Journal Date: 13th July

Sometimes I’m just feeling down…

Trusting that eventually everything will turn out well.

Sometimes I wish that I’m dumb, wish that I don’t know so much… Must stay dumb must stay dumb…

 

 

My Never Ending Math Equation…

Snap, half a year gone…

Sometimes… I wanna ask, where do we stop? When do we know when to end? How to know if we can?

I’m the same as I was when I was 6 years old,
And oh my God I feel so damn old,
I don’t really feel anything.
On a plane, I can see the tiny lights below,
And oh my god, they look so alone,
Do they really feel anything?
Oh my god, I’ve gotta move on,
Where do you move when what you’re moving from is yourself?
The universe works like a math equation,
That never even ever really even any end,
Infinity spirals out creation,
We’re on the tip of it’s tongue, and it is saying…
We ain’t sure where you stand,
You ain’t machines and you ain’t land
And the plants and the animals, they are linked,
And the plants and the animals eat each other,
And Oh my God and oh my cat,
I told my dad what I need…
Well I don’t want to have want or need?
But I don’t know what I need.
Well, he said he said, he said, he said…

…

Maybe the reason for this world is simple…

The reason is you and me,

and that I’ll love you free.

Simple, subtle.

And if only I could, I would love you all forever…

Love you all for free.

My Never Ending Equation.

~Happy New Year 2011~

Just another year passed by~ It’s a good year nonetheless…

A year that went by a bit too fast… Feels like a dream… Like a blink of an eye… Felt like I’ve just celebrated 2010 but now it’s 2011 already~ Every time when I was browsing back my previous pieces of blog, I feel like it’s kinda childish. Must be getting older real fast…

But what I wanted to say is… It’s been a blessing, invigorating and refreshing year 2010~ To have a bunch of new friends in my workplace, fun and playful, a different perspective, humbling and enlightening… Never thought I would feel like this, and I could not have asked for more, and would not have it any other way. You guys kept me going all this while~

I guess less words brings more meaning… So I’ll save my breath… Let this piece ends here… There are so many things I wish to tell you all….

And KL I missed u guys…

~END~

 

 

Life is Art….

Life is like a piece of art.

Life is like creating a piece of art. Some draw one piece of item at a time. Some focus so hard on an item that they forgot about the rest of the picture. Some finished an item but found out that it didn’t fit the bigger picture. But what’s drawn can’t be erased. We’ll have to make to with it. It’s a matter of choice that we choose. We can either paint that particular unwanted item pitch black, a vacuum… Something that we don’t want to remember that will eventually eat us up. Or maybe… maybe just… we can just make use of that unintended piece of failed art to fit into the bigger picture even though it might seem out of place, and perhaps someday we can laugh about it… smile when thinking about it.

What about me? I’ve always been fond of art. But during the process of actually drawing a piece of work, it’s always unimpressive… not worthy of attention. Because it always appears to be a mess, so many errors, so many miscalculations, so much redrawing over and over again. While others might have completed pieces of item here and there, smiling and impressed by their own satisfaction. Sometimes, I loathe this part of the process because it’s the most agonizing part of time… But what is to be done must be done regardless. Let others be satisfied at their own peril and dwell in their own little fantasies, for there’s no time for these unfortunate misdemeanors.

As of now, the sketching marks are now gone, things are becoming clearer now. Everything is where it’s supposed to be. Colors are appearing. Vibrant. Organized. Symmetrical. Beautiful. Nothing like what I actually intended to be but… It’s actually better. We’ll just have to make do with what we we have. 12 color pencils or 24,36… It’s just a matter of how we mix those colors.

Just one last thing before everything is coming into place… Soon, very soon. I am the best. I’ll be the best. Better than the rest. Nothing comes remotely close. I hope someone’s here to witness it. There’s just so much wish to tell you, so much to share. If only I could just have a little of your time. 1am and tomorrow is another working day.

Some other time maybe…

Opportunities are only for the people who are prepared…

Once upon a time, a young man asked, “Is becoming rich a myth? Is that even possible to start with zero and end up being rich someday? Is that even remotely possible in our position in this modern society?”

Barring the one in a million who got lucky and got rich through various miracle, is there even a chance for me? The young man felt that he’s got no chance at all…because  he’s but one of those millions going to work, day in day out. Not only does he have to pay for his dailies, he has to pay for his study loan and car mortgage etc etc. Even life by itself is a problem, where’s the remote chance of being rich?

This conundrum got most of us stuck in this limbo. What’s the price we have to pay to be rich? Read investment books, read motivational books, join some get rich schemes, internet marketing opportunities but we still haven’t solve the base of our problem…

Sound financial knowledge is really simple, it basically rhymes like this, save, invest and then the patience to wait for that investment to bear fruit. If you haven’t noticed, the first one is “saving”. If we cannot live a thrifty life, we will not be able to save, thus sound financial planning at its base is: saving.

Saving is especially hard during the start and thus also the most important part in life, only by living a thrifty life do we have the chance to save up the “leftovers”. This is the universal truth that nobody could change. We cannot live a lavish, hip lifestyle on one side and expect to have plenty of money left to save on the other.

Of course, if you are one of the few who has your own business or somehow got yourself a high paying job, saving might not be your prerequisite towards getting rich. And THAT is another matter for another time. Not everyone has that opportunity to get high paying jobs or have an empire left for them to manage.

In fact most of the time, people think that by being around rich people, we’ll learn how to get rich or well… at least look the part of being rich thus having false illusions of themselves being rich. Fact: if you live like your rich friend, spend like them and eat like them… We still do not equate to them. All we’re doing were just outspending our own hard earned money while wrongly wetting ourselves of thinking that we’ve achieving their levels. And we actually thought by being around them, rich people would actually teach us ways to earn money like them. The sad truth is that there will only be glints of smile around you as we fall from grace. Words like “fake”, “plastic” , “bad financial  planning” come to mind, examples will always be made of us around the corners of mouth.

Welcome to the credit society… A society where everybody sleeps with the bank and work for the bank. Literally everything we want in life depends on how we look through others’ eyes. Imagine if the world is blind, who would’ve want to buy nice clothes to wear or nice cars to drive? As normal working class citizens, are there no chance left for us to live a luxurious life?

To get rich, we first need to have money to invest. That money can only come from  ourselves, our savings. Nobody is willing to spent one cent on us. Even from our so called rich friends. This first amount of money for investment will be the basis. If we don’t have this first batch of money, even when an opportunity presents itself, there’s nothing we can do about it and just let it just slip away.

And these opportunities will only be there for those who are prepared. By taking savings seriously, you and I are doing that preparation. The sole objective of saving is to wait for the opportunity to present itself. When that happens, we must steel ourselves to grab that opportunity in order to invest. By  then, we’ll have to patiently wait for it to bear fruit, success mostly only can come through this way.

Opportunities are only for the people who are prepared… To be continued. I think I’ve written some bullshit. Imagining myself as a Times finance article but actually more like Kacang Weekly standards. Maybe Later~

浪子心聲

難分真與假　人面多險詐
Hard to distinguish between truth and falsehood. Humans can be so deceitful at heart.

幾許有共享榮華　簷畔水滴不分差
Who is willing to share fame and fortune?
To evenly share the rivulets of rain drops from the rims of a roof?

無知井裡蛙　徒望添聲價
The naive frog under the well, looking in vain for prestige and fame.

空得意目光如麻　誰料金屋變敗瓦
Self-conceited and short-sighted, who would expect the elegant house would one day become a dilapidated wreck.

命裡有時終須有　命裡無時莫強求
We’ll eventually gain whatever as fate would permit as there’s no need to be sad when nothing is gained.

雷聲風雨打　何用多驚怕
Hardships are always there to be met, there is no need to fear too much

心公正白壁無暇　行善積福最樂也
Happiness comes from those who have a fair mind and a clear conscience, and the best happiness comes from those who’ve done charity.

人比海裡沙　毋用多牽掛
Human beings are just like the sand in the sea where nothing is to be worried.

君可見漫天落霞　名利息間似霧化
You can see the evening glow all over the sky. It’ll soon disappear like mist as like fame and fortune.

Journal Date: 10th March 2010

Destiny rarely call us at a moment of our own choosing…

I would like to stay, if I had a choice, I’ll stay forever and ever. But life has been cruel. It’s time to move forward, forget about the past. It’s time to grow up, to put some of my dreams behind me. Move on and move forward.

I thought I’ve everything within my grasp, except the very thing I wanted. Perhaps this can never be forced, can never be fought. I surrender myself to destiny… To embrace what I’m supposed to be, rather to be dragged down by this… Even if it’s not seen by the rest, I guess discretion will always be the better part of valor.

Only time will prove everything… Forget about love, for it’s not the answer. It’s just not meant to be. Not meant to be. As only fate can decide. I surrender myself to destiny.  Hesitation and drag has been my greatest vice. These moments of mourning will soon come to pass, everything will once again be 150%. Sorry for letting down all of you, 150% is my promise.

Hell, it is about time…

As Dumbledore said it… It is our choices…that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. I’ve made so many wrong choices, that I’ve stop making them. If I’m holding out for universal approval, I’m afraid I will be stucked for a very long time. Time to move on. Now that I’ve made my choices, it’s time for fate to decide its direction… And may fate have mercy on me.

What’s coming will come and we’ll meet it when it does. Soon we must all face the choice between what is right and what that is easy.

Week 9: Report

Week 9

What a Hot hot Chinese New Year… Never been this hot for a while…

Okay, now I think it’s kinda late to have some new year resolutions or to reflect on past year revelations. But let’s just say my year starts with Chinese New Year… Well, let bygones be bygones, I’ve wasted the past few months badly… And I swear to God I fully intend to make up for it. Now… As for new year  resolutions… Let’s start with smaller things within this week really…

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Week 9 Agendas:

 

1. Stop Wasting Time

1.1 Stop Facebooking (Number 1 time waster) (Done till Sunday)

Really, if I can delete it then I will. But it does more harm than good. So I’ll just leave it there and try to not touch it for this week. It  kills time like nothing and essentially achieves nothing.

1.2 Stop Visiting political news websites (or anything similar) (Done)

Having followed the political scene for so long… I realized one thing… It never stops and achieves nothing as well. I now declare a media blackout… Malaysian news are all bullshit.

1.3 Stop Youtube (or anything similar) (Done for a week)

Another time waster, f**k youtube for wasting so much if my time.

1.4 Stop football tabloids (Done)

Waste time waste time waste time

1.5 Stop reading about cars (Done)

What will come will come eventually.

1.6 Stop evening naps!!!!! (FAILED)

Wow, this really killed me…

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2. Week 9 Check List

2.1 Finish revision for C (Sigh, can’t revise by just reading… Failed)

2.2 Attend interview at Balda Solutions (Done)

2.3 Finish registering with MDEC (CCNA or MCSE or SAP?) (Postponed)

2.4 PHd proposal (Finish at least half) and call lecturer. And please finish filling up the f**king form please? (Postponed)

2.5 Jia Hao (Done)

2.5.1 Finish deciding the transaction of business. (I’m losing credibility)

2.5.2 Assist on coffee proposal.

2.6 Connie (Done)

2.6.1 Finish Connie’s task.

2.6.2 Yum Cha?

2.7 Contact lenses (Postponed)

Man… It sounds harder than it is…

2.8 Call Taylors regarding job request. (Postponed)

2.9 Be boss for the day at the shop on Friday and Saturday. Haih…

__________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Plans that Probably won’t Work but Worth to take Note:

3.1 Taiwan Trip (March)

3.2 Sapa Trip (June/July)

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4. Other notes:

4.1 Watch Spartacus: Blood and Sand

It’s freakin awesome… Watch on the net for free, now up till episode 5. (Only for Guys, no worries it’s not porn… Okay, maybe for more open-minded girls too)

4.2 Alienware M11x (RM3529)

Coming soon…

My Plans?

So what’s the decision?

So what’s the plan?

So have you decided?

So? So? So?

I barely know how to start writing this one up myself somehow. Fact is, I really have no idea but somehow, I’ve to conjure up some mambo jumbo as not to look clueless…  T_T

It’s like a cosmic collision of mind, body and soul (and other organs as well (No, not what you’re thinking…)) But actually it’s more like separation…

Basically, the basic idea goes like this. To summarize it,

1. PhD

Aside from the obvious privilege status that it brings, of course the thought of being a lecturer brings a glee on my face since it’s the easiest job available ever since humanity exist (purely in my honest opinion). Yeah, it’s really nice and all. I’d love to go out with most of my Uni friends and all since most of them are in KL and KL, has so many things that I wanted. Whatever I want, KL has it. Like gym, foreign language thingy, Low Yat, so on and so on…

That brings me to another dilemma, which Uni? Why not foreign Universities? Why wanna stay in Malaysia since you can afford foreign? Well, if you’re in Malaysia, you’re not qualified to question me since you’re here for the same reasons that I do… It’s our God damn country…

For reasons unmentionable, I really wanted to go back to that jungle for another spin… Absurd and sacrilege. In fact, my parents were supportive and they’re willing to fund me albeit saying “Well, you can do anything you want but whatever you do, don’t do it (there) because of “other” people.” Point taken, bull’s eye. Guilty as charged. Sometimes we have to acknowledge and praise our parent’s empathy towards us.

Sigh… But doubts still remain of my sanity if I continue on studying because frankly, it’s making my energy levels really low and getting my butt fat. Besides that, I really hate being poor as I’m still dependent on my parents. It’s kinda hard to swallow if you’re 25 and you still take provisions from the family. It’s even harder to swallow when some of my friends has already working for 2 years already, some started a family, some driving a Lexi… The question is, is it worth it all? Which brings me to the next point…

2. Working

2.1 Working as Engineer

It sounds perfectly logically that one should start working a few years then if it needs be, then continue study PhD. In fact I can literally start my life right here, right now. And Altera or even Intel’s offering is not bad at all… I can fit straight in and start buying a car right there, just like everybody else(which 60% of the graduates do and become car slaves). But in the end… For obvious reasons, I will never go back to Penang… It’s a small island after all (but will contemplate going back there since the money is really good…) Please don’t start nagging me because I’ve got a full month of “broad-side” from my parents after screwing up with my cousin’s offer. So there’s no real need of adding salt to the wound.

Then comes KL, working in KL boast different kinds of options really. Most salaries are often too low to support the current living standards there (btw, toll is going to go up by 10% real soon)… Basically, I don’t think I can save any “real money” in KL… How about Singapore? Firstly, it’s way too far from home, it’s hard to find a job there as well… Maybe later? Yeah, the money is good and all, probably can save a lot of money… Then, can come back to Malaysia and spend. Wait, wait… What did you just say? Come back? How can you focus on your work if you know it’s not permanent? Knock yourself out if you’re only looking for money… But the best of all comes from Hao Mun, “What are you going to do after you save RM100k from Singapore?” Answer: Not much… Really. That’s the pathetic state that we’re in and don’t get me started on salaries in Malaysia… Which then brings me to 2.2…

2.2 Father’s company

Time and time again, I always come stucked at this choking point. Most people will grab the oppurtunity and squeeze it to their chest and never let go of it. It’s the most logical choice. Tze Jin is the most stupid person in the whole world. Why do you have to throw everything that is good? I really don’t know… It’s like the 2nd easiest job in the world? Count 1,2,3 and just do add and minus, sometimes multiply and divide but never integration and differentiation. Will only be busy for a few peak hours. Deal with a few people, talk wheather, talk c*ck, laugh laugh laugh. Big money. Flexible time. What is there that you don’t want? I don’t know, maybe I just it to end… Yeah, it’s travesty.

I just want my parents to have vacations that deserve so badly. Ever since the business grew, there was never a day of peace… It’s always a race against time. A race against corrupted government officers, tax collectors, debt collectors, licenced robbers and unlicenced robbers alike. And we’re chasing people too for payments and the vicious cycle continues on and on. One eye off the pedder and you have the snake right up your ass. Maybe I can work on it for a few years and change it but I really want to do something new.

2.3 Why not you stop complainin and start working a few years first…

But so far, I have not seen any student who has graduated, start work and come back to study later (even if they plan to)… So many commitments will spring up, money, mortgages, spouse, aging parents, kids etc… Even if they do, it was done with tremendous pitfalls and sacrifices as they graduated at 35… Not a good thought really. Right before I rejected the best job offer I had in KL (Yeah, the one in KLCC), really… When it comes to crunch time, I’ve shrunk. I’ve no idea why I did that… If I wanted to work for 1-2 years, why don’t I stop wasting time and go right through it rather than going one big circle? That which brings me back to option 1: PhD… And so the Big Merry-go round continues it course over 2 months… Jobless and whiny.

3.0 Truth

But what I really wanted to tell all of you is… I’ve lost it. I don’t know when, I don’t know how. Sometimes my mum ask me, “Where is your heart?”, ” It’s as though you’re not there”. I’ve lost it. I couldn’t find it… I couldn’t just snapped out of it. And I’m still trying from time to time… I’m like a mad dog, chasing everything that comes by and when I finally catch it, I didn’t know what to do with it. But most of the time, I just let it passed… Well, it doesn’t matter. From time to time though, I’ve given pieces of myself to all those around me but I guess people are just busy with jobs and their own agendas. If only… Well, nevermind… I’m just too lazy to write.

Till I find my Mojo again. Soon, very soon. Till then, I’ll let you all call the shots.

The 21st Century Dilemma…

Finally pulled this post out from this dust-ridden draft of mine… No matter how I edited it, still seems more offensive than ever but anyhow…

Some call it the Naked Photo Test, and it works something like this: say a photo turns up of us nakedly doing something that would shame ourselves and our family for generations. Bestiality, perhaps. Ask ourselves how many people in our life that would believe in us even after looking at that photo and still look into our eyes. Underneath all the glitz and glamour…On average, we did probably have at most two.

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From the Washington Post:

Whereas nearly three-quarters of people in 1985 reported they had a friend in whom they could confide, only half in 2004 said they could count on such support. The number of people who said they counted a neighbor as a confidant dropped by more than half, from about 19 percent to about 8 percent.

The results, being published today in the American Sociological Review, took researchers by surprise because they had not expected to see such a steep decline in close social ties.

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The average number of close friends we say we have is dropping fast, down dramatically in just the last 20 years. Why oh why? Well, first of all…

#1. We don’t have enough annoying strangers in our lives.

That’s not sarcasm. Annoyance is something we build up a tolerance to, like alcohol or a bad smell. The more we’re able to edit the annoyance out of our lives, the less we’re able to handle it.

The problem is we’ve built an awesome, sprawling web of technology meant purely to let us avoid annoying people. Do all our Christmas shopping online and avoid the fat lady ramming her cart into you at Tesco. Spend RM5k on a home theater system so we can see movies on a big screen without that stupid guy kicking the back of your seat. Hell, download the whole movie from torrents and we don’t even have to spend the day driving our car to that crowded shopping mart/cinema.

Get stuck in the waiting room at the doctor? No way we’re striking up a conversation with the smelly old man in the next seat. We’ll plug the iPod into our ears and have a text conversation with a friend or play our PSP. Filter that annoyance right out of our own world.

Now that would be awesome if it were actually possible to keep all of the irritating shit out of our pathetic lifes, isn’t it? But, it’s not. It can never be. As long as we have needs, we’ll have to deal with people we can’t stand from time to time. We’re losing that skill (if we haven’t already lost it), the one that lets us deal with strangers and tolerate their shrill voices and clunky senses of humor and body odor and squeaky shoes. So, what encounters do we have with the outside world, the world we can’t control, can  actually make us succumb to a screaming balls-busting spree.

#2. We don’t have enough annoying friends, either.

…More MoRe MORE…

Lots of us were born into towns full of people we couldn’t stand. Only perhaps the dysfunctional me… But anyhow as a kid, we may find ourselves in an elementary school classroom, packed in with 3 dozen kids we did not choose and who shared none of our tastes nor interests. Most probably you got bullied/beat up a lot.

But, we’ve grown up. And if we’re, say, a huge ( insert whatever… ) fan, we can go find their forum and meet a dozen people just like us. Or even better, start a private room with our favorite few and lock everybody else out. Say goodbye to the tedious, awkward, painful process of dealing with somebody who’s just… Well, different. That’s just another Old World inconvenience, like having to wash your clothes in a toilet or wait for a raccoon to wander by the outhouse so we can wipe our asses with it.

The problem is that peacefully dealing with incompatible people is crucial to living in a society. In fact, if we think about it, peacefully dealing with people you can’t stand is society. Just people with opposite tastes and conflicting personalities sharing space and cooperating, often through gritted teeth.

Some time ago, we had to sit in an over crowded room to see a movie. We didn’t get to choose… We either sit down or we miss the movie. When we’ve got a new car, everyone on the block came and stood in your yard to look it over. You can bet that some of those people were assholes. Yet, on the whole, people back then were apparently happier in their jobs and more satisfied with their lives. And get this: They had more friends.

That’s right. Even though they had almost no ability to filter their peers according to common interests (hell, often you were just friends with the guy who happened to live next door), they still came up with more close friends than we have now-people they could trust.

It turns out, apparently, that after we get over that first irritation, after we shed our shell of “they listen to different music because they wouldn’t understand mine” superiority, there’s a sort of comfort in needing other people and being needed on a level beyond common interests. It turns out humans are social animals after all. And that ability to suffer fools, to tolerate annoyance, that’s literally the one single thing that allows us to function in a world populated by other people who aren’t us. Otherwise, we’ll turn emo. Science has proven it…

#3. Texting is a shitty way to communicate.

Well, nothing to do with this article at all…

I can never emphasize this enough but ah well…

I have this friend who uses the expression “No, thank you,” in a sarcastic way. To me, it means, “I’d rather be shot in the face.” She puts a little ironic lilt on the last two words that lets you know. You ask, “Hey, you wanna have some breakfast? I’m sooo hungry” And, she’ll say, “No, thank you.Sorry.”

So one day we had this exchange via text:

Me: “Hey, want me to come over and help (XXX) as promised?”

Her: “No, thank you. Sorry.”

That totally pissed me off. How can someone calls me when they need me and dump me when they don’t? Phuck OFF… (Hey, nobody likes to be taken for granted esspecially me) And, now my offer of service was dismissed with her bitchy catchphrase?

I didn’t speak to her for a month or 2. She finally looked me up and realized that the “No, thank you. Sorry” she replied with was not meant to be sarcastic, but was a literal, “No, but thank you for offering.” She was up for some personal matters(secret), it turns out. Kinda think of it, well she just used it 2 times out of well… I lost count. Nonetheless, I’ve no idea why I’m particularly pissed with “No,thank you”

So did we really need a study to tell us that more than 40 percent of what we say in text based messaging is misunderstood? Well, they did one anyway.

How many of our friends have we only spoken with online? If 40 percent of our personality has gotten lost in the text transition, do these people even really know us? The people who dislike us via text, on message boards or chatrooms or whatever, is it because we’re really so much against each other? Or, is it because of the misunderstood 40 percent? And, what about the ones who actually liked us?

Hell, my first argument with Yuri started with the word “Duh~” on Msn…Hahaha

Many of us try to make up that difference in sheer numbers, piling up sixty dozen friends on facebook. But here’s the problem …

#4. Online company are only making us lonelier…

When someone speaks to us face-to-face, what percentage of the meaning is actually in the words, as opposed to the body language and tone of voice? Take a guess.

It’s 7 percent. The other 93 percent is nonverbal, according to studies. No, I don’t know how they arrived at that exact number. They have a machine or something. But we didn’t need it. I mean, come on. Most of our humor is sarcasm, and sarcasm is just mismatching the words with the tone. Like my friend’s “No, thank you.”

You don’t wait for a girl to verbally tell you she likes you. It’s the sparkle in her eyes when you talk, her posture, the way she grabs your head and shoves your face into her boobs… Exaggerated

That’s the crux of the problem. That human ability to absorb the moods of others through that kind of subconscious osmosis is crucial. Kids born without “it” are considered mentally handicapped. People who have lots of “it” are called “charismatic” and become movie stars and politicians. It’s not what they say… it’s this energy they drawn upon themselves and put off that makes us feel good about ourselves.

When we’re living in MSN/Facebook World, all that is stripped away. Don’t we all notice the weird side effect to it? The absence a sense of the other person’s mood, every line we read gets filtered through our own mood instead. The reason I read my friend’s “No Thank You” message as sarcastic was because I was in an irritable mood. In that state of mind, I was eager to be offended. And worse, if I do enough of my communicating this way, my mood never changes. After all, people keep saying nasty things to me! Of course I’m depressed! It’s me against the world!

No, what I need is somebody to shake me by the shoulders and snap me out of it…  That which leads us to the next…

#5. We don’t get criticized enough.

Most of what sucks about not having close friends isn’t the missed birthday parties or the sad, single-player games of computer games. No, what sucks is the lack of real criticism.

In my time online I’ve been called “noob” approximately 30k times, “c*b*i” 20k times, “s*h*i” probably a few more times more that “c*b*i”. And none of it mattered, because none of those people knew me well enough to really hit the target to do any real mental harm. I’ve been insulted lots, but I’ve been criticized very little to none. And don’t ever confuse the two. An insult is just someone who hates us making a noise to indicate their hatred. A barking dog nonetheless. Criticism is someone trying to help you, by telling you something about yourself that you were a little too comfortable not knowing but truly helpful in the long run.

Tragically, we’re having lesser and lesser of those types of conversations. The interventions, the brutal honesty, the, “you know, everybody’s pissed off because of what you said last night, but nobody wants to say anything because they’re afraid of you,” sort of conversations. Those horrible, awkward, wrenchingly uncomfortable sessions that you can only have with someone who sees right to the center of you. Most of the time, we only engage in empty conversations… “You’re so cool… I’m so cool… I’ve been here, there, everywhere… Blah Blah Blah” Endless Blabbering and flattering and never ending suspicions where the only hypocritical reason to even continue those pointless conversation is “I don’t want to hurt you so we talk about other stuff other than the things we really need to talk about”

E-mail and texting are awesome tools for avoiding that level of honesty. With text, we can respond when we feel like it. We can measure our words. We can pick and choose which questions to answer. The person on the other end can’t see your face, can’t see you get nervous, can’t detect when you’re lying. You have almost total control and as a result that other person never sees past your armor, never sees you at your worst, never knows the embarrassing little things about yourself that you can’t control. Gone are the common quirks, humiliations and vulnerabilities that real friendships are built on.

Browse around people’s Facebook pages, look at the characters they create for themselves. If we’ve built a pool of friends via a blog/twitter (oops…), building ourselves up as a misunderstood, happy little angels that is so happening and all… It’s kind of hard to log on and talk about how you went to prom and how your date ditched you for another guy/girl. You never get to really be yourself, and that’s a very very lonely feeling…

And, on top of all that …

#6. We’re victims of the Outrage Machine.

A whole lot of the people still reading this are saying, “Of course I’m depressed! People are starving! Malaysia has turned into Nazi Africa! My parents watch retarded television shows and talk about them for hours afterwards! People are dying in meaningless wars all over the world!”

But how did we wind up with a more negative view of the world than our parents? Or grandparents? Back then, people didn’t live as long and babies died more often. Diseases were more common. In those days, if your buddy moved away the only way to communicate was with pen and paper and a stamp. We have N***b, but our grandparents had Japanese (which literally screwed every chinese in Malaysia). Some of your grandparents grew up at a time when nobody had air conditioning. All of their parents grew up without it.

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We are physically better off today in every possible way in which such things can be measured … but we sure as hell wouldn’t know that if we’re getting our news online. Why?

Well, ask yourself: If some music site posts an article called, “Fall Out Boy is a Fine Band” and on the same day posts another one called, “Fall Out Boy is the Shittiest Fucking Band of the Last 100 Years, Say Experts,” which do you think will get the most traffic? The second one wins in a blowout. Outrage manufactures word-of-mouth.

The news blogs many of you read? The people running them know the same thing. Every site is in a dogfight for traffic (even if they don’t run ads, they still measure their success by the size of their audience) and so they carefully pick through the wires for the most inflammatory story possible. The other blogs start echoing the same story from the same point of view. If you want, you can surf all day and never swim out of the warm, stagnant waters of the “aren’t those bastards evil” pool.

This wasn’t as much a problem in the old days, of course. Some of us remember having only three channels on TV. That’s right. Three. We’re talking about the ’90s here. So there was something unifying in the way we all sat down to watch the same news, all of it coming from the same point of view. Even if the point of view was retarded and wrong, even if some stories went criminally unreported, we at least all shared it.

That’s over. There effectively is no “mass media” any more so, where before we disagreed because we saw the same news and interpreted it differently, now we disagree because we’re seeing completely different freaking news. When we can’t even agree on the basic facts, the differences become irreconcilable. That constant feeling of being at bitter odds with the rest of the world brings with it a tension that just builds and builds.

We humans used to have lots of natural ways to release that kind of angst. But these days… It’s just so tired… Exhausted, SPIN SPIN SPIN… This must stop…

#7. We feel worthless, because we actually are worth less.

There’s one advantage to having mostly online friends, and it’s one that nobody ever talks about:

They demand less from you.

Sure, you emotionally support them, comfort them after a breakup, maybe even talk them out of a suicide. But knowing someone in “meatspace”, “meatface” adds a whole, long list of annoying demands. Wasting our whole afternoon helping them fix their computer. Going to funerals with them. Toting them around in your car every day after to buy Christmas gifts for their friends. Having them show up unannounced when you were just settling in to watch the Dirty Jobs marathon on the Discovery channel, then mentioning how hungry they are until you finally give them half your sandwich.

You have so much more control in MSN, Facebook…

The problem is we are hard-wired by evolution to need to do things for people. Everybody for the last five thousand years seemed to realize this and then we suddenly forgot it in the last decade. We get suicidal teens and scramble to teach them self-esteem. Well, unfortunately, self-esteem and the ability to like yourself only come after you’ve done something that makes you likable. We can’t bullshit ourselves. If I think Todd over here is worthless for sitting in his room all day, drinking CocaCola and playing video games one-handed because he’s masturbating with the other one, what will I think of myself if I do the same thing?

You want to break out of that black tar pit of self-hatred? Brush the black hair out of your eyes, step away from the computer and buy a nice gift for someone you loathe. Send a card to your worst enemy. Make dinner for your mom and dad. Or just do something simple, with an tangible result. Go clean the leaves out of the gutter. Grow a damn plant.

It ain’t rocket science… We are a social animal and thus we are born with little happiness hormones that are released into our bloodstream when we see a physical benefit to our actions. Think about all those teenagers in their dark rooms, glued to their PC’s, turning every life problem into ridiculous melodrama. Why do they make those cuts on their arms? It’s because making the pain-and subsequent healing-tangible releases endorphins they don’t get otherwise. It’s pain, but at least it’s real.

That form of stress relief via mild discomfort used to be part of our daily lives, via our routine of hunting gazelles and gathering berries and climbing rocks and fighting bears. No more. This is why office jobs make so many of us miserable… We don’t get any physical, tangible result from our work. But do construction out in the hot sun for two months, and for the rest of your life you can drive past a certain house and say, “Holy shit, I built that.” Maybe that’s why mass shootings are more common in offices than construction sites. LOL?

It’s the kind of physical, dirt-under-your-nails satisfaction that you can only get by turning off the computer, going outdoors and re-connecting with the real world. Like Gunung Ledang… “I climbed that”… That feeling, that “I built that” or “I grew that” or “I fed that guy” or “I made these pants” feeling…

Those feelings can NEVER EVER be matched by ANYTHING the internet has to offer.