It could have been me! That’s what most people would say at a near miss of say winning the lottery, getting a promotion or averting a possible accident.
Found out someone I knew got retrenched. Only a two-weeks notice was given. As I looked back at the events that unfolded, I saw how the stage was actually set for this to happen. From the looks of it, it really stinks. And all I could say to myself was – it could have been me.
Darwinism, that’s what it is all about.
It all goes back to survival instincts. Talk about caring for the weak is just overrated. No one will give a shit if you are weak and small. It is Who who can get the job done who seizes the deal. This Darwinistic language is so pervasive in our everyday lives that it manifests in all shapes and sizes in our daily exchanges and our decisions made. To say that it is pervasive is probably inaccurate – it has been innate and will not cease to be in our subconscious.
Being otherwise is the conscious, rational, cold emotive side talking. The well-reasoned and thought argument after considering all assumptions and exceptions is just far too appealing. Nobody grants you a get-out-of-jail card for free just because you have a great personality and you have been a good kid at school. There are no happy endings in reality. No one is going to bend the rule for who you are, though they might considering doing so based on what you are. I wished I could say its sad, but the truth within this is that it really isn’t. It is all about accepting the cold truth that won’t sugarcoat its words to make things better.
The people who are good at this game are not necessarily the best players, they are just the best managers. They know how to pick their players and when to play each player at the best time possible. It’s about being at the right place at the right time so that the right-ess possible thing happens to you. You could be the best player; but at the wrong time, even with the best qualities, you will still be passed over.
Things may change; people may behave outside this observation. Reality is – most times it takes something life-changing to really change a person. For example, regret, guilt, death, loss, grief. Notice what all these words smell of – negativity. Being at the top of the game will rarely (never) change a person’s mindset – why change if I am already at top form? That’s how we have all been tuned. Everyone is like that, including yours truly. Yup, I am in one (maybe more) of those states I described.
The reality is: no one will make exceptions or bend the rules for you. You are, just, what you are; you are not who you are. You will always be judged on your expected value.
Perhaps the irony of this all that is making me feel so devastatingly horrible is that I can rationalise that there is nothing that devastatingly sad about that.
Sadness is chronic.
A nudge here, a pinch there and I feel sad. It’s no longer about mis-steps in life and how I wished things were better.
I finally understand what people mean when they say sad people don’t need solutions. All they need is a human to listen to them. Guess the tricky part is that this other human doesn’t know what to say or how to react. Sad people know how to solve their own problems. They really do. Guess it really just hit me today.
Lately, I am in a lot of pain.
Pain on many fronts, feel myself slipping back into the self-deprecating mode but I guess I can’t really say it out loud cos it pisses people off plus I’m mostly in this state due to my own doing. Therefore, I can only blame myself.
But I guess most of my attention has been used up in dealing in my physical pain and my difficulties walking. This gives me a convenient excuse to discount all the other types of pain felt rationally and develop temporary amnesia for them. I wish someone will just hit me with a dose of morphine in each foot. I miss waking up every morning and just skipping to the loo. Mornings are especially hard now. They remind me of the sheer difficulties of reality. Hits me hard and I wish it was just night-time all over again.
Yet as I compare myself in my current position and two months ago, I rather pick my current position – pain over fear. Then I realised how bad it must have been to be living in extreme fear. I don’t know how I got myself out of bed every single day to go to work and just waiting for shit to happen. I guess it’s really bad when the mere tinkle of the phone sends chills down my spine. It was really tough.
As I look back, I wonder why does it always rain on me. I tried my best to follow the rules of the game of life. No matter how I hard I try, I find myself spurned. It’s tough and I guess it gets tougher. Ironically, I guess I’m in a better mental state because I feel hardier. Yet the pain and hurt linger. I don’t know when my time will be and I guess I can only wait in pain, patiently for my break.
I have to admit I am guilty of of confirmatory bias here. But here’s exactly what I have been trying to say all the time – money dehumanizes the human spirit.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/27/rich-people-_n_1305008.html
I won’t forget the day someone of higher authority (whom I had deep respect for) scoffed when I said money was evil. Using perfectly intact reason and logic, here is the evidence you challenged me to provide. When genuine passion is measured with money and power, it does nothing to uplift it. It only dehumanizes the human spirit.
Hello Capitalism!
The Pill comes nicely packaged with a fabulously enticing label that reads “Eat Me”. The efficacies of the Pill are unknown but rumor has it that it makes you feel better instantly. To eat or not to eat. The head says give it a try, what’s the worst outcome? You just get sick and you will get all better tomorrow. Just give it a shot. The heart is not so sure. Something is not right but you don’t know what’s wrong.
There are just so many things in our Capitalistic world that are just like the Pill. They offer instantaneous relief and so many of us jump onto the bandwagon. The promise of better days ahead is just so alluring. The pictures painted in our heads are always rosy, never dark and stormy. We always ask what does the Pill do; rarely do we ask what are the side-effects. For every one bad thing, we can think of five good things. That’s how our minds work – aversion to negativity.
Here comes the next part, the Pill makes you better but it also makes you ill. Run as you want, before you know it, you have become addicted to the Pill. How can you be drunk yet sober? How do you know you haven’t been addicted to the Pill already? Have you? Are you?
I like Wicked!, not for the singing and dancing, but for the story. Musicals have this really predictable theme in their stories. Usually the good triumphs over the evil. With Wicked!, you are just not so sure.
So is the good witch really good and is the bad witch really wicked? The evil witch looked like she was fighting a battle, a battle of David vs Goliath, one which she was doomed to lose but appeared to have the power to conquer. Was she really powerful? Was she really doing it for the greater good, or was she just lost, as lost as the good witch?
Are the good people who follow the rules, follow the norms necessarily good? Should they fight these norms; should they speak up against them even though they know what is the truth? Are people who fight norms necessarily bad? Can people who follow rules, who go with the flow be actually bad? Is the truth the best medicine in our half-confused, half-drunken state? Are we all fully conscious of what we are doing, or are we all just lost in this world, not knowing and hoping that life offers us first-class tickets in this journey?
I have been angry, sad, jealous, envious, greedy all at the same time. The riot of such emotions suck. I thought I had been humble, but truth be told, life has never been more humbling that the last couple of years. It has been so tough on the spirits, I wish I was drunk more often. Being drunk made me sober.
Do I see goodness? I’m not so sure. The seemingly good has its evil moments; the seemingly bad has its moments of goodness. Where does this leave us? Be good and bad, all at the same time. Life is not going to offer you first-class cabin tickets all the time. You want it? Earn it. Be it to beg, borrow, steal or earn it through sheer hard work. At the end of the day, don’t look back in anger. Cos being angry, sad, envious doesn’t help an inch. What helps is what you have – be it experiences, things, money, love, friends, knowledge. No one will stop to say what a poor thing you are. People will just scorn you if you just don’t fit in their definition of goodness or their definition of being successful. You make your own definition of success and you live with it. If you hate what you have, either change your thoughts or choose new goals.
I just remembered two things I learnt from school which I forgot – people have an aversion towards loss and a better memory for misfortunes. Emotions towards loss and misfortunes make these memories more painful and memorable.
I see Season 2 of Reason vs Emotion. To cut the chase, I have decided - R.I.P. to all these shtick. I’m just going to start my happy list. I may seem like I’m in denial but I know all I am trying to do is to re-wire my mind and body, which seem to be failing me of late (pun unintended).
To end off, just a few quotes from the week, which seemed to be speaking to me in their own ways:
“Never resist a temporary inconvenience if it results in a permanent improvement.” -H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
“Problems are only opportunities with thorns on them.” – Hugh Miller
“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.” – Confucius
And finally: ”Trust your intuitive heart.” – Richard Carlson
I have leapt. Just patiently, waiting, now.
Just hit me that my life hastily be forever altered. I can no longer wear cheap pretty shoes, Birks are going to be memories. I have been banished to the land of ugly, well-supported shoes for the elderly. All thanks to my feet condition. Just realised that probably very few people have this condition on both feet. I’m one of the lucky few and at my age. Wonder why I don’t have such luck with the lottery.
Was just looking at all the shoes people wore this afternoon. I don’t wear the dangerously skinny stilettos nor the menacingly high platform heels/wedges. Yet those guys who balance themselves precariously on these modern day shoes have the good fortune of normal feet. Such is life – some guys just have all the luck.
So here I am, stuck with the nightly stretching exercises and hot-cold therapy and collapsing arches on both feet. And I’m not even a fast runner! Damn.
Somedays I feel sorry for myself, my life feels like a soap opera with obstacles after obstacles. Yet I just have to get up after each fall, coax myself to walk on. They say what doesn’t kill you make you stronger. I say what doesn’t kill you instantly kills you slowly; just like how i’ll be needing those feet aids from now.
so here i am, at the crossroads, again, for the umpteenth time.
somedays i get increasingly frustrated by my frequent stops at the crossroads; many days, i wonder what i have done to deserve such bad luck; and just on those remaining few days, i wonder why my life is fraught with adventures (pun totally intended!).
in spite of this all, i guess i have been forced to grow up much faster than my peers. somedays i am struck with pangs of resentment, envy and jealousy, that i have to admit. yet i guess to a certain extent, i have been forced to confront with some existentialism issues which i guess they haven’t had time to think about (since they have been so preoccupied with other things in life).
either i have learnt to accept that there can’t be a “perfect life” – something gotta give; or i have learnt to convince myself of the “lies” i have weaved for myself to make sense of my experiences. whatever it is, i think i’m happier to know that i have simplified my life a fair bit by taking myself out of the rat race and learning to appreciate the other things in life. and most importantly, i have learnt not to measure myself and my “achievements”.
I think I really started 2012 with a BANG! I did something so liberating, I almost said in my boss’ face – you suck and good riddance to bad rubbish. Well, I wished I knew how to do this explicitly yet diplomatically. Nonetheless, I hope somewhere, somehow, someone will be wise enough to pick that up.
Though I learnt much, I wished the entire ordeal didn’t happen to me. Thankfully, I am glad that this too shall pass and this is something that I can change and not be stuck with it. Thank God for that!
