I had a long talk with Jiayi today to iron out all the misunderstandings and discontentment that has built up over the years (it amplified during the 5 days in Hong Kong which made me feel that it's necessary to address these with her) and I've learnt one really important lesson.
Bitching doesn't really help.
To get information out of somebody, then yes, hearing to a person bitch may be rather useful (but then it would be loaded with emotions, so their rants may not be 100% accurate).
But when you bitch about someone, it doesn't help the relationship between you and the person. While you are bitching, you are so charged up with emotions that you start to make assumptions out of what the person has done that may seem logical at that point of time. As these assumptions pile up with no confirmation whether they are really true or not, you start to be convinced that the person is whom you have assumed and hostility further develops between the 2 of you. This widens the gap and sows further discord.
You may argue that bitching helps to relief your current frustration but if the result is a worsened relationship out of pre-conceived misunderstandings, would bitching still be beneficial?
After having a heart to heart talk (HTHT) with Jiayi, I realised that most of the things I've said about her are misunderstandings. She is a simple person while I tend to overthink, which causes me to mistake many of the intentions behind her actions. As I talked and listened, I slowly realised that all of her actions were sincere, with no motives behind them. I realised that my mindset about how humans often behave and act (usually due to a motive behind) has caused me to project all sorts of assumptions upon her, causing me to be unnecessarily cold towards her.
She doesn't blame me for it. She may be hurt during that period of time but her short term memory wipes it away, leaving no trace behind. Though often, I am astounded (in a negative manner) by how fast she can forget things, at such times like these, I'm really glad that she has the tendency to easily put things behind her no matter how horrid they are. It's as though she has forgiven me unknowingly by forgetting and I really am grateful.
Yesterday, as I was planning as to how to approach the topic with her, I imagined all kinds of reactions from her. The worst response would result in the end of our friendship (5 years and ongoing as she continuously emphasised during the trip, which irritated me a little but I believe she has already forgotten). Jonathan was bemoaning as he imagined the situation. He revealed that he has been trying to reconcile us for the past 2 years to be how we used to be in sec 2. To be frank, I was a little surprised since he always used to say that Jiayi has fell from her throne and would disappear from my life. I was indignant at first but as I allowed my misunderstandings and discontentment to build, I realised that what he said could really come to hold soon.
I was wrong. My assumption that she would react unfavourably and get offended. My assumption that she wouldn't listen. They were wrong. She took my words and listened. How she would behave from now onward, I am not entirely sure but at least I'm relieved that she really did listen to what I have to say and cleared up all the misunderstandings between us.
Sometimes, just a simple yet honest talk could possibly turn that thin thread of friendship into a thick, steel chain.
5 years of friendship and still counting... :)
Abigail
Monday, December 1, 2014
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Sorry
I was inspired to write after having to go through a mindless rant entitled to most of my family members (except my older brother and my maid) when it was first directed to my father by none other than my mother.
Rants are normal and rather understandable, usually a long expression of one's frustration towards a situation. I'm not going to accuse her of ranting, about how often we don't get our facts right and have a biased viewpoint whereby we usually would picture ourselves as the victim and start criticizing others. I do it too, in fact I used to be extremely fond of it. When I was younger, I created blogs for this very purpose, to rant whenever I was so fed up and that I didn't really have anyone to pour my woes out to because nobody seemed to understand what I was going through or they simply couldn't spare the time. I've heard loads of rants as I grew older, some would sound rather biased, some would sound a little more objective. But never have I heard rants that pour so much contempt over the people involved in the issue. Yes, I'm referring to my mother in this case. Her rants are far from ordinary, one (rant) would stand out from all the other rants I've heard in my past 16 years of my life (and unfortunately, I've heard and digested a lot more than one rant from her).
I admit that most of us portray ourselves as the poor, suffering one when we rant. We want people to empathise with us and to agree that others are the epitome of wicked. However, in her rants, she does not only view herself as the victim but she basically sees herself flawless, without any fault at all. And there she starts, putting all her ten fingers into and her irrepressible tongue jumps to life.
Her prejudiced rants are one thing, after all most rants are meant to be biased. Perhaps what really flicked that rage switch in me is the lack of apology.
From the moment I was born into this world to the moment when I'm right now typing this blog entry, I've never ever heard my parents said,"Sorry" to me, even when it is explicitly their fault. I get so overwhelmed by so many different emotions whenever I start thinking about this issue. Resentment, indignance, disappointment, perplexion, exasperation... Sometimes, I'm just lost for words.
Even a toddler is taught how to apologise when he did something wrong. What more working adults with four kids? There are so many books, even books for children, that teaches it is not difficult to say sorry but harder to forgive. So really, how hard is it for them to say sorry when they did something wrong? Being a father or a mother doesn't make you 100% perfect or somebody who would never mistakes. If anything, they would probably make more because (I admit) that parenting is never easy. As much as I can try to understand what they are going through, I simply cannot think of a reason to justify their lack of apology. Pride is hardly a justifiable reason when we were taught to be humble as kids from the well known story of the tortoise and the hare.
As a (turning) 17 years old, I guess I can never understand what is going on in their minds. I can only hope that God would give me the grace to be forgiving for it is really not within me to do so.
- Abigail
Rants are normal and rather understandable, usually a long expression of one's frustration towards a situation. I'm not going to accuse her of ranting, about how often we don't get our facts right and have a biased viewpoint whereby we usually would picture ourselves as the victim and start criticizing others. I do it too, in fact I used to be extremely fond of it. When I was younger, I created blogs for this very purpose, to rant whenever I was so fed up and that I didn't really have anyone to pour my woes out to because nobody seemed to understand what I was going through or they simply couldn't spare the time. I've heard loads of rants as I grew older, some would sound rather biased, some would sound a little more objective. But never have I heard rants that pour so much contempt over the people involved in the issue. Yes, I'm referring to my mother in this case. Her rants are far from ordinary, one (rant) would stand out from all the other rants I've heard in my past 16 years of my life (and unfortunately, I've heard and digested a lot more than one rant from her).
I admit that most of us portray ourselves as the poor, suffering one when we rant. We want people to empathise with us and to agree that others are the epitome of wicked. However, in her rants, she does not only view herself as the victim but she basically sees herself flawless, without any fault at all. And there she starts, putting all her ten fingers into and her irrepressible tongue jumps to life.
Her prejudiced rants are one thing, after all most rants are meant to be biased. Perhaps what really flicked that rage switch in me is the lack of apology.
From the moment I was born into this world to the moment when I'm right now typing this blog entry, I've never ever heard my parents said,"Sorry" to me, even when it is explicitly their fault. I get so overwhelmed by so many different emotions whenever I start thinking about this issue. Resentment, indignance, disappointment, perplexion, exasperation... Sometimes, I'm just lost for words.
Even a toddler is taught how to apologise when he did something wrong. What more working adults with four kids? There are so many books, even books for children, that teaches it is not difficult to say sorry but harder to forgive. So really, how hard is it for them to say sorry when they did something wrong? Being a father or a mother doesn't make you 100% perfect or somebody who would never mistakes. If anything, they would probably make more because (I admit) that parenting is never easy. As much as I can try to understand what they are going through, I simply cannot think of a reason to justify their lack of apology. Pride is hardly a justifiable reason when we were taught to be humble as kids from the well known story of the tortoise and the hare.
As a (turning) 17 years old, I guess I can never understand what is going on in their minds. I can only hope that God would give me the grace to be forgiving for it is really not within me to do so.
- Abigail
Sunday, August 31, 2014
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing
It has been a long time since I've blogged. I've changed the url of my blog (again) because after I've had a long break from blogging and my fingers are aching to write another, I can't help cringing at the url my past self came up with, Hopefully, my future self would be satisfied with this url. Anyway, today's blog post would be somewhat of a paradox. Enjoy.
Ever heard of this saying? It is something that most people, even myself, are guilty of. Many a times, we feel that we have enough knowledge or understanding of a situation that we feel that we have the right to judge what is correct and wrong, who is the one at fault. We start to get over confident and even at times, we overestimate ourselves. We start making assumptions and we comment. Perhaps, that is why people often say,"Get your facts right!". After years of observation, I've learnt that little knowledge is indeed a very dangerous thing and in fact, it is common in many situations. As a student, I'll start off with the academics.
Academics
As a student, I make this mistake over and over again. We assume that we know how much time is needed to revise a topic when we barely even know the topic. We end up planning a timetable which is unrealistic because we fail to understand how much time we truly need. I used to think that I can memorise things quickly. Thus, I often allocate just one hour to get an entire biology topic committed to memory. It took me three days to get Biomolecules into head. I paid an F for my bio test and disappointment from my teachers for that lesson.
Procrastination
This is also another result of over estimation. We think that we only need this certain amount of time to get things done when in reality, we really require way more than that. We start to push things later on and then get really stressed. Regret comes in, often too late.
Bitching
"Bitching" is teenagers' jargon for ranting. When we are upset by people or a situation, we would look for listening ears and start to rage and rant about those people/situation and frequently. When a person bitch, very often the person would tend to think that he/she knows the full picture and picture himself/herself as the "victim". Usually, when one person bitches, it tends to be biased (because of their emotions). I created blogs for this very purpose, whereby I would bitch about people, things happening to me whatsoever all day long. I'll also look for people to pour out my grievances. I always felt that I could see things objectively and that I was not being biased but objective. Most importantly, I felt that I was always right. However, over the years, I've learnt that is often not the case. When I think that I know everything, I actually don't. There are always certain facts that are left outside the picture, which I would only come to know about it later on and regret. I'll bring in the example of my mother.
I have been bitching about her since I was very young. I was probably the most mischievous in my family and as most Asian families practice, I was caned so often that I grew immune to it. I hated her for caning me. I know what I did was wrong, but I always felt that there was no need for her to inflict physical pain for me to learn the lesson. I grew up to be a very angry child because she never explained the rationale behind the caning. As a result, I always felt that she caned me for her own pleasure. As I grew older and became more rebellious, I would stand firm and could remain silent as she had fun with Mr Cane. That infuriated her (that I could remain nonchalant), which resulted in more caning. And this further convinced me that she really did cane me for her own pleasure.
I bitched. When I was in primary school, none of my friends face this problem. I had nobody to relate to, and that's when I started blogging. In secondary school, I managed to find somebody with a similar experience. It brought me such great solace. After so many years of walking in the dark, with my throat hoarse from shouting, whereby a part of me is starting to slowly accept that nobody would reply to my desperate cries, all of a sudden, a hand intertwined its fingers with mine. It gave me strength, that even though I have to continue walking in the dark, I could carry on walking with a huge burden lifted off my shoulders because I know someone is with me. I was no longer alone.
However, today, I'm slowly seeing dim rays of light through small cracks. My father told me a shocking revelation about my mother, explaining why she behaved the way she is and why she is adamant on certain things which I cannot agree.
My mother doesn't really have a friend to confide in. Her husband is away at work most of the day and he faces his fair share of problems. Her oldest son can never comprehend the way woman think. Her youngest daughter never has the patience to listen and her youngest son is autistic. The only person she could probably talk to would be her oldest daughter, me.
She see herself in me. Because among her four children, I am like an extension of her. The things I do, the things I say, even my temper, they are so similar. And among the four, I seem the one that is most capable of listening to her woes.
She scolds me for the mistakes I've made. Yet, she make the same mistakes herself. I felt so indignant to be reprimanded. Even though I kept quiet as she scolded and scolded, I was internally screaming,"HYPOCRITE!". The anger in me which always surged whenever I thought of this has finally been extinguished. Because I now know that she finds relief in my shortcomings. Yes, a part of me still is unwilling to accept all the scoldings because it is still not fair for her to scold me for the mistakes she make herself. But I acknowledge my lack of knowledge. I believe that there are still things that I do not know of and that I shouldn't be quick to judge (as I did in the past).
And these have reduced my tendency to bitch. I start to reserve my judgement about things and keep my mouth shut. Because I don't wish to say things that I would regret in the future.
But perhaps what really saddens me is that when I make neutral statements, I'm accused of not speaking the truth. People think that I bottle my feelings and refuse to share. They say I'm in denial just because I refuse to take an absolute stand in certain scenarios. This assumption really upsets me. I do take strong stands in what I believe in. But when it comes to people, I can never really take a firm stand because I simply do not know everything. I am not a mind reader, I do not fully understand what is going on in people's minds, I may be unaware of the reasons why people are doing such things, this is why I do not impose my stand. Even in History, arguments are constantly changing because of new found facts that are only revealed many years after the event has happened. And ultimately, who am I to judge? Perhaps, I am also guilty of the mistakes they commit.
Accusations have been thrown at me, sometimes by people whom I regard dearly. And most of the time, I do not tell them (that they are making assumptions) because I, myself, may be making the assumption that they do not know they are making the assumption about me (see the paradox?). Or perhaps, they may be facing certain situations and they are merely looking for an outlet to vent their frustration on. And when one is charged up with emotions, all reasoning would be void. Take the example of assuming that whatever I'm saying is not heartfelt. I can argue and justify that that is not true. However, from the start, if they were adamant that whatever that comes out from me are lies, surely all my efforts to justify myself would never convince them (because they would all be lies). Thus, rather than me justifying myself (which might get dismissed), it would perhaps be better to let time reveal it for them.
Perhaps it is better to not know anything rather than to know bits and pieces of the puzzle.
-Abigail
Ever heard of this saying? It is something that most people, even myself, are guilty of. Many a times, we feel that we have enough knowledge or understanding of a situation that we feel that we have the right to judge what is correct and wrong, who is the one at fault. We start to get over confident and even at times, we overestimate ourselves. We start making assumptions and we comment. Perhaps, that is why people often say,"Get your facts right!". After years of observation, I've learnt that little knowledge is indeed a very dangerous thing and in fact, it is common in many situations. As a student, I'll start off with the academics.
Academics
As a student, I make this mistake over and over again. We assume that we know how much time is needed to revise a topic when we barely even know the topic. We end up planning a timetable which is unrealistic because we fail to understand how much time we truly need. I used to think that I can memorise things quickly. Thus, I often allocate just one hour to get an entire biology topic committed to memory. It took me three days to get Biomolecules into head. I paid an F for my bio test and disappointment from my teachers for that lesson.
Procrastination
This is also another result of over estimation. We think that we only need this certain amount of time to get things done when in reality, we really require way more than that. We start to push things later on and then get really stressed. Regret comes in, often too late.
Bitching
"Bitching" is teenagers' jargon for ranting. When we are upset by people or a situation, we would look for listening ears and start to rage and rant about those people/situation and frequently. When a person bitch, very often the person would tend to think that he/she knows the full picture and picture himself/herself as the "victim". Usually, when one person bitches, it tends to be biased (because of their emotions). I created blogs for this very purpose, whereby I would bitch about people, things happening to me whatsoever all day long. I'll also look for people to pour out my grievances. I always felt that I could see things objectively and that I was not being biased but objective. Most importantly, I felt that I was always right. However, over the years, I've learnt that is often not the case. When I think that I know everything, I actually don't. There are always certain facts that are left outside the picture, which I would only come to know about it later on and regret. I'll bring in the example of my mother.
I have been bitching about her since I was very young. I was probably the most mischievous in my family and as most Asian families practice, I was caned so often that I grew immune to it. I hated her for caning me. I know what I did was wrong, but I always felt that there was no need for her to inflict physical pain for me to learn the lesson. I grew up to be a very angry child because she never explained the rationale behind the caning. As a result, I always felt that she caned me for her own pleasure. As I grew older and became more rebellious, I would stand firm and could remain silent as she had fun with Mr Cane. That infuriated her (that I could remain nonchalant), which resulted in more caning. And this further convinced me that she really did cane me for her own pleasure.
I bitched. When I was in primary school, none of my friends face this problem. I had nobody to relate to, and that's when I started blogging. In secondary school, I managed to find somebody with a similar experience. It brought me such great solace. After so many years of walking in the dark, with my throat hoarse from shouting, whereby a part of me is starting to slowly accept that nobody would reply to my desperate cries, all of a sudden, a hand intertwined its fingers with mine. It gave me strength, that even though I have to continue walking in the dark, I could carry on walking with a huge burden lifted off my shoulders because I know someone is with me. I was no longer alone.
However, today, I'm slowly seeing dim rays of light through small cracks. My father told me a shocking revelation about my mother, explaining why she behaved the way she is and why she is adamant on certain things which I cannot agree.
My mother doesn't really have a friend to confide in. Her husband is away at work most of the day and he faces his fair share of problems. Her oldest son can never comprehend the way woman think. Her youngest daughter never has the patience to listen and her youngest son is autistic. The only person she could probably talk to would be her oldest daughter, me.
She see herself in me. Because among her four children, I am like an extension of her. The things I do, the things I say, even my temper, they are so similar. And among the four, I seem the one that is most capable of listening to her woes.
She scolds me for the mistakes I've made. Yet, she make the same mistakes herself. I felt so indignant to be reprimanded. Even though I kept quiet as she scolded and scolded, I was internally screaming,"HYPOCRITE!". The anger in me which always surged whenever I thought of this has finally been extinguished. Because I now know that she finds relief in my shortcomings. Yes, a part of me still is unwilling to accept all the scoldings because it is still not fair for her to scold me for the mistakes she make herself. But I acknowledge my lack of knowledge. I believe that there are still things that I do not know of and that I shouldn't be quick to judge (as I did in the past).
And these have reduced my tendency to bitch. I start to reserve my judgement about things and keep my mouth shut. Because I don't wish to say things that I would regret in the future.
But perhaps what really saddens me is that when I make neutral statements, I'm accused of not speaking the truth. People think that I bottle my feelings and refuse to share. They say I'm in denial just because I refuse to take an absolute stand in certain scenarios. This assumption really upsets me. I do take strong stands in what I believe in. But when it comes to people, I can never really take a firm stand because I simply do not know everything. I am not a mind reader, I do not fully understand what is going on in people's minds, I may be unaware of the reasons why people are doing such things, this is why I do not impose my stand. Even in History, arguments are constantly changing because of new found facts that are only revealed many years after the event has happened. And ultimately, who am I to judge? Perhaps, I am also guilty of the mistakes they commit.
Accusations have been thrown at me, sometimes by people whom I regard dearly. And most of the time, I do not tell them (that they are making assumptions) because I, myself, may be making the assumption that they do not know they are making the assumption about me (see the paradox?). Or perhaps, they may be facing certain situations and they are merely looking for an outlet to vent their frustration on. And when one is charged up with emotions, all reasoning would be void. Take the example of assuming that whatever I'm saying is not heartfelt. I can argue and justify that that is not true. However, from the start, if they were adamant that whatever that comes out from me are lies, surely all my efforts to justify myself would never convince them (because they would all be lies). Thus, rather than me justifying myself (which might get dismissed), it would perhaps be better to let time reveal it for them.
Perhaps it is better to not know anything rather than to know bits and pieces of the puzzle.
-Abigail
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