Year 2024 reflections & Year 2025 resolution?

 My end of the year was spent looking out at fireworks from Level 8 of my brother's condominium. The facilities level has two big and long swimming pools, therefore it has a wide panoramic view facing the KL city centre. Fortunately there are TNB station and highways adjacent to the condo, therefore there is no other tall buildings blocking the view. Me and my parents crossed over to new year with a big crowd of residences, shouting "Happy New Year!" with them. We bought KFC but didn't have the appetite to eat while waiting for 12am, due to many people around.

There were some fireworks to the left side, which started 5 minutes before 12am, presumably by some condos' management. At 12am, fireworks were set off at TRX and Sunway Velocity, which are exactly at the middle of our panoramic view, though some parts of the fireworks were blocked by buildings. Further right, near the condos area, there were also fireworks. But the most impressive one is the one just in front of us, fired from the empty parking lot with food court just behind my brother's condo. The first round was not really impressive, so we didn't expect much. But the second and third round have vibrant colours and unique patterns, which awed everyone. The distance was just perfect to enjoy the fireworks. I wonder who sponsored this one - the condo management, the food court, or just an individual finding the perfect spot to lit fireworks?

While waiting for 12am, I was scrolling on my phone and saw many friends posting about their 2024 reflections, almost all are about being thankful for the new meaning of life with their spouse and child(ren). I'm happy for them, and lately I realise that I like looking at children's antics while they walked past, and I even smile unintentionally. 

Tried to have some meaningful conversation with my mom, and she also prompted me few times to talk instead of both of us just staring at our phones. But besides some shallow conversation, I don't have any topic that I would like to talk about. In the past, we would just talk about everyday things easily, and the words just flowed smoothly, directly from my mind. I could talk about what I think about anything (life, work, crazy ideas, teasing). But after that incident (not the one in previous post), I'm sure she can feel it too, there seems to be a thin barrier now between us, and I filter some things before sharing with her. I wonder, is it because of:
(a) I know now that I can't be my truest self anymore in front of her without being judged.
(b) I realise that I'm too much of an adult now that there are some things better off not to be shared with her and better to keep by myself. (which I think is a good thing, as we shouldn't feel that we need to share everything of ourselves)
(c) I'm just a bit overwhelmed with work and tired to care about anything else.

My reflections for year 2024? I think this year is about my own realisation about social connections. After just finished reading "Still Alice", my take from the book is that, no matter how outstanding we are at our work/profession, we shouldn't miss out to spend valuable time with family and friends, because companies will forget us once we're no longer useful to them, but family and friends are the ones who will still stick with us through thick and thin. (Although unfortunately, there are exceptions if someone just happened to be born into the wrong family or have the wrong friends.) Also another realisation, based on personal experience, I believe that some things are better just kept as secrets to myself. It's nice as a treat, secrets exclusive to myself, and also save some troubles of creating bad feelings between me and others.

Year 2025 resolution? Fortified by many small things that I've observed and being inspired by, I would like myself to be remembered as someone who has touched certain people's life in just a small, good way. I may not be a great inventor or Nobel prize winner who change the history of mankind, but just having a positive, small influence in someone's life would be enough to make me happy. My past motto in life is to be humble, and I even set this as my password to many things, to remind myself every day. Now, the motto will be, "to be humble and treat everyone with the sincerest heart". In work, I'm working not to fulfill the expectation of meeting management's goal, but to pour my passion and ability to serve the people whom I can contribute to, i.e. the beneficiaries (which I'm helping very, very indirectly), my colleagues (sharing my knowledge of ERP to help them with their work which contributes to providing aid to beneficiaries). My brother doesn't agree with me about working too much overtime for the company, but I guess he's looking more from corporate perspective, but I'm just looking from altruistic view. 

But I have to be careful also, not to become a people pleaser!!! I must enjoy my own life too, and may I don't lose my own principles and values! May I have a conscious mind to think sensitively and not go into automatic mode of saying "Yes" to all requests. (I once helped my friend to cheat during exam, and till now, I'm still wondering, why I can't say "No" when I know that it's wrong.)
And of course, not all people should be treated with the sincerest heart. I trust my gut feeling to differentiate people whom I will like and love, from those whom should just remain as acquaintances.

Welcome, year 2025!

Destined to be Happy Loner?

 A friend once wished for me to be alone (not lonely) forever, without being married and having children. I know this is not an ill-wish, and I don't feel offended at all. I just have been curious, what does he see in me that made him wish that? Is it because of his own life experience and he sees something in me that's similar to him, and he knows I would be more suitable to live life alone? 

But I have always know this. I know I enjoy being alone and I can find my own happiness from doing things that I like and just following my instinct. But sometimes, it's common for human to yearn for things that they don't have, so I also wonder, will I be happy also with a married life (provided it's a happy one)?

Today I went for Japanese N2 test. At first I was very adamant on going there by myself. It will feel like a small ceremony for me, to take on the MRT, doing some revision in the MRT, and walking to the Confucius school where the exam will take place. By then, I would have prepared myself to face it, no matter whether I pass or fail. (I'm prepared to fail, since I even have problem doing the mock questions. If I pass, it will be a very lucky, near-to-passing-marks kind of pass.)

But as always, my ever so 'protective' parents want to follow and send me to the examination hall. Some might say I'm not an appreciative child. But I have been constantly battling within myself, between the yearn of being treated as an independent adult, being allowed to go out by myself and given the trust that I have the capacity to overcome whatever danger I might face; versus the feeling of guilt of not giving the chance for my parents to participate in my life, and sometimes gaslighting myself, telling myself that I will miss this moment in future. 

I don't like this feeling at all. Why must I cause guilt to myself and accept something that I know I will often look back and regret, and as I'm not too good at hiding my feelings in front of close people, my negative emotions will spill and might hurt people near me. Example today, if everything goes right, I would be going to the exam by MRT, took the exam, then happily go window-shopping with my family to celebrate whatever results it might be. But instead, I felt bad in the morning for being transported around like a child, then felt a little bad for not doing so well in the exam (it's my bad for doing last-minute preparation as usual, but it isn't so bad because I can always retake the exam), then had no mood to go shopping and lunch. 

How nice if I am given that nice trust by my family to do whatever I want. How I envy my friends who can go out of house whenever & wherever they want. Even me going to Seremban to visit my friends were also being stopped by my parents for few times, and sometimes due to guilt (of not spending time with them), I give in; but other times I fight through my own self-inflicted guilt to do what I really want.

Why can't my parents just refrain their 'clinginess' and just understand that their child is adult enough (in fact, 30 plus!!!) to lead their own life? With me being happy doing my 'loner' stuffs, then only I can happily spend some quality time with them, without spilling out my negative emotions. Perhaps my 'loner' time is the time for me to relax and dissipate any negative emotion, to ensure that the cup is left with more positivity when others look into it.

Today is the first time that I actually search for the meaning of 'loner'. Google says that it means a person that prefers not to associate with others; someone who prefers being alone to spending time with other people. I feel that these definitions totally match my state of mind. Even in the turtle conservation program, I don't mind just sitting and observing people, without being involved in their conversation. Perhaps being in a jungle treehouse, monitoring tigers would be a suitable occupation for me.

I even discover that there's a song called "Happy Loner" sang by Marina. There's also a Korean two-episode drama called "The Happy Loner", about an individualist, who avoids relationships with others, meeting another person who can't live without having relationships. I shall watch it someday. It must be a great contrast, and although a love story is nice, in reality, I think relationship with opposite personalities might not last long.

To end with a happy note, I managed to tell how I feel to my mum (through Whatsapp message 😅), about me needing my personal time alone to recharge and then only I have the energy to engage socially. Glad that I have the courage to express myself, sometimes it's hard to tell our real feelings to our closest people.

Ok, off to do some exercise, as I think this lack of exercising recently also affects my mood and mind.

2 weeks of holidays ended now. It's time to buckle up and be committed, proactive and positive in facing work challenges!! 💪(Hope this pep talk works in tricking my mind to propel forward until finishing year-end closing, and hope I'll have some changes in my life next year!)

(Written on 2-Dec-2024, but I had published and retracted the post back and forth, because I'm not sure if anyone would be interested to read this, and also I was not ready to share intimate and vulnerable side of me. Reading again on 1-Jan-2025, I felt, "Who cares?! I do what I want and it's just a record of my life." Besides, not many people know this blog of mine. So now it's published publicly!)