defragment.me

I am who I am

I've finished reading "The Fountainhead" yesterday after seeing the book or the author mentioned in 3 separate blogs in a space of 1 week, after never having heard of it all my life (I love to read, but I am really not that literary). I was barely into it for 20 pages before I had this OMG moment whereby I wondered why on earth did I not read it earlier. This is almost the book I have been waiting for all my life. Almost.

If you're working in a creative field or you have issues reconciling your individuality with society, go read it now. The true depth of the book has to be experienced by the individual reader, but there were a few parts that touched the very core of my soul which I would like to write about.

The protagonist, Howard Roark is an architect. He is the what Ayn Rand, the author, thinks as the perfect man. The man that upholds his ideals no matter what. He believed so much in what he was doing, that it didn't matter if nobody believed in him.

There was this part of the story whereby after a series of incidents whereby the society did everything it could to repel him, Howard had no work – he would rather remain idle and face the possibility of suffering, rather than to compromise of his ideals. His friend, very concerned, tried to advise him to compromise, just a little. Howard refused, and so his friend asked him what was he waiting for if he wouldn't compromise?

Howard replied, "My kind of people".

When I read that part, I just froze. I know exactly what he meant, because I too, have been waiting for "my kind of people".

Howard Roark was everything that mainstream society hated. They thought of him as selfish, because he only cared about what he did and would not integrate himself into society (i.e. develop PR skills and do what other people expect). He believed in creating buildings that were functional, he refused to add a feature to his buildings simply for the sake of pure aesthetic. He was born ahead of his time and he was despised for it. Why?

"Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision. their goals differed, but they all had this in common: that the step was first, the road new, the vision unborrowed, and the response they received- hatred. the great creators- the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors- stood alone against the men of their time. every great new thought was opposed. every great new invention was denounced. the first motor was considered foolish. the airplane was considered impossible. the power loom was considered vicious. anesthesia was considered sinful. but the men of unborrowed vision went ahead. they fought, they suffered and they paid. but they won." - Howard Roark / Ayn Rand

Considering this book was written more than half a century ago, I now realise that the issues that exist in our modern society now have probably existed throughout the history of mankind.

Ayn Rand's believed that the man should be selfish in order to be truly selfless. It is man's destiny to live up to his/her fullest potential, to create what he/she is truly capable of, unwavering in his/her vision, in order to share his/her greatest gifts with his/her fellow human beings. I may not have worded it right here and I don't think I am equipped to do so. I agree with most of what she was trying to convey, only that I personally believe that the ideal world requires diversity. I believe in the concept of duality and I believe the individual only can exist because of the mass, just like how I believe you need to experience pain in order to fully experience joy.

I guess if I have read this book earlier in my youth, I may have saved myself a lot of pain. Pain of trying to integrate myself into the mainstream society instead of celebrating my individuality. Though I must say, I appreciate my individuality very much now, because of what I went through in order to preserve it.

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For the past two weeks I seem to be undergoing some surreal reality that I find it hard to explain in words. I kept getting tested in many different situations, with people that exist in social circles that do not overlap each other. I got questioned for my beliefs, people trying to persuade me to see the light of their advice (which was kind and I appreciate), some trying to veer me off the path I was intent to take. Mostly out of good and 'right' intentions in their perspectives.

It was as though I was being asked, "red or blue pill" every other day. It was an interesting experience from my own observation because the more I was being tested and as I defended my beliefs, the more I grew in my conviction. I had plenty of opportunities to take the more comfortable and perhaps easier path. Yet I simply refused.

I no longer cared whether I could get people to believe in what I was doing, neither did I care whether they understood, or even respected my choices. I was someone who always looked for external validation and I needed a lot of it, but this time round, I just didn't think it mattered anymore. I believed in what I was doing and that was enough. Of course, it made me appreciate the empathy I got, out of the very few who understood, even more. My kind of people.

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Life amuses me. The moment I decided to give up control, the moment I stopped hoping for people to validate me, they start popping from nowhere.

Today, I simply feel very blessed. Blessed that somehow throughout the years of society's conditioning I somehow, barely managed to remain true to myself. Blessed that my partner fully supports me. Blessed that I have a select few who is exactly the "my kind of people" I have been waiting for. Blessed for that hug a client gave me today, the same person who saw something in me that I myself couldn't see, much less others. Blessed for that conversation I had in the evening because I could make a difference to someone else. And that someone else could make a difference to me.

Most of all, I am blessed that I seem to be finally able to feel comfortable in my own skin. For I am who I am, I live the life I want to lead. I cannot tell anyone else to live like me, neither can others tell me to live like them. This is the basic right of a human being – free will – that somehow I seem to have lost along the way. I take back that right of mine, today.

If one attends to the problems of humanity and commits oneself to solving them, the universe will care for that person the same way it cares for a flower or a bird. - Buckminster Fuller

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Happy birthday, Singapore – with gratitude but not love.

Growing up in my home country feeling like a misfit, it is indeed difficult to express any sort of patriotic love. For never once I have truly felt like a child of this country, I have never felt loved nor accepted.

I had felt no sense of belonging and instead trapped, bound by the location of my birth. I was angry with the lack of choices available for my education, the restriction of speech that I should have, the lack of tolerance for diversity in a country that boasts of being multi-racial.

Yet as I grow older and as my horizons widened (still rather narrow, unfortunately but am trying to correct that), I am increasingly grateful for what this country has given - security, stability and freedom. Yes, freedom, though not in the idealistic sense, but the freedom of choices still exists and we do not realise how much freedom we have, until we look beyond and out of what we've taken for granted all this while.

I am grateful that I feel safe roaming the streets of Singapore, I am grateful for our transportation system, I am grateful that that I can have clean water to brush my teeth with.

However, it makes me extremely grateful, that having the privilege of being born a Singapore citizen, I do not have to undergo female circumcision, systems with racial quotas (apart from buying a hdb flat), or risk getting stoned to my death if I was ever unlucky enough to be a victim of a sexual assault.

I am sorry to be such a wet blanket in a celebratory mood but I wish to remind myself and all of us, the sort of freedom we have, and to a certain extent, the social responsibility we have as the younger generation to protect the harmony and rights most of my peers are born with but these were not given to us without a fight by our forefathers.

I am also sorry, that I love the foreigners that are now running riot in this country and are supposedly taking our jobs away. We're proud of being a multi-racial country for a reason, that reason being we had a diverse range of ancestors. Before taking a swipe at that foreign person, perhaps we may want to recall if our grandfathers were 'truly Singaporean' in the first place.

On this day I hope and pray that the younger generations will grow up to not only tolerate diversity but to embrace it. I hope in an idealistic manner that misfits like me will come to be accepted one day, that there will come a time that we will enjoy greater freedom of speech and less media censorship.

Perhaps I will come to fall in love with this country one day, perhaps I won't. Maybe I'll find a better environment for myself, just like many of the others coming to Singapore in search for a better home. I will still remain grateful. For despite all the difficulties I've faced being a Singaporean, it is undeniable that I still have the basic rights as an individual to dictate my fate.

Happy birthday, Singapore. I wish to love you from the bottom of my heart but I still find it difficult to. I am very grateful anyway, thanks for what you've given me all these years.

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Why I don’t blog about design

On my twitter bio, the field for website is directed to this blog. I would think most people would leave once they land upon this page. If, my twitter page is linked to my portfolio site, it is very likely that I'll gain more followers. After all, there'll be more people who would want to follow a designer than an emo blogger right?

Very similarly, if I blog about design, whether is it about critical thought or my design process, I would again presume that it would likely raise my online profile a lot more. I honestly do not want that attention in an egomaniacal kind of way, but in a professional sense, blogging about design would definitely help to raise my profile, which translates a lot to more or better quality business. There is definitely a wider audience interested to read a blog on design rather than a blog on.....personal issues and lessons? ;p

I went through this entire thought process prior to starting this blog and the process became rather lengthy and it hindered me from starting my blog for years. My mind tells me to start a blog on design but my heart tells me to write about myself. Now, who is the egomaniac? ;)

Why start a blog?

I want to start a blog because I want to share my experiences with people. Good or bad. I can start a blog on my design experiences or a blog on my personal experiences. The design blog will reach a wider audience which is nice. But I hope that the personal blog will reach the audience, however small, on a deeper level.

There are tons of quality design blogs out there and I don't think I can offer better content than what is already out there. I am not saying that I can offer better content than other personal blogs, but what matters is I am trying to write a blog with my heart and honesty. How much of me will you know if I write about my work?

I reckon that people who bother to probe a little bit more will discover the link to my portfolio site anyway. Those that leave based on their 3 second impression of this site, will not be the people I want to connect with. On the contrary, if there are some who actually bother reading any bit of this site and still want to connect with me, these are the people that will be quality connections. Because they want to connect with me even if I go on long-winded musings about myself, or going a step more, they see the intention behind the long winded musings about myself.

The value of being authentic

I feel that it is not easy to find authenticity on our society, online or not. How much of a person can you get to know even face to face, much less on social media? I offer myself almost like an open book, if anybody actually take the time to read it.

I very much enjoy authentic writing and I applaud people who write openly of their less-glamorous experiences. It takes courage each time to write about your emotions, your weaknesses, your failures. How many people will start judging? How many of my clients will deem me less professional because I openly admit that I have low self-esteem?

I want to tell you, that it is incredibly healing to be able to relate to someone else's honest, emotional writing. And it is even more empowering to be able to write your own.

Why? If you can relate to the statement above, you will know what I mean.

If many more of us can open our minds and hearts, the world will be a much better place. Failures and weaknesses will not be perceived as negative, so much more hurt can be avoided with truth. If only more of us know that it is okay to be ourselves.

I have learnt that, while taking the step out to write this blog, if I am no longer afraid to be judged publicly for my weaknesses, there is nothing much else to be afraid of.

There will always be people who are critical or judgmental but it is very much worth it if you find the ones that understand and accept you for the person that you are.

Why I think it is important to share

Our society doesn't readily accept people who are different from the mainstream. Times are changing, the society is evolving, it is definitely better than how it used to be when I was a kid. However, it still remains a challenge. Whether is it about being gay, being an artist, pursuing your dreams, discovering that truth is relative while the rest of the world believes that it is absolute. That any of us can create the reality that we want. That we're very much conditioned to remain in a state of fear for the benefit of those in power. Or that whatever that's not been scientifically proven can be real. That I think that us humans are egoistic for believing that we're the only intelligent life-forms in the entire universe. Or to dismiss ancient wisdom for mumbo jumbo. That I don't understand why we're still trying to win peace through violence. That we're all human beings and we all have flaws and I don't understand why we judge people for their looks, colour, intelligence, size, etc when we know that we're not much better ourselves?

I have been through certain radical transformations myself and thought-provoking experiences. I want to write about challenging the status-quo, about being unconventional, about trying my best about living my life differently from the mainstream. I am what geeks call a 'use-case' for pursuing an alternative lifestyle (no I don't just mean the gay part) and there are plenty of others who have the courage to live their lives differently.

It is just that we are conditioned to believe that these people don't exist or are very few and far in between. We are not. We are still the minority but we are a growing lot.

And we're not 'lucky'. We simply believing in having the power to create our own reality.

I write to share because I want to stand up and be counted. To be counted as one of those who defied 'reality' as our society perceives, and to share content of similar people, just so that maybe, just maybe, it will make a difference to the number of people encouraged to create their own reality.

I want to be the change that I want, and perhaps you can too.

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Why I refuse to be a Singtel mobile subscriber anymore

I have been a Singtel mobile subscriber for 13 years. I have wanted to stop being a customer of Singtel for the past 3 years. I was thwarted time and time again because of the iPhone. My love for Apple has overridden any distaste or dislike for the big red telco.

Now, with the impending launch of the iPhone 4, I am determined not to recontract with Singtel whether they hold exclusivity to the phone or not.

Why?

1. The Phantom 30%

I signed up for a contract for a VAS (value added service) sometime last year. I wanted to stay with my current plan (Classic) which didn't provide 3G access, so I had to sign up for mobile on broadband. At that existing time period, the promotion was 30% discount with one year of contract.

My bill came the following month, and the 30% discount was not reflected. I assumed that the customer service officer had forgotten (not the first time they have forgotten requests) to activate my contract, and on second thoughts, maybe it was better not to be on a contract, so I left it at that. The itemised billing did not state whether the VAS was contracted or not.

Almost one year later, I signed in to their new one login service, "My Account" to check my recontract eligibility in the case I wanted to recontract with them for the iPhone 4 (still being open minded).

Imagine my surprise when I saw that I *am* on a contract. I called the customer service online and enquired. Apparently, the official status is, I am on a contract for BBOM which will end September 2010. I wanted to be certain of the error, so I asked her again if I was on a contract, which she impatiently replied the contractual end date, so I asked her how much I was paying now, and she replied $18.60 (before GST).

I was expecting her to make the connection as the regular price was $19.90 and I was on a promotional contract, but she didn't, so I asked the officer why was I paying $18.60 every month for the past one year when I am supposed to be on a contract.

She replied that that $18.60 is supposed to be 30% off $19.90.

With my disbelief at her bad calculations, I had to ask her to redo the math again. She got confused, put me on hold for what seems like forever, and another officer answered.

Which he tried to do a smokescreen by telling me $18.60 *is* the promotional price. I am very confident that the regular price for BBOM was $19.90 when I recontracted, which I tried to politely tell him of my certainty and not try to pull off trying to make me believe that that was supposed to be the amount I was contracting for.

I had to get him to check (again) what was the regular price, so this time, he told me it was $19.90, so (for the nth time) I asked him why was I paying $18.60 then?

AGAIN, he replied that $18.60 (before GST) is 30% off $19.90 (after GST).

I cannot believe what I was hearing. Both officers have obviously bad product knowledge having to check the pricing time and time again, and I cannot find a word to describe their inability to realise 30% off $19.90 is definitely not $18.60, with or without GST!

And I am trying very hard not to doubt their ethics when they are obviously trying to make me believe that I was the one making the mistake.

This is just one of the many other incidents which I will describe briefly here as I really don't want to write a 10-page essay.

2. 'FREE" Colour-me-tones

TWICE, I had family members being subscribed to colour-me-tones WITHOUT permission. The first case was a new line under my name, which I clearly remember not agreeing to signing up for the VAS when I signed the form for the line.

The second case was very recent when my partner suddenly had her ringing tone changed. She was being subscribed to the VAS without her knowledge in the middle of her contract.

We have paperless billing (save the environment)  and we don't check the bills every month. The service is free for 3 months which thereafter they wil start charging you if you didn't notice it. Which you wouldn't unless someone asks why your ringtone becomes some cheesy song when they call you instead of the default, or you scrutinize your bills every month.

I admit the responsibility for checking my bills, but I don't think it is ethical at all to subscribe people to services without their permission.

3. The mioTV false promotion

Back in those days when mioTV was initially launched and nobody wanted to pay to watch it because of their uninteresting programming, they had people going door-to-door to promote it. My father and a friend's father was persuaded to sign up for it with the promises that they will not be subjected to any contract and that there will be no hidden charges.

The installer never explained that the service needed an internet connection or a ADSL phone line, and he conveniently plugged out my brother's Pacific Internet ADSL line, plugged in Singtel's one, and also conveniently plugged out my dad's starhub set-top box, and replaced it with the mioTV's media connectors. How irresponsible. Nobody told my father that my brother's ADSL will be rendered useless if he chooses to watch mioTV or vice versa.

Again, imagine my poor dad's surprise when he tried to cancel the service and was told it was a 6 month contract.

I had to send a few emails with a few long phone calls before they agree to give a 50% discount to the subscription, refusing to terminate the contract.

Horrible customer service

I am absolutely sick of calling their hotlines and dealing with their customer service officers because for all the incidents mentioned above plus a few more, I had to be put on hold countless times, sometimes up to an hour just to get a officer to speak to me.

That is not all, they will first refuse to take any responsibility for anything, trying to insinuate that it is your fault/responsibility, often had no clear answers to questions, and many times, they promised to get back to me, only to go missing in action.

Why I had to write this

These mentioned 3 incidents are just the highlights. I have had more encounters that will probably take me a week to finish. Wrong billing, bills get sent to the wrong address, signing up for services that didn't got forgotten and didn't get activated, transfers of services that didn't happen even though it was done personally at the customer service counter.

I understand in big organisations, mistakes will be made. I don't mind the mistakes as much as they try to do tai-chi each time a mistake occurs. I also don't agree with prioritising sales over ethics.

If you know me personally, I am not one to lose my temper at all or become aggressive at all when dealing with customer service officers, sales people, whoever. In fact, I empathise with them so much, because I know how much shit they have to take in their job. I am the sort of person who will tip a person even if I had bad service, hoping the small tip will brighten up his/her day.

To get my blood rising to this level, it requires extraordinary effort. Singtel has made that extraordinary effort countless times and I wish it would be put to better use instead.

I don't feel that big organisations should get away with things just because of their monopoly (unless it is Apple). I think it reflects badly on their management when the junior staff behaves in such a manner. How are they being trained?

What I am going to do

One of my new mottos is to become the change that I want. I am just one person and it is a minute effort but any effort is an effort. I am not going to be a Singtel mobile subscriber anymore once any of the other telcos launch the iPhone 4.

Sadly, I have to be stuck with mioTV because my love for football overrides all that anger. The phone I can do without, the football I really have to watch.

Leave some thoughts?

Re-conditioning myself for inner-peace

The post would actually be titled "Re-conditioning myself in pursuit of happiness" until I made a recent discovery that happiness is a choice, not a pursuit.

The perception of happiness

People do all sorts of things to pursue what they perceive as 'happiness'. In the Singaporean society, 'happiness' generally (I repeat, generally) means earning enough money so that they never have to worry about having to cope with the rising standards of living. When I was younger, 'happiness' means the freedom to do whatever I want. Money, I thought was secondary. I was insistent that freedom does not neccessarily have to come with money. Back then, even as a kid in school, I was already the odd one out. My peers were very concerned about getting straight As in order 'succeed' and 'be happy'. Nobody told us that academic success is not equivalent true happiness and success. On the contrary, we kept getting drilled about the importance of being part of an academic elite in order to survive in Singapore (at least, in my experience).

I was determined to be happy. I have already disappointed my parents when I didn't do well for my O levels, and I sought the middle-ground, entering a polytechnic to study IT when what I really wanted to do was to go to a design school. I dropped out in the middle of my course after realising that I will never be able to graduate as long as data structures gave me a headache, resulting in more disappointment from my family. That resulted in me feeling even more that I should make it up to them. This pattern continued throughout my twenties as I tried hard to seek 'a good job' as defined by society. If I could not be the lawyer they wanted, perhaps I could at the very least try to climb the ladder as a designer.

I spent my twenties caught in between trying to be happy and trying to make it up to my parents. Or you can see it as trying to be myself and be weird, or trying to be 'normal' like everyone else. I swung between the two as there was never a period I could be happy without feeling guilty, or trying to be normal without driving myself crazy.

I thought I left it all behind when I made a big step to be self-employed, mistakenly thinking that being self-employed would mean freedom. I stopped caring whether that would please my family or not, it was something that I really wanted and needed to do.

In a conditioned state of fear

What I didn't realise was, the conditioning that existed in my mind/psyche was far deeper that I have thought to be. As I progressed further into my business, my worries about the future grew. What if I stopped getting business? What if I don't make use if the opportunities presented to me now? What if I didn't save enough to buy a house? What if I can't pay rent? What if my parents get old and they need money from me? What if one of them fall sick? What if I fall sick?

I was setting myself up for failure. Even before anything started to happen, I was already 'preparing' myself for all the negativity that can happen to me. And I assure you, whoever that is reading this, that probably 90% of us have the same fears going through their minds all the time.

That is why many of us stay in jobs we don't love. It is better to be unhappy than to be poor, a lot of them think. As a friend once remarked, she would rather cry in a mercedes than in a public bus.

And that is why, even myself, as much as I try to pursue happiness consciously, the conditioning of my mind has weighed me down very much, subconsciously. Most of us are brought up to seek stability and security, even if I seem to be a 'free-er' spirit that most of my peers, I cannot help but think about the house that I should buy, the money I should be earning, the 'success' I should be chasing. This affected the way I ran my business as I subconsciously sought stability (lots of cashflow! ;p). I made awful decisions accepting projects that I shouldn't, or working when I should have rested. I took my work too seriously, because I was very afraid to lose my 'freedom', and my work suffered as a result as I over-analyzed everything since I was afraid to produce work that was mediocre. I lost my love for my work.

Consciously or subconsciously, I was falling back into my old pattern of swinging between trying to be myself and trying to be normal. I was still trying to seek the middle-ground by not having 'a proper job' and still being able to make my family proud of me. I was still trying to make the invisible 'deadlines' that we seem to have – by 30 you should have established a career, by 35 if you haven't, you should be totally ashamed of yourself.

Why?

Why should we place all these deadlines on ourselves? Why are we conditioned to pursue things that society deem acceptable? Why do we make our children and youth feel so guilty when they try to be different? We do we shake our heads at people who want to have a change of career in their mid-thirties? And why can't old people find love?

Why do we accept these 'rules' as part of reality?

Why am I taking life so seriously? If you believe in one life-time and that you either make it or not with one chance, perhaps you have enough reason to be serious about life. Me? I believe in multiple-incarnations (this is going to be another post) and I find it hard to reconcile within myself when I am weighed down by the supposed practicalities of life. This is how conditioned my mind has become. Fear of failure.

Re-conditioning

I have found a great divide between my beliefs and the conditioning of my mind. And that has been creating a lot of noise in my consciousness. No wonder I never could quieten my mind. It seemed to be always anxious, always analyzing, always debating. It doesn't have to be this way if I simply have faith. I was very afraid to waste time, to make wrong decisions, to experience pain when things go wrong. Yet the other part of me is constantly trying to remind me that I should be doing what I love, I should choose what makes me happy over what makes me stable. I gradually realised that my unhappiness was caused by the inability to make peace within myself.

Considering that I don't believe in hell, one-lifetime, judgement (as you know it) or punishment after life, what is there to be afraid of? I don't even believe in 'right' or 'wrong'. I find it really amusing that I am in constant anxiety about my life even though I hold such strong spiritual beliefs. Okay, at least it is amusing to me now.

There was a mildly controversial comment made by Joi Ito at Echelon 2010, apparently saying that he does not hire MBAs because he would need to untrain them. Similar to the sentiment that some startups find difficulty in hiring Singaporean talent because of their apparent inability to be flexible (am not trying to criticise, I am just stating true feedback). That is sort of what I am consciously doing to myself now. Reconditioning my mind to incorporate what I believe in and not what people has conditioned me to believe in, which will probably be a long but necessary process.

Digressing a little. the Singaporean Government often states that many of our local talent go overseas, never to come back. And they are trying so hard to make Singapore a creative hub. I find it hugely ironic. Perhaps it is time for them to take a long hard look at our system. Or maybe some courageous soul can attempt to improve the system. Only if our bureaucracy would allow these courageous, idealistic souls to make a difference. Many times, they want us to make an effort, but they don't allow the effort to be made (Once bonded / Once bonded, reloaded).

Finding inner-peace to be happy

So, I realise I have been going about pursuing happiness the wrong way. I thought that by gaining or acquiring something, happiness follows. Usually it is only transient. Especially if you tie happiness to achievements or possessions. Your human nature will always want you to achieve something bigger in order to experience the same level of 'happiness'. For me, I came to the epiphany, that true constant happiness comes to me when I achieve a state of inner-peace – being at peace with who I am, what I am doing, what I have, etc. When you're truly happy, you don't need external events to provide that source to you. You see happiness in everything. Whether is it that the grass is green instead of yellow, or that I am looking at a 24in lcd screen, or that I get to eat dumplings. Knowing myself (sorry I cannot help that cynical side), I wouldn't say I will remain in this state consistently, but I will strive to.

I think that is the most important in life. The effort and process, and the non-attachment to results. Enjoy the journey anyway, whether it is long, tiring or painful. You can choose to be happy in spite of anything and everything. Similarly, you can be unhappy even if you seem to have everything but you cannot be at peace.

Leave some thoughts?