Wednesday 10 December 2014

The (non) instruction manual for living

We are going to track back for a bit to year 2008, the year of the Global Financial Crisis, otherwise known as the GFC. It was also the year that I hit one of the lowest points in my life – if not the lowest point to date. Of course when it was happening, it didn’t feel like it was a low point, it just felt like life, and I was living, and struggling and trying to do the best that I could. But now, in retrospect, yes, it was a low point and fuck, how did I survive that? I did not know, and I still don’t know.

That was the year that I asked so many questions – so many fucking questions that I could not, and still can not, fucking answer. I attributed this to this phenomenon called the quarter life crisis. I mean, when you were young, and you were supposed to live life that was fulfilling and worthwhile, without actually knowing what it looked like, let alone felt like, it was pretty impossible not to get a little depressed. What is this thing called a full, enriching life? And how the fuck do you know when you’ve got one? Navigating your twenties is one ugly beast, because you feel like life, where you are right now, is extremely fucking hard. But you are not allowed to say it as such. You are supposed to make it appear effortless, darling.

In the year 2008, against all odds, and without managing to figure things out, I survived relatively intact. One thing that is for sure though, even when you manage to figure things out, hold down a job and get a house and a life, all of these could be taken away from you in the blink of an eye, because of things that are beyond your control. Even when you have done everything within your power to weather the bad times, it is rare for anyone to escape unscathed. There would be some effects; some of these are deep and lasting, and invisible to the naked eye. So I hated adulthood; growing old is one motherfucking bitch.

But I have never told anyone this, until now.

In fact, I have joined the popular wisdom of getting older: that life gets better. I like to think that this is because I have a terrible memory, but truth is that, I suppress the terrible times, to the point that if I could, I would erase them from my memory. Selective recalling masked as positive thinking. I am all in for being positive and all that jazz, and I remain a big fan until today. And I also believe that it doesn’t hurt to remember the terrible times, even if they only serve as a reminder of how far we’ve become.

The truth about living is that life doesn’t always get better, and it continuously and perpetually takes a lot of hard work. You don’t always have everything figured out, but it doesn’t give you the excuse to not show up, because living is in showing up. You show up every single day even when you feel so tired and you look at the mirror and notice shit, I not only feel old, I also look old. And I feel fat. Shit, am I fat? When did all of these happen?

There is a deep satisfaction in showing up because it often carries with it an element of connection, an element of struggle, and more often than not, it involves other people. There is a deep satisfaction when you demonstrate (through your actions) a willingness to take on someone’s cause as your own, especially when you haven’t found out what your cause is. There is a deep satisfaction in knowing that in showing up, you are actually doing something, no matter how small, that contributes something to lives of the people around us.

There is no instruction manual for living, quite unfortunately. My one and only rule is this thing called flow – there has got to be a flow, you have to stay in motion. Because the alternative, i.e being stagnant, inaction, is never a valid option. Showing up may appear trivial, but the impact on the people that we are interacting with everyday as a result of us showing up is truly profound. Look out for the smile that results from something that you’ve done. You may not find this often, but there is at least one smile amongst all the hustle and bustle of live.

That one smile is never an isolated effect; believe me when I say this, because of two things. First, the multiplier effect, according to which, this one smile will result in a lot more one-smile-s, which will then result in a lot more more one-smile-s. Or in other words, a smile (or happiness) is contagious. Ever had a stranger smile at you and said somewhat randomly, have a good day? And then you end up having a good day? Yeah, something like that. So, smile, and wish someone a good day, even when that person is not a stranger.

Two, even when the outcome that we look for is a smile, there is almost always something else, and these things are often invisible to the naked eye, or often referred to as ‘I am happy when I’ve contributed to your happiness’. Your happiness in this case is another effect of you showing up.

So then, is this the secret to a good life?

Yes and no. This is because it is rare for two variables to perfectly influence each other. In this case, while it is (somewhat) undisputed that the rate of us showing up is positively correlated with our general well being, there is almost always something else that contributes to this relationship. Or that, even when you’ve successfully identified (albeit only statistically) the relationship between two variables, it is very rarely that this correlation is 100%; there is always something else that contributes to the outcome. Sometimes, this ‘something else’ is a combination of insignificant, therefore seemingly irrelevant causes, so we just tend to ignore them. Because we are much better off concentrating on changing the one thing that we believe is going to result in the outcome that we want.  Because limited resources. Because prioritizing. Because laziness.

I know I am guilty of the last one, which is why I still struggle to make sense of things. I have even more questions today about life than I did one year ago. I still get frustrated on a regular basis because I can’t think my way through these things. Because it makes me feel like I am not smart enough. Like I am dumb, or so blind that I can’t even see these answers that I’ve been told can be found inside me.

Maybe, just maybe, this is one of those things that I can’t think my way through. Maybe, what this really means is that I need to just stop trying to make sense of things right now. Maybe, one day, it will all be made clear to me. Maybe I would be able to see things that have been there all along. Or maybe not. Or maybe, it doesn’t matter. Because life still goes on as long as I show up, open my heart and appreciate the things that make me grateful to be alive. Or in other words, give my mind a break, live life right now with all of my heart, and celebrate the little moments that contribute to a much bigger sum.

Happy birthday to me.


Monday 1 December 2014

A note on crashing an MBA class

One Wednesday evening, I found myself crashing a dear friend's MBA class.

I don't have a master's degree, so I don't know what to expect, other than I am going to be entertained for the next few hours of my life. I get that this is not the kind of entertainment most people would go for, but it is for me.

What I got was way more than entertainment; I found out a few interesting things about being human, in the form of really informative graphs that really could've been drawn better (another story another time). There were lessons about how to manage resources (which is what a good MBA program is focused on). There was a lesson about how to manage yourself. More specifically, how to manage your feelings.

(To most people that were in that room at the same time, the take away is very likely not to be the above; it certainly was not worded nor presented as such. And that's okay, because understandably different things would resonate differently to different people, or differently to the same people in different times of their lives.)

As a society, we are obsessed with happiness. Like really, really obsessed. Obsessed like all that we ever want in this life is to be happy kind of obsessed. I know because I have said this once upon a time. And the irony is not lost on me that it was during the time that I was most miserable that I said that every single fucking day. I was chasing happiness, without knowing how, and most importantly why.

After years of futile search and extreme exhaustion that manifested in the form of what I labelled a quarter life crisis, I delved into the topic a bit further. There was a very good chance that I was wrong, and perhaps, I should stop whatever it was I was doing because, well, it was clearly not working.

I said that my take away from that 3.5 hours entertainment was how to manage my feelings because of this one sentence: you cannot be happy; you can be happy about something. And that something better be something you can bloody identify. When I wake up in the morning feeling happy, what I really want to say is I am happy that I had a good night sleep, I wake up feeling rested and ready to start my day. When I say that I want to be happy, what I really want to say is I want to be happy with my choices in life.

Being able to identify specifically what you are happy with is part of being in touch with your feelings. I think this is a very important step towards being able to manage your feelings. I also think that a lot of times, when we discuss how to manage our feelings, most of the time the discussion is skewed towards suppressing the bad and accentuating the good. There is nothing wrong with accentuating the good, I am a subscriber. But constantly suppressing the bad is dangerous and can be detrimental to one's health. Because I do not believe that the good is meant to cancel the bad, the two are meant to exist side by side as part of this thing we call our feelings. It is very possible that you feel good about something and at the same time feel bad about something else. And this is not a bad thing either, it is just what it is.

Upon reflection, I think, the same principle applies for all of the feelings that we have: the good and the bad. We are happy about something, we are annoyed about something, we are excited about something and we are bored about something. Yet somehow, the reason behind our feelings are often left out in our sentences. One of the things that we constantly feel is this thing called inconvenience - like, for example, the rain and how we need to walk out of the house with umbrellas that would then get destroyed by the wind. Or that because of the rain, we could not go running our usual track. Or that the broken treadmill in the gym plus the rain mean we have to resort to the bike or the rowing machine, or whatever monstrous machines that we have to endure for the next 20 minutes or so. And most of the time, we summarise all of these with "ugh, so annoying."

It really doesn't hurt to identify the source of the feeling; in fact, I think it can help us sort out our feelings better. And perhaps, if we get to understand why we feel a certain way, then we would be more open to pause for one moment and feel the feeling, no matter how uncomfortable it is. Because I think, being able to feel a range of your feelings is a part of managing it, and being able to manage this well is a part of growing up.

We are not skilled in articulating our feelings, or even, identifying our feelings accurately, i.e why we feel a certain way, let alone managing them. When we feel an emotion that's of an uncomfortable nature, we tend to shut it off, or ignore it, because (1) we think it is wrong to feel that way and (2) in some twisted way, we believe that ignoring it will make it go away. We forget that to see the rainbow, we have to live through the rain.

We are not bad people, even when we do not feel perfectly content about life 24/7. We think we should be excited, giddy, positive all the time. And this is because, well, a lot of people are uncomfortable when we share some form of painful emotion/experience. I don't blame them, really, so most of the time I don't share these things. When I do share them, I get some judgment - which adds to my pain. Very rarely I would get an ear that would listen without judgment. The worst judgment of all: "wow, you are really negative." Yes, I was. I am sorry that I made you feel uncomfortable; but I sure learn my lesson of not sharing private moments with you. [This is a terrible response on my part, I know. I pick this because this is easier for me than trying to connect on a deeper level with this person. This sounds like a cop out, because, well, it is.]

Why we need to share the good and the bad - especially the bad? Connection on a deeper level. Deep connection that most people shy away from. Including me. Because it takes a lot of time and energy and I only have so much of those.

But it is through deep connections that we find meaning. Finding meaning does not automatically make us happy; we are happy about having deep connections, hopefully with those we love: when we get to share their deepest, most intimate thoughts and feelings, and for that moment in time, we let them know that we love them, and we act on that love.

We may not be able to change what we feel, but we have options on how to respond to those feelings. So, choose wisely.


Every day I make decisions about how I choose to live my life, consciously or not.  These decisions become the building blocks of my life. And when I put off making a decision about something, usually because of paralysis by analysis, I still essentially make a decision: that of indecision, and that's when I feel stuck. Stop thinking, start feeling and go with the flow.