ckg day #73

big roars.

i'm like down with flu again for the donkey times since i have been here in chongqing. perhaps its the weather, the changing season which i am not used to. perhaps i didn't manage to get my 12hours of beauty sleep that i always need. perhaps i am missing everyone at home and i have fallen ill due to my distracted focus.

like what i told alex a few mins ago, when one person is sick, the heart tends to fall ill too. just like how i will always get super emotional (because i am alr emo by nature) when i am feeling very lousy and uncomfortable. missing my love ones who will take extra good care of me when i am sick, missing friends who will check if i am getting better.

ohwell. perhaps its the distance ba.

i really appreciate friends like alex. who always catch me up on the msn once in a while, asking me how am i and stuffs. and amazingly, he often got me when i'm feeling down or sick. and when the new msn window is blinking and alexus FIGHT! appears... you just dont know how much warmth it has been transferred. like how you are trying hard to transferred your recovery power to me now. lol. but still, thanks alex. you have been a great friend :)

marv and barney tooo. when my private message change. you guys always seem to be on the lookout and had cheered me up simply by asking me if i am alright and well, the chats we had. xie xie ni men. :)

my bestie, stephie. know you had been busy and hope you are coping well. though we dont really get to catch up, but still emails recieved from you had been simply wonderful. just wanna say sorry too! cos i know our chats had always been halfway through bcos of hmmm. yups. but still thanks for updating me with you life even though i cannot be there with you. loves you! :)

also appreciate my lovelyy family. my mama, dad and my sister. who will always check me out through the webcam every now and then. my mama who will alwayss tell me that she cooked curry chicken for dinner, updating me with family-gossips. my dad who will always to do something more constructive over here instead of watching tv and computer. and my sister - regarding facebook.

and most importantly, my dearest boyfriend who never fails to give at least a call everyday since my day1 here. to make me feel so close yet very far away from home. thanks for believing in us, thanks for your encouragement, for your understanding tolerance and love. thanks for not leaving me out in your everyday even though i'm so far away. you are my greatest motivation. :)

thanks to all those who have dropped a line or so somewhere. jenn is happy to have you guys around.

87days more till i am back. rarr.

ckg day #70

Alone but not Lonely adapted from ‘Life is An Attitude’.

It scares us more than anything except death being alone.
Our fear of aloneness is so ingrained that given the choice of being by ourselves or being with others we opt for safety in numbers, even at the expense of lingering in pain, boring, or totally unredeeming company.

And yet more of us than ever are alone.

While many Americans have their solo lifestyles thrust on them – people die, people go away, a huge and growing population is choosing to be alone.

In 1955, on in ten U.S. households consisted of one person. By 1999, the proportion was one in three. Single men and women accounted for 38.9 million of the nation’s 110.5 million households. By 1999, single parents with children under the age of eighteen made up 27.3 percent of the nation’s 70.9 million family households. Meanwhile, many more Americans are divorcing. In less than three decades, the number of divorced men and women has more than quadrupled – to a total of 18.3 million in 1996, compared to 4.3 million in 1970. Never before in American history has living alone been the predominant lifestyle.

Nonetheless, we persist in the conviction that a solitary existence in the harshest penalty life can mete out. We loathe being alone – anytime, anywhere for whatever reason. From childhood we’re conditioned to accept that when alone we instinctively ache for company, that loners are outsiders yearning to get in rather than people who are content with their own company.

Alone, we squander life by rejecting its full potential and wasting its remaining promises. Alone, we accept that experiences unshared are barely worthwhile, that sunsets viewed singly are not as spectacular, that time spent apart is fallow and pointless. And so we grow old believing we are nothing by ourselves, steadfastly shunning the opportunities for self discovery and personal growth that solitude could bring us.

We have even coined a word for those who prefer to be by themselves: antisocial, as if they were enemies of society. They were viewed as friendless, suspect in a world that goes around in twos or more and is wary of solitary travelers.

People who need people are threatened by people who don’t. The idea of seeking contentment alone is heretical, for society steadfastly decrees that our completeness lies in others. Instead, we cling to each other for solace, comfort and safety.

Ironically, most of us crave more intimacy and companionship than we can bear. We begrudge ourselves, our spouses, and our partners’ sufficient physical and emotional breathing room, and then bemoan the suffocation of our relationships.

To point out these facts is not to suggest we should abandon all our close ties. Medical surveys show that he majority of elderly people who live alone, yet maintain contact with relatives and friends, rate their physical and emotional well-being as “excellent”. Just as an apple a day keeps the doctor away when they were young, an active social calendar appears to serve the same purpose now.

But we need to befriend and enjoy ourselves as well. We must learn to be alone. Instead of planting our solitude with dream blossoms, we choke the space with continuous music and chatter to which we do not even listen. It is simply there to fill the vacuum. We can’t stand the silence, because silence includes thinking. And if thought, we would have top face ourselves.

Let us learn, then, from those in search of what they have not been able to find and hold: peace of mind, gentleness of heart, calmness of spirit, daily joy. Who have come to understand that to know and to love and to be of value to others, they first must know and love and value themselves; that to find their way in the world, the have to start by finding themselves.