Have you ever encountered a nightmare or a bad dream that keeps playing over and over in your mind everytime you try to catch a shut eye? It's want of those things that probably plagues most of us if not all of us.
I am no biologist and neither am I a neurologist but there's definitely something in our brain that insistently wants to store bad memories or bad experiences and then constantly reminding us about it. Last night I was watching Discovery channel and I got a bit more insight on a health condition called posttraumatic stress diorsder or commonly called as PSTD. Apparently it's common to see PSTD manifest itself amongst soldiers and those who have witnessed really bad scenes in their lifetimes.
In the show, there was this soldier who was sent to Iraq as a medic and he witnessed a colleague getting shot and he treated him. His colleague did survive the incident but it left a scar in the medic's mind. By the time he got back to the USA, he constantly saw the scene replaying itself over and over again. When his PSTD got so serious, he actually saw blood all over his hands from treating his colleague. It was as if he was back in Iraq again. He kept seeing blood on his hands that he kept trying to wash the blood off to the point he was literallys scrubbing his skin off.
Before I go off lecturing about PSTD, let me regress back to the original topic of this post. PSTD is a severe condition without a doubt, but I think that even we suffer from some from PSTD in our lives albeit not as severe as the soldier I was talking about above.
It is undeniable that me, you and a whole lot of people out there have had experiences in their lives that they'd rather forget. Sometimes, there are unfortunate moments that you stumble upon a scene, text, verse or anything that suddenly reminds you of that bad memory. Like it or not, that's life, we are going to stumble upon things that simply remind you of bad memories. Even I have had issues with bad memories and bad past events (regretfully)! Leave it be long enough and it will take you over and control your life, of which more often than not you end up feeling sorry for yourself and you continue dwelling in "should have, could have, would have" conundrum.
The past will be a mish mash of happy and sad memories. In fact, it's good reminiscent the past every now and then, talk about it over a cup of tea or to catch up with friends but a line has to be clearly drawn between reminiscing and clinging on to the past. Many a times we keep dwelling on the past and that inherently holds us back from moving forward. Moving forward is the ever constant in our lives because time doesn't stop for anyone.
My grandad once told me, "If you tripped at the spot behind you, just look back at it, check your wounds and then move on. Staring at the spot you fell isn't going to change anything!". That's my food for thought today...... hope it sheds some new light in your life.
Thursday, September 4, 2025
the dark side of immobility
Over the weekend, I had the unfortunate liberty to injure myself............... again.... yes. Again, for the God knows how many time. Only this time I didn't injure myself from squash. I injured myself whilst exercising in the gym. Also, it's not the knee this time. It's my back this time.
Due to the injury, I have been confined to my bed most of the time for the last few days. Hence, I have the free time to write this blog post. Given how long I have been inactive on my blog I guess, it's high time I wrote something meaningful (writing about injuring myself may not exactly be a useful read but you may never know).
So.... under the constraints of my injury, the limited physical spaces of my bed and this horrendously hot weather, I am like a bird clipped of its wings and unable to fly. Apart for feeling horribly frustrated about my current situation, it can be a very appreciative moment to reflect on how lucky all of us are when we can move around and do whatever we want with our legs and hands.
Now, I think I have a better grasp of how those bedridden people feel like - literally confined to the bed for the rest of their lives. You'd be surprised but not being able to move around on the bed itself is frustrating enough! I am not even talking about running around doing stuff. I used to think lazing on the bed not doing anything would be nice. I now know how wrong that assumption is. I am extremely surprised as to how difficult it is to not doing anything and just lay still on the bed. It really is a pain (in my current context, the pain is both figuratively and literally!).
Let me try and give you an impression of what it's like to be in my current position. I wake up in the morning, I try to get out of bed, I have to slowly turn myself to be on all fours before I slowly raise my torso upwards. In the process of raising my torso, I'd still feel a sharp pain in my lower back, albeit not as sharp as compared to raising myself in a seated position. When I finally succeed in standing up, I then limp my way to brush my teeth. Believe you me, 10 feet feels like 10 miles with the pain in my back.
Then I limp to the kitchen, make a hot chocolate and some biscuits, then I limp back to the bed and lie down. I then let the pain subside before grabbing a book to read to kill time. From there, I get up only to answer the call of nature.
Third day of immobility and I can now safely say what a real pain in the back it is to be immobile and knowing there is so little you can do in such a state. It's a taste of the dark side of immobility.
Then I limp to the kitchen, make a hot chocolate and some biscuits, then I limp back to the bed and lie down. I then let the pain subside before grabbing a book to read to kill time. From there, I get up only to answer the call of nature.
Third day of immobility and I can now safely say what a real pain in the back it is to be immobile and knowing there is so little you can do in such a state. It's a taste of the dark side of immobility.
listening
But is there really more to it or is listening merely utilising your auditory capabilities to decode decibels into meaningful data for your brain to interpret?
One of my friend had learn to become more than just a father. His daughter, Lisa was born autistic. So for him, it didn't only involve learning about diaper change and feeding time, he had to learn to communicate with Lisa. It wasn't easy from day 1 to begin with because it was very difficult to communicate with Lisa. He would find her sitting in one corner just rocking back and forth staring into blank space and mumbling to herself. He wanted more than just to care for Lisa, he wanted her to have a normal life like every other kid. But before he could hope for her to have a normal life, he knew he would have to breach the communication gap that stood as a barrier.
It took him weeks to find some way to communicate to Lisa until he discovered it by accident. Apart from rocking back and forth, mumbling to herself, he noticed patterns in the way Lisa reacted depending on her mood. For example, Lisa would grip her soft toy really hard if she was hungry, curl her toes really tightly when she needed to take a leak, and a myriad of other patterns he noted in Lisa. When the patterns started to form more conspicuously, he grabbed a notepad and started to record the patterns he noticed for future references.
The result, he became more than a father to Lisa. He became Lisa' best friend. He knew what she wanted, what she was asking for or at times, he simply knew Lisa just wanted a nice comforting hug. It was almost like communicating on an emphatic subliminal level of which an open line of communication was available between only the two of them.
Communication doesn't always have to mean someone talking and another listening. It also involved a huge part of observation and understanding. Those involve your eyes and your heart. That's how Lisa and her dad bonded. Not by words but through gesture, body language and a certain degree of mumbling.
Listening requires more than your ears. It's your ears, eyes and most importantly, your heart. It means communicating with another not just via literary words but with a tinge of empathy.
WIP
I am certain many of you out there have heard of the term, 'W.I.P" or commonly spoken as WIP. WIP stands for Work In Progress. We always say WIP for something that's in the works, still in building, still in the formation stages and all the other pre-completion stages.
If you ponder about it in depth, you will realise that our lives are always in the WIP stages. We never really completely complete, no? Everyday we learn new things, experience new things, see new things, hear new things, do new things. That's us in WIP stages because we are never ever truly complete even if we finally breathed our last breath and kick the bucket.
But the best thing you can do for yourself is to keep maintaining the WIP and better still, grow the WIP!
If it's one thing I have learned since I started my professional career in an accounting firm is that constant learning and development is part and parcel of my career. But it applies even in my personal life trying to learn other things I can learn from reading the burgeoning myriad of knowledge bases that's out there - magazines, books, e-books, etc.........
Continuously being in WIP doesn't mean imperfection but rather it means you are always on the road to perfection because you never stop progressing. Even the most beautifully hand crafted building is still in WIP because it can never stay as beautiful as it is right now unless someone constantly maintains it (i.e. WIP!).
Business continue to grow, evolve and when necessary down size. Again, that's WIP!. WIP is everywhere if you'd take a step back and look around you. The globe spins constantly and continuously keeps us on our toes to make sure we continue to wake up in the morning and sleep in the night knowing that we have to do something about our lives that constantly in WIP.
If there's one favour you can do for someone, it'd be doing yourself a favour and making sure your WIP never stops growing and progressing........ But remember, being in WIP means you are bound to bump into rough spots, face doubts but being in WIP also means you will eventually progress out of glitches as long as you try earnestly to progress and grow.
If you ponder about it in depth, you will realise that our lives are always in the WIP stages. We never really completely complete, no? Everyday we learn new things, experience new things, see new things, hear new things, do new things. That's us in WIP stages because we are never ever truly complete even if we finally breathed our last breath and kick the bucket.
But the best thing you can do for yourself is to keep maintaining the WIP and better still, grow the WIP!
If it's one thing I have learned since I started my professional career in an accounting firm is that constant learning and development is part and parcel of my career. But it applies even in my personal life trying to learn other things I can learn from reading the burgeoning myriad of knowledge bases that's out there - magazines, books, e-books, etc.........
Continuously being in WIP doesn't mean imperfection but rather it means you are always on the road to perfection because you never stop progressing. Even the most beautifully hand crafted building is still in WIP because it can never stay as beautiful as it is right now unless someone constantly maintains it (i.e. WIP!).
Business continue to grow, evolve and when necessary down size. Again, that's WIP!. WIP is everywhere if you'd take a step back and look around you. The globe spins constantly and continuously keeps us on our toes to make sure we continue to wake up in the morning and sleep in the night knowing that we have to do something about our lives that constantly in WIP.
If there's one favour you can do for someone, it'd be doing yourself a favour and making sure your WIP never stops growing and progressing........ But remember, being in WIP means you are bound to bump into rough spots, face doubts but being in WIP also means you will eventually progress out of glitches as long as you try earnestly to progress and grow.
Giving his best to his son
I once knew a school mate who was aiming high becoming a long distance runner. Every evening without fail, Ganesh can be seen jogging from his house nearby the school and heading up to the main town centre. All in he ran an average of 21km every evenings and sometimes varying the distance if there was a need to cut down the distance due to physical fatigue.
Most importantly, every evening whilst Ganesh was running his routines, his father would be tailing behind him on the family motorcycle clocking his time and giving him pointers to improve his running form.
Every evening, rain or shine, I'd see father and son working on the running routine whilst I was headed home from school taking the rail transit.
At that point in time, he was already representing my school for the long distance running repertoire and in many instances begging the gold medals as he ran the events. Last I heard just after I left secondary school, he was already offered a scholarship by one of the top local universities. His father couldn't be prouder with his achievements.
He grew up in a family who lived under mediocre terms, a father who was an assistant in an Indian spice mill and a mother who was full time at home taking care of his other 2 siblings. Being the eldest son of 3 siblings, he had to make sure he could graduate into a stable job to assist his parents in bringing the other two up. Running wasn't going to be just an evening hobby for him, it meant his future and his siblings' future. He knew he had to run, and run well at that.
His father knew if Ganesh was going to even stand a chance to perform well, Ganesh was going to need his support. He knew all too well that in school, there were other more affluent children whose parents could afford proper training and coaches. For Ganesh, he knew he would have to fill in the empty spaces as a father, coach and training mate. Starting of the training regime meant he had to learn how to coach his son with sufficient strictness, yet know how to show affection as a father and know how to be competitive as a training mate. As an assistance in a spice mill, those were the exact three things he had no idea about.
As father, he would have wanted to have money to hire a coach, to put Ganesh in a proper training school to be the best but he knew he couldn't afford it. So he made up his mind to give Ganesh his best.
His best meant stealing quick reads from nutrition books available at bookstores over the weekends, spending evenings planning out running routes for Ganesh, timing Ganesh, ascertaining areas of weakness then going back to bookstores to steal a bit reads from books on fitness and running. Lastly, giving Ganesh all the moral and emotional support as a father who wanted his son to be the best he can be.
Deep down, he didn't know how far Ganesh could go, he didn't even know if he was giving Ganesh the correct advice and he didn't even know if his training would be injurious to Ganesh but he knew one thing - it was the best he could give Ganesh.
Giving someone your best isn't about spending valuable monies on the best coach, best food, best facilities and best what not, it's about the best you have to offer and giving it with all your heart. Ganesh eventually succeeded in wining many gold medals and a scholarship to pursue his higher education. All the time his father spent at the bookstores stealing reads to fill in the gap as a coach, pushing him on as a father, motivating Ganesh to be hungry for victory as a training mate, all that put together was the what giving his best to his son meant to him.
Most importantly, every evening whilst Ganesh was running his routines, his father would be tailing behind him on the family motorcycle clocking his time and giving him pointers to improve his running form.
Every evening, rain or shine, I'd see father and son working on the running routine whilst I was headed home from school taking the rail transit.
At that point in time, he was already representing my school for the long distance running repertoire and in many instances begging the gold medals as he ran the events. Last I heard just after I left secondary school, he was already offered a scholarship by one of the top local universities. His father couldn't be prouder with his achievements.
He grew up in a family who lived under mediocre terms, a father who was an assistant in an Indian spice mill and a mother who was full time at home taking care of his other 2 siblings. Being the eldest son of 3 siblings, he had to make sure he could graduate into a stable job to assist his parents in bringing the other two up. Running wasn't going to be just an evening hobby for him, it meant his future and his siblings' future. He knew he had to run, and run well at that.
His father knew if Ganesh was going to even stand a chance to perform well, Ganesh was going to need his support. He knew all too well that in school, there were other more affluent children whose parents could afford proper training and coaches. For Ganesh, he knew he would have to fill in the empty spaces as a father, coach and training mate. Starting of the training regime meant he had to learn how to coach his son with sufficient strictness, yet know how to show affection as a father and know how to be competitive as a training mate. As an assistance in a spice mill, those were the exact three things he had no idea about.
As father, he would have wanted to have money to hire a coach, to put Ganesh in a proper training school to be the best but he knew he couldn't afford it. So he made up his mind to give Ganesh his best.
His best meant stealing quick reads from nutrition books available at bookstores over the weekends, spending evenings planning out running routes for Ganesh, timing Ganesh, ascertaining areas of weakness then going back to bookstores to steal a bit reads from books on fitness and running. Lastly, giving Ganesh all the moral and emotional support as a father who wanted his son to be the best he can be.
Deep down, he didn't know how far Ganesh could go, he didn't even know if he was giving Ganesh the correct advice and he didn't even know if his training would be injurious to Ganesh but he knew one thing - it was the best he could give Ganesh.
Giving someone your best isn't about spending valuable monies on the best coach, best food, best facilities and best what not, it's about the best you have to offer and giving it with all your heart. Ganesh eventually succeeded in wining many gold medals and a scholarship to pursue his higher education. All the time his father spent at the bookstores stealing reads to fill in the gap as a coach, pushing him on as a father, motivating Ganesh to be hungry for victory as a training mate, all that put together was the what giving his best to his son meant to him.
No act is too big, or too small
"All I did was pray. If it is His will for things to be, it shall be."
That's when I reacted with the first tinge of astonishment, "Huh?".
"I don't ask anyone for anything. I never have. You know.... expectations creates problems".
That's when I reacted with the second wave of astonishment, "Huh?" again.
My initial reaction was that life can't be as simple as pray and let things happen. Or in some instances, hope that something good turns out of the prayer. But this is the truth that a pastor I spoke to believes in. In fact, something similar was said to me by a lady whom I know serves at a temple frequented by my grandparents.
"I live my life everyday doing the will of God. When I pray, God speaks to me and tells me what He wants me to do and I just do it trusting Him to provide me with all the necessary enablers to execute what He wants done. It can come in the form of financial assistance, physical help and a myriad of other forms. It's all about service."
I had to know what he meant by the above.
"Take this church for example. When I started the church believing in his voice telling me to start this church, I had no idea how to start, where to start, who to start with. But I prayed and I prayed. Eventually, God pointed me to the right direction. Believe it or not, it was as simple as looking at the morning paper's classified. In fact, I didn't typically looked at the classifieds section until that morning when I suddenly found myself browsing through it. Surprise, surprise, there was this shop lot unit for rental at a very low rent rate and I decided to rent the shop lot with whatever cash I had.
That solved one problem. Next was getting the furniture for the place. Again I prayed for guidance. I immediately started by putting up blog posts, facebook requests, and all avenues I could think of. Then slowly, slowly, I received donations in the form of used tables, used chairs, someone even donated a used keyboard. All I did was pray for guidance. Really!
No church was complete without worshipers, again I prayed and asked for guidance. I simply started reaching out to my friends, friends' friends, friends' friends' friend, neighbours, anyone who I could speak to. People of course didn't start flocking in but we started off with 5 members. Today we have well over 600 worshipers after only 3 years of service.
As we grew larger in numbers, I prayed for guidance. Soon enough, one of our members dedicated a part of his large office lots for our church. I just prayed for God to bless us, trusting Him to meet our needs and enabling me to serve all the church members.
All I want to do is for God to use me to reach out to as many as possible. There is nothing to fear because I know He will always provide for me to serve Him. In serving this church, no act is too big, or too small. From the first chair we received to the wonderful premise from our church member, it was a service to God. It's something we can't do on our own without God's hand holding our tiny hands walking us through our walk of faith. "
Amazing, a miracle, or someone delirious. I leave that to your judgement. But the point here I wanted to bring about is how much conviction one man can have when he really believes in something. Maybe it really was God's blessing or maybe it was simply that he had so much belief in the cause he was participating in that it all fell into place for him. It's amazing when you look at how he built the church he serves.
No act is too big, or too small when it comes to doing what you believe in is right. From the first tiny step of having the initial thought in your mind to actually doing it. It all forms part of the cause. Believe in yourself and every act to achieving what you want will fall into place..........
That's when I reacted with the first tinge of astonishment, "Huh?".
"I don't ask anyone for anything. I never have. You know.... expectations creates problems".
That's when I reacted with the second wave of astonishment, "Huh?" again.
My initial reaction was that life can't be as simple as pray and let things happen. Or in some instances, hope that something good turns out of the prayer. But this is the truth that a pastor I spoke to believes in. In fact, something similar was said to me by a lady whom I know serves at a temple frequented by my grandparents.
"I live my life everyday doing the will of God. When I pray, God speaks to me and tells me what He wants me to do and I just do it trusting Him to provide me with all the necessary enablers to execute what He wants done. It can come in the form of financial assistance, physical help and a myriad of other forms. It's all about service."
I had to know what he meant by the above.
"Take this church for example. When I started the church believing in his voice telling me to start this church, I had no idea how to start, where to start, who to start with. But I prayed and I prayed. Eventually, God pointed me to the right direction. Believe it or not, it was as simple as looking at the morning paper's classified. In fact, I didn't typically looked at the classifieds section until that morning when I suddenly found myself browsing through it. Surprise, surprise, there was this shop lot unit for rental at a very low rent rate and I decided to rent the shop lot with whatever cash I had.
That solved one problem. Next was getting the furniture for the place. Again I prayed for guidance. I immediately started by putting up blog posts, facebook requests, and all avenues I could think of. Then slowly, slowly, I received donations in the form of used tables, used chairs, someone even donated a used keyboard. All I did was pray for guidance. Really!
No church was complete without worshipers, again I prayed and asked for guidance. I simply started reaching out to my friends, friends' friends, friends' friends' friend, neighbours, anyone who I could speak to. People of course didn't start flocking in but we started off with 5 members. Today we have well over 600 worshipers after only 3 years of service.
As we grew larger in numbers, I prayed for guidance. Soon enough, one of our members dedicated a part of his large office lots for our church. I just prayed for God to bless us, trusting Him to meet our needs and enabling me to serve all the church members.
All I want to do is for God to use me to reach out to as many as possible. There is nothing to fear because I know He will always provide for me to serve Him. In serving this church, no act is too big, or too small. From the first chair we received to the wonderful premise from our church member, it was a service to God. It's something we can't do on our own without God's hand holding our tiny hands walking us through our walk of faith. "
Amazing, a miracle, or someone delirious. I leave that to your judgement. But the point here I wanted to bring about is how much conviction one man can have when he really believes in something. Maybe it really was God's blessing or maybe it was simply that he had so much belief in the cause he was participating in that it all fell into place for him. It's amazing when you look at how he built the church he serves.
No act is too big, or too small when it comes to doing what you believe in is right. From the first tiny step of having the initial thought in your mind to actually doing it. It all forms part of the cause. Believe in yourself and every act to achieving what you want will fall into place..........
use an eraser or liquid paper
Last week I had a very unfortunate chance to know a very close friend of mine had suffered a massive brain stem stroke. I am no medical expert so I don't know what it means but only that he is now in coma state and that his family and close friends are all hoping for him to wake up and go home with his family. I say go home with his family and to his family because I want to see them walking out the hospital together headed for home, where they belong together.
Needless to say, his wife and kids are truly worried sick and praying for him. I am fairly close to his son and seeing some of his Facebook saddens me and I don't think I would even come close to understanding the depth of sadness his family members must be experiencing.
I found this Facebook post particular interesting:
"I won't complain about the ciggy smoke. I won't whine about the TV volume. I won't nag about the bills. Please just wake up and come home."
I guess we all know, especially those of us who still live with our parents or with other family members, living under one roof is really an ultimate display of tolerance. I mean imagine a family of 4, all with different personal preferences and domestic demands. It's quite amazing to see that albeit the fact that quarrels do happen, you'll realise that it happens not as often as you would think it should or does.
Anyway, let me regress to my original purpose of this post before I get too caught up with family domestic squabbles. No matter how close family members are, there will be arguments one way or the other without fail. That's because we are humans and we think differently from each other. And, undeniably there are and there will be instances when we say or do things we wish we hadn't said or done. It's like scars, either mental ones or emotional ones, which don't go away easily and sometimes even sticks in your mind or heart until the day you kick the bucket. You can not think about these "scars" but you can never eliminate them forever.
Like erasers and liquid paper, they can erase the markings you have made but you would see the effects of the earlier markings no matter how well you erase them with an eraser or liquid paper. You'd see some minor scratchings on the paper, or the harden liquid paper on the paper. That's just the way it is.
And my point is??
My point is this - notwithstanding that there are going to be "scars" no matter what you do in your effort to eliminate them, those "scars" will continue to remain there. But at the end of the day, really, the question is, "so what if those scares are there?". There is nothing to stop you from mending those broken down relationships and to patch things up. Patchwork may not mean everything will be back to square one like with super glue fixes but it's still at a minimum a fix.
What was mention in the Facebook status I quoted says just that - differences are differences only if you let them be differences. If you can ignore them or work around it, those differences are tolerated and eventually becomes a mere anomaly in your life. If there is an issue, use an eraser or liquid paper and rewrite on top of it and start afresh!
Needless to say, his wife and kids are truly worried sick and praying for him. I am fairly close to his son and seeing some of his Facebook saddens me and I don't think I would even come close to understanding the depth of sadness his family members must be experiencing.
I found this Facebook post particular interesting:
"I won't complain about the ciggy smoke. I won't whine about the TV volume. I won't nag about the bills. Please just wake up and come home."
I guess we all know, especially those of us who still live with our parents or with other family members, living under one roof is really an ultimate display of tolerance. I mean imagine a family of 4, all with different personal preferences and domestic demands. It's quite amazing to see that albeit the fact that quarrels do happen, you'll realise that it happens not as often as you would think it should or does.
Anyway, let me regress to my original purpose of this post before I get too caught up with family domestic squabbles. No matter how close family members are, there will be arguments one way or the other without fail. That's because we are humans and we think differently from each other. And, undeniably there are and there will be instances when we say or do things we wish we hadn't said or done. It's like scars, either mental ones or emotional ones, which don't go away easily and sometimes even sticks in your mind or heart until the day you kick the bucket. You can not think about these "scars" but you can never eliminate them forever.
Like erasers and liquid paper, they can erase the markings you have made but you would see the effects of the earlier markings no matter how well you erase them with an eraser or liquid paper. You'd see some minor scratchings on the paper, or the harden liquid paper on the paper. That's just the way it is.
And my point is??
My point is this - notwithstanding that there are going to be "scars" no matter what you do in your effort to eliminate them, those "scars" will continue to remain there. But at the end of the day, really, the question is, "so what if those scares are there?". There is nothing to stop you from mending those broken down relationships and to patch things up. Patchwork may not mean everything will be back to square one like with super glue fixes but it's still at a minimum a fix.
What was mention in the Facebook status I quoted says just that - differences are differences only if you let them be differences. If you can ignore them or work around it, those differences are tolerated and eventually becomes a mere anomaly in your life. If there is an issue, use an eraser or liquid paper and rewrite on top of it and start afresh!
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