soul tibits

"Solitude is used to teach us how to live with others"

"Death is used to teach us about life"

food for tots

• Retiring and discovering that you no longer have enough energy to enjoy life and dying a few years later of sheer boredom.
• Postpoing doing the really interesting things in life for later, when you won't hav the energy
• Avoiding depression with large daily doses of television.
• Spending years studying at university only to find at the end of it all that you're unemployable
• Working from nine till five every day at something that gives you no pleasure at all just so that, after thirty years, you can retire.

Quotes.. Quotes.. & more Quotes ;)

From confucius;

"To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it."

"We should feel sorrow, but not sink under its oppression."

"When you are laboring for others let it be with the same zeal as if it were for yourself."

"Wherever you go, go with all your heart."

From Dalai Lama;

"Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive."

"My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness."

"We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection."

"What happens is not as important as how you react to what happens." Thaddeus Golas

"The only disability in life is a bad attitude." Scott Hamilton

"People are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be." Abraham Lincoln

"Our attitude toward life determines life's attitude towards us." Earl Nightingale
"An optimist is a person who sees a green light everywhere. The pessimist sees only the red light. But the truly wise person is color blind." Dr. Albert Schweitzer

"Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact." William James

The blank slant of tomorrow - Robin sharma (Reminder)

At midnight tonight, you get a most amazing gift: a fresh set of 24 hours.
These hours are pure and flawless and limitless.
They offer you the opportunity to show courage and behave brilliantly and forge new habits that will get you to a new place of being.
And they offer you a space to laugh. To love. And to do your dreams.
Whether you'll admit it or not, tomorrow is incredible. Not everyone gets one.

So make tomorrow special. No, make it ridiculously great. Breathtakingly brilliant. A piece of art you can tell your grandkids about. Just amazing what one can do in a day. To be what we are meant to be.

The Contemplative Quest

Paulo Coelho

Linda Sabbath took her three sons and decided to go and live on a small farm in the interior of Canada, where she wanted to dedicate herself completely to spiritual contemplation.

In less than a year she fell in love, got married again, studied the saints’ techniques of meditation, fought for a school for her children, made friends, made enemies, neglected her teeth, got herself an abscess, hitchhiked in snowstorms, learned to fix the car, thaw out frozen pipes, made her alimony stretch out at month’s end, survived on unemployment money, slept without indoor heating, laughed for no reason, cried with despair, built a chapel, made repairs to the house, painted walls, and gave courses on spiritual contemplation.

“And I eventually realized that a life of prayer does not mean isolation,” she says. “Love is so big it has to be shared.

Quote of today:

Man improves himself as he follows his path; if he stands still,waiting to improve before he makes a decision,he’ll never move ~~~ Unpublished sayings

Quotes

While I kept my heart to myself, I never had a single morning of anguish or a single night of insomnia. Since I fell in love, my life has been a sequence of anguish, losses, confusion. I think that God, by using love, managed to hide hell in the middle of Paradise” (C.A., 23/11/2006)

Courage is shown in acts, not in words; it is not bluffing, arrogance, or madness. A courageous man is the one who dares to do what he finds is right, and bears the consequences of his acts – whether they are political, social or individual.

Our selfishness will condemn us to the worst suffering that we ourselves have invented - loneliness.

“Carry in your memory, for the rest of your life, the good things that came out of difficulties.”

"Do not try to explain feelings. Live everything intensely & treasure what u feel as a gift"

Daily master

Ha... there are times when I go for my quick toilet break at work that I'm struck with tots while doing the er-hem 'toilet business'... today is one such day ;p

Something that I have read last time & was reminded of recently just appeared in my head.

All of us born in a developed & comfortable country has forgotten how to enjoy simple pleasures in life that's so important.

Especially in such a safe & properous Singapore, we are given so much things & lead such comfortable life that we started to take things for granted, that nothing satisfied us and we just want more & more & more!

Come to think of it, it's quite perverse & pathetic. We have so much and we are not happy with what we have, in fact alot of people become unhappy because they feel they do not have enough!
No wonder 3rd world country ppl hates us. I don't like it too therefore i shall be mindful of this.


Every new day is a gift for us to learn new things. I learnt not to complain unnecessarily and to treasure what I have.


I'm thankful that I'm surrounded by many like-minded friends who understand what i'm saying and i'm really glad to have them by my side. Seeing them give me hope that our society will not become too materialistic :)

To quote Ajahn Brahm, " In order to relish and know life in its fullness, we should often savour one moment at a time in silence. Then we might get our money's worth in the five-star resturant called life."

Relationship and love - from 'my spiritual odyssey' blog

Love - the illusive and elusive that apparently dangles in front of us, reachable at times yet mostly just out of reach. For it is when we first utter the word "I love you" be it verbally to another, or internally to ourselves that we called upon to ourselves suffering.
Why? The moment "I love you" is uttered, we worry if we'll hear it returned. If it is returned, we worry if we can keep it. If it is kept, we keep worrying if it will be lost or sizzle down one day.

And so... this has been the cycle of love that many human beings have gone through and through. Okay - that sounds so bleak, like I've been through love and given up on it.

Far from it. I'm merely observing a fact, and wondering if there's another 'love'. A love that is free, unconditional, empowering and uplifting.I believe the answer lies in this question. What's the purpose of relationship? Let's explore some of the common answers given :

1) To share my life with someone special. So if it is to share my life with someone -what is it within me that I have to share? Is it love, joy, contentment, peace, happiness, wisdom, maturity, generosity or do I carry resentment, anger, bitterness, unreasonableness, insecurity, fear. Okay - these are extreme negative conditions.What about a sense of lack? Many people including myself have gone into relationship because fear of loneliness.That may not be the initial reason... I was hopelessly, heads over heels in love once - but if I had stopped to reflect inward, a deeper reason was to put away my loneliness, to have that someone special in life. Whenever we get into a relationship hoping that the other person can cure our loneliness or give us happiness, contentment - we are bound to be disappointed as nobody can give us happiness and peace. Loneliness is self-created and can only be cured from within. Happiness and inner peace comes from within - not given by external factors, and certainly not another human. It is unfair for us to put such burden onto our beloved for they can never achieve that.

2) Some people believe that it is to find joy, happiness and peace in a relationship. To find implies that we don't have joy and happiness right now and we're trying to find it from another person. That means our beloved has to give us joy and happiness throughout the relationship.

We may argue that we're also giving the same thing - but the truth is - if we enter a relationship with a subconscious reason to find joy and happiness, it means we don't have it right now in our live. We cannot give what we don't have.

So then what's the purpose of relationship? - to procreate and start a family. If that's the only reason - I shudder to think of the sex life :)

Let me suggest that the purpose of relationship is to create love, joy, peace, happiness, contentment, truth, freedom, etc.
To create means I have those stuff now, and even if I don't have them, I can create them again, and in a relationship I can create it together my beloved, doubling even tripling the power. To create suggest a mutual act, one that will bond 2 people even deeper, or as a phrase I've heard, literally melts 2 person into 1. (not just physically la).

To create means I don't fear losing because we can always create more.It also means that a relationship will not curtail the freedom of a person to be who he/she really is, but rather encourage and create a journey of life that bonds 2 person to live out their dreams.

Potent stuff that i read today

Will just like to post some stuff that i read today that's really hits me.

Here goes...

Accepting yourself

I found out who I am by looking at others. I am afraid of not being as good as they think I am, but I believe they all think this about themselves. During the time that I kept this diary, I finally accepted that I am brave enough to feel fear and to see myself without any artifices. I feel secure enough to feel insecure.

I discovered that people try to project a lot of their own insecurity onto you, just as you do with them. They try to diminish you because they feel small, try to intimidate you because they are not convinced that they are capable.

P/S: www.paulocoelhoblog.com

Reminders

Posting some stuff that i have read that i will like to keep in mind of..

• Putting off doing the most interesting things in life until you no longer have the strength to do them.

• Thinking that your religion is the sole proprietor of the absolute truth, the most important, the best, and that the other human beings in this immense planet who believe in any other manifestation of God are condemned to the fires of hell. (Which in my opinion, i think it's crap)

• Keeping a smile on your face when you really want to cry.

• Always saying “I tried”, even though you haven’t tried at all.

p/s: Why are human beings so complicated...

A very meaningful lesson about life

A professor began his class by holding up a glass with some water in it.

He held it up for all to see & asked the students,' How much do you think this glass weighs?''50gms!' .... '100gms!' .......'125gms' ......the students answered.

I really don't know unless I weigh it,' said the professor,

'but, my question is: What would happen if I held it up like this for a few minutes?'

'Nothing' the students said.

'Ok what would happen if I held it up like this for an hour?' the professor asked.

'Your arm would begin to ache' said one of the students.

'You're right, now what would happen if I held it for a day?'

'Your arm could go numb, you might have severe muscle stress & paralysis & have to go to hospital for sure!' ventured another student & all the students laughed.

'Very good. But during all this, did the weight of the glass change?' asked the professor.

'No'

'Then what caused the arm ache & the muscle stress?'

The students were puzzled.

'Put the glass down!' said one of the students.

'Exactly!' said the professor.

Life's problems are something like this.
Hold it for a few minutes in your head & they seem OK.
Think of them for a long time & they begin to ache.
Hold it even longer & they begin to paralyze you.
You will not be able to do anything.

It's important to think of the challenges (problems) in your life, but EVEN MORE IMPORTANT to 'put them down' at the end of every day before you go to sleep.

That way, you are not stressed, you wake up every day fresh & strong & can handle any issue, any challenge that comes your way!

'So, as it becomes time for you to leave office today, Remember friends to'PUT THE GLASS DOWN ! '

A Dreamer Lives For Eternity!!!

A very good book

It's really a very very good book. Everyone should read it.

Wanted to borrow the book since the movie came out ( i didn't catch the movie) but can't find it in the library, guess everyone was reading it that time.

Recently i went to bukit merah library, suddenly just remember abt this novel and so i did a search on the NLB search site, there's 10 books available for loan! So glad!

******Strongly recommended to all************

These great masses will have turned their backs on the grave insult to human dignity which described some as masters and others as servants, and transformed each into a predator whose survival depended on the destruction of the other.

Thus shall we live, because we will have created a society which recognises that all people are born equal, with each entitled in equal measure to life, liberty, prosperity, human rights and good governance.

Such a society should never allow again that there should be prisoners of conscience nor that any person's human rights should be violated.

(Nelson Mandela, who for 28 years was a prisoner of conscience, on receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, 10/12/1993)


A man can obey others for two reasons: for fear of being punished, or for love. Obedience that comes from love of others is a thousand times stronger than fear of punishment.

(Mahatma Ghandi, 1869–1948)

“When You Come Into My Room,” by Stephen A. Schmidt.

“When you come into my hospital room, you need to know the facts of my life

that there is information not contained in my hospital chart

that I am 40 years married, with four children and four grandchildren....

that I love earthy sensuous life, beauty, travel, eating, drinking J&B scotch, the theater, opera,

the Chicago Symphony, movies, all kinds, water skiing, tennis, running, walking, camping...

that I am chronically ill, and am seeking healing, not cure.”

thoughts

' We do not stop playing because we are old;
we grow old because we stop playing.

There are only four secrets to staying young, being happy, and achieving success.
You have to laugh and find humor every day.
You've got to have a dream.
When you lose your dreams, you die.

We have so many people walking around who are dead and don't even know it!

There is a huge difference between growing older and growing up.

If you are nineteen years old and lie in bed for one full year and don't do one productive thing, you will turn twenty years old.

If I am eighty-seven years old and stay in bed for a year and never do anything I will turn eighty-eight.

Anybody can grow older.

That doesn't take any talent or ability.

The idea is to grow up by always finding opportunity in change.
Have no regrets.

The elderly usually don't have regrets for what we did, but rather for things we did not do.

The only people who fear death are those with regrets.'


p/s: hmm.. my blog is starting to sound pretty heavy recently.... My tots are pretty heavy too for the past few days..

the worse thing is one knows that one is walking around dead and don't know wat to do to improve it... gosh... tat's worse rite? now.. tis is really heavy.. lolz..
**** just my tots ****

important stuff

To be true to oneself.

To always look on the bright side of life.

To learn to listen, really listen to others.

To have at least one good laugh everyday.

To have empathy for others.

To have confidence in oneself but not be proud.

To treat others with respect.

To treat mummy nicely.

To treasure love ones.

To care more for friends.

To have a little fun everyday

:)

To Live

To rejoice over others' happiness

To cry over others' misfortune

To love, To get angry.

Isn't that what it means to 'live'


喜怒哀乐 & 爱

=）

Changes

Things changes all the time.

People u thought u know for a long while changes too.

Maybe i'm also changing but didn't realised it.

Just adapt to the changes and be true to myself.

Quote of the day

“Some people can only value what they have, when they endure the experience of loss.”


But there are also those who endured the experience of loss but still don't value.
How tragic...