before the valley of insight, it may have been success or simply success propped up on paper stilts, only the valley of insights reveal what truly came before. rethinking the times, where the success was from, were we deluded, were we naive, were we contented, were we blind. but now i know, now i know better, now i know where to go, and it’ll only be higher and better and glorious and brighter and closer and closer
5. from my fingertips there is only two breaths worth of quick submission into the moving scenes of wild laughter. behind the retina the image congeals into a grimace, a frown, but it is a wrong-side up perspective… you say, and think you deserve a point of view if all you see is you? i remain silent, but i still think i know best; you see, nobody looks at the heavens from the wrong end of the telescope

PARAMORE! is my new loves&foreva

Paramore paramore paramore makes more sense than any other worldly thing

I settled down
A twisted up frown
Disguised as a smile, well
You would have never known

I have it all
But not when I wanted
‘Cause hope for me was a place uncharted
And overgrown

You make your way in
I resist you, just like this
You can’t tell me to feel
The truth never set me free
So I did it myself

You can’t be too careful anymore
When all that is waiting for you
Won’t come any closer
You’ve got to reach a little more
More
Open your eyes
Like I opened mine
It’s only the real world
Life you will never know

Shifting your weight
To throw off the pain
Well you can ignore it
But only for so long

You look like I did
You resist me just like this
You can’t tell me to heal
And it hurts remembering
How it felt to shut down

The truth never set me free
The truth never set me free
The truth never set me free, so I’ll do it myself