The Mayonnaise Jar

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day is not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and two cups of coffee.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him.

When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and fills it with golf balls.

He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured it into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.

He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.

He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous “YES”.

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

“Now,” said the professor, as the laughter subsided, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things - God, family,
children, health, friends, and favorite passions. Things, that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the things that matter like your job, house, and car. The sand is everything else — the small stuff.” he said.

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “There is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are
important to you…” he told them.

“So… pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Worship with your family. Play with your children. Take your partner out to dinner. Spend time with good friends. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the dripping tap. Take care of the golf balls first — the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.”

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented.

The professor smiled and said, “I’m glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

A good read. The feeling of being enlightened.

No matter what, I always feel better when I'm talking to you.

I always been complicated

My personal status doesn't have to be changed into "It's Complicated" because I have always been complicated. I can never seem to reconcile what I think to what I feel and thus complicates a lot of things in my life.

My brain always overpowers my emotions and I have the tendency to over-analyze things and forgets that in life, a lot of things doesn't really makes sense---especially when we are talking about the emotions. I can never force myself to submit to what I feel and always end up letting go of things I really really want because logic dictates that if I go the other way, things will never make sense.

In the 20 years that I have been living in this world I had come to realize that life is not really complicated, it is actually our actions that complicates our lives. In my case though, my life is somehow complicated because I am complicated. Does that make sense? I don't think so but I don't care. I told you, I am complicated.

Inside me is a constant battle between logic and emotion. Inside me is an unending debate between my heart and my brain. Which part of me will win in the end remains a mystery. But I will most likely lose myself before any of them could win. I'll probably just end up in some asylum.

Peace on earth.

Idea of Perfection

Here's something that popped in my mind all of a sudden and I want to write it down so I can see if it makes sense or not. This is free-writing---i type as the thoughts come in. You are not required to make sense out of it. But if it does make sense to you, you're welcome and thanks for reading.

The tragedy of life comes from the fact that humanity can never accept that life is not perfect. Every single human being has his own idea of a perfect life and each one wants to achieve it. That in itself is not a problem. We are all entitled to imagine and dream of a beautiful life. Who doesn't want a beautiful, perfect life? The problem is, there are some people among us who will do everything to achieve their ideal life without a thought about how it affects others. There are those who doesn't care if they ruin other people's dreams so they can reach their own.

But if you would think about it, every time you reach your dream, someone loses his. That's how life goes. We cannot all be presidents or superstars or millionaires. Life is a win or lose game and we are all winners and losers. Although I must admit some people are worst off than others and most of us lose more than we win. Still, at some point in our lives, we win. I always believe that life's imperfection makes it perfect. I guess you will never really be able to say that you have lived if you haven't experienced a little bit of everything.

I guess we all do what we do to make our vision of a perfect life real. The choices we make, the groups we join, the jobs we took, all of it to find a way to make our lives perfect. Or at least close to perfect.

Here's the thing, we all have different perceptions of what is perfect. We all strive to make things perfect. That's good. As long as we remember that sometimes our idea of perfection may totally be the opposite of what some people may call perfect. Sometimes, it is not bad to remember our differences. I guess remembering these differences makes us considerate and help us respect other people's idea of perfection and happiness. We cannot force people to see our vision of perfection.

You know what makes the idea of perfection tragic? because it is not real and humans have problems processing the difference between "real world" and "ideal world". You see, the ideal world is a perfect world. Everything you want the world to be: fair, happy, romantic, rich, etc . Real world is imperfect. It is a world made of everyone's idea of a perfect world. It is a world of happiness and sadness, laughter and pain, success and failure.

At some point, something happens and we think we have finally made our lives perfect, then life (being the bitch that she is) slaps us and returns us to reality. Result? We get hurt. But we are humans. It is in our nature to seek for anything that makes us happy. We gravitate to the things that makes us happy. We get attracted to what we think is perfect or close to what we think is perfect. Again and again we do our best to make things as close to perfect as we can. Sometimes we get it, sometimes we don't.

And my idea of a perfect world? A world were there is tolerance, respect, and equality. A world were nobody is killed because of religion or political beliefs. A world were everyone is accepted regardless of race, social status and choice of gender. A world were everyone has what they need and doesn't have to have sleepless nights to get it. A world were there is no pain, no sadness, no heartaches. More like Narnia minus the White Witch. *sigh* If you would think about it, even Narnia isn't perfect.

In the end, we are all just adventurers in this world.We go out and seek for happiness and perfection. Some returns triumphant. Some fails. Some dies along the way. It's like being in an expedition I guess. One big expedition to make the world perfect. It's a long journey and not all of us will succeed. That is reality.

I do not have tolerance for people who threatens the democracy of my country. A threat to democracy is a threat to freedom. And anybody who threatens my freedom is my enemy.

Turned back

I was thinking the other day of when I was always full of ideas and wanted to action them so bad, yet never did it. When I did remember all the fun I had just thinking of how I would carry it out, how cool would it be if people responded well to those ideas etc. That was then, this is now.

I have changed a lot since then. Instead of holding back, I've been planning, researching and looking forward to ensure that once I set myself on something, I'll do it. So many wonderful ideas were left as just ideas by me not really believing that it was possible. I want to be able to settle down with a family when I'm older, knowing I at least achieved something that I had aspired to do. Only then can I really enlighten and encourage my own kids to do the same.

If I could change one thing, I would have actually bought a book, and written all those ideas down. Because if I couldn't accomplish them then, I could always accomplish them later in life.


So now here I am. I'm trying my best to work hard and make the most of my youth, to ensure that I can sleep soundly at night.

Contradiction

A load of criticism have been bestowed on me, naturally I should take it and learn from those experiences, but at the moment, having so many in the one go, nearly everyday, just goes to show I ain't perfect. Nor do I strive to be. I know I should make effort but its not like this effort is really being appreciated. There are times when I feel like, why should I bother? Whenever someone goes out of their way for me, I make sure that they feel good and that I appreciate what they have done for me. But shouldn't appreciation go two was? What happened to the times when appreciation was a massive part of everyone's lives? Surely people would see that once someone goes out of their way for you, it means they care for you. But seriously... Where is the love these days? We keep asking ourselves that but no one has even bothered trying to answer the damn question. Why ask when you know people can't be bothered answering you? What is the point of having a voice when no one really wants to listen to you? What is the point of having ideas when people laugh at them?