Thought Instrument

We are often bombarded with connotations about the sort of things that would seemingly make us feel happy. The very idea that all the things that we should enjoy in order to attain fulfillment ought to be Rare , Expensive, Popular  and of Grand Proportion .  These preconceived notions in the face of today's society are not entirely wrong, but it has inadvertently reveal a cruel and unfavourable bias against the widely available , the cheap , ordinary and simple scale . When someone in your Facebook friends list posted getaway trip photos to the Maldives on a private jet, we unquestionably infer that they must have had a better time than someone who cycles at a local park; we would imagine that visiting the Uffizi gallery in Italy is always going to be more pleasurable than reading a novel in your backyard garden; A dinner at a downtown steakhouse sounds a good deal more impressive than a simple home-cooked meal; it feels more natural to think that the highlight of a weekend g

Perhaps you could have come up with other issues that matter more "freedom", like your personal health, your wealth accumulation, your amazing family or love relationship. However, if you are not able to face your personal health, wealth, or any of your relationships with a heart of freedom, all these seemingly beautiful and enjoyable things in life can turn out to be a unbearable burden. You may be physically very healthy but you could persistently be upset by some of your internal troubles and conflicts, to a point where constant depression and worries are slowly eroding your own will to even live. You sometimes may even wish that you could be the lying on a patient's bed, at least there will be someone who can comfort you and take good care of you. Having abundant wealth may not bring you happiness and a sense of security, for you may have to cast your worries everyday on the many eagle eyes preying on your wealth. The same goes for relationships, many a times it

Ever since the dawn of mankind, we have an innate tendency to attach a reason to everything to make sense of the world that we live in. We take a shot at contriving meanings for everything. We conceive theories in order to justify any patterns that we recognize amid all the noises in our everyday lives. In fact, what we do not realize is the downplaying on the element of luck and the role it plays in the eyes of those successful people. "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity" ~ Seneca When we see a soccer player scoring goals and winning the game for the club, we conclude that he is the best player in the world. We spot a classmate scoring high marks on a test and we presume that he is one of the smartest in the class. We certainly expect the same kind of performance for subsequent tests. Anything less than a stellar result would be considered as something out of the ordinary.  If truth be told, it could simply be the soccer player or the student has g

Do you ever have somebody around you who spend most of their waking hours at work? Whenever you try to ask them out, they claim to be always very busy and have seemingly never-ending work waiting to be completed. However, when you ask around their colleagues and bosses on how they are performing, they shake their heads in disbelief, like they have numerous untold stories to tell. In short, they are really busy, but the work they produce are not pretty. You may wonder, so what are they really busy at? It seems strange that if they were really putting in the hard work, why aren't the work done nicely? Where in the world could be the problem? The problem lies in them not really striving hard. They were simply toiling aimlessly.   Remember an instance when I was still in school, there was a classmate of mine that did the same things that many of the better students did. He spent his time studying whenever he could and he played hard as well. However, his school results were not

If you never strive to live life your own way, who's ever going to live for you? You are not born in this world to satisfy other's expectation. Neither is anyone else born to satisfy your expectation.  If you insist on the things that is right for yourself, you should not be afraid of being hated by others.  If we care to stop and imagine for a while, for most of our waking hours, we constantly toil hard to maintain good people relationships; we thread cautiously in our speech for fear of offending others; we dare not speak up the truth since we are apprehensive about being condemned by the small social circle that we depend upon. This will not only cause us to concede the very principles that truly define who we are, and we may also make others think we are just being pretentious. Too concerned about what others think to a point where you lose yourself. Similar to what famous psychologist Alfred Adler has mentioned, in our interactions with other humans alike, we

Always remember this: Never try to live a life afraid of making mistakes. For when you are afraid of making mistakes, you will have literally closed the doors to infinite possibilities. For when you are afraid of making mistakes, you will have missed a lot of beautiful scenes along the way. For when you are afraid of making mistakes, you will have missed the chances to create beautiful memories. For when you are afraid of making mistakes, you will have missed many opportunities to become a better version of yourself. For when you are afraid of making mistakes, you will have missed that dream of your lifetime. When the befallen mobile phone giant Nokia was acquired by Microsoft in 2015, Nokia CEO famously ended his speech by saying: "We didn't do anything wrong, but somehow we lost." Everyone from the management team began to tear sadly following that speech.  Indeed, Nokia might not have done anything wrong. But, clearly, doing nothing wrong was not enough. &quo

If we care to step back from our daily worries and think deeply for just a moment, it is easy to conclude that we exist in this world to live out a certain purpose. To any other living organisms, protecting and ensuring the survival of their species are their only instincts. However, out of all living organisms on this Earth, we, as humans, seem to take Life most seriously. Throughout history, we have evolved and have become so sophisticated that worrying for our own basic physiological needs has simply been reduced to a small footnote in our lives. We have explored ideas and along the way, spawned so many activities (Sports, Politics, Hollywood glamour, etc.) that are seemingly unrelated to simply protecting survival. This is essentially tied to one thing: To live life happily with a sense of satisfaction. We have reached an age where we are able to make many choices in Life. However, we are, by nature, denied the information we would need to make the best choices with ultimate

With today's increasingly connected society, Time has been an integral part of our lives in synchronizing tasks. The flight is scheduled at 9 am tomorrow. That basketball match is taking place tonight at 7 pm. No matter what kind of activities we involve ourselves in, getting to know the Time is certainly of utmost importance in navigating through our lives. Our incessant need to keep track of Time sort of beleaguers us to being slaves of our own invention. In olden times where Time was presented in a different texture, nature was our only calling in life. The movement of the Sun and Moon was our only way of telling the time. Time used to be a commodity which is seemingly in abundance and endless. Ever since the Industrial Revolution, our relentless race against the literal and our biological clock to try and amass ever more has sparked a phenomenal growth in amazing technologies that aim to surpass the current limits. Over centuries, we have made use of technologies to e

Most of us have been through days where we find life seemingly unfair. However, the reality of Life is always fair, it just depends on which perspective you view Life to be. It is our outlook of equality in this life that needs to be fixed. None of us can win forever and when you are losing, most of what goes on around you will naturally just look grossly unfair to you. The concrete rules of life should be evident to all of us and the main reason why most of us never really get to comprehend them is because the rules can appear to be uncomfortable for us to face them upfront. All of us go about our lives yearning for some sort of authority or control. This idea of authority holds different meaning to each of us. No matter how differing this notion may mean for us, it will always converge to each of our own  sense of self . Our sense of self is an integral part of our lives. It  helps to define the choices that we have in this world and it enables us to be independent and the cour

If you ever find yourself constantly being bothered by the same problems everyday,  you should not just sit back and expect the problems to change for the better someday . Instead, you should expect that one day you s hall possess the choice to  leave the problems behind and move on. It is not up to you to dictate the changes in your surroundings, for there are way too many factors that will need to line up in order for the situations around your surroundings to tilt in your favour. I n order for things to change for the better, h owever, you only need to commit yourself to change Change in itself is never easy, for you are bound to meet with many resistance along the way. That is why you should set goals; and that is why you should work even harder to become a better version of yourself. Until a point where you can finally have the choice to leave your problems in the dust. image credit: J. Money You must never be afraid to always give yourself a challenge and tre

Your hard work may turn into nothing of value when it is coming from someone else's mouth. The endless behind-the-scenes efforts in getting something to fruition may be judged by others as something that can be easily done by anyone given enough time and resources. After all, things are always easier said than done. Truth be told, these people, or anyone for that matter, may actually be able to succeed. Only that they lack the necessary actions required for actual execution; only that they lack the undying determination to see it through to the end; only that they lack the fiery passion in them to fuel their ambitions; only that they lack the undaunted courage to continue despite the many struggles; and only that they lack the sincerity to convince others to believe their visions. Credit: Romain Guy (Flickr) Never let those people who can only talk stop you in your tracks. The person that is advancing through your own actions is you and absolutely nobody can take that

All of us wish to be perfect but the truth is, none of us really are. In reality, there are some people in your life who see the same vision as you, and some of them obviously don't. It is the blind spots that is the origin of all the inadequacies  in our lives. Deep inside each of us lives a gloomy   shadow . This dark unconscious personality that we do not acknowledge often becomes part of this shadow and manifests itself into our stance towards the people around us.  It would seem that whatever behaviour we may find irritating, or unacceptable on the outside is nothing more than a reflection of a dark part of ourselves. It verges close to impossible for people who are living in today's society to acknowledge the existence of this shadow  since it naturally reflects a less attractive part of ourselves. This further gives us motivation to balk at some of the traits that we do not like about ourselves. We are taught at a young age that we have to be law -abidin

The controversial 21 Grams Theory by Dr. Douglas MacDougall claimed that everyone of us has a soul that weighs 21 grams. Dr. MacDougall tried to prove his theory by conducting the experiment on several patients facing imminent death from tuberculosis in 1901. The experiment was not attempted ever since . This theory has since over the years appeared in many films and novels, including the likes of the 2003 movie  21 grams , and Dan Brown's  The Lost Symbol . Although still very much unproven today, the popularity of it should be undisputed and ought to really pique our interest as to the missing link between life and death.  Credit: Simply Being Spiritual Albert Einstein once stated in physics under the Law of the Conservation of Energy that "Energy cann ot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed into one form or another". So when we die, all of the energy in our body should theoretically be transformed into other forms of energy.  Einstein also expla

31st December typically marks the last day of every single year. Traditions would have us believe that on this day, we should come together to celebrate the start of a brand new year. However, the truth is that this day, on 31st December 2015, much like any other day before, has simply transitioned from Thursday to Friday without too much of an impact made to our lives. What is the significance of celebrating on this day then? The countdown of this new day usually prompts us to put aside our day - to - day work and toast our glasses to celebrate. This ubiquitous ritual observed by mankind all around the world must contain some profound relationship on how we behave. Even going back to the early days of Homo sapiens , celebrations such as the triumphant encounter with the wildly beasts have brought together communities, bestowing upon us a sense of fulfilment. Credit: Traveljee As for New Year's Day, it  is about celebrating the completion of another milestone in our