I can't read minds

Everytime when people learned that I did Psychology in university, they always ask "So you can read minds/people?" And the sad answer is "No, I can't!"

I'm actually pretty bad when it comes to reading people, or maybe I just don't trust my instincts/intuition enough or just couldn't be bothered reading them because I prefer to judge a person based on how s/he interacts with me in reality. That is to say, as long as Person A treats me a particular way, that is how s/he will be in my books unless proven otherwise; I won't try to second guess their intentions except under certain circumstances.

You may say I'm naive for behaving that way, but I don't see the point of complicating matters which I cannot fully comprehend. The human mind is a complex mechanism that produces complicated output, but I like things to be simple. I guess I am turning a blind eye on the ugly-ness of human nature, but why make life difficult for oneself by doubting others?

No doubt that gaining more understanding of the people around you will give you an added advantage and prevent oneself from being deceived. Though how reliable is that understanding? Psychology had taught me that everything is subjective and there will always be outliers, heck we even calculate standard deviation for our experiments! So what does that tell you? There is never a right or wrong answer when it comes to understanding humans, there are only generalizations, which can be dangerous when applied wrongly or misused.

So let me ask you this...would you want the ability to read what is on another's mind?

"You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you will join us, and the world will live as one."

- Imagine by John Lennon

The Corporate World

All the unspoken rules
All the between the lines

All the backstabbing

All the lies and deceit

All the sacrificial stepping stones

All the success

All the rewards

All the status

All the fame and fortune

All the promises of glory

I HATE IT!

Am I suppose to learn how to cope and overcome all these?

To grow up? =(

Tears

"That's better. Why are you crying? You never cry." - Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James

Crying to me has always been a sign of weakness. I never used to cry easily, I never get emotional easily either. I somewhat believe I have been conditioned not to cry because crying would bring about more punishment. I was taught earlier on that crying never gets you what you want, so I stopped crying.

My colleague asked me a funny question yesterday "Do you sometimes just start crying out of a sudden for no reason?" I find it a really weird question to ask. I don't believe people cry for no reason. There is always a reason, it's just whether you are aware of it or not.

I remember the time when we were at the hospital when dad passed away, I cried, briefly but hard. I didn't cry after that, not at the wake, not at the funeral, not at all for a few months. In fact, I never cry at funerals. I couldn't find any reason to cry, the dead cannot be brought back to life, and nobody could change that, not if I cry. I know it is not right, we need to grieve, but I couldn't find the right channel to do so. Bro was the same and mum was trying to be strong for us, and that caused a lot of penned up emotion among the three of us. During that year, we always got angry at each other easily, shouted at each other all the time, it was difficult. I knew why and what was causing it, but I just couldn't stop myself from getting angry and shouting. It was our way of communicating and releasing the emotional pressure, however wrong and inappropriate it was.

One day, bro and I were arguing over something really petty. I just blew up and started shouting at the top of my lungs. I had no idea why I was so angry. It was such a silly argument over such a silly thing, but I was so angry to the point where I just started crying. I remember hiding in my room curled up on my bed, and having a long hard cry. It took a while to realize the main reason I was crying, and the more I thought of the reason, the more I cried. It was a long while before I calmed down and slept a little before I faced the world again.

I finally realized the healing powers of a good hard cry. That was roughly half a year after dad passed away.

Since then, I am more easily touched and affected by emotional things (yes, they are things because I'm trying to depersonalize it >_<). I don't know if this is a good thing because I feel more vulnerable. I still can't shed the notion of crying being a form of weakness even though I have experienced it's healing side. Crying is not my thing, being weak is not my thing.

So if I ever cry, it means something.

Branding

Personal branding is defined as the creation of an asset that pertains to a particular person or individual; this includes but is not limited to the body, clothing, appearance and knowledge contained within, leading to an indelible impression that is uniquely distinguishable — according to Wikipedia.

The above is apparently my personal branding, or in other words how I appear to my colleagues. Sweet? Charming? Pretty? Comel? Many would be delighted to have people say such thing about them. I don't deny feeling good for a bit when I found out, however, I realized that out of 9 people, only 2 thought I was helpful and easy to mingle. What does that say about me as a person? I don't seem smart, friendly or professional then?

I can't help but think people only wrote whatever they did because they don't know what else to write and is just being nice. I don't think I'm sweet, charming nor very pretty or comel. People who really know me would probably agree with me and think it's a joke -_-'' Even if they did mean what they say, does that mean I'm basically just a nice-looking empty shell there for decorative purpose?

Is this really a reflection of how I am at work? Labelled under the "dumb blonde" category? =( I often question why I got into this management trainee program but failed in all the other ones. Why? What if they got the wrong person for the job?

There have been a few times in the past couple of weeks where I was put on the spot and end up saying or doing stupid things. I believe I would be forgiven since trainees are seen to be still learning, but no doubt it'll affect my evaluation somewhat =/

It's only been slightly more than 2 months since I started working at N. But the 2 months had been so different compared to my previous job. No stress, no late nights, and I feel so much closer to many of my current colleagues in these past 2 months than most of my ex-colleagues whom I've worked and OT-ed with for 3 months.

Nobody knows what will happen next year once they switch to being performance-based, nobody knows what will happen after 15 months when I hopefully graduate from the program, but I know that despite being possibly labelled as a "dumb blonde" I am definitely much happier working at N =D

Art Attacked!

Three weeks and a rejection later, I have come to another decision:

I AM GOING TO ART SCHOOL!

I've always liked art and have always wanted to take art in high school. Dad didn't approve of it at that time, and by the time he allowed me to change my subjects, it was already too late. Later on, I thought I could take art as an elective in university, but Monash don't offer such unit at the Sunway Campus, so the closest thing I got was Contemporary Film Studies.

Now that I've finished my degree and have unfortunately been unable to find a job for the past three months, it got me thinking. Why not take up an art course?

I was so bored during my whole unemployment period that I made a friend a hoodie card.

I don't mean to brag, but I must say I was rather proud of myself =D

Don't ya think? =P

Since it wouldn't hurt my CV to pick up some mad Photoshop and Illustrator skills, I figured I might as well learn something useful if I still can't get a job by the end of this month. I did a bit of googling for adult art courses and found Claz'room. They offer 1.5 year full-time courses and monthly part-time courses as well. The full-time Illustration course next intake is this coming September and cost less than RM20,000 for the whole thing, inclusive of a free laptop and tablet! Freaking worth it or what?! But of course I don't have that much money =( So unless mum approves, I'll just have to keep looking for a job until I find one =/

However, now that I've found this little gem of a place, I have decided that even if I've gotten a job I'm still going to take up the art course =) They offer part-time courses during weekends, and is way cheaper compared to the full-time one so I'll be able to pay for it myself ^_^

It is a far cry from your usual art school, and I'd actually prefer a more rounded course that includes traditional media, some theories and stuff like photography, multimedia, printing, sculpting etc. But it's hard to come by those in Malaysia. The One Academy came pretty close, but it's too institutional for my need. So let's hope mum approves if I don't get any offers by this month *fingers cross* >_<