Sunday, December 31, 2006
Religious holidays..
Saturday, December 30, 2006
More quotes..
Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
-Ghandi
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Quotations from Chi
-Chi
...then comes the realisation that Chi is not capable of building proper grammatical sentences while making up her very own self acclaimed quotations...
...which was followed by a bittersweet realisation that she has accummulated a heavy emotional baggage by taking coward people's shit and trusting them more than she did herself. They're not worth it. Better recognized late than never.
Okay, okay, okay, okay. I'm not gonna write in third person anymore.
Your New Year's Present
Some of you will hate me after seeing this, but here is your new year's present. I was looking for something a bit more classy but youtube did not live up to my expectations. I still like the song and the message it conveys. Have fun!
Tuesday, December 26, 2006
Happy Holidays
"You are just like the baby. So young and gracious and beautiful".
Wow, what a dream! That just made my...er...night.
Merry Christmas everyone!! Your cheesy Christmas present is coming to this blog very soon.
Saturday, December 23, 2006
About blaming other things/people as an excuse for retiring from life
well,
you shouldn't do it.
beecaaauuuse,
When you tell someone that they are the reason of your sadness/procrastination etc. you're actually saying that the person is in control your life. It's like turning yourself into a victim. If they're on a good day and happen to be nice to you, then you can be happy with their consent. If they do something you don't like, you end up feeling exactly the opposite. It's also very unrealistic to be so demanding from your environment. Everything is obligated to happen a certain way to ensure your happiness. Taking responsibilty for our actions is taking back the control of our lives. Other people don't make us the way we are. Only ourselves are responsible for our actions. We should know better than to beg happiness from others because most of the time we cannot change or prevent other people's actions.
I love Einstein! (and myself?)
-Albert Einstein
It seems like I'm one step ahead of my "meditation club" teachings, for today we have talked about harmful "paradigms" which, in this context, translate as our irrational beliefs. The lecturer gave some examples of harmful paradigms we might have with regards to ourselves, others, and the world, then asked us to write our own. Here is what I wrote:
About myself:
1. People do not want to hang out with me because I'm not attractive enough.
2. I need to be beautiful in order to be loved.
About other people:
All people are motivated by self interest.
(This was the first thing I learned when I walked into college, although now I realize I might have interpreted the whole thing incorrectly, or taken it to the extreme, just like many others do. As an alternative study, I recommend this.)
Anyhow. I, now, would like to apply Einstein's legendary approach to my own problems. I obviously cannot deal with them by waiting to get pretty or screwing other people over because they are egotistical bastards and they deserve it if it serves my self interest. The next level of thinking, is recognizing that the above statements are false and replacing them with paradigms that are...er...not so false.
So here we go:
1. 99% of who I am cannot be seen or touched. I do not consist of how I look.
2. I shouldn't wait for other people's approval to feel loved. I can start NOW, by loving myself. I'm not a child anymore and I no longer have to turn to other people to give myself the care I need.
3. I want to help other people, love them, do something that will make them happy. Then why should I think that I'm the one-of-a-kind human specimen? If I think this way, there must be millions of people out there who do not act solely out of self-interest. It is, however, unrealistic to expect our loved ones to be there for us on every occasion since they may have some limitations or they simply might make mistakes.
Just as the darkness is the absence of light, pessimism is the absence of optimism. We need to let the lightness in and uproot our irrational beliefs.
Friday, December 22, 2006
On Depression & Letting Go of Old Habits
Those irrational beliefs may follow many different patterns, but here is some of them:
- People treat me like [the way they do] because I'm ....(insert derogatory word here).... If I were more .......... then I would be successful and loved.
- I'm never good enough at what I'm doing. I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing anyway. Thus, I have nothing to offer to other people and I understand if they don't want to be around me or make fun of me. I need to be more ........... to deserve other people's love and attention.
- I'm actually intelligent, funny and fun to be around but I cannot really show my true self because I'm .....(insert derogatory word here).... If I can manage to .....(insert obsession here).... then I will be able to show my radiant, true self.
You make yourself vulnerable without an excuse to hide behind after every assumed failure. You open yourself to risks, remove the shield that protects you from the vicissitudes of life. You start living again, in the world, as opposed to in your head.
I'm in favor of maintaining a positive attitude when dealing with this however. I believe that it is possible to make your new beliefs and thinking patterns habitual just like the same way you have made yourself accustomed to thinking irrationally. This process may not make you gain money, power or reputation, but it will certainly make you gain strength and peace of mind.
What would make me really happy right now is learning how to post book links with pictures on this blog, for a change...
Monday, December 11, 2006
Coping
1.There are people who love you and who want to help you.
2. There is always a way out.
3. True hapiness lies in the small things of life, like watching the ducks on a sunny morning (and feeling that you're a part of this divine beauty).
4. You have to be patient, no change is quick and easy.
My mind seems to be blocked now, what else?
Thursday, December 07, 2006
News Alert..
I'm really in a great mood before my drivers licence test, which by the way is earlier than I thought it was. Both news indicate that I'll be doomed to taking "minibus"es for the rest of my life.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
On Trust and Love
What if we thought that people actually loved us and cared about us? What if we made ourselves believe that whoever let us down actually values us and likes spending time with us? We wouldn't be focusing on small things that much. We wouldn't be taking things personally as frequently as we did. We would trust people when they say something and not look for hidden subtext beneath the words.
For instance, the person who loves me the most is my mother. I think that she loves me more than anything else in the world and I'm really grateful for this. However, she sometimes says things that makes me sad, does something that pisses me off. This doesn't change the fact that she loves me. It just shows that nobody is perfect. People are humans and they're not infallible. Even the person who loves you the most cannot be there every single time you need it. Even the person who loves you the most may inadvertently say things that hurt you without realising it. I know my mother loves me because she is my mother. But the same thing should be true for everyone. We should just give people some credit, just to make it a little easier for both sides.
There are vicious and virtuous cycles in life (like in ecomomics). A vicious cycle starts with a negative thought and gets amplified with increased effort to seek for negative things. You start watching out for things that would bring you down and interpret them accordingly to reach your goal of self demeaning. This naturally affects your feelings about yourself and in turn increases your negative thoughts.
A virtuous cycle is basically the same except that your starting point is an optimistic, if not a positive, thought. If you focus on the times when you have enjoyed yourself, when you have done something nice for somebody else or somebody else has done something nice for you, then you will have a lesser tendency to think that others are trying to hurt you. Just by focusing on a different thing you your increase your self respect and give your soul what it needs. You'd be less likely to be pissed off, and take things personally when something unexpected happens. I'm saying unexpected because you wouldn't interpret it as "unpleasant" anymore.
If you change the belief that "nobody likes you" to the belief that "you deserve to be loved", then first and foremost you would start liking yourself. In that case, even if somebody really screws you over, you wouldn't worry about it that much anymore because you wouldn't be basing your personality on what others think of you or what others do to you. The only person from whom you need love is yourself. If you can't give yourself this, then you're going to have to beg for love from other people and you know that you're not always going to get it.
You get what you radiate. If you radiate love and positivity then it's impossible for others not to honor this with love and positivity in return. This can only happen if you look for love within yourself.
Sunday, November 26, 2006
The future of Turkey and The Pussycat Dolls
I'd like to infringe the principles upon which I've founded this website and share with you a pretty hillarious event that happened to me today. I was returning home from a movie theatre this evening and I hopped into one of the "minibus"es that I always take to go home. For those of you who don't know, these minibuses are locally very popular, primitive transportation vehicles with drivers who can be, suffice it to say, "quite a character". They look somewhat like the one below, except that most of them are worn out and generally overcrowded.
As I got in the minibus, I heard a Pussycat Dolls song coming from the stereo, which was unusual but not surprising. Even though American Pop is not the music of choice of your common minibus driver, some of them prefer listening to it or even to rap or hiphop as they drive along. However, as I've raised my head after handing in the money, I was dumbfounded with the sight of two LCD screens manually placed in the two cornerns of the minibus: a bigger one installed right behind the driver's seat, and a smaller one in the top right corner where the driver can conveniently see. What was actually playing was a video of the Pussycat Dolls in a satellite channel that mostly the upper-crust Turks can afford. (Translation into colloquial chi-ce: amcam teknoloji yapmis!!) I was certainly impressed by the innovative creativity and the determination of the person who came up with the idea of installing hi-tech satellite television in the sub-par minibus. As I was riding along today, I've watched the videos of the Pussycat Dolls, Xibit and Eminem, consecutively. I've also taken pictures of it with my cell phone; I wish I knew how to transfer them to my computer. There must certainly be a sociological lesson to be learnt from this, in the "what's really happenin' here?!" sense, but I leave it up to the reader to come up with his own conclusion.
My next posts will be about blaming other things/people as an excuse for retiring from life and my first meditaiton club meeting, quite possibly consecutively.
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Wish me luck!
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Thou shalt not eat! (without knowing the calorie content)
I was astounded by the text message that I got in my cell phone this morning. Apparently, my service provider has decided to do the society such a good deed that it makes you go O-M-G-W-T-F?! The message goes something like this:
"type 'calories-space-the name of the food you'd like to inquire about' and send it to the number XXXX. (Example: calories rice). Learn the calories of the foods. Each message costs blah blah blah…"
Wow! Such a novelty approach to dieting! I wonder whom they're targeting with this spectacular service... Let's assume that you have an eating disorder and can't eat anything without knowing exactly how many calories there are in the food you're eating. Let's also assume that you're away from the internet and cannot reach the informational database that would foster your eating disorder. In that case, your local cell phone service provider is there to help!! You can immediately learn how many calories there are in your food for a price and accordingly restrict your intake! At the end, everyone's happy.
I wonder which exploiter marketing genius assholes came up with this idea. It's really bothering (and sad) because I believe that it wouldn't be there if there were no demand for it. The other problem is that these tiny messages concerning beauty and weight issues are everywhere and are so easy to notice if you look out for what's being fed into your brains everyday. Once they accumulate however, they can have a big impact on people’s physical and psychological health. And they do. How can’t they? People literally don’t know what to do with themselves because they’re getting mixed messages from their surroundings everyday and the extent of this is so intense that these messages get implanted somewhere in their subconscious regardless of their validity. “You should eat but you should not eat because then you’ll get fat”. “You should only eat if you are thin. If you are a woman, and weigh anywhere above 10% below your natural weight then you’re not beautiful and thus you’re not even a person anymore. In that case, you don’t deserve to eat”. (They’re also concerned about our HEALTH!! but that’s another issue to talk about). People then get bewildered because they can’t figure out what’s the healthiest way to live, the best way to look etc. and they don’t know what to do with themselves. They might as well send text messages to my so-called cell phone service provider just to feel assured that they’re doing the right thing.
Can they tell me how many calories it takes to respect and nourish one’s body?
Thursday, November 16, 2006
On Obsessions
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Imagination
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Some notes for the faithful reader ;))
- Pain and uncomfortable feelings are cyclical. I never thought that they would go away sooner or later if I didn't resist them so much.
- Forms, thoughts and most events are temporary and shouldn't be a legitimate reason for happiness or sorrow.
- It helps a great deal to catch irrational beliefs/value jugdements at the moment they arise and deal with them without giving them the chance to get you.
- Resistance shows itself in many forms such as self-victimization, frustration, despair, depression, fear etc. None of these behaviors are constructive and they will not assist you in accomplishing anything by any means.
By the way, I'd like to announce that my friend has had a baby boy just two days ago!! His name is Oscar Yuxuan and is going to be the cutest half Sweedish and half Singaporean boy ever!! Welcome to the world little fella! I wish I were born yesterday too.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Do these pants make my insecurity look big?
We are living in a society which tells you that you are not O.K. just the way you are, especially when you're a woman. And by this, I don't even mean the unrealistic idealized images of women that you see on TV or magazines everyday. It's utterly stupid to look at the women on the cover of fashion magazines and feel ugly or bad about yourself. By "society", I'm rather referring to people around me, especially other women. (Not necessarily close friends or acquintances, but people that I interact with everyday). I think that it's not men or media's unrealistic expectations that are most detrimental to a women's self image. I seriously think that it is other women, or it has been in my case. Every time I witness someone looking gorgeous complain about her fat, her face or whatever, my self esteem goes a little lower. Even though I'm totally aware that this is irrational.
First of all, if those women are not aware of their beauty and cannot cherish it, it's the number one indication that beauty does not gurarantee happiness. Then, why do we see beauty as magic potion that is going to heal all the problems in our lives? Why do we wait to get beautiful to start living? I have known enough women, looking thin but extremely unhealty and miserable. I have also known quite a few women who has slept with a lot of men but still have a very low self esteem. I don't think that hurting yourself in the quest for beauty is about men.(You might think so if you're a teenager, but as you grow up you realize it isn't.) It's about proving something to the outside world. It's about making a point that you don't even quite know. Maybe it's about deciding how much you're worthy of being loved by comparing yourself to other women. After all, you wouldn't feel that there is anything wrong with you if all the other women looked just as the way you did.
I might have diverged from my initial point a little bit, but my point is that I just want to be over with being negatively influenced by other women around me. Most women that I know are on a diet, somewhat restricting or starving herselves, has previously had plastic surgery or are spending 3 hours a day in front of the mirror for the sake of looking more attractive. I no longer want to witness this and feel bad about myself just because other women are feeling bad about themselves. I chose to invest my time on something more meaningful, something beyond the mere appearance. That way, I will know that I will be able to better handle hardships whenever they come. To look good is of course important but looking better is not going to make a difference in your life if you don't have the self esteem to go with it.
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Paradoxical Commandements
Love them anyway.
by Dr. Kent M. Keith
Saturday, November 04, 2006
Having a bad day?
Monday, October 30, 2006
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Self Parenting?
Friday, October 27, 2006
Perception of misery
What does it take for one to say “I have all the reasons to be depressed”?
During the summer, most of my complaints went something like this: “I still don’t have a job and still don’t feel like doing anything about it, I’m such a lazy bitch” or “Gee, my ass looks big, my legs are too fat”. (mostly the latter, sadly). I also can’t do without mentioning my constant pissed off state towards the stupidity, jealousy and the fake-blondness of the common Turkish girl. During the summer, I sometimes thought that my life really sucked. (Needless to say that those thoughts were false and temporary)
Then came a sudden realization along with a heavy feeling of guilt, after reading the blog of a Lebanese friend written during last summer's Israeli occupation. I'd never really contemplated about what war does to somebody’s state of mind. Somewhere in her blog, she wrote: “All the time that I have spent structuring and maintaining, organizing and deciding, all the effort that I have made into building a self seems to have been broken against this enormous hegemonic body that is forcing its existence on me.” That really struck me. I never had to suffocate from the smell of dead bodies or constantly hear the sound military planes flying over my head and live with the fear that they might drop a bomb or two and I (or worse the people I love) might get killed any second.
Can it be true that, all the effort that you’ve put into establishing a sense of self, everything that you stand for can become meaningless under such great duress? And if so, why do I still worry about the size of my butt? Shouldn’t I be grateful that I’m in a state to worry about my butt or other trivialities in the first place?
I guess it all boils down to that famous quote from The Fight Club: “We're the middle children of history. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives”.