Reminder to ourselves: mati, binasa, leta

Okay, I think it's time for brief summary of what is going on the past month.
In a nutshell, I became very very busy. Like 活该 right?

I guess you could say I deserved it. I really am.
But the difference between you and me is, I don't complain.

Written by Dale Carnegie, a super solid book, worth a read if you want to be a better person,
and I assume that without this book I would have been a bigger asshole than I really am now.

Okay maybe there are times where people are really doing stupid things and not listening at all, and it gets a little frustrating, but according to Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, don't criticise, condemn, or complain because it will never result in the behavior we desire.

Criticisms, condemnations or complaints most of the time come from emotions. As we put it in Malay:

Ikut hati mati, ikut rasa binasa, ikut mata leta. 

[To follow the heart is to die,
To follow the emotions is to perish,
To follow the eye is to despise.]

More often than not such emotions are not built over a day. In fact, it takes long periods of interactions for people to build understanding and trust. When I say "interactions" they don't mean the superficial hello/apa khabar/吃饱没/哇唠做么你还没有死 kind of contact, but instead deeper and more meaningful engagement, like enjoying a meal together (and talking about life, not bitching about someone else) or working together in a project. It is always through such engagements that we understand and appreciate each other better in spite of whatever flaws one another might have.

Friends are about each other, isn't it?

Recent developments did agonise me a little--well, my personal well-being is unaffected but apparently the people around me are. Seemingly I am starting to see annoying judging trends all over again. As I mentioned close to two years ago in another blogpost (click here), during the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew quoted that:

"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 

How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?

You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."

-----------------Gospel According to Matthew, Chapter 7 (in the Bible lah)

Truly, it does not benefit you in anyway to put down others. Similarly, no one likes to be put down simply because of their past, which doesn't concern you truly anyway. Whatever you choose to see and think is a reflection of your own set of values, which I dare not judge. Simply put, if I can't settle my own flaws, what right do I have to nag at yours?

I feel paiseh when people say I am selfless. I am not exactly selfless, I just don't see the need to take care of myself for the greater collective good. Yes I am a very collective person, which may be a product of my ahbeng upbringing. A behaviour which stems from such a virtue is the respect for people's private life. People often say I have poor judgment; but I simply choose to trust than to doubt.

Whatever people has done in their past, that's really none of our business.
Tengok hadapan lah.
And have a bit more compassion.


Talking about compassion, taken from last week Lianhe Zaobao obituaries:

一个人无论是仍留红尘或已下黄泉，
只要被另一个人真挚地爱着，
就不能算是白活。
——奥地利·茨威格


For everybody deserved to be loved and cared for.

做 Eusoff Hall President 没有什么了不起，要做到不亢不卑，对得起众人之福祉才称得上是真本事。

[PS: Chinese lesson: President is not 总统 zǒngtǒng but 主席 zhǔ xí .]