• Ramblings

    Lessons Learnt

    March 18, 2010

    The past few months were a steep learning curve for me. I do not think I came out with flying colours, but lessons learnt are always useful.

    Out of the many lessons learnt, there were two that were most memorable:

    1) When I reach the age of 50, I better be prepared to be retrenched. I will ensure I am debt free, have alternate streams of income, and be ready to retire. It will happen to anyone, and I better be prepared for it. Thinking about it, in fact I should be aiming for retirement as of now. Time to relook at my finances and investments.

    2) Health comes first. It will be too late when health is gone and I try to do something about it. Without health, everything else does not matter. Time to get back to the gym, and allocate time to exercising regularly. Eat healthy, think healthy.

    Both of the lessons were learned from people around me, and it will be foolish to ignore it.

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  • Ramblings

    Regrets

    March 1, 2010

    Tonight is one of those nights that I think back and wonder what did I do with my life? What have I gained? What have I lost?

    Could be that I have no time nowadays to really think of anything else but work, perhaps it is really time for a change.

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  • Ramblings

    Changes

    February 28, 2010

    ChangesIt seems like this year will be a year of changes for me.

    What I thought I will be doing for this whole year has been changed. Due to many factors, the responsibilities for me this year has changed. People working with me and around me changed recently. I think this is a sign for another change. A change to ten years of being in one place.

    Come the month of May, there will be another major change, and there is a series of changes as a result of that.

    Am I afraid of changes? Searching within, I have to admit that I am worried of changes. Perhaps as one gets older, one is more resistant to change.

    No matter what, changes are inevitable. For better or for worse, I will just have to meet these changes head on.

    Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

    – John Lennon

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  • Ramblings

    Nothing Lasts Forever

    July 6, 2009

    Have to keep telling myself, nothing lasts forever.

    You do not stay in a place forever. People come and go. People you know will leave eventually. The job you have is not forever. That favourite eatery place might not be around tomorrow.

    Stop being sentimental. Stop trying to hold onto the fast moving threads of time. Impossible. You will only get hurt.

    Nothing lasts forever.

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  • Ramblings

    Looking Back

    July 5, 2009

    I scrolled through the list of names that were from the same secondary school batch as me. Some of the names are familiar, some no. Going through their current career, ‘Head of so and so’, ‘GM of so and so’, ‘Director of so and so in Ministry of so and so’, each and every single one of them holding top and senior management positions in both the public and private sector.

    And then, inevitably, I look at myself and asked, ‘What happened?’ At which point in my life did I got sidetracked? What did I do that put me like 10 years behind my peers?

    I looked back, and sigh with regret.

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  • Ramblings

    Fuel For The Soul

    June 29, 2009

    “One ought, everyday at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture and speak a few reasonable words.” —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

    The words had stopped. The spark of creativity is long extinguished. I find it harder and harder to write.

    The last book I read was months ago, and it was a biography. Everything seems to just dried up. All I think about is work, the only words I type are for work, and the only items that I strike off my to-do lists are all work related. Why is my life revolving around work?

    I need to find fuel for my soul, I need to read, I need to write, I need to ignite the spark of creativity, and find back my passion. Passion for life. A reason to live. Something to make feel me alive.

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  • Ramblings

    I Looked Back and Wonder

    January 27, 2009

    A few days ago I was checking my emails from an email account which I hardly used. It was only then I realised that the husband of the woman who unfortunately passed away in the Mumbai attacks, attended the same secondary school in the same year that I was in.

    Decided to check out some of the respective groups in Facebook. The people that I remembered seems to be doing very well, there was one who moved to UK and published two books on the gay community in Singapore, another one was a corporate lawyer who was actively involved in the local poetry scene and environment conservation. A few were overseas, holding high positions in big corporate companies.

    And then I looked at myself and I wonder.

    While not doing too badly, it seems like I also have not been achieving much either. Too many wrong choices, too many wrong roads taken, and the times when I was on the right road, it seems something always happened to sway me to the wrong one.

    Regrets. I have so many of them that if I stacked them together, it will reach all the way to the moon. And back.

    I wished I had studied more. I wished I had focus. I wished I did not screwed up that much. I wished. I wished.

    Of course, with more than half of my lifespan gone, I could just be going through a midlife crisis. Whatever it is, I do want to make the most of my other half of my lifespan, and achieve more. The problem is now asking myself, what I want to achieve. And I suspect the answer to that question requires me to look back and wonder.

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  • Ramblings

    Familiar Face

    August 27, 2008

    What are the chances of meeting someone that you have not met for almost 20 years?

    A familiar face. Amongst the crowd. Walked past me. I looked at the face, trying to remember.

    Then I remembered.

    I turned my head back. At exactly the precise moment the face did the same thing. We both laughed. Did not stop.

    Two weeks later.

    Facebook.

    Somethings in life are like that.

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  • Ramblings

    Memories

    August 17, 2008

    As part of a New Year’s resolution I made, I had to travel to a part of Singapore that I have not being for more than 2 years.

    As the train passes station after station, I discovered that there are less greens than I remembered. Where once there were lush vegetation, now stands tall concrete buildings. Where once there were open lands, now stands yellowish brown construction sites. Buildings that I remembered were being constructed now stands tall and filled with life.

    I remembered the scenery. And more.

    A friend once told me, at the end of the day, the things that anchored you to a place are your friends, families and places which you have lots of memories of. In a fast moving place like Singapore, the places that you had fond and bitter memories of, are temporary. So what is left are friends and families.

    At the end of the trip, the memories that came flooding back, both bitter and sweet, reminded me that I still remember them. And that no matter where I am, or who I am, those memories will forever have a place in me.

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  • Ramblings

    Life

    January 15, 2008

    I think I have this thing call life figured out.

    Sure, it took many, many years, and after successive failed attempts to decipher it, pouring through books and articles on faith, religion, Zen, self-sacrifice etc, I think I have it figured out.

    No, it is not 42.

    Life is a game, not just any other game, but a RPG (roleplaying game) one.

    In a RPG, you start off weak, naked (well maybe a loincloth), a wooden stick perhaps and off you go, to kill some low level weak trash, like a mouse, or a cockroach. As you kill them, you gain experience points, gain some better armour or weapons, and in time, you gain a level. As you kill bigger monsters, you get even more powerful, gain even more levels, better gear, so that you can go out and kill even bigger monsters. And the cycle repeats itself. Until you get to the demi-god levels.

    In life, it is the same. You start off knowing nothing. You go to school, armed yourself with the best spells and skills, go out and gain experience (through having a job, not killing someone of course). You get paid peanuts, but with experience gained, you get paid more, you go out and buy better items for yourself (like a new car, or a expensive apartment beside the sea), and you realised you want more, so you go out and gain even more experience, and the cycle repeats. Just like in a RPG.

    It sure makes it easier to go through my life now that I had this figure out. Working 12 to 15 hours a day? Nothing to it, I am just farming for honor points or gold. Facing a demanding client? I am just having a bit of trouble killing a big boss. Falling sick after working non stop for more than a year? A potion of cure poison will cure that.

    And of course, when it is pay day, it is just the loot I deserved after battling and overcoming a dragon guarding its treasure at the end of the long and dark dungeon.

    However, there is still some minor part left that does not fit in. Where does love fits in? I do not recall playing any RPG that has any significant love in it. Unless it has to do with female night elves blood elves (someone insisted blood elves are hotter).

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