Sunday, March 29, 2009
Sian
Sometimes, you really wonder for what you do it for, seriously.
If I had the power to decide on everything and something failed, I'll be responsible enough, even happy to accept criticisms, because it was my doing, it was my fault, and being accountable is certainly nothing to be afraid of.
However, when someone else was responsible for something and yet I have to bear the wrath of the failures, it's certainly very pissfying, totally unfair, and to a large extent, disappointing.
It's disappointing that people don't take responsibility on something they have the power on. It's disappointing that people want to have a share of the glory when something goes well, and yet no pride to resolve issues when something goes wrong. It's also disappointing for people to direct their wrath at the wrong people, and in the wrong way.
I'm being overly critical. But I believe that these incidents show the true side of people. If it happened to me, I'll criticise myself for being that, take responsibility, repair the damage done, scold myself, and want to change for the better. If it happened to other people, the impression usually stays deep on me, and unless a new patch comes along given the same situation, the impression stays that way, and tada, you're judged.
And I mentioned it before that there are certain people I can't stand. And the categories don't change, they are the same. Of course, typing this kind of dislike and complain stuff on my blog won't win me any favours, but it doesn't matter.
The true sides of people are painful (including my own).
lowtide blogged @
3:25 pm
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Self-reminder
It's funny sometimes when I see people dreaming of grandeur.
You know, for people like when you judge (ok maybe I shouldn't, but I did it anyway) that they are (to be PC, "at this point in time") distinctly average.
Or to put it blantly: People who all talk but no action.
I have a friend who once told me: If you want to talk of any grand plans, make sure you gain the respect of people (often but doing it first).
From young, we are told to dream. The refusal to settle for average, the hope to be a head above the rest. It's easy to talk, really.
But when it's time to walk the walk (after talking the talk), this is the time these people fail, and sometimes I wonder whether I should look at people in the positive way or the negative way.
Positive way: At least they are aiming high and working for it! They are your friends, you should support them!
Negative way: The way they talk is damn impressive, but when the time is there for them to work, they falter in the execution. They can't even convince people their actions are worth their words.
Sometimes, I struggle between the extremes of the 'nice' me, and the 'cynical' me. Towards these people, while I applaude their ambitions and grand plans (and am sincere cos they are my friends and I truly wish well for them), the other me just wanna laugh at these people. Aligning to what my friend said, once these people lose my respect when they walk the walk, it is very hard for me to take in their talks.
Going on the vein of the 'cynical' me, small little incidents (or some even minor things) recently irked me to some above-mentioned people:
1. People who keep talking and talking things on paper, but when it is time for them to do things themselves, all the theory suddenly dissipates
2. People who said they refuse to settle for the average, yet I've seen nothing from them to suggest that they are going to break their current demise (other than thinking about it)
3. People who keep harping on some ideological ideals, but unable to match them with reality. The best thing is, blame other people for creating reality.
4. People who keep asking people for views, but refute nearly every single one of them (on both sides of the argument), ending up contradicting oneself.
Actually, all this irritation of other people or incidents only serve a strong reminder to myself. I'm a strong critic of things I see, so this lesson will be valuable to me:
Before you want other people to listen to your 'idealistic' grand plans, always make sure that you have been there, done that, or are putting your own actions to achieve them. If not, you lose your credibility, and people will just be irritated by you, and think that you're nothing but someone using 'idealistic' situations to criticise them.
And because of that, I'm always very wary when I aim for grandeur. For previous things like my projects; for current things like my studies; for future things like my career prospects. I'm really worried that either on current standing I'm just not good enough, or I haven't put enough effort to acheive those lofty aims.
To be specific, to talk things like getting a First Class Honours and getting a good internship is easy, but it requires extra effort like understanding the requirements for the Thesis, finding a good professor, exploring your interests, sourcing more places, brushing up your resume, polishing your interview skills, knowing what you want etc etc.
I'm really afraid that I will fall into the category of people I hate, by keep saying that I want this and that, but when the time comes to the crunch, I'll keep procrastinating and not put in that extra effort. Or worse still, if I forget to be humble, and constantly remind myself that what I
want to be is not what I
currently am, and I still need to put in a lot of effort in order to reach the former.
Ok! Time to work hard again! Admist the academic nonsense, to sit down and plan, for internships, and for my Thesis!
Reminder: It's only by
TAKING ACTION will I achieve what I want, not moaning.
lowtide blogged @
12:11 am
Monday, March 23, 2009
Mistakes
Sometimes we must understand that life is a journey, never a destination.
If it is indeed a destination, we might as well die now. Why bother with all this intermediate nitty-gritties?
If life is a journey, well, a journey is a process for us to learn, as nobody is born the nice, perfect, finished end product.
If life is not a destination, then the process to reach the numerous destinations in life takes time.
Some people reach them faster, some people reach them slow.
However, in this globalised hence competitive world, as we grow older and older, we often look for the immediate solution, the perfect end-products, often neglecting the process which learning needs.
We get impatient (with ourselves and others), we get frustrated (with ourselves and others), and we get judgmental (with ourselves and others).
The problem with many (including myself) is, in this fast-paced world, we often only see the destination as our aim, and totally forgot about the process in between.
The only way to reach the destination fast is not to blame yourself, feel sorry for yourself, be angry with yourself or even judge yourself.
It is to face the errors you made head on, and move swiftly never to repeat them.
Mistakes are the best platforms for people to learn, and while people know it, they seldom learn it.
Normally it's about defending yourself from people's comments, feeling disappointments, feeling anger, but seldom it's about reflection, learning, creating new actions if similiar scenarios occur etc.
Hence, the worst kind of mistake-maker in the world would be
1. You know something's wrong.
2. You claim that you KNOW what mistakes were made
Yet..
3. You defend yourself on the causes of the mistakes (and label them as legitimate reasons)
4. Cos you keep defending yourself (despite claiming to KNOW that it was a 'mistake'), you never really did change
5. Since there was not much change, number 1 comes again
6. You get frustrated.
7. Then repeat 1-6, especially point number 6.
Well, as I've said, like is a journey, never a destination. Everyone makes mistakes, that's just life, that's just human. It's how many times u get on point 7 that determines how much frustration you have, I guess.
If one keeps getting to point 7, well, I guess it would be better for one NOT to know his/her mistakes. At least in this case, one lives in the bliss of one's ignorance.
"They are just JEALOUS of my ACHIEVEMENTS, that's why they hate me." I quote, with a large LOL.
I'm lucky that I'm willing and able to face mistakes, dust myself off, and avoid making them again. Well, I think after attaining some age, I realised that life is a journey, never a destination. I learn to face mistakes a lot more positively after making them, and as long as they are not irreversible, personal pride always make me want to do a lot better to 'compensate' for past mistakes.
Well, again why am I typing this? I dunnos.
lowtide blogged @
12:39 am
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Thinking like LKY
Young people seldom associate with Mr LKY fondly, but slowly, I think my mindset is scarily gearing towards his.
I always believe that people who don't work hard (enough) have no right to complain about their current mediocrity. Because you have enjoyed the slack of, well, being slack, then don't complain about your lack of results (not just academically).
It's not that I never failed before. I have failed plenty of times, the deepest one hitting me was of course being forced by the school to drop to combined science during sec 4. I could have blamed the school, blamed my family etc, but I didn't. I just knew that I was lazy from sec 1 to 3, and I definitely deserved that kind of treatment. What did I do? Study in one year what other people studied in 4 years - in my sec 4 year. Think it was easy? L1R5 32 to L1R5 8. Go figure.
I still have yet to get an internship, up to now. Despite the many cover letters + resume I sent, I still have not gotten any reply from them. Judging by my major, my CAP, perhaps my CCA record, I should have a high chance of beating others, no? I can blame luck, I can blame the society. Yes, I did when it first happened to me. But so what? I still have to bite the bullet, waste more time, and email more agencies.
Mr LKY also once said, roughly, that if you have good people under you, your job as a leader is really simple, you do half the work. If you find bad people under you, you have to work doubly hard to cover for him/her. How true, how true.
Sometimes people think I'm being proud, or I'm being boastful. But come on, do people see the hard work behind? You think Oweek just happened like that? What about the arts camp + 1000 x proposal vetting + video planning + video filming + house ic por-ing + log buying + everything and everything (with work somemore)? We did the hard work, we deserve the credit. Instead of trying to be hypocrite and pretend to be humble, why not accept what you deserve confidently?
Logic test: I practised Natural Deduction for 3 days, pracitised and practised, copied those unreadable answers from the textbook website to a clear form, understood then memorised them. Don't I deserve the full marks and the credit I get as a result? I'm confident to claim the credit, because, deep down I know, for my assignments, I never asked friends to tell me what to do, the most I asked for is some mathematical checks or grammar checks. When people ask me what I get and I answer with a straight face: "Full marks." Is that boasting? If you can't take it, don't ask me. And, to repeat, I totally deserve it cause I worked for it.
I'm not sure why I'm typing this, but many a time, I do have a siege mentality. As I grow older, the less I can accept people's complaints, when in the first place, they didn't work hard for it, or work hard physically in terms of time, but not in terms of brain effort.
Not everyone has the same aims in life, I accept that. Just that to me, wanting high = working hard, wanting to slack = aiming low. People who work low, but aim high, are really mindsets I just can't seem to accept.
Different people perhaps have different innate ability, I accept that. But given that your ability is like that, shouldn't you work even harder, or learn even more ways to work smarter? I always think of the example of let's say Singapore. Constraints are aplenty, but we did find ways to work AROUND the constraints and build our country, didn't we? Through sheer hard work of our older generations, seriously. Plus of course, smart ways to work around the constraints.
(And history people please don't give me the shit about Singapore being already a nice trading place etc - it ain't enough without smart planning and hardwork)
And again, another blog post so serious and angsty. Haha, I'm getting old.
p.s. A happy note! Thinking back, what a great day it was for me. Blackburn Rovers rose to 15th (a position not heard of since Paul Ince was boss), got full marks for 2 tests. =) Still nervous about Rovers' relegation battle though. Good win! =D
lowtide blogged @
2:11 am
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Time to revisit this. DETERMINATION IS THE KEY
lowtide blogged @
12:52 am
