Life and Humans

A Dangerous Method

2012-02-06T07:31:00.000-08:00

So, to those who are familiar with this movie, must have guessed by now that I'm about to talk about what I think about this movie. And for those who think that, yes, you are right. I can't miss discussing about this movie because it is, if not all, very factual to the history of Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud, two very notable psychologists in the history of psychology. I learnt a lot, and this is a list of what I observed (please note that this observation is in response to the movie, so if there is a factual fallacy, then excuse me):

1) Freud's overemphasis on the effect sex had on behavior was more astounding than I thought.
2) Freud and Jung fought "like a sir." They disagreed on so many things but still showed their respect and professionalism toward each other.
3) The motivation to learn in the culture of professionals was so high that even the patients could teach his or her physician a thing or two. They learnt from each other, something I didn't see in modern educational world. Especially in universities, lecturers are seen as the "absolute" educators. Teachers learning from students now seem to be impossible and inappropriate.
4) They still called their clients as "patients."
5) I think this was one of the earliest realizations in the history of psychological services where therapists or counselors should not push their personal opinions into the head of their clients. One of the characters, Otto, was a physician who kept convincing his client that their problem in life had sexual element and basis. As the result, his clients believed it.
6) Apparently, Freud and Jung were more than friends, Freud seemed to have affection (professional or personal) toward his opponent.
7) Sabina was Jung's client, who was very neurotic, but when she began to heal, she became the next notable psychoanalyst, without the prejudice from her colelagues. I don't think this could happen, again, to our modern world. We always believe in the idea of "once a shrink's subject, forever a shrink's subject..."

Some notable quotes:

1) "And you don't find it necessary or desirable to exercise some restraint as a contribution, say, to the smooth functioning of civilization?" Carl Jung on monogamy.
2) "I'll start gently ripping you to shreds..."
3) "...true sexuality demands the destruction of the ego."
4) "In general, I don't care if a man believes in Rama, Marx, or Aphrodite. As long as he keeps it out of the consulting room..." Sigmund Freud' view on religion in psychological progress.
5) Sigmund Freud's "The world is the way it is" vs. Carl Jung's "We can show you what it is that you might want to become..."
6) "How sweet it must be to die..."
7) "Think about your behavior and then decide which one of us who is neurotic..." The name-calling version of professionals in the early 1900's.
8) "And by the way, please don't feel you have to restrain yourself here. My family are all veterans of the most unsuitable topics of mealtime conversations..." Freud when Jung couldn't stop talking about sexuality while having dinner with the former's family.

I personally think that this movie would be great for those who want to learn about a part of the history of psychoanalysis in an entertaining way. I'd recommend it.

Bias Against Introverts

2012-02-05T01:20:00.000-08:00

I read an interview with Susan Cain, an author who criticizes how society nowadays latently value extroversion as a way to achieve success. She said that in America, institutions now are brainwashed with the idea and value of working well with other people. One factor, she said, is that humans are such "social animals" that when simply being with others, we are just much of ourselves anymore. We change at least a bit with other people.

Of course we are not really concerned with this issue given that it is not as delicious and scandalous as prejudice against a certain race, or gender, or sexual preference, and so on. But, Susan said that statistically, one-third of individuals are introverts (maybe in America and I need to find the number for population in Malaysia), and that's quite a lot. So, whether we like it or not, it happens, and without we realizing it, introverts sometimes find it difficult to work in certain situations.

Please note the differences between shyness, people who are afraid of social rejection, and introverts, people who find it more comfortable being in a situations where they are only around close friends, family, or just by themselves. Introverts like it when they are at home sitting on a chair with a partner, for example, reading a book, or watching a movie. The calmer, the better. It's just a pattern of personality whose existence various institutions in this world need to recognize.

I still remember an assignment given by one of my lecturers in IIUM, Dr. Alizi, who taught Forensic Psychology at that time, he gave us the freedom to do the assignment individually or in group. Some people wanted to do it in group and some individually. I, of course, chose to work alone. I think this is one of the best way to deal with the various personalities can find among our students, especially if it is related to introversion and extroversion.

As you can figure out, I'm an introvert myself. I understand the feeling when your lecturer gave a group assignment, especially when noone in the classroom was someone you were comfortable working with. But I survived, so did/do/will a lot of other introverts I believe. Although introverts need to do whatever they should to survive and be successful in this extroversion-oriented world, this doesn't mean we can take it for granted, because time after time, we'll find a group of people, as Susan called as "pretend extroverts," and the name speaks for itself.

All Children Grow Up!

2012-01-26T19:41:00.000-08:00

Last Monday I brought two of my nephews to KLCC. They are 13 and 12 years old. If you observe them in my home, it'd never occur to you that these 13- and 12-year-old would like to be children. Mostly because all day they were "training" to be a soccer player and entitled themselves to be adults.

"Saya dah besar sekarang, dah orang dewasa. Eh, tak, tak, saya dewasa muda..." Pegged the 12-year-old one day. Translated as, "I'm big now, an adult now. Oh, no, no, I'm a young adult..." But who knows, deep inside, they felt differently.

At KLCC, I brought them to the park beside the lake, where we could see people running, hanging out, dating, and all sorts of thing people did in a park. Then, we reached to a place where there was a big children's playground, with a small pool for children to play in. Obviously they couldn't play in the pool, since they didn't bring any extra clothes, but I could see from their eyes that they were dying to play in the playground. Upon seeing the 12-year-old holding his pride and ego, I asked him with a translation,

"Don't you want to play?"

"No, I'm too big for this..." He said, trying not to look so excited.

Granted, although he was supposed to be older, but the 13-year-old couldn't resist the temptation much longer, and after some convincing, he finally gave in and started to stand closer to the playground. Closer and closer until he climbed up and explored the place. The 12-year-old looked a little jealous, and I told him that I'd buy him anything he wanted after that if he would just go in and play. After some convincing too, he finally played together with his brother.

The two looked a bit hesitant when there were people around, but time after time, they just didn't care. The playground was too fun for them to be caring about what people thought. And no, no one looked at them in a judgmental way, so they finally believed that they could enjoy.

As I watched them over, I couldn't help but think we adults (I mean older adults) always stress the idea of growing up, the idea of preparing for adulthood, until we forget that they are children and they should enjoy their childhood while it lasts. My nephews, no matter how they wanted to declared their adulthood, they were still "children," technically so. Have we ever stopped and thought that maybe, the idea of adulthood seems so good to them because we plant that kind of idea into their head in the first place? We do not tolerate mistakes from them, we asked them to do things adults do, and we make it an obligations things they are not obliged to do until several years later. They are socialized to appreciate and reach adulthood until they forget to enjoy their childhood.

It's not wrong to prepare them for adulthood, but perhaps we could balance out a bit the time where they can be children too. They need to know that being children is not wrong, except it's fun!

Everybody Is a Genius

2012-01-21T03:03:00.000-08:00

Albert Einstein used to say, "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid..."

This is a very wholesome quote by Albert, implying that sometimes we make our quick conclusions based on our superficial analysis of an individual. Some parents are worried that their children can't solve simple mathematical equation, or that it's very hard for them to understand simple grammatical rule in an English sentence; but get this, not everybody can be exceptional in Mathematics or language. Different individual has different set of skills that unfortunately need to be searched beforehand.

But I don't condone the fact that if your child doesn't seem to be good in something, so just let her or him be bad in that. But I advocate the idea that try to be more flexible in your own idea of success; meaning to say, try to be proactive in helping your children find out what they are good at. But still, if he or she is not good in something, there is always the role of education, because "being smart" is not full-out genetic, it is also a product of good learning skill, attitude, and socialization. Plus, you can't afford just focusing on what you're good at because Malaysian education system wouldn't allow you to choose your subjects if you want to finish get your qualifications.

If you have a hard time finding your interest and what you like, you can go to a career counselor and take a career test which can suggest you a direction. Talking to a career counselor can also lead you to get some insight about career personality.

Long-Term

2012-01-16T17:39:00.000-08:00

I am recently an instructor in one university in my hometown. Teaching in a higher institution is my passion and I'm more than happy to be part-time lecturer in here. But, times do not pass by without me observing some things about Malaysian students. We (I mean, including me too when I was a student) have this lack of ability to see a long-term result of certain actions that we do.

Take, for example, doing assignments given by your instructor. When I asked my students to do their first assignment, I saw various behaviors across students. Some did it wonderfully, some were trying really hard, which was appreciated. But some gave a lot of excuses - the "dog ate my homework" kind of excuse. Some that they gave was that the file couldn't be opened, and that they left the file in a computer at home. Yes, I know, things happen, but they happen specifically because you're reckless!

Not to mention, there were a worrying number of plagiaristic papers. My theory is that they thought that this was an unimportant assignment, and that I would not notice that they took information from an article over the internet word-by-word. Bottomline, they thought that their action had no real consequences. Of course no real consequences, at least not now. But there will be long-term consequences.

What are the consequences? First, assignments are a way for you to challenge your intellectual. Rather than being spoonfed by your lecturer, and rather than memorizing the stuffs you learn in class and pour it all out blindly in the exam, assignments ask you to think and apply the knowledge that you learn. So, if you do not challenge your mental capacity in order to produce an acceptable product, then how will you perform well in your job when you are in a workplace? Because of this kind of attitude when they were at schools, there are a lot of frowning public servants behind the counter, or bureaucrats who hate people, or just simply an employer who does "just enough."

Then, because you are not performing well, you never get a promotion and you never see the brighter future than half of your dream. No, no, I'm not talking about knowledge because you can obtain knowledge even if you are in a workplace if you haven't done it in school. I'm talking about your attitude. I'm talking about your perspective in leading your own self to move further than the position you are in now.

So, please, fix your attitude when it comes to this. If you don't think it'll not bite you now, it'll sure come to show itself in the future. Fix it before it's too late.

You Mad, Bro?

2012-01-04T21:36:00.000-08:00

So, in these past few weeks, the FB page of my hometown was "shocked" with a picture of an Indian giving the middle finger to a frame containing the word 'Allah'. Upon the publishing of the photo, a lot of people (Muslims) commented angrily, which was normal I suppose because it was their -and my- God that the person in the photo was insulting. But some comments were disconcerting. They did not just express their anger, they expressed it offensively. When I saw those comments, I couldn't help but to wonder, what good does profanity do in this situation?

So, I tried to politely remind them that cursing wouldn't help a bit. But, they reacted by saying that I was backing up the person in the photo, that I was comparing themselves with the person, that I would be the person who would be spat in the face until I would reacted aggressively, etc. No, that's not the point! I was and still am angry at what the person did, it's childishness and blasphemous at its best, but I don't think cursing will help a thing, other than adding up the sins that you already gathered over the years on your left shoulder!

People would justify everything as long as they believe that they are on the right side. This is, again, where the phrase, "The end doesn't justify the means" is important to ponder upon. We know that the person in the photo insulted our God, but it doesn't give us the license to say anything we want without intelligence. I'm sure our Prophet wouldn't like that.

Still, I want the person in the photo to get punished for what he did. Maybe being fined, or doing some hours of community service in a mosque or something, I don't know, I'm not an expert in designing a punishment system, but yeah, he deserves to learn that religions are to be respected, no matter what religion you are.

Happy New Year!

2011-12-31T01:53:00.000-08:00

To be perfectly honest, I did not even remember that tomorrow is going to be the beginning of the new year, until my best friend, Akram told me. I was quite busy with the new job and the submission of thesis and whatnot, not really keeping up with the date.

So, upon knowing that tomorrow is the new year, I can't help but think, what good things have I done in 2011? What resolution I set in the beginning of 2011 have I actually achieved now? Hell, I can't even remember if I ever set a resolution. So, if you ask what my feelings are in this last few hours of 2011, I honestly don't know.

So, how about you? Can you look back and feel good? Or do you remember some things about 2011 and feel regretful?

But, if you feel regretful and/or depressed, then don't worry, we still have 2012 to make up for it. But still, thinking like this doesn't give you the ticket to think that you might live for years or a year more. As my Prophet said, you do your religious duty like you would die tomorrow, and you commit to your worldly affair like you would live for another 1000 years.

So, let's hope and pray that 2012 will be a much better year. Ameen!

One Thing Leading to Another

2011-12-24T05:23:00.000-08:00

Have you ever noticed that whenever you feel something - good or bad - you'll realize that the subsequent events would also be positive? For example, you find the morning so great, the shower is so warm, and the breakfast is wonderful. All in all, you begin the day feeling great. Then, you most likely will also find the things you encounter along your day positive, the morning breeze, the chirping birds, the busy traffic, and whatever. And no matter how bad it could seem. You miss the train? It's fine, it's still early. You step on a mud? Okay, it's dirty, but nothing unwashable.

But when you start off the day feeling miserable, you will most likely find yourself in a later event that seems to be worse than the last. Oh, the toothpaste is finished! The egg is burned! No bread! The birds are very noisy! The wind is too cold!

But do you notice all those annoying things are also the great things experienced by the positive people described above?

I believe this all boils down to our own perception. When negative things (e.g. our emotions in the beginning of the day) preoccupy our mind, then the negative emotions resulting from that usually weigh down all other positive events that might occur every now and then, this is called as Negativity Bias.

So, my suggestion would be to not indulge yourself in a negative emotion too long because no matter what you experience afterwards, you'd still hate it, figuratively. In addition, when you fight off the negative feelings with the positive ones, you'll more likely be more productive and reasonable throughout your day.

Falling In Love

2011-12-13T05:02:00.000-08:00

Sometimes we wonder why some people are easily blinded by love. Because of a certain person, they could, as we always say to describe romanticism, "to swim across the seas, to pick the stars, and to walk across fire." A study has shown that love is a feeling that can neurologically suppress our reasoning and logical thinking. In a layman's words, love is a kind of an addiction.

Why not? When we are in love, walking feels like floating, the body seems to be really light, and the head is slanted slightly to the side while we tilt it upward. Everything seems so right, and minor setbacks are just, well, setbacks - nothing you can't handle. When you fall in love, your mind and your partner's seem to be on the parallel level of existence. That's why you could finish each other's sentences, and it seems like your interest is always also his or her interest. There's not enough time to talking! You can spend hours on the phone, in front of the computer chatting, and even writing a traditional mail.

When you're in love, the world is bright and the chirping of the bird sounds beautiful. You can't wait to tell everything that happens in your life to your partner - your increasing grade, your bitchy workmate, or even the chirping birds. And yet, you can't even wait to hear everything that happens in his or her life. There's always something to tell, yet there seems to be so much that still needs telling.

When you fall in love, no night passes by without you thinking about the person you're in love with. You wonder, "When can I go to the movies with him/her?", "Is he/she thinking of me right now?", "Will I ever get married to this guy/girl?" Because after all, this is the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. You know that he or she is the ONE.

So, because of those, love is like an addiction. Just like any other drugs, it makes us feel good. No wonder every story in the media/books has the element of love, relationship, marriage, etc. Love is so pivotal in a human's life that the repeat of its importance in everyday life never bores the very humanity. If we can, we want to spend everyday of our life loving someone!

For me, while there is love to our family, to our friends, to our partner, to our God, there is also a unique role each plays in our life. We can never be enough with one type of love. Which is why in Prophet Muhammad's life, he was bestowed with the best of people around him that he loved so dearly. The journey that he partook was filled with the comings and goings of people that filled his life with such love and joy.

I sound lame in this entry, but love is lame, in a good way. Somehow I believe there is someone for everyone. There's no such thing as loneliness except when you are giving up. Loving is also a learning process, so don't be afraid to fail because afterwards, you are always a stronger lover.

There you go...

The Help

2011-12-07T00:19:00.000-08:00

"God says we need to love our enemies... It [is] hard to do..."

Recently I just watched a film that depicts the lives of "colored" maids in the early 1960's. In the film, we can see characters with various personalities, most of them have something to do with discrimination and stereotype. We can see some characters who are inflicted with the most ridiculous kinds of stereotypical thinking ever. Hence because of that, one of the prominent storylines in the film is the belief that bathrooms for Whites and colored people need to be separate. In order not to sound stereotyped, the character having that belief asserts that although that has to be done, it is still equal, "separate but equal." Why do they have to be separate in the first place? It is because their stereotypical thinking tells them that colored people bring disease their people don't.

We also can see characters who are sympathetic to the maids like the main protagonist named Skeeter and a couple others. Despite the community's attitude towards colored maids, and even the legal endorsements related to the relationships between Whites and colored people, Skeeter has a different sets of belief, and she does not let stereotypes and difference of skin color determine who she can and cannot befriend with. In the film, she with other two maids write a book that tells the perspective of maids in Jackson, Mississippi - the good and the bad. And the book is finally published, but not without some repercussions.

In the film, the kind of stereotypes and discrimination that we can see is the explicit kind, the kind that usually existed in the era where our grandparents were still teenagers. But, don't be rest assured, because these phenomena still exist today, but because of the pressure of the media, the policies, and education, the modern kind of stereotype and discrimination now is more implicit. It means, these things are still in our head, but they stay in there. Malaysia is not exempted from racism issue, in fact it is steadily talked about because despite of being a real social issue, some politicians use it to hype up their own manifesto and popularity.

As a result, what I can see now is, rather than people of different races start accepting one another, they become suspicious and doubtful to each other, except this time, they sugarcoat it with friendliness. For me, the education on social issue of discrimination is important to teach the young that people of different backgrounds are not their enemies. But all the talk and fake assurance about solution of racism in Malaysia is not really necessary because for me the real solution is to "ignore" it. I know it doesn't sound intelligible but this time, ignorance can be a bliss. We ignore the hype-up, the fake talk, the racist remarks, and all, but instead we start living with each others and practice respect.

So, writing this entry is exactly the opposite of what I'm advocating, therefore I'm going to stop.

Hope

2011-12-04T15:19:00.000-08:00

Positive Psychology is an interesting branch of psychology that seeks to find potential and strengths within humans. It is developed because too much of the rest of what psychology is learnt is something negative, unhealthy, or abnormal. So, rather than talk about what makes humans sick, Positive Psychology studies about what makes humans grow and survive.

One of the topics discussed by positive psychologists is the topic of hopes. Hope is a feeling where you are confident that a positive outcome will occur. According to psychologists, hopes are a response to the circumstances when things seem to be, well, hopeless, or impossible. Hopes keep us going when the only other choice that we have is to give up.

According to one of the most prominent authors about hopes is C. R. Snyder, who wrote a book titled, "The Psychology of Hopes" (2003). Snyder wrote that hopes have three mental components: Goals, willpower, and waypower. The goals are the end destination with certain measures of importance where we would like to end up. Willpower is the force of determination that drives us to the goals. Waypower, on the other hand, is the how-to of goals and willpower. We may have the destination in mind and the drive of it, but do we know how to achieve it?

I think waypower is what's wrong with so many people in this world (well, including me at some point). We all have imaginations, dreams, and hopes. We all face certain tribulations and challenges when it comes to achieving what is in our mind. But, do we really know how to achieve it? Many of us just become hopeless simply because when asked about it, "I'm just not sure what to do anymore..." If you keep thinking about it, there must be a way to achieve something. Ask yourself, have I researched everything about it? Have I figured out all the possible ways to achieve it? If your answer is "I'm not sure," then most probably you have not.

So, get off your butt and try to do something. Try to drive away the disappointment from accompanying the result of your hope. Chances are, whenever you hope, it's when it materializes. You just need enough actions to make it happen.

The Disease of Loneliness

2011-11-16T22:56:00.000-08:00

There is a woman in her mid-thirties, who is a single mother with children. After her divorce, she has been relentlessly searching for men over the internet through chatting messengers. From an observation, her choice of men are usually the kinds that are adventurous and controversial, not in a good way. Until today, she has been dating with several men including a husband of someone else's, a fraud, and a drug dealer. Because of these men, she abandons her responsibilities as a mother, a daughter, a sister and a teacher at a school where she works at.

However, if living a life without men. she can actually be a good mother, daughter, a sister, and a teacher. For some reasons, when there is a man in her life, she becomes impulsive and out of control. She always leaves her children until late night, skipping her work days, and even lying to her parents. It is like adolescent years all over again. Because of men, she has done some serious things like burying a spelled material obtained from a witch doctor, having sex with multiple men, and even now there is a pregnancy scare.

When she was young, she is described by her parents to be rebellious and always sneak out at night to be with her friends. Among her siblings, she was always the one with the troubles. Because of being too conformant to her friends too, she dropped out of school of did not finish her last year. The worst she did after her parents exerted some control on her was attempting to commit suicide by slitting her wrist. Since then, her family became very careful at what they were going to say or do to her.

~~~~~~~

What do you think about the story above? About the description of the woman above? A perception of a layman might judge her as an "insane, deadbeat mother," or "a woman stuck in her teenager mind." But for me, it is the disease of loneliness that makes her the way she is. From what I can see, she is in a constant need of connecting with someone, especially a man - and she could go to great length to make sure that she stays being connected.

The thing is, she seems to be very clinical, with the impulse problem and suicidal tendency, so I ask myself, is there in any ways that loneliness can become clinical rather than a temporary condition? The loneliness or the need to connect with someone this woman is feeling is the kind that reaches the extreme line. While she is capable of being a good mother, sister, daughter, and at her work, she still could alter her personality to the most opposite degree, and abandon everything, just to be with a guy.

But all in all, I believe that loneliness is a very dangerous disease and nobody ever deserves to feel lonely. So, I'm calling everyone out there, don't take loneliness for granted. If you ever feel lonely, reach out to someone, or if you find anyone of your friend or family members show the signs of loneliness, then reach out to him or her. Loneliness is a disease that can grow out to a more serious unfortunate event, at which life can be at risk because of it.

The Death of Wang Yue

2011-11-10T09:23:00.000-08:00

Have you ever heard of the case of an accident where Wang Yue, a Chinese little girl, who was run by two vehicles and it was reported that more than 15 people were passing by but none offered help? You can watch it here.

No, no, don't blame any nationality over this accident, blame the humanity, especially a certain psychological part of it that actually had been observed since 1964, the year where a woman named Kitty Genovese was tragically killed while the people in a building nearby, her neighbors and witnesses to the murder did not do a thing to help her. Since the murder of Kitty, social psychologists had acknowledged the threat of Bystander Effect, the condition where help is less likely to be offered when diffusion of responsibility is not clear. According to the theorists, Bystander Effect means that the more people are present in an emergency case, the less likely help is offered to the victim/patient/person in need.

Why do you think happened in the video above? My hypothesis is that, the market was a crowded place (although it did not seem crowded, but reports said that it was a busy place), so the accident was witnessed by a lot of people. When we are with people, we usually determine what happen by looking at the action of others. So, let's say there were 15 people in the accident place, each one of them looked at one another, wondering why nothing was done. When they couldn't answer the question, they resorted to the answer, "Maybe it is nothing..."

It is a tragic case, as was the murder of Kitty. I don't doubt it might happen to anywhere else in the world if the people are not educated on the threat of Bystander Effect. So, I'm making this entry, hoping that the few of you guys who read might understand what is happening and can do a little change.

A Thought on War

2011-11-05T06:33:00.000-07:00

So, I was in Turkey for 12 days and this time, my friend, Aslam and I tried to be more courageous by traveling farther than our comfort zone (well, not really courageous as in we used a travel agent to do so), and we chose Canakkale as our choice of city to visit. But I'm not here to talk about my travel experience, although I might put it in here and there to support what I am going to say. My post here is largely about war, it's because what Canakkale is and what the city is known for.

So, Canakkale (or more specifically Gallipoli) was a place where War of Gallipoli between Turkey and ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) took place. We were told by the tour guide that this war was one of the bloodiest because of the large amount of casualties including young soldiers and medical officers. I'm not an expert in the history, but upon visiting the cemeteries of both the ANZAC and Turkish casualties, I was starting to see the reality of war and its effects.

My mind was occupied with the issue of war the rest of the day and I also had a debate about the necessity of war with one of the staffs at the hostel we were staying in. The staff was adamant on the necessity of war and said that war is the most suitable way to defend ourselves when our right is stripped from us. but I thought otherwise. Despite how large the mission is, I still believe there is an alternative to war, but of course I'm too small to be issuing my opinion because wars were/are the result of something much larger.

When I looked at the cemeteries and the words that people who loved the deceased wrote on the tombstone, my heart broke. Despite the existence of the people they love, soldiers still decided to go out and love their country more (at which I do not say is wrong). Their patriotism was very strong perhaps because there was a strong leader among them that gave them the strength to do so. I respect these soldiers fully despite their religion and nationality.

But I hope in the future there is a way for wars to be prevented. Humanity is so much more important than the need to shed any blood. But if wars were still to happen, then...

Jealousy/Envy/Greed

2011-10-17T01:55:00.000-07:00

So, I had an interesting experience debating very very briefly with some guys on a page in Facebook about jealousy and it stands in Islam. The original status said that if you were a good slave of God, you would not have even an ounce of feeling of jealousy because you would always be grateful with what you got. Yes, at face value, it is true, but the more I think about it, I guess we can see it from another perspective.

I started to think about it when a comment of that status said it was wrong because somehow the poster related jealousy with envy. So, let me ask you, is jealousy really envy? And then, on top of that, another poster said that jealousy is greed. So, let me ask you another obvious question, is jealousy really greed? Is jealous on the same zip code of envy and greed. For me, it is, but what differentiates my opinion and the status is that jealousy is not really all black. For me, there is "white" about jealousy.

Now, of course you have to be grateful with everything you have got, but do you have to be settled for it? No. You can feed your family with your daily income. Your family need $20 a day to survive, and you gain $20 to give them. Yes, be grateful, at least it's not below $20, but do you really have to be just grateful? Why can't you look at people around you who are better than you and be jealous of them, then want to achieve the better state that they achieve. You don't want to just be settled with $20, you want to be able to give your family more.

Now, another issue, is wanting more greed? Yes, I suppose. But is it a bad greed? No, I don't think so. If I were to use an Islamic example, Islam always asks us to be "greedy" for His mercy and blessings. So, why can't we be greedy on a better state of life, just as we are greedy to be a better slave of God?

For me, what is bad is simple. Jealousy, envy, and greed become bad when you believe that you should be on top of everyone and no other people should achieve the same way you do. And when people do, you start to do something bad to them that can make them fall down, or at the very least, you wish them to go down. To achieve for a better state does not belong to a specific person or group of people, everybody deserves to have a better state of life. In order to have that you need to be jealous of, envious for, and greedy for it. But in order to keep you humble and down-to-earth, you also need to have a good amount of gratitude in your heart.

Free Will Is A Limited Resource

2011-10-15T05:26:00.000-07:00

When I was reading this book, "30-Second Psychology", I was intrigued by this one particular theory about willpower that was developed by Roy Baumeister that is called as Ego Depletion. This theory asserts that freewill is a resource that is limited and can be exhaustible. A study performed to see how long the participants could skip the delicious chocolate cookies placed on a table while asked to just eat a piece or two of radishes that were also there. Three groups were introduced: a group that did not have eating requirement, a group that was asked to only eat the radishes and skip the cookies, and the third group who was allowed to eat the cookies and skip the radishes.

In the same time, all participants were instructed to do a puzzle and told that they could quit anytime they want. The results showed that the group who was asked to skip the cookies quit the puzzle earlier than the other two groups. The researchers explained this that free will is limited by attributing it to the participants' report on being tired on having to keep resisting the cookies.

So, related to this, what should we say about ourselves? I would like to comment on the media in the modern world, at which advertisements on scrumptious unhealthy foods, sexual symbols, and many more are viewed before our eyes everyday. At the same time, obesity, eating disorder, rape cases, teenage pregnancy, and many more issues are increasing day by day. Can I safely say that these issues and the advertisements are positively related then? Based on this research, both might.

At this point, I honestly do not know for sure to whom we can place the burden of the issue. Is it really the parents? The media? The government? I guess it's all of them. But, perhaps more accurately is the individuals themselves who need to exercise the strength of their free will because the researchers reported although free will is exhaustible, practice can help an individual resistance to temptation stronger. But it's not easy as it sounds, is it?

Families

2011-10-03T05:57:00.000-07:00

Today I had a conversation with two of my friends where we argue about how far our family could go to accept us. One side argued that no matter how dark, how deep, and how sinful/immoral what you have been hiding is, your family will accept you. But, another side (which was me), said that acceptance has its limit. No matter how a person is our family, his or her ground would be shaken if something is strong enough to shake it - which could result in a broken floor.

What do you think? Will your family still accept you if you used to, for example, um, (...searching for an example of a terrible secret) murdered someone? That you are a murderer? Or if have been having an affair with your sister's brother (or your brother's sister)? I know that my examples are too dramatic. But let's say you keep one of these secrets, will you be able to still stand by your family?

There is one case of sex reassignment case in Terengganu that was heatedly talked about recently by bloggers and major newspapers. No, I'm not here to argue if it is wrong or right, or if it is immoral. I was intrigued by the person's mother reaction toward his decision to change his sex. His mother gave a clear consent about the whole issue and supported her son all way long.

This is one example how families could go to great length to accept us. But for me, it is just one example. Maybe the mother in this case came from a liberal family, or maybe she had been exposed to a more opened world, or any other factors that could lead her to react positively like that. But for some other families, I am sure their reaction would be brutal.

But this one I am sure - no matter how lost you feel and confused you become, the one sure place you can always go back to is your family.

The Many Words for Love

2011-10-01T03:33:00.000-07:00

A psycholinguistic theory asserts that the more prevalent something is in a culture, the more nouns are available to describe that thing. For example, if you ever heard about this, Eskimos have many words of snow that can describe snow in its different forms. I don't know what those words are, but apparently, their daily experience with snow makes them be able to appreciate snow more deeply than us.

Snow is not my point here, my point is the word "love." How many words in English that describe "love"? Fondness? Passion? Care about? I don't think so. But in Malay language, we have quite a few words that can describe "love," such as:

1) Cinta
2) Sayang
3) Kasih
4) Maybe suka?

What does this mean? Does this mean love is more prevalent in Malay culture than the English-speaking cultures? I don't think so, or at least it cannot be confirmed yet as so. I think this is a great language research that can tell us something about Malay culture that might be interesting.

Professional and Muslim Counselors and Psychotherapists

2011-09-17T20:00:00.000-07:00

This is something that I have envisioned since I took my counseling subject in my last university: A professional Muslim counselor cum psychotherapist who specializes in religious issues. No, this is not the typical you-are-depressed-so-you-must-face-God kind of Muslim counselor. This kind of counselor, in my vision, is the one that uses scientific approach (or many of us are keen to call them Western approaches) to solve Islamic religious issues. Let me give you examples:

a) Ali comes to a Muslim counselor because of his issue of concentration in prayers. The counselor uses theories of attention available to help client focus more in prayers. Ali also complains of always finishing up his prayers quickly, sometimes unconsciously, so the counselor thinks of reasons why individuals have troubles "waiting" or doing anything in slow pace. So, perhaps it is something to do with the type of personality (personality A or B), in which an individual with Personality A has problem moving in attentive pace, which is something that prayers require.

b) Halimah sees a Muslim counselor because she realizes her habit of backbiting is getting worse. The counselor analyzes her personality to see if there are underlying factors as to why she needs to gossip. Perhaps Halimah has an envy issue that begins from her lack of self-esteem, which can be covered by her talking bad behind someone's back.

c) Fikri has anger issue and is irascible towards anything wrong, from forgetting to buy a toothpaste, to a noisy neighbor, to a simple joke from a friend. A Muslim counselor that he meets understands that Rasulullah used to ask his people to sit if they are standing, and to lie down if they are sitting when they are angry. This is consistent with the assertion that a person is angrier when the desire to be angry is "entertained", so the counselor uses elements of lowering the angry person's down in many ways before the anger furthers.

These are just several examples (just examples, not scientific at all) of how a Muslim counselor can treat religious issues, or daily issues for that matter without being condescending. By condescending, what I mean is that a lot of Muslim counselors now just resort to "it's haraam" and "it's a sin" and "you must repent" while talking to their clients. I do not say that it is wrong, but before you say that, have you ever taken the steps to understand your clients first?

I hope with the time passing by and a lot of Muslim graduates are aspiring to be psychologists, they would be able to balance between religious and scientific values and practices in what they do. Islam, while can be a mystic religion, is very scientific when it comes to daily life. So, why not we, as professionals, take advantages of the knowledge we learn at school to help people, rather than judging them out of place.

One Very Effective Way to Scare Smokers

2011-09-14T23:52:00.000-07:00

My father was a smoker. Yeah, I didn't know that until recently when he was back from his Umrah with my mother. We were discussing about smoking and my father nonchalantly told us that he was a pretty heavy smoker when he was younger. Then, it intrigued me, how come is he not now? I mean, he doesn't smoke at all. I was a keen believer that once a smoker, you're forever a smoker. I know, I know, there are successful cases where smokers stop their habits, but to tell you the truth, I never see one in my own life experience.

The story on his success was simple. He experienced an indirect persuasion, an accidental one. My father had a friend who was also a heavy smoker, and they always smoked together. But, one day, his friend caught a sickness that seemed to be very much related to his smoking habit. According to my father, the sickness looked awful and scary. Out of the blue, my father just stopped smoking, fearing that he might get the same sickness.

You see, everyday, smokers are told everyday that smoking is a bad for health. The government even asked cigarette companies in Malaysia to put gruesome pictures that depict the health consequences of smoking. But we can't deny the fact that they don't work. We keep telling our fathers, or brothers, or relatives, or friends, that they could get whatever cancer disease that is associated with smoking. No, they still smoke pretty heavily. So, why did this work on my father but not on all of these folks out there?

I believe it did because a message that is not intended to persuade is actually more persuasive. Compare these sentences:

a) "Don't smoke because you will get lung cancer!"
b) "Oh, I don't know, I'm starting to feel sick now at my lung. Do you think it's because of my smoking?"

The second speaker might not intend to persuade the audience that smoking is bad for health, but my father, who was the listener to his friend saying a sentence resembling the second sentence, felt like he would be about to experience the same thing if he didn't stop smoking. So, in a way, his friend "persuaded" him to stop smoking, without intending it.

Persuasion is a very intriguing subject and we all can see how politicians, media, salesmen, or even ordinary people like us use a wide range of persuasive techniques to get what they want or desire. Maybe I'll do more entries on persuasive techniques if I have the motivation to do so. Persuade me to do so!

Greatly Glad Tidings

2011-09-07T21:19:00.000-07:00

This entry is dedicated to my parents returning back from their visit in the Holy Land. Usually when your parents are gone for half a month to a very far place and then they are back, the moment when you are looking at their faces can be elating. But when the time for you to meet them is coupled with some nerve-ridden news, that feeling is intensified.

Let me tell you what happened.

The flight was originally set to arrive in Malaysia at 3.00 p.m. But the night before, my father called me and told us that the arrival would be delayed some hours later. It was fine, because we all were thinking that delays are a normal part of flying. Then, came the next night, we all were set to pick our parents up from the airport. We almost arrived at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) at 10 p.m. but our father called to tell us that we should just not come yet and hang out somewhere. So, we went to a petrol station nearby that had some kind of little cafe in its speedmart. An hour later, after purchasing and eating foods whose prices were purposely the same with the parking fees at KLIA for several hours (yeah, that's crazy), our father called again and told us the gate was finally opened. We all went out from there and headed to the airport.

After arriving, we waited some more, but by "we" I mean, the other two cars of my sister and my brother. But, the car I was in that belonged to my other sister got lost. From going to the left to park our car inside the airport parking spaces, my sister didn't see the sign and went to the right lane, which was for going back to Kuala Lumpur. We got nervous, especially because we might not be able to get in time to see our father and mother arriving.

Then, we was able to find our way back to KLIA and relieved when our other siblings called us and told us that our parents hadn't arrived yet. So, we waited... and waited and waited, until came the time when our father called us, yet again, to tell us that it was going to be even later because there seemed to be unsettling about the situation inside the arriving gate. Then, we were discussing what we could do to kill time, and our father called again to tell us that all the passengers of that particular flight were all detained because a little big-mouthed birdie told the authority that there was a bomb inside the plane. When our father told us that, it was nerve-breaking and we needed something to soothe our feelings over.

So, not enough with the food consumed at the petrol station, added with our riveting hunger, we decided to kill the time by eating at some nearby place since there was nothing much we could do. After spending a significant amount of time at the restaurant, we decided to get back to the airport and waited for our parents there. We parked at the front gate of the airport and some of us waited in the car and some other waited inside to see the arriving and released passengers. I myself was trying to sleep in the car but the mosquitoes somehow tried to tell me that it was not the right thing to do that time.

Inside the arriving gate, my parents underwent the most annoying investigation and check-up ever. My mother was frustrated to see how it was all handled and confronted one of the police officers and asked why all this, but the officer only replied with a laconic answer that it was all perfunctory. Every bag was searched several times and the number of passengers released upon satisfying condition were moving very slowly.

Then, it was a couple hours later, and we finally saw our parents coming out from Gate 6, the gate where the passengers from that flight and that airplane to come out to. And yes, the feelings were intensified and to finally see our parents' faces were great. I'm glad that everything turns out fine.

Eid Mubarak!!!

2011-08-25T20:37:00.000-07:00

The fasting month is almost at the end, what do you feel? I certainly feel there are so many things to fix and improve, and I certainly feel I did not succeed much in this fasting month in fighting against my desires and small sins. So, it's definitely sadness. But as we all say again and again, all good things indeed come to an end.

But for all the reasons why Eid is the way it is, I feel happy for its arrival too. It is the place where family comes together, where far-away friends meet, and we visit the relatives who we are not close to in the first place. My heartfelt prayers would be to see my family comes together again, and I could meet with my far-away friends, and I could visit my relatives whom I'm not close with. But especially, the first one, especially the first one.

In this occasion, I'd like to take the opportunity to ask for forgiveness. I have made some enemies and I have made some friends. But nonetheless, I have made some kind of mistakes to both, and from the bottom of my heart, I apologize. My friends back in IIUM, back in school, in my current universities, if you happen to read this, please know that I am truly sorry for anything I did that might hurt you. Please make halal of what I have consumed from your part.

And my family, especially my parents who are in Makkah now, please forgive me and please make halal of anything that I consume or anything that you give. I hope you benefit as much as you can in your journey at the Holy Land.

Eid Mubarak!!

What's Your Struggle.... In Ramadan?

2011-08-17T21:13:00.000-07:00

In one of my past entries, What's Your Struggle?, I talked about how everyone has a struggle, or a fight in which that becomes a theme issue in that person's life. Now, let's talk a bit religiously and specifically, about a similar struggle that might have to face, that somehow magnifies in this blessed month. This entry is for my Muslim fellows out there, but I hope it could give an insight to everyone.

I had a conversation with one of my friends, who reported that his aim and goal to benefit as much from this month is sinking really low now. He was really pumped up to observe his obligations and the non-obligatory deeds, so he'd get something out of this month. But came the third week, he started feeling very down, and his energy was not as much as fiery as it was before.

The same thing happened to me, exactly. I promised myself to always go to the mosque every night (or if I didn't, I would complete the night prayers at home), and I would try my hardest not to do any obvious sins (I mean, the sins that I'm aware are sins upon doing them). The first two weeks were somehow fruitful and satisfying, and came the third week, suddenly the challenge became even harder and more difficult.

We have always heard how Islamic obligations like prayers and fasting can prevent someone from doing unIslamic things, but why some struggling individuals like me, my friend, and I'm sure thousands and thousand of Muslims out there are having a breakdown in our consistency? Why at one minute we are pumped up to do our best, but in another, we suddenly feel like we can't win anymore? This, again is not scientific, but my theory is this: Imaan (or Islamic faith), is a lot similar like motivation. Motivation is a very much popular in Psychological literature and a lot of research has been conducted to see the nature of it, such as what makes it stay, what makes it go low, or what makes it strong, or weak, etc. If you observe your Imaan, you will see the similar pattern, sometimes it is high, sometimes it is low, sometimes it is strong, and sometimes it is seriously weak. So, my question is, can we, scientifically and safely, assume that whatever applies to motivation can also be applied to Imaan? I mean, what seems to refill our motivation when it's down, can it refill our Imaan too?

I hope there are Muslim psychologists out there who would conduct such research and use the findings to benefit the other folks out here so we can benefit from it. As I conclude my entry, I would like to quote a nice phrase that I found somewhere in this virtual world that sums this topic up pretty well...

"Some people say that motivation doesn't last - well, like bathing, we recommend it daily!"

It's true...

A Letter to His Father

2011-08-10T08:21:00.000-07:00

When conducting an activity with my client who is a young offender, involving him writing a letter originally done to provide a platform for healthy expressions of emotions, he seemed a little bit hesitant at first. But once he delved into the writing phase, he started to get deeper into it and write a lot longer than my friend and I initially thought. The letter is roughly translated...

"This is for you Abah. I write this letter to tell you what I felt throughout being under the same roof with you. I can't begin to tell you how much disappointed I am with you. I know my juvenile behaviors were inexcusable, but to be honest, I did them because all what I really wished and wanted was to be like any other kids who got what they wanted whenever they wanted them. I just want to be like them. Not rich, but with enough money where I could live like other kids. Instead of working, you hung out with your friends at the coffee shop with your friends and you jumped from one job to another. When at home, all you did was finding something to blame on me, if it's not about returning home late, it'd be about me not taking care of my little brother. But do you know why I'd return home late, and not take care of my little brother? It's because I'd be out finding a job to gain a little bit money so I could buy what I want. Then, I felt like the money was slow to get, then I resorted to stealing. I was nervous at first, but it got easier everytime I did it. From stealing money at a shop, I turned to picking pockets and stealing money from my own relatives. I felt happy, because for the first time in my life, I have my own money and I could buy something for my little brother, I could buy something to eat that he liked, and then I could buy something that I liked, that I wanted. I'm sorry Abah for disappointing you. Because of my juvenile behaviors, I was never a good son. I am not sure if you hate me or love me, but I hope one day you could find forgiveness as I did to you. Take care, Abah."

What I wanted to point out is that, each of youth who has made some criminal mistakes at some point in their life, there is a story to it. I do not condone what they did, but when you are working at a place where it "stores" kids who have made some illegal mistakes, the least you could do is to spend some time to understand where they come from and how they get here. That's how much you owe it to them when you are paid every month for your "job" and call yourself a "social worker."

This is what I would advice to everyone who'd step to be a staff at a welfare institution: Please make sure you have passion in your heart in regards to what you are doing. Please make sure you have what it takes to ensure that you go to the necessary lengths to understand the residents and try your hardest to avoid assigning labels like "evil" or "bad." Each time you like to think they are evil, ask yourself, haven't you made some mistakes you wish you could take back?

What's Your Struggle?

2011-08-06T22:10:00.000-07:00

My principle about life's challenges is this: No one is struggling more than the other one. Everyone has his or her own struggle that makes up the person's adventure in his or her life. You might have the struggle of poverty, and has to find the food to eat for the day for you or yourself, but it doesn't mean you have a worse challenge than a rich guy who has variety of foods to eat everyday; the latter might have the struggle of faith in which he needs to ensure that the wealth he possesses does not possess him (or it already does). You might feel like being a married person is really challenging and everytime people "complain" about being single, you'd answer with a laconic, "you don't want to get married," but single people might battle with the own depression out of being lonely, which is dangerous in the first place.

Therefore, my point is, each of us has our own struggle. The key point is to empathize and never compare problems. I believe when you are a friend who is listening to another friend's problem, the golden rule of thumb is to never say, "that is not a big deal, my situation is worse." You are just undermining his or her problem and worse yet, you might make your friend feel even more depressed. But this golden rule of thumb is not my point. My point is, what is your struggle and how do you perceive it?

Some people place the destination of finally triumphing over the struggle as the priority, and some people view the journey to the destination as the purpose of life. It all boils down to how you perceive your struggle. I also have mine, so I know how desperate you might feel sometimes to just get the hell out of the "theme" problem you have in your life, but we ought to remember in mind that there is no shortcut to happiness. Shortcuts will always backfire. The key to arriving at the destination is perseverance, persistence, and effort. But at the same time, the journey shall be perceived as a learning process, with its own ups and downs.

As usual, when I write about something that sounds preach-y, it's because I'd like to remind myself of it, more than to you. And if you are a Muslim, then make sure to always remember, God is always by your side.

Ramadhan!

2011-07-30T23:19:00.000-07:00

Ramadan is coming again. I have written in my last Ramadhan post that I am nervous about my performance in this month. It only comes once per year and the feeling like you are not taking full advantage of the month, is like a feeling failure.

Speaking of a feeling of failure, I am reminded by my another "failure." Being a social worker is hard, and it requires you to have a high level of courage to advocate for your client. When you are working at a place where you are required to be passionate about it, as in working in a shelter home for the elderly, or an institution for orphans, in a juvenile rehab center, etc. You are required to look at your job as more than a job, because it is not. It is about helping the target group who is the reason why the institution exists in the first place.

Some public servants are very apathetic towards their job and many of them have the as-long-as-I-finish-my-job attitude. And this, I observe, cause them to want to settle down in their own comfort zone and will distress over having to do extra work. Unfortunately (or not), extra works are like a part of being a social worker because being a social worker requires you to have extra passion in what you are doing.

I have nothing more to say, other than, I was being warned because I referred a sick resident to get a medical attention. No, it's a simple job, everyone could do that, but because this resident lives in an institution, letters and documents have to be filed, and this is what they all want to avoid doing. Or maybe it's because of another reason why they have such attitude. I don't know. Whatever it is, it disappoints me.

Anyways, in this occasion, I would like to wish every Muslim a better Ramadan. A Ramadan where we fix the glitch in our personality, the errors in our slavery to Him, and the mistakes we made to others. I wish the best especially for residents in any welfare institutions.

We Are All Lonely

2011-07-25T04:18:00.000-07:00

Some say that loneliness is a disease. It is so dangerous that because of that various other problems might ensue. Today I had an interesting chat where I found out that without them being connected, three people I spoke with share a common worry of being lonely.

1) A is a government servant who has been working at Penang for 12 years and has settled down a family live in this state as well. However, he has been promoted and will be posted to another state at another extreme side of Malaysia, Johor. He is excited about it, but he is concerned about how he'll cope living alone without his family.

2) B is also a government servant who has passed his prime age of working. However, although not in his retirement age, he is observed to be very well suited to be in life supported by his children. I wondered if it was about being independent and living on what he made. No, he kept working because he thought if he didn't, he'd stay alone at home and the feeling of loneliness might hurt him.

3) C is a teenager who has the habit of adding every girl he knows in his life (and send them flirty messages too, regardless they have a boyfriend) in his Facebook friends list. He is a resident in a juvenile rehab center and he said one of the way to cope with feeling isolated from friends who were all outside was to get the comfort from the idea that the girls might find him handsome and would like to get to know him better.

You see, all of these three people with whom I had a conversation with were married, popular among friends, never would have struck as the kind of person who might feel lonely in his life. So, I was thinking, if we all feel lonely at some point (if not all) of our lives, what makes some of us more vulnerable to the danger of loneliness?

Perhaps it has something to do with the way we adjust to being alone. Do we look at being alone as loneliness or as solitariness? Do we appreciate the time we have for ourselves or do we just want to get out from companyless time as soon as possible? Maybe after all just like beauty, being alone is in the heart of the beholder.

Juvenile

2011-07-17T18:11:00.000-07:00

I used to have a conversation with a resident at juvenile rehabilitation center where I am doing my practicum now and I asked, "Where do your parents live?" And what broke my heart was that he gently and awkwardly smile and answered, "They are divorced..."

You see, I would like to make a point in this entry and it is about the children who are sent to a "warehouse" like this center because they are "uncontrollable." Now answer this question, what constitutes "uncontrollable"? It is when your children throw a tantrum when they are not given what they want? Or when they run around and break a vase? Or when they go out with their friends until late night? Or when they talk back after you? No, these are the things that children normally do. And guess what, these are enough reasons to make the parents send their children off to this juvenile rehabilitation center.

I am not sure if I am making an immature conclusion but from what I have seen in my 2-month practicum, these children, or these teenagers act like normal teenagers. Of course some of them did some serious offence like robbing multiple houses as their criminal career, or being an addict, but let's say, the teenagers who are sent off here for this form around 40% of the whole community and the rest is all here because they are being "uncontrollable."

I do not dislike this place. In fact, it does a great job at teaching these children that every wrongdoing has a consequence (which can go too far), and these children's religious and cultural values are also strengthened. But I feel a bit disappointed at the parents who take the easy way of sending their children off to this center just because their children do not know the appropriate way of talking with their parents.

Of course I'm not a parent yet, and I can never begin to imagine the hassle of being a parent, but I'm living close enough with two sisters and a brother who all have children and their children sometimes are acting like these. It is what I call as being a child. If you're a child, you can't help but to see and perceive things and want the world to see and perceive things the way you do, and when you and the world have the different way of doing things, you might burst out. It's being a child. When you are giving birth to a child, it is pertinently your responsibility to balance off a bucket full of oil (a phrase from Malay language, "menatang minyak yang penuh" which means to educate and raise your child with love).

Spending times with them at a trip really open my eyes how much they need supports from the people they love. They are these wonderful beings who are not perfect. Many from these children witness their parents getting a divorce and they don't know how to respond to the fact that they are no longer going to be in the same home. So, they break out and break away from home and do stuffs that make them feel a little bit calmer like using drugs or picking a fight. It's called being a child.

I'm sure that every child has a pattern and if you, as their parent, take time to understand that, you will realize that your children can very much be very promising and have a bright future.

Mysterious Love

2011-07-14T08:11:00.000-07:00

Love is a very mysterious emotion. It is high, it is low, it is helpless, it is hopeful, it is sexual, it is non-sexual, it is big, it is small, it is humane, it is materialistic. What love is makes up the whole world. That is what great about love. The feeling is so small, but very persistent that it slowly builds up in a platform (or what humans call as 'heart') until it is big enough for the feeling to be shared around the world.

Try to imagine, if not without the love of power and his people, how did Julius Caesar become one of the historical world's most powerful leaders? If not without the love of her children, how does a mother carry them around nine months in her womb? If not without the love of her students, how did Erin Gruwell manage to establish a strong organization, Freedom Writers Organization, that was based from a small class that was filled with hatred and racism? If not without the love of his lover, how is a man able to wait for his half across time and space?

Love is so visible yet so stealthy. Sometimes, love can be an unrequited thing in that it always appears without any supposed conditions and requirements. It is with its independent conjuring. It doesn't matter if you're old or young, poor or wealthy, good or less decent, love can come without any warning. And many times too, when it appears in a surprise, it leaves us wounded and hurt, especially when it goes away. Very far away.

Where does this put us anyway? The thing about love is that, it makes us passionate about someone or something, but love is not passionate with anything itself. It doesn't matter if it comes to the right or to the wrong person, it is not pertinent if it is attached to the good or evil, it just has to be somewhere. I guess this is one very question that can never be answered very truthfully: How do we know when a love is wrong? How can we be so sure when a love is right?

But no matter what is, one thing I am sure:

Loving someone is human.

So, I guess, we just have to cherish it when it comes.

Strains

2011-07-06T03:09:00.001-07:00

My friend and I were searching for a theory that could be a basis for her thesis writing for her degree and we stumbled upon a theory that seemed to be very abstract and pointless at first, but offered a realistic view of human deviance. Strain Theory talks about how strains that humans experience in social structure, and how the interplay between socio-economic status and the resources to the attainment of social goals can very strongly influence people to resort to the wrongdoing.

Let me simplify it, people do bad things because sometimes they believe it's the only way to achieve a certain goal at that particular time. Doing my practicum at a conduct rehabilitation center, although every resident's story is different, but almost all stories share a common theme; they commit a crime in order to achieve something. Very rarely did they commit a crime because they felt like it, because of a hobby. When they realized that these illegitimate means of attaining their goals could be very fruitful, they settled with the comfort and experience and kept doing it for the outcome.

Try to think about it, if you see a case of juvenile delinquency, blaming the youth for the wrongdoing is not doing anyone any good. I ask myself, why would they resort to crime, knowing very well the possible consequences they might face? I believe the answer lies in the system. Try to answer these questions and then we might be a step closer to understanding juvenile delinquency in Malaysia.

1) Why do some people enjoy certain opportunities like education and some others don't?

2) In what ways does the Government make efforts to identify people with the unfulfilled basic needs?

3) Should we make education free in Malaysia?

4) Should we make basic utilities like water and electricity free in Malaysia?

5) Etc.

All of these questions show us how big of a role strains play in influencing a human's life. Basic needs, especially education is supposed to be easily available to every citizen in Malaysia. For me, the most practical solution in solving any problem, including juvenile delinquency, is education.

Free Will

2011-06-27T04:40:00.000-07:00

"Free will is a gift you'll never how to use until you fight for it..."

This is a quote from a movie, "The Adjustment Bureau" that tells a story about a man who tries to fight all obstacles that come in his way in being with the love of his life. It sets a question that has been asked by philosophers and laymen altogether, "What is free will?"

I'm not a philosopher and I can never talk eruditely about philosophy whatsoever but this movie makes me think, how do fates and our free will interplay to create the life we have now? In an ordinary person's language, how many percents of influence and power do fate and free will have? I used to discuss with my friend about how if there is a "jodoh", you'll find your soulmate. We tried to answer the question, do we search for the partner of our life, or do we fight for him/her?

In Islam we are required to believe in Qada' and Qadar. These are the notions that our lives are predestined, but it doesn't mean we have to just let it be, we still need to make efforts upon something. What I understand is that (and please, if I'm wrong, feel free to correct me) everything is already written, and by our efforts and prayers, we can either stay in the presupposed condition, or we can "rewrite" it on the permission of Allah.

This movie really teaches me the value of fighting for your fate, or in a more familiar term, the value of fighting for your dream. I can't stop hearing people believing the notion that if it's too hard, it means you're not supposed to do it. Have you ever heard people say, "It's raining, it means we're not supposed to eat out..." or, "I failed again, I don't think I'm cut out for this," or, "You see, our car breaks down, it's a sign we're not supposed to go!" We are too easy to be tackled down and we're too easy to give up. But we rarely realize that giving up is a way of "writing" our fate for us to fail.

Remember this particular verse in Qur'an (the meaning is roughly translated from Rad : 11),

"Allah would not change the fate of a people until they change it themselves..."

When We Were Young

2011-06-14T02:05:00.000-07:00

Take That released their mini album, with their single, "Love Love" being the theme song for X-Men's latest series part. Said that, this entry is not about Take That nor X-Men, but I'm particularly touched with one of Take That's song in their latest album, called "When We Were Young."

The main gist of the song is that when we children, everything seems simple and idealistic. We believe in superheroes and ultimate justice. We believe that good things happen to good people and that bad endings will always befall the unjust ones. We live in this fairy imaginations that guide our happiness and simplicity.

Yes, they are simple and colorful, but we as adults can learn so much from them. They are these "foolish fearless" who somehow only know the concept of consequences after doing something. I don't condone just doing things impulsively, but I don't condone living in fear too. Some of us, especially me, always worry about tomorrow and what it might bring us. In a way, these worries always stop us from really enjoying things.

As adults, we learn how to act in accordance to the results that will occur after that, but it can be too much that it's the only thing that we ever think of. I just wonder, are we too adult? Why is it so hard for us to see things as they seem, and to see every day as a dream? Rather we overanalyze things to be what they are not, and every day is a fearful passing time.

Balancing between your adult self and your inner child can be an art. How wonderful it can be if we know how to be careful, but see things as how children see... colorfully.

The Dilemma of Writing

2011-06-08T08:51:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I want to be when I grow up is a writer. I love writing because since I'm a person who cannot very much speak that laudably, I can express my feelings and opinions better by writing them. But who knows, writing has its own price. Try to think, when you write, you become so invested with it that you let your thought, imagination, and creativity run freely. Some people let them run too much that it becomes a piece that hurts other people. It becomes a piece that destroys relationships.

I always wonder how writers (such as journalists, creative writers, etc) write and still have to face their emotional and ethical dilemma in day-by-day basis. When they write something, they don't just involve their own selves, but also the subjects whom they are writing about. And the topics that they have to write about are not always safe, but can be very controversial and emotion-provoking in nature. In brief, the scopes of their writing is something that hurts others, and when this happens, you ruin the reputation you have, not as a writer only, but as a human being.

I don't have much to talk about this issue, but I promise myself I'll learn better. There is someone who I hurt and I think I have betrayed his trust. I am truly deeply sorry for what I wrote and I hope my entries in the future will be something that are professional and beneficial in nature.

The Art of Accepting Your Friends

2011-05-19T06:18:00.000-07:00

First of all, a disclaimer for all of you who read this entry. I will be using, as my lecturer used to describe, "bombastic" words because right now I am learning the words that are common in Graduate Record Examination (GRE). I believe remembering them by using them in contexts and sentences are more effective than blind memorizing. And I'm sorry if some of these words are not used correctly. I highlight these words in case you are also interested to know what those words are.

So, this week I would like to expatiate on the issue of friendship, again. I was pondering on the question: How do you unexceptionably accept your friends? We are humans and humans err. We are all conceded with the fact that each one of us is fraught with weaknesses. Not one weakness, but sundry weaknesses. Each one of us has a way of galling others, be it talking too much, being egoic, being indifferent to birthdays, grudging, and so on. I, for one, has been very sentient of my own and my friends' foibles and faulty nature. The thing is, I have been noticing something pronounced about myself, that is I am vigilant and very sensitive to the faults of others. I know it's not good.

So, I was thinking, if they could annoy me in a way, I must have my own way nettling them. Therefore, if they could assent to the way I am, why can't I do the same to them? It is the art of accepting your friends as the way they are. The trick is, how do you modulate your emotions from getting waxed from the annoying behavior that they do, if they do it? Especially when you are close to someone, noticing an irritating behavior can be inevitable. To be honest, I don't have the answer. You can find a lot of tips, exhortation, opinions and so on, but at the end of the day, what you have to do is to really make it as a facile practice and stop flouting every one friendship that you have in your life. I am still a fledgling friend, I am still learning the art.

This entry is just purely to remind me myself and everyone out there on one of the ways to find joy in your friendships with others. I hope it's useful to you to a certain magnitude.

Meaning of the words:

Ponder - think
Unexceptionably - generally acceptable
Err - to make mistake
Conceded - to be given with something (usually unpleasant)
Fraught - filled with
Sundry - several, many
Galling - annoying
Egoic - self-centered,
Grudging - stingy
Sentient - sensitive
Foibles - weaknesses
Pronounced - very noticeable
Nettling - annoying
Assent - accept
Modulate - regulate
Waxed - increased
Exhortation - advices
Facile - accomplished
Flouting - rejecting
Fledgling - unexperienced and still learning
Magnitude - extent

The Meaning of Serenity

2011-05-14T13:40:00.000-07:00

How do you define serenity? How do you differentiate serenity from happiness? How do you achieve a state of serenity within your inner psyche?

These questions might be what many of you (and me obviously, or I wouldn't write this entry) have been asking your whole life. Different persons have the different kinds of views on how an individual can achieve a stable state of serenity. Serenity is the state, for me, where you know everything happens for a reason and that you can achieve acceptance without giving up. I don't know about you, but I get my definition of serenity from this old-timey Islamic song that I have been listening to since years ago.

Basically, this song's basic gist is that in every condition, we need to exercise humility.

When you feel difficult, you are not nerve-stricken...
When you're poor, you're still grateful...
When you're sick, you're not restless...
When you're rich, you're generous...
When you're in power, you're trustworthy...
When you're successful, you don't forget...
When you're healthy, you don't abandon God...

The best line that I have been amazed over and over is this one,

"Serenity is when you can understand the art of God's work..."

The point of this line is, many of us blame the Higher Power whenever they are in distress. In some worse cases, they even abandon their religion because they're losing their faith toward God. But, how many of us who could actually understand how in all these challenging processes, God has provided us with a bigger life meaning? How many realize that God has drawn a life journey for us to embark so we can reach to the final destination with a happy ending? It's true, God's work is an art and just like any art, it has to be appreciated, and it has to be understood.

So, if you feel unhappy, submit yourself to God and see what He has in store for you. Discover and explore life and find out what God has kept for you. Everything happens for a reason, and no matter how much of a cliché this sentence is, it's still true. Start appreciating the substance of it.

Friendship Is Earned, Truly

2011-05-09T02:29:00.000-07:00

So, I used to write an entry on friendship before, and I defined friendship as more than a person you meet casually. Friendship is emotional and it should have emotional component. I have thought about it lately and I can't help but wonder if friendships are predestined life courses. Of course as a Muslim, I believe that everything that happens in this life is a fate, and there must also be our own hands to contribute to the direction of the fate. But are friendships more "fate" than "efforts"?

I have a dear friend at USM who had been in a best-friendship with a certain person in our class. They had been together being best friends for more than five years and that should count for something right? But a particular issue that happened several weeks ago made them far apart, and now just two acquaintances who say hi to each other on the street. How could this happen? My friend asked. "We've been together in so many ups and downs. We knew about each others' good and bad. But only now, when we love each other, care about each other, then we have to have our friendship demoted to a lower status?"

As a close friend to this person, I am certain that she is not a person who likes to make enemies, nor does she like to even have a minor conflict. She is very kind and compassionate. But when she is given a chance of an opportunity that her ex-best friend was dying to get a shot for, everything changed.

You see, my point is, my friend was a hard worker when it comes to friendship. She loves her friends and she cares about her friends (note: friends, not acquaintances), and she considers them, especially her best friends as her own family. But still, fate intervenes and has to cut them apart. This happened a lot in my life too. I had a bunch of best friends in my previous universities but now, we barely contacted each other through Facebook (although in my case, it was mostly my fault and their fault equally). What does this mean?

Perhaps it means, we're not in total control of the friendships in our life. They are, no matter how much effort we put in, still a subject of fate. We can't predict the future of even the strongest friendship there is, even more the ones that just bloom. So, what should we do in the event of this? So, appreciate the friends you have now. We very frequently take some of them for granted and only when we lose them, then we realize how much they mean to us. But it's too late. Still, make effort to make your friends feel like they're a part of your lives, hoping that when you do that, fate (I hope by now, you understand by "fate," I mean God) knows that your effort should be worth your friendship.

When Can You Be Truly Self-Determined?

2011-05-03T00:07:00.000-07:00

One of the values social workers are taught to hold strongly is self-determination. It is a principle that tells the practitioners that their clients have the right to not be forced into deciding or acting anything. Clients of social work, or any other fields, should have the freedom to choose "their own economic, social, and cultural development" (International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs, n.d., para. 2). Note the word "development." What does it entail then? In social work practice, the outcome of services should preferably be social functioning. Hence, the logical conclusion we can see here is that, one of the social work values is people's right to determine their own ways of developing that promote their own social functioning.

If you read one of my entries lately titled, "Sometimes, We're Trying So Hard Not to Be Judgmental" where I argued that every social worker should be able to exercise a healthy degree of "judgmental capacity" for certain service advantages. But this seems to oppose one of the dear values abovementioned, self-determination. What I can argue further is that, self-determination comes after social functioning. It means the clinets have the capacity to know what's best for them in order to decide for themselves. I'm sure you'll agree that we don't apply self-determination on children and mentally-challenged individuals right? I don't intend to compare certain clients to being childish or mentally challenged, but we're not perfect, we can't know everything. Until we're trained to be be knowledgeable on certain issues, we can't fully be sure if what we decide or act upon is the best thing we do.

For example, a young highschool leaver is trying to decide which college is the best for him. Can you be confident in telling that this young man has the capacity to decide what is best for him without knowing a discernible amount of knowledge on colleges and universities in his place? If we're to fully practice the notion of self-determination, we'll just let this man decide and be the decision good or bad for him, we shall not judge.

But for me, of course you, as a social worker, have to educate this young man on the issue. Not just about colleges, but as a scientific practitioner, you have to be able to see the options that are the best for him psychologically and socially. Some social work academicians would argue that after educating, then the choice if up to the client. But for me, as an advocate for the client, we do not just defend his rights if threatened by other parties, we defend his own social functioning too if threatened by "his own self." But of course before all this, we have to be scientifically and personally sure that some options are the best for the young man, and that these options are also the conclusion of his own opinions and feedback too.

Social workers are not working for the clients, they're working with the clients. They're not the clients' slaves, but their partners. So as much as the clients' opinions are valuable and should be taken into account, the social workers' are too.

Love

2011-04-21T22:08:00.000-07:00

Last night, my friends and I were talking about how the past love life can make someone's current love life right now as how it is. Many of my friends are now settling down with a stable partner whom they will spend the rest of their life with (Ameen!). But one common factor that brings all of them to where they are right now is they have all been hurt.

I watched Raising Hope, episode 18 where Maw Maw, one resident of the house who has Alzheimer's disease, said to her grandchild,

"They wouldn't call it falling in love if you didn't get hurt sometimes."

That is true. That is a spot-on statement about love. And that message made me smile and hopeful about everyone's love life. Where in the world can you actually find a person who settles down with their first love? Even if there are, there must be some obstacles that this couple has to overcome. There must have been ups and downs. There must have been hurt. But then, all these challenges taught them a lesson and matured them. Although it was painful to bear the tears and sadness, but you most likely right now would just look back with a smile.

So, a message for everyone out there, if you guys feel lonely, if you feel like you are not succeeding in your love life, if you feel like it is a lot of work, remember, always remember, it is now. There will be a time in the future (God's willing) where the pain you feel right now is a distant memory in the future.

Just keep holding on.

Sometimes, We're Trying So Hard Not to Be Judgmental

2011-04-19T05:12:00.000-07:00

Several days ago, I had an academic debate with one of my friends. The proposition was as follows: "Should social worker just comply to what the client WANTS?"

My friend was a supporter of the notion that social workers should respect everything that the client wishes to do and if possible, to help the client to get it too. The example topic that we discussed was a man who had a high blood pressure but still wanted to eat red meat. So, my friend said that it is a social worker's responsibility to present to the client the pros and cons of every option and decision and after that, it is up to the client on what he or she wishes to choose. Even if he chose to still eat red meat, then social worker needs to respect that.

And I am a believer of the notion that sometimes, you have to tell the client that some of what he or she wants is not good for herself. So, even if the client still wanted to eat red meat, the social worker's task is to do whatever he or she could to try to prevent it (in ethical manner of course).

You see, I think both my friend and I were somehow true in our arguments. My friend was arguing on the basis of avoiding judgment getting in the way of intervention, because when the social worker tries to prevent the client from eating red meat, that might be just purely the social worker's own belief about what is right and what is wrong. While I was arguing on the ground that advocates on his social functioning. That eating red meat might hinder him from being healthy, which might affect the dynamics of his family, his work and whatever else effect health issue had on the client's life.

What I can observe is that, Social Work has values that can be so extreme (which is caused by the social workers themselves). These values, at one point, can be contradictory to each other. In one hand, we are asked not to be judgmental and not to exercise our own belief and judgment about what is right and what is wrong in the interventions we are developing for our clients. On the other, we are asked to ensure that our intervention is solely on the purpose of attending to the client's need and ensure that the client's social functioning is enhanced, or restored.

So, the question here, are we trying so hard not to be judgmental? Are we trying so hard not to let the personal value comes in until we're completely detached from the practice itself? For me, personal value can be useful in certain degree.

1) When a social worker has personal values, it means the social workers has experienced moral development that can help him or her see the right and wrong thing in general. Of course, by doing this, the social worker needs to be scientific and backs up the argument with scientific support. The social worker must have the knowledge about what red meat might do to a person with a high blood pressure. So, his personal value is that red meat is bad for the client. So, consulting a doctor, the social worker develops an intervention that has something to do with a healthier diet. Then, one of the responsibilities of the social worker is that to prevent the client from further harming himself with the red meat diet.

2) Personal values are somewhat the end result of professionalism. Without the ability to store a moral memory, then how do the social workers understand the importance of professionalism in the first place? Personal values can be beneficial in practice, because for me, if you really want to help your client, you must have compassion, and compassion is a personal value. Therefore, what I can conclude here is that what the literature has said about how personal values can hinder from professional practice is the ones that involve biasness in decision making like when you have revenge on the client, or even when, for me, you are indifferent with the client. So, let's ask ourselves, if you have to be indifferent with your clients, how do you actually help them? So, at the end of the day, you still need to be compassionate and passionate with what you're doing right? Isn't that a personal value?

So, for me, an extreme form of everything is bad. So, extremely being non-judgmental, and extremely relying on your personal value can be bad equally. If you really want to be in a helping profession, then make sure you check that your moral compass is in a healthy level. And of course, all this is based on my personal thoughts.

You Are Not Superior When You Forgive

2011-04-14T04:05:00.000-07:00

Do you notice a lot of people feel superior at the event of forgiving and their counterpart apologizing? Without being too scientific, when a person forgives and feels that forgiving means he or she is on the "right" side, this actually backfires and can ruin the newly fixed relationship.

It's one thing not to want to forgive because you feel you've done nothing wrong (which is a form of superiority), then when you actually forgive, you feel like the whole relationship should be adjusted to the way you want it to be. You set conditions, and expecting that the conditions are fulfilled without any possibility of amending. I knew this one person, who after forgave her friend, set a condition, "I'm glad that we're okay now, but we can't be like before, at least not now." Try to deeply analyze this sentence. Upon hearing this, I wonder why does she have to preset the condition? Why can't she let it be as it is? When I usually made amends with my friends, I know I can just let it be, as in if we can't feel close yet, so we can't feel close yet, if we can rekindle already, so we will rekindle. Why do I want to set it to "no rekindling and feeling close like before yet" no matter if it's possible or not? Do you see my point?

You see, if you feel like you're "more noble" than the other person because you're forgiving, then don't. Don't forgive at all. Don't bother to think about "finally replying your friend's apology message because it's time for you to forgive". There is no time for you to forgive, it's now. If you think you should be the one who set the time, then, again, don't bother.

Just my message to superior-feeling pricks in the world, especially in Malaysia. I hope I do not belong in this category and I hope my dear friends who color my life currently, do not belong in this category too.

The Inevitable Bitterness

2011-04-06T06:20:00.000-07:00

Oh my, this past few days, I really really can't stop Take That's The Flood from going around my mind serenading to my recent experience. Well, as I said, it might be due to the fact that the song fits perfectly well to what is happening to me right now. I lost a good friend, to simply put. What I really don't understand is how each day both of us become bitter and bitter. Everything happened between us. Well, she forged questionnaires of a research that we both supposedly had to work together. We tried so hard to hurt each other. I tried so hard to make sure that she got the point I had been making all this while. I decided to hurt her even more by reporting her to the supervisor of ours. Yes, we did all that. We did all the bitterness. We were the epitome of true cat-and-dog kind of fight who can't seem to forgive each other. Everything, except one. Except sit and talk. Just sit and talk.

You see, when I think about the evolution of our friendship - from close and good friends to two bitter nemeses who keep trying to prove a point - I realize something, I did not do what I preach. If you remember my entry, Contact Hypothesis, where I advocated the point where one person can find his prejudice and unreasonable disliking diminished by simply having an interpersonal contact with that hate target. It takes knowing - or reknowing - that person we dislike in order to be able to open up for a friendship, or forgiveness in my case.

What both my friend and I did all this time was avoid significant contact with each other and make sure that if there was anything to refer to, we made it as brief as possible. So, this was the disease that prolonged the bitterness all the way. I also contributed the part where the nemesis of mine felt as if there was no hope so a reconciliation, by my own behaviors.

So, I'm preaching again here. Take this as a lesson. Do not let fear obscure your goal to achieve good relationship with people.Do not let ego in your way of forgiveness. If you, my nemesis, happen to read this, please be assured that I am genuinely sorry for all the hurt and harm that I've done. Forgive me as I have forgiven you. If God wills, I hope we can be able to see each other in the eyes again and smile...

A List of Songs That Inspire Me

2011-04-03T04:53:00.001-07:00

Ok, my whole life I have been listening to songs. Some are bad, some are listenable, and some others just stand the hell out and put themselves in the favorite songs folder that I have. These songs are not just amazing melodically, they inspire me, which is an important characteristic for me to stick to listening a song for a long time, perhaps for the rest of my life. By the way, these is the list that pick me up when I am down.

1) Kelly Clarkson - Breakaway

From my own interpretation of the song, it tells a story of a girl who couldn't wait to break out from the shell and go out and explore the world. She was a nobody until she achieved something and a lot of people respected her for that. It basically tells us that you just need to keep doing it until you "reach the sky".

2) OneRepublic - Marchin' On

This song compares the life journey that never gets exhausted (well, except death of course) to a marching squad. The whole song is embellished with the sound of foot marching forward, hence the point of this song. From what I understand, this song tells us that no matter how crappy our past is, no matter how many mistakes we made, no matter how big or small they are, we are still here, moving forward. More than likely, we'll look back and smile.

3) Outlandish - Try Not To Cry

This songs captures my feelings of the war between countries in the world so perfectly that in some occasions, tears are shed. What makes me relate to this song is the one verse it says in the lyrics, "How can it be? Has the whole world turned blind? Or is it just 'cause it only affected my kind?" And I, the writer of this blog, belong to the kind that it said in the song.

4) Coldplay - Fix You

The vocal of this band, Chris Martin, originally wrote this song because of his wife's, Gwyneth, father's passing. The song basically tells the listener that the singer will always be there for her forever. What attracts me to the song is the anthemic characteristic of the song that penetrates straight to my heart. It tells the listeners that don't give up because "lights will guide you home".

5) OneRepublic - All Fall Down

What's so inspiring about this song is that it is very realistic. What it is trying to tell the audience is that, if you ever fall down, don't lose hope because well, everyone falls down. It is true actually. Who in the world has tasted a lifelong happiness? Noone! Whatever we feel, whatever we experience, it'll last so long. But the important thing is, to find someone whose should you can rely on when you fall down to help you stand up again.

6) Take That - The Flood

Take that has struck me as a band who always tries to be inspirational in their songs. This is especially tells us to keep going although challenges never get out of our ways. This is another song that sounds anthemic and it gives you the goosebumps which rarely occurs to me.

There are a lot of other songs that make me feel good and inspired, however, this is what I remember now. I hope all of you who are reading can benefit from them just how I do everytime I listen.

Contact Hypothesis

2011-03-23T09:40:00.000-07:00

We all experience having a conflict with someone, and we all experience not liking someone even before knowing the person. There is a saying, translated roughly from Malay, "not know, therefore, not love" that implies we hardly love something that we do not have any knowledge about. Sometimes in usual cases too, we do not like the things we do not have any knowledge about. Actually, this is true and has been validated by a psychologist, Gordon Allport, who asserted that prejudice can easily be elevated by simply knowing something about that someone. He called this theory as Contact Hypothesis, where interpersonal contact can produce knowledge that can be a good cure on prejudice.

This simple way of curbing prejudice can be useful not just in management setting, but we can benefit from it in our everyday life too. You sometimes always find yourself not favoring someone just "because the way he looks." This is normal because we are equipped with a preset stigma in our cognition that sometimes we do not realize we have. These stigma "guide" us on what to feel when we see something that could or could not resemble something in our preset stigma. When this happens, when you do not like someone without any apparent reason, try to know that person, and you will more likely grow to actually like him or her.

Contact Hypothesis does not just work on prejudice and unreasonable disliking, it can also work on conflicts between two people or groups who have actually known each other. Sometimes, when we have a conflict with someone, do you notice that you are actually angrier when you do not contact the person? A woman who hates her neighbor always seems to be bitching out behind her neighbor's back, but we never see them both to actually bitch in front of each other. Two classmates who clearly dislike each other never seem to talk or meet eye-to-eye, but they appear to have a heightened issue everytime they bump into each other but do not have a contact.

These kind of conflicts are fueled by "absence." The more absent the person with whom we have a conflict in our life, the more unresolved the issue becomes. In this situation, try to make the first move by saying hi or make a brief chat, providing you both want to make a brief chat. You'll find yourself, just like above, being less angry and lore likely to resolve the issue.

Contact Hypothesis, according to Gordon Allport, is not without its conditions:
1) Both sides have equal relationships.
2) Both sides have a common goal to achieve.
3) There is actually potential for both sides to form a relation.
4) Both are under a common supported authority.

But then, psychology has a lot of exceptional cases, even if you do not fulfill any of these conditions, try to make an interpersonal contact with someone you have an issue with. With luck, you can sleep at night like a baby.

Comfort Zone

2011-03-19T20:03:00.000-07:00

So, last night I was talking to one of my dear friends on the phone and we were talking about this friend of hers who's been so mysterious and complicated. The story, by the way, is confidential, but let me tell you another story that can show you the gist of "comfort zone" discussion I had with my friend.

There was this friend of mine, who I found earlier last semester that he had been cheating off his lecturers in his class assignments. I found out that he took my paper, which was in English, and then just translated it outright to Malay, thinking that the lecturer might not notice that those two papers were the same, except in the different language. When investigating, we learned that he had been doing this since his diploma (until masters degree!). So, basically I was asking myself, how come he did that again and again and again without facing any repercussions? Well, the answer was, that's it, there were no repercussions!

You see, when people keep doing a certain thing - well, a bad thing - and never get caught or always survive the deed, he or she creates a comfort zone catering to the bad action. The person keeps doing it saying to themselves, "Well, I'll survive anyway..." My friend kept copying off his papers from other people's works thinking that, "Nobody caught me anyways..."

So, I was thinking of a solution. It might be drastic, but it might be the one from only few guaranteed way to make them step out of the comfort zone and man up to do the right thing. The solution is, to create a bomb. The bomb can be something that really frightens the "comfort-zoners" and make them go out from the zone. In my friend's case, the bomb is easily the direct consequence of his actions, which is the instructor knowing his deeds and barred him from the class. What's the bomb for comfort zone of a person who keeps cheating on his wife? Then that would be divorce and a million-ringgit suit. What's the bomb for comfort zone of a kid who never listens to his mother? That would be that kid has to afford his daily spending on his own.

The thing is, the bombs can be too drastic that people are afraid to actually create them. But then, if you want the person in the comfort zone change, then a bomb should be created and an "explosion" should be triggered.

Remorse

2011-03-13T17:26:00.000-07:00

All this time I am doing my practicum at JKM Kepala Batas, under the unit of "akhlak," I have gone to follow my supervisor to do a lot of works and processes just to handle a case of juvenile delinquency. One question strikes me after several interviews with several offenders, and apparently it's a question my supervisor has been asking herself too. It is, how do you really know if someone is really remorseful towards what he or she did?

My supervisor said that she depends a lot on her instincts. Then, her instincts will depend on what she sees and hears during the interview. She would look at the body language, at how the offenders communicate, and how they react towards anything my supervisor has anything to say. Then, basing on that, she will determine if they really feel remorseful towards what they did. I'm not sure, but for me, it is quite simplistic, although understanding how demanding her works are, she can't really be choosy in what she is doing. But I have something else to say.

I say, they all feel remorseful, during that time.

Put yourself in the offenders' shoes. And imagine being in the position where a person, who can determine how your future is, (the "akhlak" official) is nagging you with questions that you must answer. Those questions can be threatening and for most of time, you are not sure if answering the question honestly or lying will do you any good. Especially, this is the first meeting, so you don't feel the trust to the official yet. What you feel is another person coming to see you to "do her job." You, bottomline, are in an intimidating situation. So, I'd say, at this time, you most likely tell yourself, "Why did I do it in the first place??" Regretting the offense that you did. Then, it follows by, "If I could turn back time," or "I really don't want to do it again," or "Please stop, I won't do it again." Therefore, in a way, you feel remorseful and it seems genuine, isn't it? (Well, except for the rare cases where feelings are out of questions or absent at all that usually only exist in psychopathic offenders.)

But I ask myself another question, "So, why do some offenders repeat their offense?"

So, for me, the real issue here is not whether they really feel remorseful, because I personally believe they all do. The real issue lies on the question whether or not the remorse lasts long enough to remind them of the consequences of their behaviors. The key is the feeling, because if you recall the imagination I ask you to do above, you'd understand that in the interviews, you'd feel all sorts of feelings you don't want to be feeling. Thus, these feelings make you not want to do it again, because the feelings hurt.

Then, perhaps what you should do if you were handling a juvenile case is to make sure that the feelings that trigger the remorse to last long. Just like bath, the reminder (or motivation) needs to be done everyday. The question now is, "How can we make sure that the offenders always remember that it hurts to see they and what they do hurt others?" Well, this is a question I can't really answer. I'm not an expert in motivation and hope one day I am. Maybe replenishing motivation is different than replenishing remorseful feelings. Well, we need to study on this.

What Makes Social Work Part II

2011-03-02T20:58:00.000-08:00

According to one of my lecturers, Dr. Ismail Baba, advocacy might be what truly makes social work as a profession. In every field of social sciences, there is a role that every respective practitioner has to play to practice the knowledge he or she learned in the field. Psychologists will use what he learns about the science of behaviors and mental processes to develop or alter an aspect of the individual's behaviors or mind. Economics use financial studies and theories as the main focus in their practice. Political analysis break down the political phenomena in the world into a more understandable perspective by using science of governance and public administration. And there are a lot more why a certain field is its own.

But for social work, it might be the role of advocacy that a social worker plays. Advocacy in act in social work where a social worker defends his or her client in all terms as possible. This includes but not limited to the resources of needs fulfillment, communication to other parties, and advancement of social justice. A social worker playing advocate must be able to know the policies that concern the particular client and to argue on behalf of the latter if the policies do not seem to be plausible to fulfill the client's needs. Just like a lawyer, according to my lecturer, an advocating social worker needs to know to argue, defend, and even manipulate.

Being a social worker is challenging, just like any other fields. But the challenge there is in this one is that you have to have contacts, a lot of them, and be able to know who you can call to secure a certain need for your client. You have to have the numbers of the nearest counseling agency, or medical assistance, or educational institution, or financial aids, etc.

What Makes Social Work Part I

2011-02-25T09:26:00.000-08:00

The reason why I'm inspired to talk about this is because my classmates and I are given a task to write a paper by a lecturer of ours on the integrated focus of social work and why it is important in ensuring the effectiveness of the intervention programs a social worker develops for his or her client.

Social work is based on a lot of other disciplines in social sciences. It is based on the theories and perspectives from psychology, sociology, political science, and even economics. But what differentiates social work from the rest of them? If social work is mostly nothing new, then why the need of the development of the practice? Well, I could answer it from the integrated part of the practice and field.

A social worker who is serious in his or her job should understand that an individual is comprised of a lot of factors. There's the psychological part, the social part, the emotional part, etc. The different field in social science deals with the different factors that make a person, and social work tries to synthesize the understanding and analysis so a person can be understood in holistic manner.

In systems theory, it is asserted that an individual is situated in a place where there are layers of interactions. There is a layer between an individual and him- or herself. There is another one that involves the person with the family, or the friends, or the colleagues from the workplace. There is also the interaction between the people in his or her life, such as between the family and the workplace. Then, there is a larger layer that consists of the political system, culture, and demography of the person. All this, according to Urie Bronfenbrenner specifically, who developed the ecological theory, have an impact on a person's life and how he or she is grown.

Therefore, understanding a system that a person lives in is the important part of social work, that somehow differentiates social work from other disciplines. This "integratedness" shows how important for a country to develop the knowledge and practice within it, and train a lot of practitioners to be skillful in this field.

The Two Sides of Police Brutality

2011-02-06T18:40:00.000-08:00

In 2008, Prabakar, a Malaysian Indian, was beaten and scalded with boiled water under interrogation. Prabakar was accused with aiding a group of thugs to rob unsuspecting drivers in a parking area at Kuala Lumpur. Prabakar, following the violent treatment, reported the unfortunate occurrence to the police headquarters hoping for some justice.

In 2009, one Malaysian Indian, Kugan, died under the police custody with presumable cause of death was water in the lung. But, the family smelled something wrong, and when they requested for the right of the body, they found that there were a lot of bruises in the late Kugan's body which might be attributed to the death.

There are a lot of other cases too that involve police brutality in this country. There are two sides of this issue and I'm neither on any. One side says that the police are just doing their work. Without them, the criminals will still most probably walk around victimizing other people. Another side claims that violence and brutality are never the answer nor the way to obtain confession from the offenders. No matter what they do or did, they are still human.

We all have heard the concept of "good cop" and "bad cop" in interrogation. The "good cops" are usually calm and receptive of cooperation. They are more likely to offer positive outcome if the suspects confess or give any information that can lead to convicting. The "bad cops" use harshness and force, yell, and hit on things such as the table to create a fearful vibe in the interrogation room. A more brutal "bad cop" would resort to using violence on the suspects themselves. Research shows how likely it is for the second way or coercion to lead to false confession. Rather than solving the crime, the police would just catch the wrong guy and let the true offender run free in the society.

You see, being the "bad cops" does not really solve anything. It does not reduce the crime rates either. But, I am not siding on "good cops" here too, because "good cops" do not exactly yield desirable outcomes too. So, what can we do? I'd prefer to note the way police obtain evidence. There are a lot of ways to obtain evidence such as the statements from peers, statements from victims, materials searching, and of course, direct confessions from the suspects but the police are very much depending on confessions. This might be related to the fact that they want to close a case as soon as possible so their performance will be rated good. This leads to the discussion of the system the police work in. The system might only use the solving of crime cases to indicate performance while the process to solve them is not counted as such.

Training on pros and cons of every evidence obtainment should be held to create awareness among the police on the hazards of coercion in interrogations. The system might also be taught with thew idea that quality is better than the quantity, that leads to the question, is a case really solved when it is closed too quickly? There should be an effective unit of internal affair to investigate the police themselves and the cases they are working on.

These are just some brief and simple suggestions to reduce the use of "bad cops" strategy in police interrogation in this country. I hope that some extensive research will be done in emphasis of Malaysian context. I hope too that some measures will be taken soon to really reduce the crime rates in Malaysia.

The Constantly Uncertain Life

2011-02-05T18:58:00.000-08:00

A wise man used to say, "The future is never certain..." He's right, but the more right sentence would be, "The future is never certain, neither is the present..." Life is filled with uncertainty and for most people, it gives them something major to worry about. They would worry if the there'd be an accident if traveling at night, or that something is wrong with the car, or that they might not wake up early to catch the flight, or that the flight might be canceled, or even if there'd be something wrong with the plane that might make it crash down, or their lecturer might hate their assignment, or the soft copy of the file might lose due to a crashed computer, or bla bla bla bla.....

One thing though, these worries are legitimate. What they worry about could happen and is a possibility. But you see, when we talk about this, we basically talk about two types of people: The ones who worry too much, and the ones who couldn't care less. Oh wait, how about the people who care but they don't worry too much? Well, speaking from my personal experience, this kind of people rarely exist so they don't really make the third type. And I'm basically the first type. Which leads me to this entry after all. The people in my life either need to cool down and have a little faith, or man up and have a little courage. But the how part can be tricky.

Leahy (2008) has some suggestions for the first type of people. He first asks the worriers if there are anyone in the world who actually live this life in certainty. And no, there's no such person. Every single individual in the world, successful or not, is uncertain about the present and the future. But rather than worrying about the uncertain, he invites us to focus on the issues that we can work on, that has real solutions. He also states that uncertainty has its own advantages. A lot of times too when we are surprised by the occurrence of pleasant things in our lives, and when they are uncertain in the first place, don't they make us happier? Doesn't getting an unexpected bonus makes you happier than the regular salary every month? Even if the amount of the bonus is smaller than the salary? So, bottom line is, enjoy uncertainty, because a lot of times they can turn out to be the pleasant ones.

For more information you can visit Leahy's blog in Psychology Today. It's informative and practical to read.

Restoring Justice

2011-01-22T00:20:00.000-08:00

The laws are made to govern human's behaviors. If you're taught as a Muslim, you'd learn that no laws are perfect if they are man-made, and only the laws that are formed by God will have their comprehensiveness through places and times. But, the reality of this world is that the majority part of this world is practicing the kind of laws that are subjected to flaws and changes. And if you look closely too, these laws are very much made up on the concept of abstraction and technicality. Too sadly too that while we're obsessed with keeping up with this kind of law, true reparation is very little done in this world.

Luckily, when we're talking about criminal justice, there is a movement that is based on restoration rather than punishment and the need to conform to the technical procedures of laws. Restorative justice is the kind of justice procedure that holds offenders accountable directly to their own victims, which implies on the importance of victims' participation in the process. One way of establishing restorative justice is victim-offender mediation. This program brings offenders and their victims in the same room with a mediator. Both sides will be given their opportunity to express their feelings. The victims will be able to say what they feel throughout the event of crime and the offenders have the chance to explain their positions and apologize. The offenders, too, will be given a chance to 'restore' the victim's condition back to before crime.

Of course both the victims and the offenders must give their consent to want to participate in this program, and those who consented benefit in their own respective ways. Offenders are less likely to experience repeat crimes and victims rate their satisfaction highly on the resolution process. My personal opinion would attribute these benefits back to the communication process. Communication is the one thing that is simple but very much neglected by grudge holders in this world. Conflicts usually persists due to the lack of direct communication between the two parties involved.

Although it's not really about restorative justice, but there is a new show, "Fairly Legal," that talks about how important it is to not be stuck with the technicality of laws and the benefits of mediation in conflict resolution. Try to watch it, and you might have an idea of what victim-offender mediation program is, except this show extends it to conflicts that are not based on criminal conducts.

The Danger of Labeling

2011-01-19T23:28:00.000-08:00

What is the first thing that happens right after someone is released from a rehab center or prison? "Labels" start to be stamped on his forehead so the community or the people around him. One reason why we really much like to use labels to organize people around us is that it is easier to manage information about them. Humans are more likely to categorize and labels things because, well, it is more organized, isn't it? To some extent, categorizations and labels can be beneficial. It is a way to ensure the doctors give the right medication for different types of ailment (cold fever, sore throat, gastric, etc). It is a way to give different treatment to different kind of a teacher's pupils (demotivated, bright, active, etc). And many other instances where categorization and "labels" can help us in identifying how a thing works and how to respond to it.

But all this is provided if we use labels wisely and informatively. An ignorant way of using label is when this is going too far and to backfire. People in the community usually use labels to make it easier for them to know how to act around a certain type of people or things. They are more likely to avoid buying food from "the poor" because of the expectation on the hygiene. They are more likely to desire to be like "celebrities" because they are popular. They are more likely to think that security guards are "uneducated". They are more likely to say that a woman who marries someone significantly older because of "his money." They are more likely to prevent from socializing with an ex-con because he might "fall back into the same patterns all over again." (And a certain blogger uses a "he" as an automatic pronoun whenever talking about an ex-con).And bla, bla, bla, bla...

You see, in this condition, we see what we want to see, and labels work in the same way (which explains self-fulfilling prophecy). When you have a certain expectation toward a person, even if you try not to say it aloud, your body language and way of speaking can scream the same thing just as effectively. The other person, already smelling our 'expectations,' slowly acting in accordance to what we expect. So, if we think a person is nice, he or she is more likely to act nice around us, and if we think a person is bad, he or she is more likely to act bad around us. This is one of the contributing factors of an ex-prisoner and ex-addict to experience relapse. Because their thinking on all this is that "they already think that I'm bad, so just act bad."

If you know someone who has been in an institution, try to have an open arm welcoming him or her into the community. The question of "should be careful" should not arise because it's the same issue with everyone, be they ex-prisoners or not. Meaning to say, we have to exercise a certain level of security and wariness to everyone (but not to the level of paranoia). This can therapeutically help in preventing from the same mishaps. If it happens to us, aren't we desperate for a second chance?

Bandung: A Place of Tolerance and Smiles

2011-01-14T22:53:00.000-08:00

For five days I went to Bandung for a Social Work conference beginning from 10th January until 14th. It almost seemed the same like how it is with Malaysia, except the attitudes and vibe spread throughout the entire place felt different. Let me describe to you how Bandung was (I'm not sure if this is generalizable to the other parts of Indonesia). The road was crowded with cars and motorbikes, added with the people crossing the roads, some others who tried to sell stuffs who came to stopping cars, and children playing at the side of the roads. But almost very rare, or it never occurred at all how it usually is in Malaysia. Imagine how we feel, and how it feels when it's jammed like it'd never end at our Malaysian roads. We'd hear angry honks and impatient drivers yelling. But, I didn't see that in Bandung.

Although the roads were crowded like you never could imagine. Vehicles came from every side of the street, and cars were an inch from each other before getting scratched, but no, the cars were flat clean, and no accidents occurred. All this was because the people were tolerant and patient, an obvious but very frequently ignored important characteristic by many drivers in Malaysia. We still heard honks, but only to tell the driver in front politely that the road was clear for him or her was clear to driver forward.

Not to mention that the people were never exhaustible of smiles. There was a welcome party on the first day of the conference and while the food was amazing, the treatment by the local people was warm and endearing. At one point of time, I thought and wondered if they all had been in a training of hotel hospitality, but no, I don't think that kind of training would yield that kind of results, and it seemed natural, I mean not something that is trained, when it occurred to many people rather than just one.

It's definitely a nice place to go, plus the things to shop are very cheap compared to the similar stuffs in Malaysia. I'd recommend you to go there, provided you already have an Indonesian friend to accompany you there, because the street hawkers might jack up the price of the normally cheap things (although the jacked up price would even still be cheaper than the price counterparts in Malaysia).

My last word for this entry is, I really appreciate and thank you, Bandung people who treated us like a 7-star hotel with warmth and unending friendliness. Hope we see each other again.

What Happens On Movies

2011-01-05T06:41:00.000-08:00

You guys who have reading my posts, must have noticed that in December, I have reviewed some movies. I not just stated what's good or bad about the movies, but I also tried to relate it to how real human life works in the similar pattern too. If you realize, there is a common flow how almost every movie works from the beginning till the end.

1 - The main characters (usually a boy and a girl) will get something that makes them happy. Like Dale Denton and Saul River get their new drug in Pineapple Express, or Kate Holbrook and Angie Ostrowiski get to be a mother and money respectively in Baby Mama, or Melanie Smooter and Andrew Hennings get engaged in Sweet Home Alabama. The beginning storyline acts as the way to introduce the concept of the movie.

2 - A building (or many) storyline gets in. Like Anna Brady is stuck with a cynical Irish man, Declan O'Callaghan in Leap Year, or Robert Kearns is starting to feel like successes are in his hands in Flash of Genius, or when Travis, Barris and other subjects of an experiment are finally split into being prisoners or prison guards in The Experiment. This storyline is important in directing how the lives of the characters will go, but usually there will be....

3 - A conflict. Usually the main characters will get some sort of conflicts that cause them to rift apart. Like Travis and Barris start to play out their own prisoner and prison guard role very nicely against each other, or Dale Denton and Saul Silver fight over their own different attitudes about how drugs should or should not still be used, or when Rebecca Bloomwood's boss, Luke Brandon realize that the former cheats in her job. I'd like to focus on this part. You see, whenever these characters get into trouble, the usual writing would be one or two or all of the main characters will opt to get out of anything they have between them. Couples decide to break off, spouses file for a divorce, friends vows for enmity, and family members disown each other. However, if you look closely at these movies, you will realize that usually the causes of the break-up are either manageable or tiny, like Brooke Meyers is angry at Gary Grobowski over untidy house in The Break-Up, Alison Scott is mad at Ben Stone for his overly casual and dimwitted attitude in Knocked Up, or even an eventual break-up of Anna Brady with Jeremy Sloane because she thinks that his fiancee chooses matierials over her in a fire emergency. These little things are just enough to make them realize that they should not be together.

4 - The making amends begins. When all these conflicts happen, these main character will undergo some time not being together with the other. But of course these movies need a happy ending, so Anna Brady chooses Declan O'Callaghan as her partner for life, Ben Stone and Alison Scott get married, Kate Holbrook is pregnant and is getting her own child. At this stage of the movies, one of the main character will go out of his or her way trying to win the other over again. Melanie Smooter calling off her wedding with another guy to be with her husband, or Tom Bailey riding a horse across a lake to get to his love before she gets married with another guy in Made of Honor, or the Travis and the prisoners fight for their survival by running amok. The movies end with a little sparkly smile in the end showing that everything turns out good.

Ok, I'm getting to my point, pardon my long excited movie again-recaps. My point is, if you forget these movies and come back to reality, do you see that most of humans' stories in this world end at stage #3 above. Have you seen people who just give up without trying? Who end things without communicating? Who just stop without fighting for it? This is really a reality of our lives that need an opened eye. We always depend on bad events to decide that things end that our sensitivity to those are increasing day by day. Have you ever wondered, or waited, that your new partner will screw up in his assignment to break off the teamwork? Or have you been trying to look if your new husband will show an imperfection to file for a divorce? Or your roommate to be a jerk for you to move out?

Very rarely we try to see these things as a challenge for us to deal with, rather we just escape because we think it's better to stop now than to suffer later. My very point is we feel safer, apparently, by NOT being in a commitment. So, I'm calling all of us and me to have a little fight for what you really need rather than what you want, because what we want is usually not reliable to begin with.

If You Give Him a Fish, He'll Eat For a Day

2010-12-28T04:49:00.000-08:00

I was having a conversation with one of my lecturers regarding the situation of social work in Malaysia, and one thing of what she said kind of struck me and opened my eyes on what should have been obvious but neglected by helping professionals in Malaysia. Try to imagine what is the first thing you'd give to a homeless person, poor families, or aboriginal people? The ones that usually the media have portrayed are money, money, and money. We keep hearing the news that this big person, or authority, or ministers, or any people with names and titles come to visit the houses and give a generous amounts of charity. However, very little effort has been made to realize that money is not all that these disadvantaged people need.

So, list down basic needs in human's life. There can be physical, psychological and emotional needs. Physical needs can be in forms of materials, physical health, and shelters. Psychological needs can be mental health, self-esteem, and cognitive efficiency. Emotional needs can be related to the needs of having good intra- and interpersonal relationships with others. If you visit a family whose socio-economic status is well below what is considered standard, the first thing you might think to help was to give out a certain amount of money, wishing it'd help them go by for several days perhaps. But do you honestly think it's enough?

There is a famous saying I read on a wall of my previous university's library that says, "Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, and you teach him how to fish, he'll eat for the rest of his life." This saying is very true. You see, teaching someone 'how to fish' can take on many forms other than teaching itself. As I mentioned above, there are other needs different than the physical ones, such as psychological and emotional needs. If money, money, and money is the only thing provided to these needy people, will it help provide for these needs as much? Maybe temporarily, maybe for a day, but I don't think it'll last longer.

As a starter, counseling services are very important too. And counseling is not just sit in front of the person and listen and give advice (although giving advice is not encouraged in professional counseling session), it is more than that. Counseling services should be able to open the eyes of the disadvantaged people the options that are available in their life that they can take to make a reformation. Counseling should be able to make them go out of the 'coconut shell' that they are stuck inside. They should be, then, taught how to 'fish' so rather than depending on charity, where they could actually provide for themselves. Therefore, this emphasizes on the importance of education. A major contribution to their condition could very well be their education level. This calls for the help from the authority that can enable them to get a decent education in terms of money, direction, and guidance counseling.

The basic point of what I'm trying to say is that provision must match needs. A person who needs shelter shall be given a shelter. A person who needs a job, shall be given the opportunity to provide for him- or herself. A person who needs psychological stability shall be psychologically stimulated by services in forms of counseling, therapy, etc. Therefore, evaluate what the real needs are then you'll know what to do next.

Movie Review 12 - Our Family Wedding

2010-12-17T07:16:00.000-08:00

Lucia (America Ferrera) was getting married with Marcus (Lance Gross). Miguel (Carlos Mencia), Lucia's father, was trying to 'reheat' his marriage with Sonia (Diana-Maria Riva). Bradford (Forest Whitaker), Marcus' father, was juggling between the high-school girls he slept with with his ex whom he was still in love with, Angela (Regina King). When Lucia was heading back hometown, she was nervous because she had to drop a bomb, actually three bombs, because she knew her father wouldn't like the news that she dropped out of college, that she never took a chance to tell him about Marcus, and that she and her boyfriend were living together. When she was home, she only managed to tell her dad that she was getting married. The forced tie between the Black and Mexican family brought both to have some unconcealable tension and hostility, especially between the two dads.

Meanwhile, Sonia felt like her marriage with Miguel had become distant since now a car the latter was working on would be 'sexier' than her. The condition got even more disappointing when she overheard her daughters talking about how unhappy she was. She told Miguel how she felt and how it made him sad, and Miguel reacted by reliving the couple's first dates, a romantic ride. On the other hand, although she had already divorced Bradford, she was still friends with him, and took care of him. When in one night, the situation seemed to feel like when they first got married, Angela thought there was still a chance, until she walked in on Bradford with a young girl in the house. But Bradford knew that Angela was the only woman he needed in his life, so he professed his love all over again.

With all the craziness happening in the wedding planning, and the tension between both families, Lucia and Marcus had their own conflict when the secrets Lucia kept from her father affected her relationship with Marcus. Bradford said to his son that whenever things felt wrong, he needed to acknowledge it and stop before it's too late. Marcus then felt like Lucia wasn't in the relationship as much as he was, so they broke off. But, Lucia's sister said that when they were little girls, they could bicker and become best friends the next hour, but in adulthood, conflict should be resolved with genuine apology. So, Lucia went over to Marcus' and apologized, and both made amends.

This movie makes me feel bittersweet about marriage. Although I felt very annoyed with the seemingly incessant messes that occurred throughout the film, I feel like there is something we can learn from it. First, Bradford's on-and-off relationship, or sexy friendship, with Angela, which raises the question, does rushing into marriage lead to a rushed divorce? Bradford always said to his son that marriage isn't as wonderful as people might overstate, but he himself knew that if he hadn't rushed to getting divorce, he'd still have a chance to fix things in his marriage. Rushed marriage might not sound good, but as does rushed divorce. Once you get in, give your every effort to make it a wonderful thing.

Second is Miguel's cold marriage with Sonia. This might be what people have always said over and over and over again everywhere in the world, that marriage means suicide. They believe that marriage will never be as magical as when a couple is in a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship, which for me is because of "what's rare is valuable" thing. When we're not married to a person, we feel like it's exciting to touch him or her, to say "I love you" a lot of times, or to even sleep together, because it's not allowed. When something's not allowed, we feel like it's sweet to do those things because it's 'rare', but once we get married, and have access to the once-forbidden stuffs, then we get cold. Again, we need to make efforts to make a marriage as good as it used to feel. Be romantic everyday.

Third is Lucia's romantic relationship with Marcus that had been affected by the two families' massively different cultures and traditions. When these two cultures clashed, the couple became disheartened, which made Marcus felt like Lucia not telling her father that she was dropping out of college as a sign that the wedding wasn't a good idea. The thing is, signs might be helpful in showing us what to do to a person, but it's way not important way to decide that something as big as wedding is off. Again, I can't emphasize enough, it's about effort, effort, and effort. When you feel wrong about something, you don't run away from it, you take a moment to think about what makes it feel wrong and what you can do to make it feel right. If it can feel wrong, than it can feel right. It all comes down to dealing with decisions, rather than dropping it off of hands.

As a wise man (Betty's father in "Ugly Betty") said,

"Being an adult is not about making the right decision, it's about dealing with the decisions you make"

Movie Review 11 - Rachel Getting Married

2010-12-16T03:20:00.000-08:00

In this movie, Kym (Anne Hathaway) had just gone out of rehab and she was heading home with her father (Bill Irwin), with all hecticness of Rachel's, Kym's sister (Rosemary DeWitt) wedding day soon. However, although she knew she was going back home to a loving and accepting family, she knew and she could she all the little hints and signs that her family was still looking at her as an ex-addict and could snap out anytime. Kym could especially feel this when her sister made her friend, not Kym, as the maid of honor, when her father was vigilant with her whereabouts all the time, and Rachel being frustrated when Kym was trying to announce her development in getting sober in a rehearsal dinner.

The tension between the two sisters was heightened by the fact that before Kym went admitted to a rehab centre, she accidentally caused the death of her brother, Ethan, by getting high when she was taking care of him and swerving the car she drove off to a lake. Kym couldn't take it anymore and while she was so guilt-ridden, she tried to turn a bit of the blame to her mother, by arguing why her mother still let her take care of Ethan even the former knew that Kym was high. When Kym didn't return home the night before Rachel's wedding day, everyone started to get worried, but Kym came back home anyways and the two sisters made amends. Although Kym and her mother were still unreconciled, Kym understood now that the sisterhood she had with Rachel was stronger than any possible conflicts between both. Feeling bittersweet, she returned to the rehab centre.

Labels are quite a strong psychological phenomenon in human society. Especially after you've been a part of a correctional institution, it's very hard to clean off the 'ex-' stamp, such as ex-con, or ex-addict, on your forehead. When she returned from rehab, Kym knew that although her family was wonderful, she still felt discriminated against. In literature, labeling is one of the reasons why people with 'ex-' stamps return to their old lifestyle. When the society is more eager to categorize people based on their history, the ex-convicts or ex-addicts would feel that it's much easier to conform to what the society thinks of them. Then when they experience relapse, the labels become even stronger, which reinforces the 'ex-' behaviors even further.

One way to help is to instill trust. The 'ex-' people should understand that when they go back, the community is welcoming them with an open arm, and judgment is put far aside. But still, carefulness should be there too, just like when we have to be careful with everyone, regardless they are an 'ex-' or not. This might be why when an ex-convict is sent to a place where the people don't have the idea that the former is an ex-convict, he or she is more likely to not experience relapse, provided the resource and peer with access to the old lifestyle is not strong in their life. So, make efforts to help than to blame. If you refer back to my old post, Blaming and Helping, you can get some ideas of what to do to people that might challenge our values in life.

Movie Review 10 - Role Models

2010-12-11T07:01:00.000-08:00

Danny Donahue (Paul Rudd) and Anson Wheeler (Seann William Scott) were two energy drinks salesmen in "Role Models" and their career was going well until Danny was struck with the epiphany that his life was not going anywhere. While Wheeler tried to convince his friend that the job was enjoyable, Danny couldn't help but think that he was stuck at one point of life where he couldn't move. Danny became rebellious and picked a fight with everyone, including a cashier at a coffee shop that enraged his girlfriend, Beth Jones (Elizabeth Banks), and eventually to their break-up. Feeling even sucked down, Danny and Wheeler were in a hassle with authority that landed them into a community service at Sturdy Wings.

Sturdy Wings was a community service for kids who were in need with brotherly companionship. In the service, Danny was assigned with a shy and medieval-hero obsessed teenager, Augie, while Wheeler was paired with a rebellious and profane kid, Ronnie. Of course both had their own sets of problems to deal with, but one thing that the both must always look out for was their attitudes and behaviors because they were the 'role models' for the two kids. Augie already realized that Danny didn't really want to be there, but when Danny ruined his chance to be in Laire, a mock medieval kingdom, Augie sulked away that led to a nasty confrontation between Danny and Augie's parents. Wheeler and Ronnie were bonding but when the former was busy having fun and being distracted with a girl, Ronnie went away too.

The two guys were very close to being jailed up because of their not-so-favored performance in Sturdy Wings, but they were determined to fix the situations. While Wheeler begged Ronnie to take him up again as his big brother, Danny tried to find for Augie another chance to participate in a mock multinational wars at Laire. The opportunity ended up making all of them, Danny, Augie, Wheeler, and Ronnie, to be the warriors for a newly established country they just set up to defeat the cocky king. A series of fake but real war between three countries led to a final battle between Augie and the king, and after his hand being cut off, Augie stabbed the king in the heart and won.

'Role Model' is a funny and smart, although very profane, kind of movie that teaches you that being a role model isn't easy. Especially for children, because they keep looking up to their adults, because that is where they get to learn how to behave and act in various conditions. Albert Bandura, a psychologist who termed observational learning, said that not just behaviors, children observe our attitudes and expressed ideas and determine if those are viable to be followed and imitated. But sometimes, when things are too much, they can get confused.

Augie, for example, had parents who were worried sick because their son was too obsessed with the medieval stuffs, but Danny clearly had a different kind of thinking. But since Danny matched his own attitude, Augie really looked up to Danny, until Danny ruined his position in Laire, which in the same time, ruined Danny's status as a role model. Especially when he already knew Danny was forced to be a big brother, Augie felt like he was a lost cause and he didn't know where to go and what to do, since his parents were disapproval of his interest and Danny didn't have a clue of how to act in any given situation.

Ronnie really felt that Wheeler was a guy he could depend on, but when he was dumped because Wheeler had a girl to play with, Ronnie realized that his role model wasn't such a model after all. This led to confusion too. All this emphasizes on the importance of consistency and trust, because in order to be a role model, children need to be able to identify with the models, and if the models lose that, observational learning can't take place. So, if you are a big brother or a big sister and you wish you want to instill good values within your younger ones, be consistent and walk the talk. Give them the feeling that they can depend on you, and that you yourself walk the the whole big talk about what you preach.

Movie Review 9 - Ghost Town

2010-12-10T10:36:00.000-08:00

How do you feel if you are anti to social setting but that's what you get every day and every second? A dentist, Bertram Pincus (Ricky Gervais), had a near-death experience in a surgery and that enabled him to see ghosts who were earth-bound because they had some unfinished business to deal with. When they found out that Pincus could see them, the ghosts started following the dentist who already hated socializing with people. But a ghost businessman, Frank Herlihy (Greg Kinnear) was determined to get to the other side, so he haunted Pincus so the latter would agree to help him cross over by telling the former's wife that she's now engaged to a guy who would take her money once married. Frank thought that was his unfinished business, but it's not quite so.

Trying to help Frank, Pincus did all he could to get Gwen (Tea Leoni), Frank's wife, away from her fiancée. It worked out well, but Pincus didn't expect it that the fallout would be that he fell in love with her in the process, but Frank didn't favor it. When tripped up by the ghost, Gwen got angry because she thought Pincus took advantage of her husband's death to get close to her, and Frank's reason of tricking him was that the latter was a jerk and she didn't deserve that because she was married to one.

Pincus finally realized that his antisocial attitude didn't get him anywhere, so he began his personality transformation by helping the lingering ghosts by resolving their unfinished business, and he felt good. He realized he had to start appreciating people more and offer an open arm if anyone would come in his way to associate. And his last mission was now to help Frank to cross over, and he did, and Gwen believed that he talked to Frank all along.

No man is an island. That's what John Donne said to infer that no human being can strive being alone and living alone. But Pincus firmly believed the opposite, that people lived alone, they died alone, and apparently they stayed alone. But as he witnessed himself, that kind of life didn't pay off. When he kept pushing people away, he also realized that people pushed him away too, in return.

There is no such thing as an ultimate individualism. Even in the most individualistic cultures such as the United States, the United Kingdom and some European countries, there is such term called as Horizontal Individualism, where some members of the culture would on occasions put the group goals ahead of his own. This is because sometimes for individualism to work, they have to be a little bit collectivistic, emphasizing the importance of living in a social setting. You might abhor birthday parties, community meeting, or students union, but they are simple ways where you can enhance your social being and actually benefit from it, if not now, someday.

Movie Review 8 - Love Happens

2010-12-09T06:18:00.000-08:00

"Love Happens" tells a story of a widower, Burke Ryan (Aaron Eckhart), who found himself as a motivational speaker and a writer of a book that talked about dealing with the loss of a loved one. His manager, Lane (Dan Fogler), set his next seminar in Seattle, a place where he had been avoiding to go since his wife died in a car crash. One of the reasons why he hesitated was that his wife's family lived there, and bumping into his late wife's father could be something that he wasn't sure he'd be able to do. However, out of all the reluctance, he met a florist Eloise (Jennifer Aniston), whose meeting with for the first and second time were a bit of a disaster. But warming up to him, Eloise started to get to know Burke, but she knew there was something that he hid deep in his heart.

Burke kept telling his audience that the only reason why they couldn't seem to move on was because they stopped dealing with the loss. So, he encouraged them to face the fear that resulted from the death. Feeling touched by his performance, Eloise, however, learnt that Burke didn't follow his own advice, he didn't deal with the death of his own wife when she found out that Burke didn't go to the funeral. Eloise felt that she had to do something, so while Burke became a mentor to his audience, she became a mentor to him. And the first step was that to release a parrot that Burke's wife made him promise if anything should happen to her. But the effort by Eloise wasn't taken well by Burke.

Burke finally couldn't take it anymore, and he decided that he had to tell his audience the truth. He told the world everything that happened in the car accident, but one thing he omitted from the knowledge of the audience. It was that he was the one who drove the car, and he blamed himself all this while for his wife's death. Revealing this secret to the world was Burke's important coping process so he finally could let his wife go this time.

In psychological literature, there is a model of grief introduced by Kubler-Ross, that contained five stages: Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. Kubler-Ross said that these stages occurred to people who are diagnosed with uncurable disease and will face death very soon, but later this model was applied to losing a job or a marriage, or even losing a loved one. Denial is when the individual does not accept that the destiny has called, and when he can't deny anymore, he feels rage, or anger. Then, he tries to bargain with destiny, but usually bargaining does not work out, so he feels depressed.

You see, all these stages might come off naturally in a person's process of dealing with grief, but one tricky thing to do is to accept the destiny. Kubler-Ross said that these stages might not be in order, but it seems like Burke's block-stone to acceptance is his anger. All this while, he couldn't keep away from the idea that he killed his wife, so because of that, he cut ties from anything that reminded him of his wife; her family, her friends, her stuffs in the house, etc. This caused his late wife's father to be angry at him, because all the father wanted to do was to mourn with him but he couldn't find Burke.

Acceptance might be very tricky, so a lot of us are stuck at a stage prior to acceptance. Perhaps mostly because we feel like there must be something to do to correct the situation (bargaining), or that it's easier to not face the destiny (denial). But we have to keep in mind that we can't never move forward until we accept. A guy in Burke's audience whose son was killed when falling off the scaffold couldn't go on being a contractor, or Burke himself couldn't open himself up for a new possible romance because he kept feeling hung up on his guilt upon his wife's death. The fear is the huge impediment in the process of accepting. Therefore, it is a good idea to face rather to escape, and soon you'll find an easy way to see things in a whole new perspective.

Movie Review 7 - Leap Year

2010-12-07T03:35:00.000-08:00

What is the first thing you'd grab in 60 seconds before you go out of a burning house? We all might have different thing in mind, but Anna Brady (Amy Adams) didn't really have the answer, and Declan O'Callaghan (Matthew Goode) rather just kept it a secret. Bummed when her boyfriend, Jeremy Sloane (Adam Scott), and her just celebrated another anniversary without a wedding proposal, she decided that she had to just pop the question on her own. Jeremy was leaving to Dublin for a conference, and Amy was trying to surprise him a visit, so she could pop the question on 29th February, where she thought it was an Irish tradition that on a day that made a year a leap year, a girl could be the one to just pop the question.

Departing to Ireland, that was when she met Declan, who'd drive her to Dublin for €500. Her journey to meet her boyfriend was not easy, from a greatly stormy weather that delayed the flight, to a non-cooperative ship captain, to a less than friendly Irish bar owner who was Declan himself, to a crowding cows that blocked the only road, and missing a train, Anna vowed to herself that she'd never stop and give up. In the journey, Anna and Brady went through together the ups and downs of the journey, but one that made them realize that their encounter was more than just an encounter was when they were believed to be married and asked to kiss.

Finally meeting Jeremy, Anna started to doubt her decision, but he surprised her by proposing, and she said yes. But her doubt lingered even stronger when she realized that one of the reasons he had to propose was that they couldn't be in the same room unless they were married. So, she set the alarm of the new apartment they were getting and tried to see what Jeremy would take in 60 seconds, and sadly it wasn't her. So, she rushed back Ireland and saw if she had any chance with Declan, and Declan accepted her.

So, back to the question, what would you take in 60 seconds before you rush out of a burning house? This question is more than just it seems, because it challenges us to think about what should be our top priorities in life. Sometimes this is just the one problem people seem to be having: Priorities. Cognitive view of learning asserts that the first stage of learning people must have before moving on is discriminative learning. Discriminative learning is the type that requires people to be able to discriminate information. People with this skill can differentiate important and unimportant ideas, what is good and what is bad, and can pay attention to details. Sometimes things just happen without us knowing what really has happened, so this type of learning is important.

When asked why Jeremy was so special, Anna seemed to have a difficulty in answering and resorted to "Because he's a cardiologist." Anna didn't understand why she had to stay in the relationship, because all that was in her mind was that, she needed to be with him and get married. But when struck with the "60 seconds" question and struck with the one detail of her life that she never thought was significant, she realized that in reality, what she had with Jeremy was not real. So, the lesson to learn was that try to be purposeful, and don't do something mostly because you have to. Although it's an obligation like feeding your children, or the five daily prayers, find a purpose of the acts and pay attention tot he detail of why it might become of such a dull routine rather than a joyful thing to do everyday. This might help.

Movie Review 6 - Flash of Genius

2010-12-06T04:56:00.000-08:00

"Flash of Genius" tells a story about how a man, Robert Kearns (Greg Kinnear), invented Blinking Wiper that could go on wiping even without the engine of the car running, in an intermittent pattern. He got this idea after an incident with a popping of the cork of a wine bottle to his eyes on his wedding night with Phyllis (Lauren Graham). Feeling lucky, Robert thought that he could make his own manufacturing company of his owns, with the board of directors consisting of his own family, and sell the Blinking Wipers throughout the world. However, seeing this as a very great invention, Ford Motor Company showed an interest in buying the invention so they could start installing it in their later car productions.

Damned be Robert, when Ford Motor Company suddenly pulled out from the deal and said that they were not sure to buy the Blinking Wipers just yet. It bummed Robert, but it bummed him more when he realized that Ford Motor Company actually used his idea and "reinvented" it on their own terms. Things started going downhill from that moment. Against everybody's wishes including his own wife, Robert was determined to fight for it, to fight for his invention. The company didn't want to bring this case to the court and offered Robert a generous $250000, but they wouldn't admit that they had infringed Robert's invention. More to Robert's sadness, Phyllis left him.

Robert went to the court, representing himself, and this time he was even more determined. Ford Motor Company offered him another generous sum of money to stop him from concluding in the court, $5 millions so he would back down but still, they wouldn't admit that they stole the idea. Asking his children, who finally came around and helped their father in this legal case, Robert decided that they would not stop. Finally, Robert, with the delights of everyone who supported him, won the case and was offered with $18.7 millions. He knew his battle was over.

The issue of intellectual property has been on the heat since long ago, and it is a serious infringement. That is why every university in this world has a strong rule against plagiarism, the act of "stealing" an idea without crediting the original source. You might be a big company, or a person who believes that you might get away this time, or the next time, or the next, but words are stronger and you are very likely to get caught. If you are, you'll be in trouble.

So, what did constitute 'original ideas'? Does it have to be perfectly new? or can it be a new invention if the inventor uses up components that already exist? One of the arguments of the lawyer of Ford Motor Company was that Robert didn't exactly invent something new because he did not invent the transistor, the variable resistor, or the capacitor. He just "arranged them into a new pattern." Well, this is how Robert answered them: Charles Dickens did not invent 'it,' 'or,' or 'the,' he just arranged the words to into a new pattern, but why was his "A Tale Of Two Cities" an original masterpiece? And he got that right.

Especially when you're a student, and you're still adjusting to the world of original ideas, or invention, or jumbling of words, it is very good to always remember that you have to be careful with using other people's ideas in your own works. If you have to, then credit them and do what's appropriate to make sure that you acknowledge that you're getting it from somewhere else, not from your own mind. It's good not just for your own student life, but your intellectual dignity.

Movie Review 5 - Thank You for Smoking

2010-12-05T07:02:00.000-08:00

"There is no conclusive evidence that links smoking to lung cancer." This had been incessantly promoted by a cigarette lobbyist, Nick Naylor (Aaron Eckhart), as a way to advertise and brainwash people into smoking as a response to the world's increasing campaign on anti-smoking environment. Nick first tried to put back smoking behavior into the society by using the celebrity in their sexy scenes in the movies. His theory was that the celebrities in the past were made famous by continuous indirect message that invited people to smoke, by their visual imagery in pictures, with them holding smokes and posing. This penetrated smoking practice into the society without even it knowing, but too bad, the world, or specifically a senator in the United States who did a strong campaigning against smoking.

Nick counteracted by bribing the original Marlboro guy into not lashing cigarettes (because he himself was diagnosed with lung cancer), meeting the Hollywood entertainment placer to persuade the smoking in the movies suggestion, or even went public with his ideas of the greatness of smoking. While seeing how the world almost a bit bought what he had to say, a seductive journalist used him to gather all the informations that could be used against him.

The report in the article by the journalist included how Nick compared and prided how cigarettes topped the account of the most deaths in the world, how he bribed the Marlboro man to stop using his lung cancer diagnosis against smoking, how he brought his son together in the lobbying in a business trip, and that all his lobbying was all for paying his mortgage. After this article, and his near-death condition, when kidnapped by a hater who kidnapped him and overdosed him with a lot of nicotine-patches, Nick knew he had to do something. He went to the Subcommittee Hearing on Tobacco and campaigned for smoking for the last time before he quit his job for good, but this time, in different way.

His speech in the hearing raised a certain important issue about how smoking was promoted against all these years. He pointed out that, in response to the senator's question whether or not he believed that smoking could cause serious health repercussions, he himself did. He asked the audience and asked to raise their hands if they did not know if smoking would be bad. It's a common knowledge, it's something everybody knew, thus why all this brutal and relentless campaign against smoking anymore?

Nick's point furthered to the fact that it was how people were educated. It was all how about children were raised and educated. It was all grownups were socialized and educated. In a family system, it was the parents who should take responsibility to educate (note: the word is educate, not force) their children of the importance of making the right decision. Although in smoking situation, this could be partially true because government would be responsible too, but he raised a very significant point in here. When parents, teachers, the community, or even the government kept on promoting against smoking, did they actually stop to think that they might be partly in fault when their loved ones started to smoke?

We were diverting the focus of blame onto someone else because we were too lazy and clueless into admitting that we might contribute themselves to falling into the smoking habit. Smoking children might have smoking parents, or smoking peers. Smoking children might have indifferent parents who did not care much about what their children were doing. Smoking children might be so because their parents were mostly into cure rather than prevention. All of these and a lot of other factors as well that go beyond blaming and campaigning against smoking, and putting a lame scary image at the side of a cigarette smoke as well, should be considered in treating, and more important, preventing the society from becoming even more and more desensitized towards smoking.

I hope we consider our roles and contributions we could make as parents and siblings and friends in the prevention of smoking behaviors. Well, unless we couldn't care less...

Movie Review 4 - Welcome

2010-12-04T06:20:00.000-08:00

"Welcome" is a foreign movie about an Iraqi-Kurdish young man, Bilal Kayani (Firat Ayverdi) who was determined to travel across the world just to see the love of his life, Mina (Derya Ayverdi), in the United Kingdom. Bilal was very determined that he actually could make a risky decision by migrating illegally to France, because that was the point he could go from to see Mina. After getting to France with some legal and court struggles, he began to realize that going to the United Kingdom might be trickier than he initially thought. He had to swim across English Channel, a wide ocean that connected France to the United Kingdom.

Bilal didn't know how to swim, so he registered for two swimming class with a French instructor, Simon Calmat (Vincent Lindon), but the latter could smell what Bilal's agenda was to learn how to swim. Still teaching how to swim, Simon was beginning to form a bond with his student, from where he learnt that Bilal's motive was to reunite with Mina. Feeling emphatic towards the young man since he was about to go through a divorce process himself, Simon aided Bilal's efforts and helped more than just that, he even gave temporary shelters. In France, there was this law that prohibited the local people from helping the illegal immigrants in any ways, because it would reinforce the latter to keep coming to the country. However, Simon couldn't care less and kept sheltering Bilal, taught him how to swim, and even generously gave him a swimming suit and a ring from his ex-wife so Bilal could present it to Mina.

Simon was in a lot of troubles because of that. He even was jailed because of his insistence that there was nothing wrong with helping illegal immigrants with a place to sleep, though he initially lied about that. Simon's ex-wife even warned him that what he did might be very kind, but was not worth it because it could cause a lot of problems. But Simon deafened his ears, until when reality struck, when Bilal really did decide to swim across English Channel. Panicking over his safety, Simon called the coast guards to save him. Bilal was brokenhearted when his attempt failed, and decided to go for a second time, and this time, he said to himself, he'd make it, especially when Mina called to rush him over because her father was arranging a marriage for her.

The second time did not side on Bilal. Unfortunately, the guards from the United Kingdom noticed a human figure floating around in the sea and wanted to catch him. Bilal panicked and he tried hard to hide from them, by diving into the water. However, his own determination killed him when the guards realized that the figure did not come back to the surface. Simon was called by the authority to be informed that Bilal died. Simon came to the United Kingdom by himself to give the ring to Mina, and to inform Mina that her love died while crossing the water.

Love can make us blind. And not just that, it can make us do brave and risky and, well, stupid things. But this movie teaches us about something. It teaches us the value of determination. It teaches us the value of never giving up. Even if Bilal didn't make it to see his girlfriend, but his efforts were so valuable that Simon was touched by them and decided to make it forever and memorable by giving the ring to the girl. If Bilal didn't risk his life illegally migrating to France, didn't have the guts to ask Simon to be his teacher, didn't have the courage to swim across a wide sea, none of it would happen.

Simon said, "the boy could swim to meet his girl, but I can't cross the road to get you," referring to his regret over having to divorce his wife, whom he was still in love with. It's true, sometimes it's as small as a simple road, or as massive as a huge ocean, but it all comes down to our own perception whether or not we want to start taking our first step, and go on and go on and go on. Kelly Clarkson sang in her single "Breakaway," that she'll spread her wings and she'll learn how to fly, and she'll do what it takes until she touches the sky. So, my message to everyone and me too, do what it takes until we have a grasp of what we want to achieve, until we touch the sky.

"It's better to die fighting than to live in fear..."

Movie Review 3 - My Name Is Khan

2010-12-03T04:40:00.000-08:00

The idea and debate about Islam and terrorism have been incessantly ongoing, especially after the tragedy of September 11, where Muslims were the targets of blames. Rizwan Khan (Shah Rukh Khan) was not an exception. After marrying Mandira (Kajol), Rizwan lived his life as a married man with Asperger's syndromes happily, because his wife and his stepson accepted him for who he was. All the wonders ended when the towers in New York were attacked by militant extremists, and Rizwan's life started going downhill. When the son of the family, Sameer, got killed because of his recent change of last name to 'Khan,' Mandira began to feel that marrying Rizwan was the biggest mistake of her life. A sobbing scene at the boy's murder place, Mandira pecked that if she didn't marry him, nothing would turn out like this and swore that she'd never accept her husband back in her life until he went to the president of the US and said, "My name is Khan, and I'm not a terrorist." Rizwan, being autistic, took it literally.

Rizwan, then, swore off that he'd never return to the lap of his wife until he did what she asked him to do, leading him to a series of terrorism-suspicion related events, such as being investigated in the airport, witnessing an Indian hotel being thrown with a rock, and being looked at prejudicially when he perform Islamic prayer in the public. But nothing compared to what happened when he finally got to meet the president, but being arrested after yelling, "I'm not a terrorist! I'm not a terrorist!", and people, having the tendency of negativity bias, only focused on the last word of his sentence.

He was put in jail, being beaten up by an inspector, and frozen just because he was thought of having the information on some terrorist groups. However, destiny sided on him when two dedicated journalists actually recorded everything when Rizwan cried the "I'm not a terrorist" and it could be a proof that Rizwan was actually not. Trying to find an agency who could make a story about Rizwan, the journalists were finally helped by a scared Sikh journalist, who opened the eyes of the American authority that Rizwan was not a terrorist.

Rizwan journey turned from religious to humanity issue when he met a poor family in a poor town, Wilhemina. When flood struck the town, Rizwan was the first one to help the people in the town build back what had been damaged, inspiring many people in the country to come and lend a hand. After an eye-opening revelation, Rizwan finally got to meet the president and tell him what Mandira had inadvertently implanted in her husband's mind. The both finally got back together.

This is, for me, a very good representation of how Islam and Muslims have been perceived since the tragedy in September, which actually still goes on until now. Some people in this world are still terrified whenever they hear the name Islam. What pops into their mind when this religion is mentioned is bomb, explosion, or murder. Luckily, a lot of sides of people now realize the true nature of Islam and start to advocate for it.

As how this movie has shown, the perception of Islam and how it goes on from teasing, to insulting, to unnecessary war, has been an issue of religion turning to an issue of humanity. Looking at how people in Palestine suffer, not just the militants, but the public, as in the women, and the old people, and children. I do not want to blame anyone, but a war that does not follow ethical guidelines will never turn out good. A war that is based on generalization of the perception of a small bad group to the people in general is always disastrous.

Rizwan Khan was just another Muslim, suffering from the prejudice that stemmed out from this kind of generalization, and this kind of war. There are other Muslims just like Rizwan, with or without the Asperger's syndromes, who might be suffering from the same too. It's important that the people are educated about issues like this, because illiteracy is what actually starts out prejudice that can result in many other hazardous events, like war. Educate yourself, and when you're capable, try to educate others. Hope this condition might better soon.

Movie Review 2 - The Experiment

2010-12-02T00:05:00.000-08:00

Have you guys heard of a classic unethical experiment called as the Stanford Prison Experiment? This field experiment sought out to see the attribution to the behaviors manifested by guards and prisoners in a prison that lead to abusive treatments. This is the base of this 2010 thriller movie, "The Experiment" where chosen male participants would be acting as the guards and the prisoners in a mock prison. Much of the motivation these guys decided to participate in the first place was the handsome amount of money offered if the experiment was successful, about $1000 perday, and the experiment was intended to go on for two weeks.

Travis (Adrien Brody) and Barris (Forest Whitaker) were basically the main pro- and antagonist of the movie. Travis was located among the prisoners and the Barris among the guards. The first day went on normally, with ever participant still adjusted to the role that had been given to each one of them. However, as the days went by, they started to take their role seriously, actually too seriously.

Travis quickly became the unofficial leader of the inmates since he was with all the courage and bravery to protest, and Barris quickly assumed as the leader of the guards when his initiatives to shut down Travis' rebellion was respected by the prisoners and the guards altogether. However, being too deeply invested in his role, Barris started to act authoritarian, where every rule, or his rule, broken would be responded with aggression until it flamed a serious anger when Barris killed a diabetic inmate, who also was a friend of Travis'. Starting from there, and the drowning-of-head-in-the-toilet-bowl, the prisoners, led by Travis, became uncontrollable and ran amok to take down of the violent guards. Until when it was too aggressive, the participants were finally let go, and the experimenter was arrested for manslaughter.

A lot of psychological phenomena can be observed from this movie. First, role theory asserts that every individual carries a set of roles within him or her. Somehow, when we're given a role, we're more likely to conform to it, because there are a certain expectations that we do not want to violate (like not wanting to mess up their role as prisoners and guards because they're expected to finish the experiment or else, they wouldn't get paid). These roles, and the way we try to uphold them, influence our behaviors and personality traits. This might be why Barris who was a shy and homebody man, became very aggressive and violent once he was very uptight about his role as a guard.

Second, do you remember Stanley Milgram's obedience experiment? He found from his experiment that people have the tendency to obey to an authoritative figure to a frightening and threatening level, up to the willingness to end a life. The experimenter in "The Experiment" and in the original Stanford Prison Experiment (the experimenter acted as the superintendent) became the authority and the guards obeyed to them. Without the guards realizing, a man died and bloods were spilled. That is how dangerous obedience can be.

Third, you can see from this experiment how Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs can be seen very significantly. The prisoners were secured with the biological needs, but their safety need was the one that was threatened. You can see how true it is that we could go to an unexpected length to make sure that we're safe. When the prisoners in the Stanford experiment felt unsafe with the guards taking control, they started to rebel, and in the movie, the rebellion caused a bloody war.

This movie, although only partly represented the experiment, actually gave good ideas how dangerous a certain psychological phenomenon can be. Which is why some experiments are unethical in the first place, because lives could be at stake. Watch it if you're a fan of psychology. This might inspire you.

Movie Review 1 - Dinner for Schmucks

2010-12-01T07:32:00.000-08:00

This month December, I will dedicate my blog posts to reviewing movies I missed before, that I'm catching up now, and I feel it's worth it to be reviewed. Maybe the movie has some good qualities, and is worth to watch. The first review will be Dinner for Schmucks. I know, I know, this movie has been ages but deep down I really feel like I need to watch it, and it seemed like I made the right choice.

Dinner for Schmucks is about how an employee was trying hard to impress his boss to get promoted, was in a dilemma when he was invited to a dinner where every guest should bring an "idiot" for them to make fun at. Tim (Paul Rudd) found Barry (Steve Carell) trying to save a dead mouse on the street, and texting while driving, Tim bumped into Barry with his car but he was lucky that Barry was safe and an idiot enough to think the latter was the one who should pay for any damage caused by the accident.

Barry's presence in Tim's life had been collateral. Barry did not just bring back a violent stalker of Tim's three years back, but he also caused Tim's girlfriend to leave him, his house to be in a huge mess, and his car to be so massively damaged by the psychotic stalker. Barry also almost put Tim's career in jeopardy but being a good friend, Barry attempted to get Tim his promotion by attending the dinner (while Barry did not know at all that the dinner was for "schmucks"). Tim, finally following his conscience, standing up to Barry and lost his job.

Something intriguing that I observed while watching this movie. You see, this movie teaches about dreaming and daring to dream. Do you notice that successful people are people who dare to dream and who dare to actually step forward in achieving their dreams? They do stop sometimes and pause and think what might happen, but the difference between these people and stuck-at-life people is that, they don't turn back. Barry understood this, so that was why he tried so hard to make sure that nothing stopped Tim from achieving what he wanted, what he dreamt of.

Barry was excited and looking forward to the dinner, which was why too that he never let anything to stop him from going. Although he learnt how Tim actually felt about him, that he was an idiot and friendless, Barry still went to the dinner to see people (although part of it too was that he hoped Barry got the promotion). This teaches us that, people will always try to put us down, and if we want to be successful, what they should not do good enough to make us stop. We should keep going, and going, and going.

Idiots do not think about consequences, which may be why they are more daring than us, but we have to know, it's their redeeming quality. And that is something we should learn from them. At the end of the movie, Barry finally fixed everything, his heart triumphed over his head when he knew if Tim's girlfriend knew what Tim felt about her, how madly in love he was with her, she'd be back to him, which was why Barry let Tim ranted about his feelings while she was at the back, listening.

And Barry said, the evolving monkey, the Wright brothers, Sir Francis Bacon, Vincent van Gogh, Louis Pasteur, Benjamin Franklin, Evo Kanevo, and his best-friend-to-be, Tim Comrad that they were dreamers and without their dreams, they couldn't even achieve what they did now.

Watch it. It's worth your money and time.

"You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one..."

Blaming and Helping

2010-11-23T09:07:00.000-08:00

If you notice, our world has gone so obsessed with blaming that it blinds their way out from something that matters more, which is helping. There are a lot of social problems in society that seem to be so deplorable that society just lessens their understanding capacity by just resorting to labeling and organizing information on the basis of those labels. It's easier for us to stamp people with a certain mark on their forehead, and keep calling and seeing them as that rather than taking time to actually understand and help.

Consider the cases of homosexuality. Have you ever considered, Muslims worldwide especially, they spend their every waking moment in their lives trying to search for a proof in Al-Qur'an and Hadis or any other reliable sources that homosexuality is forbidden? Even after proving it, they can't get enough, they have to talk in a public discussion about how haraam it is, they have to make sure that the message is delivered loud and clear. But do you notice, that none of these "good" Muslims ever try to stop for awhile and really think, "how can we help this guy?"

To make it worse, they use a lot of common-sense nonsense to cover up what they are lacking in the intelligence area, so they keep making these suggestions as if they were really effective and supported so in scientific research. Suggestions like getting married, having sex with a woman, or even as horrible as aversion therapy (which only serves as a punishment rather than nurturer, so a gay guy's most likely be asexual rather than straight), are strictly based on simplistic perspectives.

So, my point is, there is no effective way yet, so rather than encouraging the homosexuals to get wild with being homosexual, why don't you absorb them into the society and give them a purpose? Why don't you, rather than making a harsh and cruel rejection, give them a platform for them to express their feelings and perspectives on life? Why don't you, rather than making quick and baseless judgments, try to stop and put yourself in their shoes for a while?

I know I might get flamed for posting this. But I hope you would stop to think and do the right thing, though it's hard.

Forgiver and Forgiven

2010-11-14T11:22:00.000-08:00

I am human just like you, and you, and you. And while it's no excuse to doing mistakes and all, it's still true that humans err. Being a human like you, you, and you, I have wronged some people and there's nothing I have wished bigger than them offering their forgiveness to me. But all my life apologizing, I have seen two kinds of people when it comes to conflict resolution.

1) The kind that feels superior and somehow victorious in the little "battle". This kind usually just feels that he or she just wins and is reinforced by the triumphant feelings, the person wouldn't just stop there yet, s/he has to create more drama by not accepting the apology, just to secretly want the person to blame to be on the knee and begging for mercy. A way for this kind to extend the conflict period is as little as not replying an apology text or message in a Facebook, or as big as yelling the person back to his guilt.

2) The kind that knows that extended conflict period can never do anyone any good. So, they handle the apology maturely by replying politely and forgive. And no, when I say forgiving, I do not equalize it with forgetting. You see, forgetting is tricky, and we should actually NOT forget, so the similar pattern of mistakes wouldn't happen again. But when they receive an invitation of truce in someway, they knew better than making a fuss out of it.

You see, the classifications are not exactly black and white, of course there are other ways people manifest their forgiving and apologizing behaviors, and they are ways for people to have a mixture of those classifications too. But let me tell you one thing, whatever their reaction is, do know that you have done your part in apologizing and expect nothing more from the person. If you become resentful of his or her reaction towards your apology, you'd just do nothing but make it worse. Sometimes the first kind of people are just to confused of what's the forgiveness is really for, so you just pray that the person would find out soon.

As usual, I need to remind that to myself too...

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free, only to discover the prisoner is you..."

Professionalism Is Overrated

2010-11-11T09:30:00.000-08:00

In the world going toward corporate dimension and academic emphasis, professionalism cannot be stressed enough. Professionalism means that the matters involving personal issues, interests, and desires should not intervene with the performance at the institution or workplace. Which is why to protect from things like fraud and biasness, some ethical guidelines are introduced by bodies who guard professional issues. For example, psychologically, in a therapy session, the counselors, psychotherapists, social workers, or any helping professionals, are prevented from having personal involvement with the clients, because obviously it's not helping. When you're in love with the client, as an extreme example, the way you see him or her can never be the same as when you see a person as the one you want to professionally help. There's biasness involved. Even some research supported the idea that lie detection is very hard to do when we're doing it to the one we're close to.

Well, I'm not against the idea of professionalism, I'm even in agreement with some of the concepts that are linked with the practice of professionalism. But does this issue have boundaries? Or is an extreme form of professionalism can still do any good? What do I mean by extreme professionalism? It is when, an aspect of it, the authority or people of higher position like bosses, lecturers, or managers can't be the least involved with their subordinates emotionally (and don't you dare equalize 'emotionally' with 'romantic'). It is like, the bosses do not bother if their employees have a hard time at home, or the lecturers frown upon the students having a small talk with them, or the managers can't sit in the same table with their workers at lunch.

My point being is, when you're completely detached from the personal life at work, some problems might ensue. Bosses out there, if you can't even be friends with your subordinates, how would you figure out how to understand them personally that can lead to figuring out how to make them perform even better? Lecturers out there, why do you have to shush a student if he asks about your family? You don't have to tell the gross intimate details, but a small talk can actually motivate the student into working harder (you'll be surprised how it works!).

Think of the time of Prophet Muhammad S.A.W. Did he detach himself from the personal lives of his Companions and people? The way he was a leader at that time was by knowing intimately who the people in his lives were. By that knowledge of his people, he'd know appropriate response to give everytime they consulted him with something, or to give out advice that's relevant to their life background.

Professionalism, in my opinion, was initially something that protects an institution from being a circus society. It was intended to maintain efficiency and promote healthy climate, and I believe it still is. But some professionals use it as a "guard" to protect them from having to do ''extra works'' not listed in their job scope, like being vigilant and friendly and not detached and emotionless to their people's personal life, as well as professional life. It makes it so much easier for them to do their works.

So, what I'm trying to say, get involved with each other (and please don't misunderstand it, you know you get the point after all this gibberish), and get to know each other personally. Bosses, lecturers, and managers, don't stick out your ego just because you're higher. I end my rant.

Coffee

2010-11-03T08:40:00.001-07:00

Coffee is such a delicate drink. It's drank cold, hot, with or without milk. Coffee helps me go through the day. And it certainly is a great company when I'm revising my studies on this particular table where I'm blogging right now. Many people believe that the caffeine in that cup of coffee can help them stay awake and energetic in doing their chores and works. Or if not, coffee can be just a delicious kind of routine contained in a cup. These are some random psychological facts on coffee and its effect.

1) The caffeine in the coffee will only work if you don't take it regularly. Just like drug, the more you take it, the more your system is craving for it, so the sensitivity for its amount in the body is decreasing, which makes another cup of coffee the next morning doesn't do anything to you. Wait, no, you still feel the effect, you still feel awake. But how? The arousal effect is resulted from your body returning to a state where it finally gets the fix, where it no longer experiences withdrawal symptom.

source:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6422279.stm

2) The effect of caffeine and how body craves for it can extend to the association of drinking the cup of coffee itself. This may explain why the body subconsciously feel the coffee tastes nice when we drink it out of the same mug, or the favorite mug. Since no formal research has been done to confirm this, maybe I can relate this to Mere Exposure Effect?

source:
http://idiolect.org.uk/notes/?p=783

3) Coffee can be related to how capable you are in accessing your memory. State-Dependent Memory asserts that the state where you memorize something or encode an information, is a state where your memory will be more efficient in decoding or accessing it. To put it in layman's words, for example, if you study in a caffeinated condition, you'd recall better in examination if you're caffeinated too.

So, now you know a little tidbits on coffee and its psychology, so take advantage of it, especially on #3. Now, I got to have my fix of coffee for the day...

There Are More Realities Out There

2010-10-25T23:36:00.000-07:00

Perhaps, before reading down what I have got to say, you can enjoy this one song by Jordin Sparks, "God Loves Ugly." Why I introduce this song first? Because it has the essence of what's reality is, of what confidence is. In the beginning of the song, she said that everyone is looking down upon her because of what she, and others apparently, considered "ugly." The blemishes, the weight problem, and the dirt that spiflicated her appearance made her feel so inferior, and probably one less of a woman. Then, towards the end of the songs (and some parts of the middle), she was starting to believe that she's beautiful, she's "apparently" beautiful.

You see, it's her reality. She believed that she's ugly, she knew that, she knew that confidently. Sometimes when people tell you one of their realities, you should know that it's not helping to just deny what they are saying. Saying, "No, you're beautiful..." or, "You're wrong!" even if it's true in your reality, it's not true in the person's own reality. It may work sometimes, aided by a couple other factors. This is also why comparing problem, "my problem is much worse than yours," will only make the person feel bad about him- or herself. So, if you want someone to believe in something, to believe in him- or herself, to be believe that it's his or her reality, then make one. Make what you say a reality to the person, by strengthening the reasoning with something that she feels important and powerful.

In this song, she was finally able to have altered her reality in which she now believed that she's beautiful. Why? Because God was an important figure in her life, and she learnt that God never discriminated anybody, for God, everyone was beautiful. If God was down here on earth, she knew she'd be able to face Him feeling strong, without the feeling that she might get judged by her own appearance, like other people did on her.

Carl Rogers, one of the founders of humanistic psychology, believed that people get their realities by experiencing them in the past. the experiences are deeply rooted in their system that they become, well, their realities. Rogers asserted that helping professionals should hold to the first cardinal rule, which is to accept the perception of the person unconditionally, which is why when you want to listen to other people's problem, empathizing is something you should do. How can a person feel better when all you do is, "You're being a crybaby. Move on already. Come on, your problem is so small compared to mine! You think it's hard to lose a friend? Try me, I might marry a jerk out of my family's force..."

Having to marry someone you don't love is not worse than losing a friend, and vice versa. The problem is a problem according to your own book, according to your reality. This is very important to remember if you want to be a good friend, a good spouse, a good family member, or even a good helping professional. What you have to do is to accept the perception of that person. Then, without being directive and suggestive, you can help the person realize that there is another reality in his or her life. A reality that helps the person build a better life. Remember this your whole life.

You'll Be Happier When You Realize It's Your Fault

2010-10-16T06:37:00.000-07:00

Self-serving bias is a social cognitive error in which you most likely attribute your successes to your own personal factors and your failures to other factors that you can't control. Try to imagine what a person would most probably say why he got an A in a subject, and why he slumped his grade for another. And you also might think that you're exempted from having this error, but think again, harder (Halvorson, 2010).

This kind of thinking might protect you from having a downfall of your own esteem. You might feel better when you think you're not the one who screws up the whole thing. But, there is an unfortunate dark side of self-serving bias, where it leads and teaches you how to be powerless and in no control of your own life. A lot of what has been found in research showed that happiness can be stemmed from our own perception on whether we have control on our life (e.g. Myers, 1992; Cook & Chater, 2010). Cook and Chater concluded from their research that people who are happier and with higher perceived control on their life and have a healthier eating behavior.

Can you see the relationship between all these things I've been babbling about? Why do you think people become so incessantly sad and depressed over the their own misfortune? Society, environment, their own family members, their friends, or even God are most likely the target of blame because these saddies think these targets are the ones responsible (i.e. self-serving bias) for their bad events.

What I'm trying to point out is that, once you realize that you also have an equal share of the blame, that it might easily be your own fault, you will see that you have a higher chance to make it right in the future. Try to ponder what you did wrong, what made it go the way you didn't hope it to. By doing this, you heighten your perceived control in life and you'll more likely feel happier. Seriously try it.
And this entry is inspired by my own experience when God used to be my target of blame. Forgive me Allah.

References:

Cook, E. & Chater, A. (2010). Are happier people, healthier people? The relationship between perceived happiness, personal control, BMI and health preventive behaviours. International Journal of Health Promotion & Education, 48, 58-64.

Halvorson, H. G. (2010). In failure, we are all Alan Greenspan. Extracted from Psychology Today from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-science-success/201004/in-failure-we-are-all-alan-greenspan

Myers, D. G. (1992). The Secrets of Happiness. Extracted from Psychology Today from http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200910/the-secrets-happiness?page=2

My Life Is On Pause (A.K.A. The Art of Saying Goodbye)

2010-10-13T00:34:00.000-07:00

Losing something significant, especially the ones you really care about, is a tragedy. Be it a dear friend, a beloved family member, an attached pet, or your loving spouse - it is never easy. What is worse is when you are very desperate to move forward, to go on with your life, you feel like there is this giant person with a giant remote who presses the 'pause' button on your life. You're not the one holding the remote, so you can't do anything but be frozen in the screen and wait.

There is a reason, well, two, two reasons why you're on pause, in my opinion. First, you need time to heal. They say that time heals and time doesn't certainly rush in doing its job. If you suddenly move forward, you never have time to think everything through. It's time to feel sad, to accept that you have experienced a tragic loss. It is the time when you have to accept that there might be no other kind of ending for that event. I don't mean to mourn and lock yourself inside the room, but give yourself a break. You have gone through a lot.

Second, this is the time when you have to properly say goodbye. Sometimes what hangs us up is the improper way things end and we don't like that. We keep wondering if things ended differently. So, rather than moving forward, we busy our mind with all the happy endings that could have happened. There's no time to regret! It's time to say goodbye, and for what's it's worth, you can do by your own. Admit that there's nothing between you anymore and that it's time to go. Say goodbye.

Moving on is tricky but it's not impossible. As I said, time heals, and time is your best friend that you don't want to lose here. It'll help you move forward, when you're ready.

I have to say goodbye too.

How Are You?

2010-10-05T03:33:00.000-07:00

How are you?

That's what people usually say to each other when they meet. It's a sign of caring and friendship, where it's the simplest way to find what's going on with our friends. It's the simplest way to know if our friend is happy or sad, up or down. What's the better way to ask your friend that you want to know what is up with him or her.

Unfortunately, 'how are you?' has been much of a ritual question rather than an actual question. Paradoxically, 'how are you?' can be a sign that we're bumping into a person whose closeness to us is just so-so, and the safest way to look like you even care meeting with him is by asking, "How are you?" And what's worse is you don't even stop to wait for the person to answer the question and you don't even accompany the question with the appropriate body gesture and and facial expression.

This question has been very imbedded in our mindset as a way to start and quickly finish off unnecessary encounter, that we even just ritualize the answer by setting it to an automatic, "I'm fine..."

You see, especially when we're a close friend to someone and he or she is struck with a big trouble. It could be tricky what to answer when we ask that person 'how are you?'. It's like, he or she wants to just answer, "I'm fine." but we're his or her close friend, so s/he really wants to tell you what's going on, what's really happening. But then, we are asking, 'how are you?' which is not so elaborate for a person who really wants to know what's going on with him or her. So, at the end, the most likely option of answer would be the over-ritualized, "I'm fine..."

So, who should we blame? The way people treat a redundancy in everyday communication to avoid having a cognitive overloading (humans are naturally constantly trying to reduce workload in their cognition)? The way our creativity dies whenever it comes the time to do or say things differently than the normalcy? Or is it that we're unconsciously obsessed with friendship status with everyone in our lives that who doesn't make it to the 'significant' list does not deserve our undivided attention?

My suggestions would be to make an effort in showing that you care. Just asking 'how are you?' might just backfire in the friendship itself. Couple the question with the right body movement and facial expression. Stop for awhile when meeting to really catch up with the friends.

I also need to do the same ~ ~

Departure Prayer

2010-10-01T20:53:00.000-07:00

Aslam,

I know that you'll read this when you arrive there. I want to dedicate this entry to you. Today is your departure to Japan and you're living in your dreams coming to realization. You're making efforts that are so amazing that dreams have to listen to you. I'm learning a lot about determination and persistence from our friendships. It's so valuable a knowledge that I never forget to be determined and persistent myself, because I know if I spend even half of my time making efforts like you did, I'd see my dreams coming true too.

So, this is my hope and prayers for you. I pray to Allah that you're one day, a big and successful man who makes a difference to the world. You inspire people and make people realize that their dream, each one of them, is worth fighting for. Please be safe at Japan, and please have fun over there. If Allah helps you realize your dream, He'll help you make a fun and beneficial living over there. He'll help you face any enjoyment and problems. He'll help you continue being the person, the brilliant man, you were in your studies and in your friendship.

Sincerely,

Taufik

Places Where Hungry Hearts Have Nothing to Eat (A.K.A. Chasers of Beauty)

2010-09-27T22:08:00.000-07:00

They say that the food of mind is knowledge, and the food of heart is love. I don't know if I am actually well-phrased to talk about it but you see, beautiful people, men or women, they have an endless queue in front of them who is more than eager to have a connection with them. Before, when I was quite naive, I always thought it was a very superficial nature of humans, longing for the things that look good in the eyes. But, no, though we're always taught with the value of what's inside is more important than what's outside, we still feel that it's more enjoyable to be in a company of beautiful people. Why?

This is a list of answer of such question. It kind of gives a shed of light of why beautiful people always seem to have chasers of friends or lovers. Some answers are worth mentioned.

1) post #3 - the poster says that when you hang around beautiful people, it makes you feel beautiful too. It makes you happy. But what about the case of post #2 where the poster says that hanging around beautiful people shakes his self-confidence. Being around ugly people makes the person looks good.

2) post #4 speculates that hanging around beautiful people gives you a share of what is given to your beautiful company. If they're getting attention, you'll too. Is it true? Don't you even feel more lonely hanging around them?

3) post #6 says that pretty people have an awesome personality. Is it a case of "what's beautiful is good" myth? And it's countered by post #7 who claims that ugly people have nicer personality. Well, then, isn't this a case of "what's beautiful isn't good" myth?

4) Post #9, 10, and 14 make a direct statement by saying that ugly people are ugly. Well, there's no more further comment of these ones, isn't there?

Among all these, and the more sensible answer is given by,

5) post #1, 5, and the best answer chosen by the asker that we have been engineered in our genes to chase after people of beauty. They symbolize health, give refreshments to the eyes, and possess symmetry in their physiques. They chase beautiful people because well then, they want to have some "love" from them, which eventually satisfies their social life, which philosophically we can say, their hearts have been fed.

Beautiful people possess some evolutionary "mysteries" that maybe psychologists can attempt to understand, but in a meanwhile, us non-psychologists, please don't ever repeat what posters #9, 10, and 14 said, average Joes, me especially don't feel good when you say that. So, even if you hate us so much, keep it inside, answering in a public platform like Yahoo! Answers is very hurtful.

Friendship Is NOT Given, It Is Earned

2010-09-20T07:41:00.000-07:00

What is friendship? It is a non-sexual relationship, can be deep or superficial, shared by two people who find that there is something that connects them together. Friends can be someone who shares the same workplace and knows you, or someone who is in the same study group with you, or your neighbor who knows your routine. Someone who you meet at the bakery several times and exchange smiles.

No, that's not my version of friendship. That is NOT my definition of friendship. Friendship never is without being deep. Someone who bumps into you at the workplace, someone who happens to live next door, or even someone who has a conversation with you, that is not a friendship. That may be an acquaintance. That may be someone, just someone.

If there's anything I learn these past few days, it is that friendship is not something that you find on the street and wear on your necklace, or something your mother gives you and you use it to buy something at the shop, or something you borrow from another person and then you give it back when you don't need it.

Friendship is earned.

You can't just be someone's friend and expect to be close to that person. You have to earn to be close to him, or her. It's so much work, it's so much and you might get tired but at the end, it's worth it. You have to work for it. You have to show and give your effort. And you might or might not get the friendship but it's the way it is. According to Karbo (2006), for acquaintanceship to transition to friendship, it should be based on reciprocity, and understanding of give-and-take of intimacy. But what's most important is that the two friends can relate with each other, meaning to say that they share, or understand the same social identity.

And any of you who are reading this, please take a moment to pray for me so this one friendship I have with this one person (you can refer to him as AM in your prayer) will be taken care of by Allah.

Reference:

Karbo, K. (2006). Friendship: The laws of attraction. Extracted from Psychology Today: Relationships Blog at http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200611/friendship-the-laws-attraction?page=2

It's a Shame

2010-09-14T19:59:00.000-07:00

Somehow, OneRepublic's It's a Shame is very much describing what I am going through now. You see, I applied for Turkish scholarship and though has been reassured acceptance by the authority, I still can't bear the waiting, unemployment sucked. I tried to get to the scholarship, but unfortunately the authority itself didn't know when the result would be released, but he assumed it to be in August.

"Now I tried to get to you
Pushing in vain to break me through
And I tried with all I had
You left me standing empty-handed
Well time has past nothing ever lasts"

Yesterday, the authority called me and told me I am accepted to further my studies in Turkey under the scholarship by the Turkish government. I don't know whether to call it a good news or bad news, since now I have signed a contract with my government, and I can't back out now. Even if I am accepted, the circumstance is not the same anymore.

"So now you confess that you need me

And now you release what you're feeling
But how is this suppose to ever be the same

Oh it's a shame
It's a shame"

Wow, this is more reason why OneRepublic is the best! And, oh, the circumstance is not good now, I have to choose between the two, maybe thinking of a compromise. I don't know.

Listen to the song:

Do You Enjoy or Suffer Being Infatuated?

2010-09-12T21:58:00.000-07:00

In an entry in Psychology Today blogroll, infatuation is defined as "idealization of the new love, often followed by deflation and feelings of loss. Intense longing and yearning - especially when the person is unattainable or elusive." (para. 4).

But the same author also asserted that infatuation is a normal developmental process of a teenager, though people in their older age can experience infatuation every now and then. In another writing I can't remember where the source is, infatuation should be enjoyed, rather than seen as a suffering.

Well, this is my experience and feelings every time I am attacked by one of these infatuation monsters. I know that the people I'm infatuated with are unattainable, so it only gives depression rather than the high feeling as if you're on drugs. Well, I feel aroused and high some of the times, except that whenever the thought that I won't get the person pops up in mind, I become so tired and moody, and depressed of course.

I want reassurance by the person and my life is more likely revolving around the person where changes might happen. The person is in my mind 24/7 and I am in a 'great' dilemma whether or not just say 'hi' in a message or just call or just do nothing. I have to force my life to do other activities in order to put that person to the back of mind, which is only working if I'm interested in the activities, or otherwise it'll only become a case of Pink Elephant Effect.

So, now you judge, whether being infatuated is an enjoyment, or well, a suffering. It's the latter obviously to me...

Source:

LaBier, D. (2010). Why your love life is a version of adolescent romance. Retrieved from Psychology Today: The New Resilience from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-new-resilience/201004/why-your-love-life-is-version-adolescent-romance

There's Always a Different Side of a Coin

2010-09-12T03:36:00.000-07:00

You can't always get what you want. It's what they say. It is implied that when you pray and wish for something but end up craving even more of it, there's a good chance that your wish is replaced by something that's even more important than you.

I can't tell the whole story of why this entry is inspired in the first place but my exact point is that there is always a different side of a coin. When you haven't got something you want, you might actually get it, but you just have to flip the coin's another side to your looking and there is a good chance that it is that what you have got. You see what we wish isn't always exactly granted in the exact manner, though I believe it is very very frequently granted.

For example, you wish for a lover, then you meet a wonderful person. He or she does not end up being your lover, but your best friend. You still get what you want, but it is only visible at the other side of the coin. It means you have to think harder what God actually wants you to want. Maybe in this case example, you should not get a lover, at least for the time being, you need someone to be your friend first, so here comes the wonderful person.

I don't know if I make sense, but it is what I learn yesterday and I hope what I'm trying to preach here, I can practice. In the meantime, enjoy this song, "You Can't Always Get What You Want..."

Forgiveness

2010-09-09T21:09:00.000-07:00

Err...! OMG! Wow! Phew! *Sigh.......

Those were what I felt throughout this dramatic first day of Raya. You see, when you have not been talking to someone for more than you are supposed to, or not, initiating the relationship back to where it was can be tricky, and a lot of things can happen, things that are out of expectations that is.

It's been a long fight, an incessantly prolonged conflict, one that now I am asking myself why I stopped talking to her in the first place. Bottom line is that this fight has been more and more pointless. You see, we're not perfect but we have been more than persistent to expect people, especially the significant ones, to be, perfect. We keep blaming each other, trying to prove to the other one. Until at one destructive point when you could go to the extent that you try to persuade others to feel like you about that person. You hate to see the face 'til your feeling about it is rampant and extended to every other thing about the person.

All of those, and you already forget what you're been blaming each other for, what you're hating the person for, why you're not talking to person anymore... You just forget, proving the point that whatever reason you were angry about can be solvable at that right moment when you picked that fight with that person, or when the person did with you. The conflict is just so small but it is your ego that magnified it 'til it could burst a flame.

Can you see my point?

Anyways, Selamat Hari Raya and Maaf Zahir dan Batin... again...

Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri!!

2010-09-05T21:26:00.000-07:00

It's Raya again and I am emotional again. Maybe I'm emotional for the past two days because it's Raya, and until now, I don't know why on earth I should be emotional in this festive holiday. Maybe because it is the time when every good thing might have their own chance again to restart again, when they have ended long ago. Yes, Ramadhan is as equally blessed, but usually the redemption is only between the self and God. And God is forgiving, Ever-Forgiving. But, in Raya, it is always associated with the tradition to right the wrong between people, between friends, between family, and between everyone else. And I'm not so sure that humans are as forgiving as God Himself.

So, anyone who reads this, please take your time to forgive others. I do not ask for you to forget, because for me, forgetting is your full right, but forgiveness is the wrongdoer's full right to have. I am also reminding myself, because I am one to talk. I sometimes have a lot to ragingly keep inside, grudges and all, but let's try together. Just hope that when you can forgive people, that people can forgive you for your own bad deeds.

Please forgive me... Zahir and batin...

The Big V

2010-08-28T23:04:00.000-07:00

I was just appalled to the extent of needing to write this entry, after I saw many young people (doesn't make me old though) just somehow 'hate' virginity. For them, virginity is a source of humiliation, inexperience, shame, and illiteracy. Losing the big 'V,' according to them, is something that's highly valuable for them.

I get it, I was once a teenager too. When a peak of hormones production just kick your conscientiousness, you have got nothing in mind other than experimenting. It's worsened by the fact that now the world is going toward 'less-cloth' era, where beauty is in the eye of the naked beholder. We are blitzed with the images and representations of people with countable strings of threads on their body. We have got nowhere to spend the surplus of hormones to, which could be very very manageable, if we are educated with it.

You see, for those of you who're still a virgin, appreciate it. Value it. Feel it and believe that it's the best thing that's ever happened to you, that being a virgin is the best thing that's ever happened to you. I'm grateful that it's not too late to me too. I'm grateful that I still got the chance to choose someone special whom I love to lose the big 'V.'

With all these STD's, HIV, and other unmerciful diseases that just cling on human's system once they got in, you got enough reason to keep it timely and right. The diseases are not just the problems, it's how people see us, how the family would see us. How the people we love see us. Do you think it's ever going to be the same like before?

Remember, do not rush, do not hate it. You're lucky you're still a virgin. I know I feel lucky.

My Friend is Going to Japan

2010-08-22T01:11:00.000-07:00

Finally, all this emotion-wrecking process of application, rejection, false hopes, genuine hopes, hearts-to-hearts, insecurity, faith, he is finally accepted. One of my friends will finally depart to Japan for his postgraduate studies and it is his dream. Come to think about it, how nice is it when your dreams just materialize before your eyes? It must feel wonderful.

Several months before today, we (me and my friend) both keep expressing our ambition to further our studies in our respective dream country. He'd say that he dreamt of going to Japan and I replied that I really wanted to go to Turkey. We both got the chance, we both had the opportunity. But isn't it funny that only one stood a chance to see the chance turning into real event?

This entry is just me trying to express my feelings of how unfair this life could be. But then, there must be a reason, a flaming wisdom why I need to stay in here, studying something that I'm not really passionate at. Maybe time will tell.

By the way, to the friend in question, you know how happy I am for you. Please be successful in your studies there. Dreams are hard to achieve and obviously you deserve this. Congratulations and please keep in contact...

Courage...

2010-08-16T00:31:00.000-07:00

I remember this one piece of serenity prayer that says,

"God, give me the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference..."

You see, courage is a big deal. I am prompted to write about this after I saw one small child, when I was about to perform my tarawih for the night, who wander around in the mosque just to shake people's hands and swab a little perfume onto it. He'd do it to almost everyone in the mosque, thinking that what he did might make a difference, to make people smell good.

Well, he did. He did make a difference, people seemed to be happy looking at him. He actually brought up good vibe around the mosque. He had the courage to make a difference, he had the courage to swab perfume onto people's hands.

So, a little reminder to both of you and I, do not ever occupy yourself on the issue of amount, just do it. Donate 50cents or treat your friends a nice meal in the iftar. Anything. You can always start with a small step. Then you'll be ready to make a big difference insyaAllah. Ameen...

Ramadhan

2010-08-10T02:19:00.000-07:00

Ramadhan is coming again. Mixed feelings are felt. Of course there is excitement, because this is the one month we can be cleansed away from the unwanted, physically and spiritually. And there is nervousness, especially when this time of year, I am furthering for my masters, doing all the difficult assignments and all, can I be up for the challenge? There is also a sense of repentance, the feeling like we want to stop it all, the things that bring us lower in slave status in His eyes.

My father, as usual, says the advice again, "it only comes once a year, so take advantage of it, make a full use of it." It's an obvious advice, really, but how many of us actually take it by heart? Come to think about it, it's true, Ramadhan only comes once a year, and yet people still manage to take it for granted, most probably because the blessings and advantages of this month are intangible. We mostly spend the nights at mamak, rather than take half an hour to perform the tarawih, at least. We prefer to feed the desire of the mouth, rather than just keep on starving for only 12 hours. We continue to gossip and backbite, rather than take a time to stop and enjoy the silence.

It's a reminder for you and me, mostly me. I hope that this Ramadhan, it will witness the better us, a better slave, son, friend and student. Take advantage of it, you know you understand this.

Peter Pan's Also Growing Up

2010-07-26T12:35:00.001-07:00

When we talk about development, sometimes we talk about either the development in us is either abrupt or subtle. We can notice what we have been experiencing, like the growth of mustache, maturity on voice, or most clearly, puberty. And some other aspects of development, we just have to take a while, in order to realize that we're experiencing them.

One of them is wisdom. Wisdom is considered as one of the liquid development of human beings, liquid as in it's constantly changing and developing, upwardly or downwardly. Your whole life you may find yourself being like a complete idiot, not knowing what's best for you and others, making the wrong decisions, and saying the terrible things to others.

I believed that I am a late bloomer, or worse, what they call Peter Pan Syndrome when an adult is stuck inside, waiting for us to just have the guts to get a hoe and dig all that sands that blocks our development. It takes years for me to just head out and feel like an adult. Well, it takes enrolling in a Masters program for to feel like an adult! But all this while, I never felt that wisdom has been liquidizing in my mind (lame!) and no, seriously, I just find myself growing up, wisdom-wise.

My point is, you're an intelligent being, I believe every individual is an intelligent being. When you're experiencing your experience, your mind records what happens and if mistakes happen, your mind will unconsciously record them and teach you that the mistakes aren't supposed to be repeated. You just let the nature takes its course, and don't feel bad because if you think Peter Pan's not growing up, think again. He also learns from his experience.

Six Degrees

2010-07-18T05:17:00.000-07:00

Stanley Milgram, the psychologist who did the obedience experiment, who shocked the world by finding that people's readiness to kill others due to authority is higher than expected, also conducted an experiment that everyone in this world is connected to each other via at least other six individuals. He named his theory Small World Phenomenon. To make it simple, you want to connect a certain Fredo Prego (names are totally fictional) and you might know Ali who knows Fatimah, who knows George, who knows Derek, who knows Stephanie, who knows Crystal, who finally, knows Fredo Prego. So, it means there are a distance of 6 persons between you and Fredo Prego.

To detail it out, you might know Ali who studies in the same college with you, Ali knows Fatimah who is his sister, Fatimah knows George who is Fatimah's friend when she was an exchange student at the US, George knows Derek, who is his childhood friend, Derek knows Stephanie who works at a certain publishing company, Stephanie knows Crystal, who is her husband's sister, and finally Crystal knows Fredo Prego who is Crystal's boss in her workplace.

Look at this map...

The implication of this is how small the world is, and if you pay a deal of concentration and effort, you can actually get connected to almost anyone in this world. Do the experiment yourself. If you have a facebook, try to find any name that is quite alien in your life. Try to click on one of his or her friends, then one of the friends of his or her friends, chances are you might just stumble upon a person who you actually know. Try it several times and see what the average number of people who connect you and the person in the beginning point.

No Youtube!

2010-07-13T11:19:00.000-07:00

I guess this is why it is an APEX university...

This is 'it' trying to load...

...and this is 'it' finally just couldn't...

There goes my internet life...

Adulthood

2010-07-08T19:00:00.000-07:00

I've settled down and now I'm comfortable with the fact that I'm staying and studying in USM. Although the impression that I'd like to give was my decision was the right one, but I couldn't help but to feel scared, fearful about this whole thing. Really scared. The first moment I set my foot on USM, I already felt like things were going to be hard. Taking the course I'm not interested in, being in an unfamiliar place and blending in quite a remote environment, I never thought I'd end, even eventually, being an adult.

Finally, it took my mother's call to make me realize what I should be feeling instead of fear. My mother told me how she kept thinking about me and finally one of her own children actually moved out of the house, of the place, of the "safety zone," in a sense that shows I'm achieving something. She couldn't be prouder, and you know what, I shouldn't be too. It takes gut, as Wilhelmina said to Betty when the latter decided to quit her job at Mode, to do that. It takes gut to move out, live independently and start your journey as a full-time adult, not leeching off your parents.

So, from now on, I not just have to to train myself to be good in the field of Social Work, I also have to work very hard to succeed as an adult, because well, I'm an adult now.

USM

2010-07-06T22:20:00.000-07:00

Just want to say, USM is much better than I initially thought. The people here are very friendly and they are helpful. My classes will start on Monday next week which is on 12th July. It's going to be a subject I'm not really interested in but who knows what's going to happen in the future. I'll try my best and I really hope you readers will take some time to pray for my success in this place.

Oh, by the way, I'm residing in a one-person room so I am very so happy! Since when I was studying in IIUM, I had been dreaming to stay alone, because it's much easier. And now it feels so calm and relaxed. Hope it stays this way.

That's it my random thought for today. :)

The Roads Less Traveled (A.K.A. I'm Taking the Safe Road)

2010-06-20T03:21:00.000-07:00

First, it started out as hopes, and who doesn't like hopes? Everybody likes hopes. Hopes give warmth and comfort, and they make us want to see the next day, because well, the hopes might come true.

Then there were challenges. Growing up, we were all taught that winds make a strong tree, or what doesn't kill us, makes us stronger, or any other claptraps that just intend to make us a risk-taking person. Challenges are supposed to make a person to be braver and stronger.

Then there was a time we fell down. As usual, everybody keeps saying the obvious, that we should get up and continue with the journey. The destination is just around the corner.

Then there were times when it was very dark and the only choice to go is the safe road. But, everybody keeps saying, repeating what's been repeated, we should take risk. Take risk! So, I decided to go through the darkness.

Then, it's the destination. After the bumps on the road, falling down, blinded by unlightedness, I reached to the destination. It turned out to be nothing but a dead end.

Finally, I had to go back, to the point where I had to choose between the risky road and the safe road. After all, the safe road is the better road after all. Except, it took time to go back to the beginning and in the process, I might die eaten by the wild bats, because I had used up all the resources.

Gratefully, I reached, and I had a little injury because of bats' bites. I'm healing and now I'm taking the safe road.

Powerful Me

2010-06-15T05:15:00.000-07:00

People have been always asking, if you can have one super ability, what would you choose? There are a variety of cool superpowers to choose from - namely telekinesis, telepathy, levitation, time-space manipulation, and a lot more. And for me, my answer would be premonition. Imagine Nicolas Cage who can see 2 minutes in advance prior to the present in Next, or Phoebe Halliwell in Charmed, or Cordelia Chase in Angel; Aren't they awesome?!

Disclaimer: this post is strictly fantasy- and imagination-oriented.

Let's say you have the ability to know the future, wouldn't it be easier to just figure almost anything? Wouldn't it be even much easier to avoid making a screwed-up and twisted mistakes and choices in the future? Currently, I am in a dilemma of whether choosing a scholarship that offers furthering studies in Turkey with an allowance every month that can only cover a tenth of my tummy space and another scholarship that has a very nice monthly $$$. But of course it's never perfect. The scarily low scholarship would allow me to do something related to what I've been dreaming of to do - Forensic Psychology and the one with a nice bump in allowance requires me to do Social Work.

This is when I really really really hope premonition can aid my decision making process. Will I survive at Turkey? Will I develop love for Social Work? Will a foreign language be a blockade in my success in a Masters studies? Will I ever finish my Masters if I do something I'm not interested in? Will I be able to find other revenues for my daily expenditure in Turkey? Will I... Will I... Will I... There are a lot to ask and to answer. But then, I have to wait for 2 years to know them, to figure out what's best for me, and at that time, of course it's too late.

What do I do?

Drama Addicts Anonymous (DAA)

2010-06-13T06:07:00.000-07:00

Surprisingly, there are a lot people than we thought, who have the idea that life isn't as exciting without drama and scenes. That's why we have this term, 'drama queen' or 'drama junkie' to describe the people who can't get 'turned on' by anything unless there is a fight, major scene, conflict, or anything that would fit as a criterion of drama.

Too bad, at one point of my life, I was a little bit like that. I don't know why, and I wasn't even aware of it, but I used to be a fan of the idea that friends are closer when they undergo conflicts, which now I know is very untrue. If you have heard the term Self-Fulfilling Prophecy, our inner belief can affect our outer world, which happens especially when we are not noticing that the effect is taking its place. My point related to self-fulling prophecy is that when you always expects conflicts in life (or when you subtly want conflicts), conflicts will happen, even when you're not asking for it, at least obviously.

If there's one thing I learn about conflicts, it is that they usually become true and end things. Friendships don't blossom on fights, relationships don't grow on fights, and even family ties can be broken by misunderstandings. When at first, we just want to have a little movie scene, where two people are in conflict, then at least one party will realize the truth or just got the hidayah to make amends, they make up and become closer. But, sadly, the making amend part can be skipped and the broken relation remains broken, and unfortunately, for the rest of your life.

I used to write about friendship - Life and Humans: Little Friendships - where it doesn't need big things to happen, because friendship is a million little things, it's a million little communications, exchange, and memories that are most likely little things. And I can't stress LITTLE enough.

This post is especially dedicated to this one person I really care deeply for. I am sorry for my behavior and I should stay with you in this time of stress.

I am sorry...

The Beauty of Failure

2010-06-08T18:22:00.000-07:00

Growing up, we always heard the idioms, phrases, and sayings that tell us how failures should mean to us. Failures, despite of the negativity the word brings and denotes, has some perks most of us fail (pun intended) to understand.

Many of the older people I met, among their favorite advice for the younger generation is that we do not repeat the mistakes of people of the past. Those mistakes were frowned upon, sure, but they serve as a way to tell us that doing a certain way can result in the failure in the first place. A post in Psychology Today has a very inspiring way to tell how to look at failure. It's not by changing the name, a failure is still a failure. Denying its concept will not help in any way, but embracing it as a part of your life (Rubin, 2010) and treating it as a platform for success (Barth, 2010).

I have been baking cheesecakes since ever. I will not deny that my first attempt of baking this expensive, delicate, and spoiled (as in manja) savory dessert was somehow disappointing. And being costly, my mother wouldn't want me to waste another sum of money spent on a spoilt (as in rosak) cake. Of course I would choose to listen, I mean just listen, but I knew if I took some risks and found what was wrong, I would figure out the correct way to make sure the next attempt would turn out good.

So, I took some amount of money, big enough to empty half of the space, and bought the ingredients for cheesecake. I tried to bake it again, this time with more careful 'obedience' on the baking instructions, the weight of each ingredient, and any other extraneous variable such as the heat of the oven and all. And you know what the turnout to be? It was awesome! I changed the flavor to orange and it tasted just like it is supposed to be. I think it can compete with Secret Recipe.

My point is, without wanting to accept failure, and without learning from it, success is very hard to come out to the surface. I can say, success is the son of failure.

Listen to this song (Bette Midler - The Rose), there is one part that says, the soul who is afraid to die, can never learn how to dance. Perfectly said.

References:

Barth, F. D. (2010). Turning Failure into Success. Retrieved on June 9 2010 from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-couch/201005/turning-failure-success

Rubin, G. (2010). Enjoy the fun of failure. Retrieved on June 9 2010 from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-happiness-project/201006/enjoy-the-fun-failure

Prejudice is Helpless!

2010-05-20T20:10:00.000-07:00

Ugly feelings are out there. No matter how deep we hide them, no matter how much we deny their very existence in our sole hearts, and no matter how much we resent their stepping in our own mental zone, but they are there. When we go around, we always see people denying the ugly feelings that they have; like hating cute babies (~~because babies are supposed to be loved~~), despising minorities (~~because~~ ~~equality is supposed to be believed~~), feeling like our mother's yapping has been too much and annoying (~~because~~ ~~we should be an obedient son or daughters~~), or disfavors own country (~~because there is what they call 'patriotism'~~), and many more.

Lately, I am attacked with these feelings where if I express them out loud, people will be gasped with terror, with a face like I just ate a child. Especially when one of my close friends just admitted something that made me rethink about our friendship status. The whole night, when we were talking about it, I was acting fine, because, well, as a friend, I was supposed to understand him. But, more and more the time passed by, I couldn't help but to feel very much prejudiced towards him.

It is one ugly feeling that I have, whose existence most people would strongly deny, because it's an ugly feeling - It's disgust. It's disgust towards something I'm not supposed to...

Or am I?

One Marshmallow Now, or Two Marshmallows Later?

2010-05-16T02:37:00.000-07:00

Last 3 days, I met with a very nice elderly woman who has a life, as said in a Malay idiom, "Kais pagi, makan pagi, kais petang, makan petang" which means that whatever you gain in the morning will be what you eat in the morning and whatever you gain in the afternoon will be your food in the afternoon. She has been planting grass under the sun, being a maid at many houses, etc. This elderly woman has been working hard to make sure that her children are fed, clothed, and schooled. And something about what she said twitched my conscience. She, very calmly, said, "I once said to my children, go for your dream, study and be very educated, so you wouldn't be having jobs like what I had."

I always had the idea that when your parents are financially strapped, it is always an honorable and huge sacrifice when the first sibling or the first son dropped out of school to work and gained some money, but not after she said the above-mentioned. In this world of knowledge and literacy, how far can you really go and gain, or how long would it be if you can go that far? It'd help your parents in the short-term but will it be any more of help in the future?

No matter how troubling our parents' financial condition is, but your parents wouldn't be selfish by not letting you to continue your education, because I believe every good mother and father has a universal motto that "no matter how hard it is, we'll find the resources to keep it going."

If you really want to help your parents, work hard in your education and be somebody who can finally afford your parents' lives, make them feel the most comfort in their lives. This is what we call as impulse control (Plante, 2010), "one marshmallow now, or two marshmallows later?" A research has been done that children who chose to have two marshmallows later are more likely to succeed in their future, as in they know how to control their impulses from immediate gratifications.

InsyaAllah, where there's a will, there's a way - so believe it, rizq is everywhere.

Reference:
Plante, T. (2010). Two words to remember to maximize success and satisfaction in life: Control impulses. Retrieved on 16th May 2010 from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/do-the-right-thing/201005/two-words-remember-maximize-success-and-satisfaction-in-life-control-

The Power of Now

2010-05-11T06:10:00.000-07:00

Maybe some of you have heard a book titled, "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle. I am neither promoting nor have I read this book, it is just the title has been really giving me a lesson lately. Alhamdulillah, in my recent life journey, I have been blessed with some fortunate events that really make me happy. I am very grateful to Allah for this and I pray that He will prolong these events and make them stay 'til the rest of my life.

But, have you ever experienced the phenomenon where your mind is deliberately trying to sabotage you, that you being happy is not supposed to happen. No, I'm sure that mind is NOT that tricky, but I believe this comes from past experience that might have just made you felt so insecure and paranoid about your future. When you always experienced that good things in your past always ended up turning bad, you might not believe in life anymore.

But then, have you ever considered the possibility that things turning bad might be so because you were so focused on bad things that might happen in the future? Being very insecure is very unattractive and can drive people away, and drive you away from the good likelihood per se. The only solution is for you to appreciate the elephant that exists in your moment - the now. Aren't you feeling happy now? Aren't you feeling like on the nine clouds right now? So, enjoy it! It's an art not everyone can master. Forget about future - the only one you think about is how you can harvest the now to make sure the future can be lived in an expectably nice manner.

So, enjoy the now!

p/s: By the way, this is my very good friend, I just want to dedicate this post for him.

Bad Conclusions about Turkey!

2010-05-01T23:03:00.000-07:00

Finally, after a 'grueling' session of relaxing myself after a long and tiring flight journey from Istanbul to Doha and Doha to Malaysia, I got myself back again, typing for this entry, about Turkey and my many opinions about it.

Turkey -- Generally, it's very hard for me to find one person who can speak in, at least, broken English with me. Communications with salesperson, or assistants in any place, or almost anywhere in at least Istanbul (well, of course in Grand Bazaar you can find many English-speaking Turks because a lot of foreign shoppers are there) can be very difficult. Oh! And they are bad drivers! Bad, bad drivers with no patience whatsoever, and just drive across roads even when pedestrians are there crossing the roads. Because of the speed, I even watched live a small accident of a car hitting behind another car.

But, if the language and driving attitude already made you think Turkey is not worth it to be visited, think again. A lot, and yes, a whole lot other sides of Turkey and Turkish people can glue you to your own stay at the country. I love every other parts of Turkey when I was there. For example, one thing that amazed me was the fact that there was almost no gap between people of high ranking and people below them. I met with a lot of Turks who have achieved a lot of things - the mayor, the doctors, the managers, etc. But none of them actually deliberately tried to show us the fact that they're higher than us.

In Malaysia, especially the ones who already have PhD, many of them have this "I'm more superior than you, so you must speak with me in certain manners," or "I'm a doctor, you're a degree holder, so control your gazing, and don't touch me," or "I'm a doctor and who says you can call me or SMS me?" In Turkey, even the mayor offered us hugging and the PhD students talked with us like we were their brothers. They could make jokes, and we could have a conversation with them. We were not bombarded with the emphasis, "call me doctor, don't call me something else," or "why do you call me with that title?? It's inappropriate!" It is supported with the fact that everyone is honored with ONE title, which is "Abi." We call the person to whom we respect with his name followed with Abi. Like they called me Taufik Abi.

So, now, I have a very bad conclusion about Turkey after this trip. I fell in love with the culture and environment (although the weather made my lips and nails area dry as a desert) and I have a new dream - coming along with my dream to study at the country - that now the conclusion is, I want to migrate there and be a citizen. It might just be a dream that's afraid of waking up, or it might be a dream that comes true in the next morning, but I'll keep dreaming and if Allah wills, it'll soon be realizations. InsyaAllah.

Sorry that "Hujan emas di negeri orang, hujan batu di negeri sendiri, lebih baik di negeri sendiri," saying doesn't apply to me.

Everything Has Its First

2010-04-16T23:47:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, 18th April 2010 at 9.30 a.m. I will be departing by Qatar Airways to Turkey. I decide that today, I should write something about it because this is kind of a huge deal for me. This is my first flight, and this is my first time stepping on a land that is not called Malaysia. This is my first time looking at clouds beneath me. This is my first time visiting a country that has been a dream since I was first introduced to it in my first year at university.

People traveling abroad often keep complaining about jet lags, panicky flight, bumping heartbeats, feeling like they're constantly being thrown up and down on the Space Shot at Genting Highlands. I don't know how it's much better or worse for me out there, but what I'm sure is, this is my first time experiencing those. The next time when people talk about feeling sleepy in the daytime, and wakeful in the night time after traveling, I'd know how to jump in and contribute my piece of mind.

Well then, 'til we meet again. See you in May. Wish me luck in my travels.