Teddy Tales

And, first things first, as I said in the last post, oh am I glad my birthday is not on a weekend, so I can actually take a break from “life” and like actually give myself a break. 

And yeh basically she miraculously got me a bit upset again. HAHA. I guess I am glad it is not tomorrow, and I’m glad I am trying really hard not to let it get to me. 

But its really miraculous how every single year they manage to make me feel absolutely miserable on my birthday. Is not just sad, it is like (mega) upset. 

When seriously every year on my birthday I just wish for peace.  To be happy. To be calm. Don't need to celebrate even, I’m totally fine with it. 

I guess this year my birthday wish, I added one more birthday wish, apart from the usual things I wish for. 

My birthday wish is really damn boring by the way. HAHA. 

It's usually things like : - For everyone to be healthy and well - For myself to be healthy and well - To become wiser since I’m turning a year older (or rather just to act like my age) - To be happy; to be strong - To love my work

This year I also wish for my heart to be at peace, regardless of my surroundings. I wish that I can have the strength and the resilience to keep picking myself up after I fall down.

It’s also about time I start giving up on trying to get them to see the really important things in life (well at least to me). I’m really grateful to be born in a safe country. I’m grateful that I grew up comfortably, could pursue education, can choose what jobs I want to do. 

And that I never had to worry about whether I have food to eat the next meal, or whether we have money for my school fees. 

I really, am really grateful to that. I am grateful, to have people who love me, to have friends who love me, to have a partner that tries his best to take care of my needs. 

Sometimes I am really amazed that perhaps he does know what I need a lot better than I do, or maybe I’m just in denial. Haha. I start to understand why he is persistent in trying to get me to go to a staycay for my birthday. It’s really to give me a peace of mind on that one day a year where it’s the most important to me to feel peace. 

And friends that never fail to remember my birthday even though I always forget theirs. Friends who make effort to hold me together when I feel like I’m falling to pieces, especially at times when it feels like they are also falling to pieces as well. 

Thank you. I am grateful for all that I have been given. For things that I persisted in - maintaining friendships; or for things that are given, being alive, a healthy family, a financially comfortable life, good friends, an amazing partner. 

Thank you, higher power up there, whoever it is, for letting me have the most important things in life already - which is what I have right now, all the good and bad. 

Happy Birthday to me. 

I really would have thought 1 year down my life would have been better, but well apparently not.

It’s been close to 12 months of being upset, raging, crying, feeling better; and then cycle repeats again. First about T, then about them. It feels like my entire emotional self went through an upheaval and tore everything down. 

Thing is apparently it hasnt finish renovating the house called my heart, and it’s still a complete mess. And how I wish it can renovate faster so I can get on with my life. 

Approximately 2-3 months ago I read and found out about emotionally immature people. And my house (heart) that was being torn down basically almost 夷为平地. Barely managed to keep any walls, but yay it didnt get completely demolished so yay for me for keeping it together. (I guess be positive at whatever is left that I can be positive with right)

And I feel really bad for being a complete mess. 

I really do. 

It’s annoying (to me) but I’m barely keeping my house upright and not thrashed by my emotions so. I dont really have extra energy to worry about me being in a mess or not. 

And its annoying that 2-3 months in I still havent figured out a way of dealing with them. Well I’m trying some stuff out and I’m experimenting. But it really goes against my core values and it’s really tiring. 

But I guess it’s either I figure out or I go away -- so might as well give it a really good shot. 

Only constant in life - is that life goes on. The sun rises the next day no matter what happens.  So everyday is a new day no matter what happens.  May I have more strength and resilience to get through all these.

Edit : Oh - and I just checked my birthday next year - thank god it’s not a Sunday. Oh I really hate having my birthday on a Sunday. Just leave me in peace (alone) on my birthday please. I think it’s the only day I feel like I deserve a break. 

I have once been a really angsty teenager, with a reallllyyy bad temper. When I was angry in secondary school I used to throw chairs (and things), [but not at people] to vent my anger about my life and how they made me feel. 

As I got older, I tried to learn to appreciate everything more, them more, life more, to be grateful for the comfortable life I have gotten. I tried to be grateful with the life that didnt require me to worry about tuition fees, without having to support the family. 

I tried to tell myself because of this gratefulness - I should be appreciative, be nice, be helpful, not to be angsty cause it doesn’t help anybody.

But this month I just realise I have been in complete denial of my problem. 

It dawned on me, after reading around, that I’ve been with emotionally immature people. I’ve been struggling to keep my head afloat with emotionally immature people (behaving emotionally younger than their actual age), and I’ve been doing it all wrong all this while. 

I realised that I have been in denial about my emotional loneliness, I have been handling more emotions than myself for a long time, for many many years, since I was a kid. And I guess that kind of explains why I always felt like I was an adult kid, well above my years in maturity. I guess it also explains why I tend to attract needy people to lean on me. 

It explains why I “pass“ my hurt to my ex - constantly telling him I wanted to up and leave. Doing the same thing they do, by threatening to leave me. Doing it without meaning or knowing why I was doing it. I didnt even realise what was causing me to do it.

Because I have had no choice but to quickly “grow up” emotionally to not just handle my own but also other people’s emotional upheavals. I had no choice but to cry on my own when I get insulted to be stupid, horrible, telling me I am making people’s life difficult, that I am purposely making them upset all the time. 

I’ve always had to feel like only I’ve got my own back, to have to defend myself from the hurt, cause no one can fend it off for me. To feel like even in a place full of people who love me, why sometimes it feels so depressing and lonely and tiring. 

And until he came along, I’ve had to do this myself, at least I’ve had to figure out how to, for the 10 years before he came into my life. 

And I’ve been trying to be the good person, to prove my worth, to do what makes people happy (even if inside it doesnt really help me), been trying to get validation. 

And everytime I get rejected, again and again, being called horrible, and other names again, and again. The heart just loses more hope; but yet it says ok never mind, next time we try harder. 

And finally it cannot take it anymore. It breaks apart. It no longer wants to try to get validation anymore, it wants validation to be served on a plate to me. And that’s when the angsty teenager comes back. 

The one who used to hit my fist on a wall. Even though my fist hurts, but it feels somehow the heart hurts so much more. The one who used to scream in a pillow cause there is nowhere else to scream at. The one who is upset with how life turned out, and has no clue how to get out of the situation. 

The one who comes back hurt, crying. But doesnt get the cuddles, nor the hugs, nor the support, but just gets the already bleeding heart trampled even more and returned to me. Who goes to a place the rest of the world deems to supposedly give me comfort, but it dishes out more hurt on a plate. To a place where I not only cannot nurse my wounds, I get salt thrown on my wound, declared that it is all my fault and I caused it, and I have to help other people nurse their wounds. 

And I realised that I had learned to block it out, I had learnt to ignore my own feelings and just work on other peoples’. And when I really needed the help, I reach out, and is expected to help again; I realise the little kid in me is dying inside all over again, and no wonder it feels like everything around me is crashing down. 

And then it completely was torn apart and broke down. 

“Developmental psychologist Jean Piaget (1963) observed that in order for people to learn anything new, their old mental pattern must break up and rework itself around the new, incoming knowledge. This process of internal breakdown and accommodation is key to continuing intellectual development. Likewise, Polish psychiatrist Kazimierz Dabrowski (1972) theorized that emotional distress is potentially a sign of growth, not necessarily illness. He saw psychological symptoms as coming from a freshly activated urge to grow and coined the term “positive disintegration” to describe times when people break down inside in order to reorganize into more emotionally complex beings. Dabrowski noticed that some people were able to expand their personalities as a result of these upheavals, while others soon slipped back to where they’d been before. He observed that psychologically unaware people weren’t likely to change much after an emotional upheaval. Other people, however, seemed to take periods of distress as opportunities to learn about themselves, meeting challenging emotional conditions with curiosity and a desire to learn from them.“

And I really almost lost it, I was so hurt and appalled at all of this new information tearing into my reality. I was so appalled at them tearing at my reality as well, trying to constantly still be getting me to validate their opinions and their feelings when like I’m hurting as well. 

I was so appalled at them telling me things that made me feel like I was really crazy; it made me really believe I was going crazy. And then it hit me.

They do love me, but they are so buried by their own emotional needs, they cannot extend beyond themselves to care for other’s emotional needs. 

That I couldnt ever reach out to them for help, I would just constantly get a slap in the face if I did. 

That since I already broke down inside, then I ought to make use of the opportunity to be stronger; use the sadness as a source of strength; and grow above it rather than go back to the status quo right after. 

That I needed to relearn how to deal with them, rather than constantly be a pushover and either fighting them over emotional battles (which is dumb); or letting them win over things I should have pushed for. 

That I needed to be focused on the outcome of what I wanted in my life rather than focus on them being emotionally needy and needing the younger me to support all of their emotional needs. 

I need to rise above this and be better, and not to let it go back to what it was before. Wishing myself to be stronger, be braver, be more confidence going forward.

Wishing myself to be able to say to myself that I am enough. 

Wishing myself to be able to say, I dont need to prove anything to anybody, that I am good enough being me right now.

But I realise, 6 months down, having achieved close to none of the objectives above, maybe I’m not the best person to do this. At least not right now.

We just simply don’t work well together, our working styles are in completely different tangents.

In fact, I left T, to come here, to find a safe space to recover and restart; but it just feels like I became more jaded, disappointed, angry, upset than before I came.

I haven’t done my own reflection, and figured out what went wrong, what i did wrong, what could have been improved. But I do know I cant stay here longer being like an angsty teenager. And it is better to leave now and restart again somewhere else.

It also taught me that the culture can make or break a company; and more importantly, having a hire that can fit in with the culture can also make or break the company. Clearly I just didn’t fit in, and it caused utter chaos with him and his operations and employee confidence.

It also taught me that, it is hard being a leader, a manager. It’s always easy to talk - it’s another thing to do. Watching the Moonlovers Scarlet Heart taught me that too.

When Wang So realised that changing the King can improve the lives of all the people of Joseon, he decided that instead of waiting for things to happen, he wanted to make it happen, he wanted to become King. He wanted to have power, in order to make peace.

Before he became King, he swore not to kill his own brothers, to marry Hae Soo, rejected his sister Yeon-hwa, promised Hae Soo he will try not to marry more than one woman (namely her).

But after he became King, everything changed. It dawned on him even in a position of power, not everything is up to him. It made him realise how hard it is to be in the position of power, especially when a lot of time his hand was forced. He could no longer just decide based on his own will; he needs to consider the potential implications of his actions on the country.

He ended up killing his brother; forced out of his own marriage with Hae Soo; forced to marry his sister Yeon-hwa; and many other decisions that were taken out of his hand in order for him to protect the throne, and the country.

It taught him that it was not as easy as he thought to be King.

And similarly I realised it is not so easy to be a leader, a manager, a boss. But I still truly believe that the leader has the ability to make a difference, to change things, to make it better. So I also realised instead of being upset and grumbling about life and its issues, I need to make myself stronger.

I need to grow my skills and strengths, I need to learn how to adapt faster. I need to be able to be able to grow into a position that can make things better. And I also realise then that this is not the place I can learn or grow all these. At least not right now.

I still have no clue what is next, but off to hunt for it I shall.

it’s been 8 months. 8 months since I’ve decided to leave. 6 months since my last day with T. and today, T has been striked off with ACRA. we no longer exist anymore as a company. 14 days away from the 2-year mark from the incorporation of T.

It’s remarkable really. Remarkable how : - I took so long to recover from the heartache of T (even then i dont think im fully recovered actually - How I’m an absolute shit at dates but I can remember dates like when we started, when we incorporated, when we did certain things at T. - How I’m damn stubborn and when I really hate doing things, i refuse to even touch it, but with T I did so many of the things I hated; Finance, Sales, etc - I never thought I’ll walk so close to the edge again, not since secondary school; but because of this 2 years (and other things after) - I was so close to the edge 2 times. - Leaving T = leaving me clueless on what to do with my life.

My life purpose is just missing. It ran away, leaving me to deal with the mess it left behind, leaving me to pick up the pieces. How could you, my trusty gut feeling, left me in the lurch and just left me to deal with the aftermath of everything?

And 8 months down, everyone else has moved on, and I’m still stuck here back in the same spot figuring out my life all over again.

But I learnt lots this time. I really did. Other than family, which is really big (issues); this is probably the other biggest “ordeal” of my life.

What is studying, what is grades, what is losing friends, what is disappointment with life; as compared to leaving, losing, stopping T?

Never was there once I had to build something up with my own hands, and not be able to see it through the end, and still have to make the choice of tearing it down with my own hands.

And it fking hurts, it does. It sometimes still does, not as often as before, but it comes up and I get sad about it. It’s like prematurely killing it cause it’s the logical decision, but my heart is screaming “Nooooooooooooo”

But I’m better, and hopefully stronger, and I spent some time thinking about what went wrong, so hopefully I’m wiser as well.

I decided to leave T.

For the past month, I’ve been struggling with the decision, especially in the last 2 weeks before today’s meeting. I’ve been struggling, cause my heart and my brain doesn’t match up. My brain thinks I should move on but my heart doesn’t.

My heart keeps feeling like its been ripped apart, it doesn’t understand why the brain needs to consider about an issue like that. It asks the brain, what’s so bad about staying here? Why can’t we stay here?

And the brain replies. We are not needed here anymore, we are not exactly happy here anymore. We struggle to agree with simple decisions. We are starting to hurt each other. It’s time to move on and leave it behind. 

All sorts of rational explanations for this one action. 

But all the while the heart doesn’t want to hear, doesn’t want to face it. Just want to cover the eyes, the ears, it doesn’t want to face the reality for what it is. 

But when push comes to shove, when there comes a deadline, when it seems like it’s about time for an ultimatum between the heart and the brain, the heart has no choice but to realise that it is perhaps, indeed, time to move on. 

And today I told them. 

After the month long civil war with myself, today I told myself I’ll be brave and I’ll tell them.

And to be honest, I was surprised.

No angry discussion. No screaming session. No confrontational words. No accusations of betrayal. No pointing of fingers.

In fact, not even really asking me why.

Just calmness.

Calmly accepting it when I said “I’m leaving”. Calmly discussing what’s next for them. Calmly discussing what’s next for the company. Calmly discussing how to move on from here.

I’m abit shocked to be honest, I was expecting it to become remotely a little ugly but I guess at the core of it everyone understands. 

That it’s been hard, that it’s not been easy, that everyone probably considered it more than once throughout this journey.

But when it came to just this, I felt calm, a little relieved that I said it; a little relieved that we could handle it like adults; a little relieved that I made a decision and stuck to it. 

For the first time in a long time, I’m sleeping late today, not because I was working late;  not because I couldn’t sleep thinking about the struggle; not because I was struggling to find a direction that can work for T. 

But because I’m thinking through my decision and how it’s making me feel a lot lighter than I’ve been feeling for quite awhile. Maybe people call it liberating. I think of it as letting go of a boulder I’ve been carrying for quite awhile. My heart feels lighter. 

In fact I’m feeling like I can respect them a lot more than I used to do when I’m still a part of this. The fact that after all this, after me leaving, they still want to hold on to it for a little bit more. I feel that I gained more respect for them for making this decision (somehow). The fact that they really didn’t hold out for so long just because I was working on it; or that they just didn’t want to admit that this is not for them. 

It’s not hard for them to just declare that without me, they would stop. I can only say I’m a little pleasantly surprised by their decision to go on. 

Never once in the past almost 2 years journey, have I thought I would be the first to step out and leave; but I guess sometimes life’s like that. It moves in ways that you would never expect, in places you don’t imagine. 

And the next thing will be to think about what’s next. But I guess that’s for another day, another time, to sit on it and wonder about. 

For today I can just slowly appreciate the calmness and the zen that washes over me, just for today.

Thank god we are fast approaching the end of the year so hopefully in the next 10 days I can feel better, and I dont have to go through another one of these things, at least for 2016. 

Looking at this blog, and its posts from 1 year ago, and ho. things have not changed much, especially with the issues that spark the posts below. The issues are almost unanimously similar to those a year ago. 

On the bright side, we’ve been through another year of this nonsense and hurrah I’m still alive in one piece, somehow I am still surprisingly sane. 

The other thing I’m really glad about is despite all these nonsense, I still have you around. You are still here despite allll my nonsense. And you are still my pillar of strength. I can never thank you enough for sticking your ground and choosing to still be here beside me, and I also don’t think I can ever do enough to repay the kindness and care you have showered on me. I can only try to remotely repay you by loving you as much as I know how to. 

Christmas is coming, but this has got to be one of the most drab and dreary christmases I have ever had, even though it’s kinda caused by me. I just can’t pick up the christmassy mood no matter how much I try. 

Maybe cause theres a lot on my mind, maybe cause this is a really big decision for me (at least at this point of my life). perhaps when I look back in the future, however way it might play out; I will laugh at myself for being silly at this point; I might tell myself that I should have done certain things or seen certain things a lot earlier. 

But at this point, where I am now, it’s a big decision and I constantly struggle with it. I keep going back and forth in my mind, about how it could be better, about how it could be worse. About how hurt I am thinking about this. About how I would hurt the rest. 

About how I’m really upset about whats going on right now, and that its just mostly caused by stubborn-ness, and ego, and selfishness. About how we keep going back and forth between things, and somehow it feels like things hasnt changed, even though its been many years. 

About how this past year, as it progresses, I found it harder and harder to let go of things along the way. Even though I clearly thought that as a child I have learnt very earlier into the thing, how to let go of certain things that bug me a lot. 

Till the point that it feels like I’m carrying so much weight I can barely move forward. Till the point that everyday I wake up it feels dreary and drab, like i have to drag myself through the day. Till the point that I’m starting to lose confidence in myself, in my decisions, I doubt my ability to make decisions and to do things I believe I could. 

Till the point that I felt lost, regain motivation, feels lost once again. 

And somehow all these emotions throughout this year feels so, foreign, so different. 

All these years I would have thought I would have already seen the full range of emotions I would have been capable of having, but no it surprises me that I can still feel so much more. So much more joy, hurt, turmoil, injustice, anger, excitement, love, than the past 25 years of my life. 

You said to me, you have learnt so much throughout this journey, just that maybe right now you cannot see. I think I’m feeling too hurt, too broken, too torn apart to see. But I also believe that you are right, some time down the road I will look back and say that I appreciate the chance to have learnt these things. But I guess now is not the time for me to feel that yet. 

This is the time when I feel that I should just let go, leave. I’m no longer suitable to be around anymore, I no longer feel that I can change things anymore. I no longer feel (happy) here anymore? I don’t really know either. 

But what I do know, just the thought of leaving is like tearing something out of my heart. It hurts but I dont really want it back in, but I dont really want it torn out. I dont really know what to do with it, but I also know the longer it is in between, the longer it would take me to heal from this. My brain is very clear about this, it’s the heart that hasn’t been able to understand it. 

Days like this, I just want to be able to sleep, so I can not have to think about things, but its nights like this where I lie on my bed and I cannot go to sleep. Where I have to do things to make myself so tired, that when I lie on my bed my brain just crashes. Otherwise I can’t really sleep. 

Nights like this, I wish I can just sleep.

no. i get hurt everytime you cast me aside, tell me things like i ruin your life, i am bent on torturing you, i am dragging you down. 

all the freaking time.

and today i told you that i'm making effort to keep you company, and all i got was "i dont need your company"

thanks but no thanks for hurting me all the time and claiming that i only occasionally get upset when you throw a tantrum.

did you forget the many times your words pierced through my heart?

or did you not even know they pierced through my heart?

you said you are tired, am i not?

you said you want to give up on the family, do i not?

i almost walked away 10 minutes ago, when you stepped on my heart again, when you pierced through my heart again, for the n times this night.

why do you have the right to give up when i haven't even though its just 10 minutes after you pierced my heart, and i still came back to you, bleeding, to ask you to stay?

and i came back telling you that i almost left, saying why i can come back after you just hurt me, and you cannot, and i get a reply "leave if you want to, i don't care anymore"

and you dare say, that I suffer less than you.

and you dare say, that I don't get hurt as much as you do.

the person who only cares about yourself when you grieve.

i don't listen to you, hence i don't care.

i don't listen to you, hence i didn't put in any heart. 

When you state to me that i didn't do something, and i attempt to rectify immediately, you say i 假假。

i'm forgetful, I admit.

i'm forgetful, I agree it's not an excuse.

but if i don't listen to you, and you make it sound like i :

- do it on purpose to anger you

- didn't care enough to listen to you

- didn't have enough heart

i think that is fairly hurtful.

would you like if i went back in history to state the times you didn't listen to me, or was not there for me, or stepped on me when i was the weakest and needed support.

and told you that you didn't care for me as family because you failed to do the above

i don't know if there something wrong with your concept of judging what is a good child and what is not, or there is something wrong with me (according to your point) that made me not listen to you all the time.

either way, i am trying hard to understand your rationale, why you do such things, why you get upset, and trying to be understanding during this period for you, spending time with you, talking to you.

and all i get back is to be stabbed by a 我讲你-你就假假，没有心就讲咯.

apparently trying to appease you on the spot is being fake.

you get upset then you stab people.