A step at a time

"To be interested in the changing seasons is a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring" George Santayana Spring is here! As I looked out the window from the bus that I use to go commute to work and back, it struck me that spring came early this year. Scotland had had a harsh winter late last year (the worst in 20 years! I was told by some of the old folks here) and flowers are blooming early. From daffodils to tulips and Cheery blossoms, colours started to emerge from every nooks and corners. Most houses here started to fill their garden with flowers and the greyness of their building gradually disappear . April is technically over and it looks as if summer is coming. Weather is becoming warmer...too warm for the likes of Scottish as I recalled meeting a chap at the bus stop, when he said that Scotland is generally cold for the first six months and colder the remaining six months of a year. Hmm ...how true...but maybe we will have a prope

" Neutral is state where you are not jumping ahead too quickly or moving too slow. Neutral does not mean being inactive complacent or passive. Its about a calm poise that allows new information and new possibilities to emerge before taking further action. When in neutral you actually increase your sensitivity and intuitive intelligence . Neutral is fertile ground for new possibilities to grow from." Don Childre This is the state that I am in at the moment, neither passive nor complacent. It seems like I am, but simply weighing a few options in hand. I guiltily confess , since graduating last December I have been relaxing, maybe because I have been working non-stop then continuing my study right after. I said that I owe it to myself to relax for a while, to justify why I need time to relax. De-stress for a while. Options? Yes, I wasn't thinking of any other option early in the year. The plan was to graduate and find a job soon after. But the global crisis and recession in

I haven't update my blog for almost a year now, not because of haven't got the time, but there seemed to be lots of things to be done. I keep putting it off as I spent most of my time writing assignments. 7 months of reading and writing. More and more words were put down and after a while I get sick of thinking and writing. I just wanted to relax. But the trouble is, too much relaxing also makes you lazy to do anything else. I think I spent too much time during the break watching movies, from internet to movies on tele and cinemas. I will write something about this later. Just to update, I am halfway on my masters course which hopefully will finish this coming September. I remember complaining there was no time to relax during the last 2 term breaks as we have to finish group assignments that took up most of the holidays. Now that I have time to relax, I became bored very quickly. The most I can relax is a for a couple of days! Even then I didn't know what to do. I know I&

For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin.....But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid.Then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life. Alfred Souza Indeed, we seem to wonder that our lives haven't started and when will it start? There's a lot of things that we need to do first before we can begin our lives..what life? This is our lives. Looking back, I realised that my life has been somewhat colourful. All the obstacles, the ups and downs makes me a stronger person, more confident to meet the rest of my journey of life. Gone through several jobs, taking care of my mom (with my sister) who had diabetic who finally passed away due to renal failure, more jobs, learning diving, quitting jobs, relocate to a place that I would never imagine to be, err....Scotland, going back to school to do masters degree, (and in th

Diving, the latest hobby that I've taken up a few years ago, 2004 to be exact. Ironically, the hobby was being introduced by my boss! Reluctantly, I agreed to take up diving lesson just to get him off by back, and telling myself that I would take up the activity just for exercise. I am a person who's always been afraid of water, and being in the water is the last thing that I wanted to be in! I remember declining when Susan asked me if I wanted to go on a cruise, and I told her that only after I learn how to swim that I would want to step on a boat. Voila! What do you know! Not only I learned swimming, I've also taken up diving! A certified Advanced Open Water diver, no less. I instantly fell in love in diving because through it I have made quite a number of new friends, new places to explore, or rather islands in Malaysia that I've never knew existed, or never care to go before. And, what a stress reliever it is! The fact that you can go to Malaysia's beautiful is

Resentment, anger, frustration, worry, disappointment - negative emotional stress, justified or not, take a toll on your heart, brain and body. Don't let justified emotion rob your health and well being. Don Childre & Howard Martin I have been feeling the stress of my work place recently. Never have I felt before throughout my working years. I have always been able to separate work from my personal life till I have to work with an emotional boss! After spilling my guts out to family and close friends, I realised that they are facing the same thing. Ironically, its never the tasks that have been assigned to you, but behaviour of the boss is sometimes unbearable. The fact that they are the boss, thinking they have the right to behave the way they did. I wish that if I ever get to that level, I would not behave the same way. I certainly wouldn't want to be cursed by staff, God forbid! But I guess at the moment, I'm grateful that I have family and close friends that I can