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My subconscious tore me to pieces.

Ariadne: Why is it so important to dream?
Cobb: Because, in my dreams we are together.

Cobb: Dreams feel real while we’re in them. It’s only when we wake up that we realize something was actually strange.

Cobb: I miss you more than I can bear, but we had our time together. I have to let you go.

Mal: Do you know what it is to be a lover? Half of a whole?

Mal: You keep telling yourself what you know. But what do you believe? What do you feel?

Arthur: With the slightest disturbance, the dream’s going to collapse.

Cobb: Look at you. You’re just a shade, a shade of my real wife. How could I capture all your beauty, your complexity, your perfection, your imperfection, in a dream? Yes, you’re the best that I can do. But, I’m sorry, you’re just not good enough.

Cobb: She locked away a secret, deep inside herself, something she once knew to be true… but chose to forget.

Cobb: The moment’s passed. Whatever I do I can’t change this moment. I’m about to call out to them. They run away. If I’m ever going to see their faces I’ve gotta get back home. The real world.

Some lines from the movie really strikes a chord in me, just sharing with a slight re-arrangement to match how I actually feel or hear from the whole story. Guess I could relate to it in a different aspect and in general, life.

People dream of happiness, to know how it feels like to be in love, to be in control of something that makes them happy in life. Yet not many people know the true meaning behind a relationship and how little things can affect the feelings between 2 people. Sometimes people hold on, for different reasons – mainly because they knew what they had before and believe that things will change for the better. However, when this dream collapses, you wake up to reality that is harsh and you realize that you have been obsessed with your own dream and never realizing that the moment has long gone – nothing is going to change. You come back to the real world eventually because you choose to lock yourself away and try to forget, be it returning with regrets, hatred, remorse or simple happiness that you once remembered from these memories.

On a side note, Leonardo DiCaprio definitely has a home run with Inception. Ellen Page is as usual, just an eyecandy with the average sidekick acting skills, along with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. But best film I’ve watched so far this year. Christopher Nolan, impressive !

Tags: ariadne, arthur, christopher nolan, cobb, dream, ellen page, eyecandy, film of the year, happiness, homerun, inception, joseph gordon-levitt, leonardo dicaprio, Love, mal, reality, relationship, sidekick

‘Rough Patch’ vs ‘Relationship Chicken’

Marshall: If they can’t stand each other, why don’t they end it?
Ted: Neither one wants to be first. They’re playing relationship chicken.

Disclaimer : I really love HIMYM and I am actually re-watching episodes from  the 5 seasons when I have the time to, so bear with my random quotes/reviews of the episodes.

I think in ‘How I Met Your Mother” season 5, Barney and Robin’s relationship was mainly to  satirize everything couples  go through – from the mushy stage to hating each other’s guts.  The episode mentioned the term  ”relationship chicken”  which refers to the situation when neither person wants to admit the relationship isn’t working out.  On the other hand, Lily pointed out that all couples go through the ‘rough patch’ – getting used to each other and understanding each other better.

So when do you know you’re being ‘relationship chicken(s)’ or just going through a ‘rough patch’ in a relationship ? If there are times when you feel unhappy about everything – but that not exactly bad enough to kill the relationship – are you just undergoing this so-called rough patch?  Or are you playing the ‘relationship chicken’ by refusing to see the depth of the problems and brushing it off as it is probably just the usual lows that couples go through and that you should be working out over? When do you know you should hold on to that faith in the relationship ?

Sometimes you have 3rd parties who comment (be it knowing the details, or not) and you stop to ponder if they have a ‘clearer view’ over the situation than the deluded self you’re being. In chinese, there’s a saying that goes ‘當局者迷，旁觀者清’ which roughly means ‘the onlooker sees more of the game’. However, I think it is really up to the two parties involved to actually see for themselves for what they truly are. Like Barney and Robin, both of them were starting to lose themselves and you could tell that they were unhappy – even if they seem to be happy in each other’s companionship. They were better off as friends – and the breakup ? We know that it was not the end but just returning back to how it has always been for them – friends.

Would that be possible to happen in reality ? Does it really means happiness when Barney returned to say ‘Daddy’s home.’ ? (Of course in later episodes, we see that Barney isn’t entirely truly happy after returning to his old single self.)  It’s really kind of hard to tell isn’t it ?

Tags: Barney, daddy's home, HIMYM, How I Met Your Mother, lily, marshall, relationship, relationship chicken, Robin, ted, the rough patch, 當局者迷，旁觀者清

Love Yourself.

Future Ted : Kids, there are two basic philosophies of how to handle yourself after a breakup. Some people throw themselves into..

Robin : My career. That’s my number one focus right now. From now on, no more dating, it’s all about work.

Future Ted : .. while others throw themselves into..

Barney : Every woman in New York City ! That’s right, Barney Stinson is back on the market ! Mothers, lock up your daughters.. Daughters, lock up your MILSWANCAs !

- How I Met Your Mother “The Playbook” (S5E08) *awesome episode by the way*

Very much like Robin, I have been throwing myself into my summer part time job and planning for the upcoming term. Number one focus is to get my life back together, find and love myself again before I learn to love another. Cliche as it sounds but I think it’s the better than the latter option because 98% of the time, you end up hurting someone new because it ends up like a rebound or you don’t learn from your previous relationship mistakes but rush into someone new and continue to make the same mistakes over and over again.

“Don’t rush into any kind of relationship. Work on yourself. Feel yourself, experience yourself and love yourself. Do this first and you will soon attract that special loving other.” – Russ Von Hoelscher

Some people think that it is a good way to move on when you find someone new, in fact, I had friends offering to ‘matchmake’ or introduce guys to me (which I’ve all kindly refused).  During one of the conversations, my friend asked “So what kind of guy do you like ? Can’t really tell your ‘pattern’ apart from the fact that you always end up with ‘hot tempered/emo people’… ” (in which I laughed out loud because come to think about it, it’s quite true..hur) So she suggested that I should write a letter/blog post to remind/prevent myself from making the same ‘mistakes’ – like how Ted would write to Future Ted after each breakup…just that this will be a summary of all the past relationships (haha)

So Dear Future Ingrid,

Remember this : “When you struggle with your partner, you are struggling with yourself. Every fault you see in them touches a denied weakness in yourself. “- Deepak Chopra

If you start to feel that your partner is having expectations of you, that’s because you feel that you’re not good enough. Instead of complaining or finding faults in the other person, remember a relationship is not just something to ‘take’ from but to ‘give’ as well. If you feel that you can’t meet the ‘expectations’, don’t be afraid to voice it out and find other ways to fill that ‘gap’.  Trust is the main key to effective communication and foundation to hold any relationships.  It can’t be found in words but through actions. People will find out the truth no matter how hard you try to hide it so don’t bother telling lies or covering up. To love is to risk not to be loved in return. When you love someone, it may not mean that you have to be with that somebody. Find someone who shares the same mindset/beliefs/values. Love doesn’t count on the laughter that you shared but on the pain and tears you tried to get over with just for the sake of holding on. To understand is to listen, not what your partner says but what he/she does not say.

Actually, enough of all these nonsense. Just be yourself and love yourself. Like what Ted Mosby said :

“Kids, you may think your only choices are to swallow your anger,or throw it in someone’s face.there is a third option you can just let it go, and only when you do that is it really gone,and you can move forward.
And that, kids, was the perfect ending to a perfect love story. It just wasn’t mine.

Mine was still out there waiting for me.”

God has his plans for you. =)

So…Thank You(s) for the calls, the SMSes, the DMs, the tweets/plurks, the msn conversations, the talks, the meetups with attempts to make me feel better lately. I am truly blessed with wonderful friends around me and I really appreciate all the effort ! Sorry to cause all the worries but like the following quote :

“But in the end, the most important thing to accept is that no matter how alone you feel, how painful it may be, with the help of those around you, you’ll get through this too.” – Scrubs

Just give me the space and time too eh ? Thank You once again =)

Tags: Barney, breakup, effective communication, expectations, future ted, How I Met Your Mother, listen, Love, love yourself, perfect ending, perfect love story, quotes, relationship, Robin, russ von hoelscher, scrubs, ted mosby, the playbook, trust

Moving On – Easier Said Than Done ?

Life can still change with the blink of an eye, so does relationships with others.  Sometimes when a relationship has been damaged, we learn to deal with them and move on. “Time will heal” they say, but how ?  After a term of reading about relationships (one of my module in school talks about such things) and personal experiences, here’s 5 tips that I gathered :

1. It takes time to repair a damaged relationship. You will experience resistance initially but you have to commit yourself to doing what it takes to get the relationship back on track.

2. Share your feelings, listen to each other’s concerns. Sometimes what we end up saying might just be plain outrageous and hurtful – sometimes we don’t even recall saying/doing whatever that was shared. It is hard not to get defensive but resist the urge to act on these feelings and be patient with each other.

3. Apologize and seek for forgiveness, even if you don’t feel like it’s your fault. It removes the barriers between each other and it is important to spend time together and talk about various issues that might affect your future relationship with the person.

4. Don’t let pride get in your way. There’s no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in a relationship, if you start to justify your actions (which is most likely to happen) – stop and listen.

5. Make a sincere effort to get back on your feet, on your own. If you’re strong enough to face yourself, you can face anything in life =)

Relationships with people are a funny complicated matter, in which I think we all go alil mad sometimes. It’s definitely easier said than done to repair a relationship and there are tons of books out there which act as  ’guidebooks’ in a way or another. Who should we listen to ? What’s the right step ?

I guess I chose to observe and learn from my own past experiences – follow your heart.

Tags: apologize, damaged, feelings, guide, life, moving on, pride, relationship, resistance, tips

Have a ROARing Valentine !

Happy (overrated) Valentine’s Day ! Oops, I forgot the year of Tiger (my year!) kinda took away the fun for all the hallmark greeting cards and big bouquets of roses most girls are expecting. Come on, Vday shouldn’t be just for this ONE day when you’re in love.

This day is just totally over-hyped ! What’s the point of being sweet for just one day and being ‘normal’ again for the rest of the year ? It should be spontaneous and just surprise your loved ones every other time you feel like it !

If you want to give me a Valentine’s Day present, give me a gift of love that will last my lifetime !

Not forgetting, Happy Chinese New Year ! I hope couples out there made the ‘right’ decision to spend the special day with family as well. ‘Luckily’ for the boyfriend, my family decides to escape from Singapore for CNY (since we don’t have relatives here) for a short Batam getaway (my first time too! Will blog about it when I’m back!) so he doesn’t have to face that dilemma. Hur.

Have yourselves a happy holiday nonetheless =)

Tags: batam, chinese new year, cny, cupid, getaway, hallmark greeting cards, Love, roses, singapore, valentine's day, vday, year of tiger

Overheard On The Bus : Money Over Love ?

Earlier this week, I overheard this bunch of secondary school boys chatting among themselves on the bus.

The conversation as followed :

Boy A : 我长大以后，我要有多多的钱咯！(When I grow up, I want to be really rich!)

Boy B : 我要 chio bu 老婆！(I want a pretty wife!)

Boy A : 不用啦，有钱 then 你要几个老婆都可以咯 (No need, you can have as many wives as you want if you have the money.)

Boy C : 可以买 meh ? (Can I buy them?)

Boy A : 你有钱 then 她们就会来咯！(If you have money then they’ll come to you)

I’m appalled to hear such comments from the boys, especially when they are just secondary school boys (say 13-16 years old?) With that kind of mindset, I really doubt the ‘bright future’ of our society. So are you trying to say that with money, you can ‘buy’ girls ? Is money really everything ?

Another point worth mentioning is – why are girls being viewed this way ? Is it the way we behave or stereotypes of how most girls simply just dream to marry into a rich family and be ‘Tai Tai’s ?

‘When you’re in charge of money, you’re in charge of your life’. Money is certainly important and most parents would agree that you should marry someone who shares similar social class background. Rather than ‘gold-digging’, I’ll advice girls to be financially independent and pursue love instead.

At the same time, don”t be duped by romantic unrealistic dreams and regret later on in life. Smart individuals earn their own money and find your own happy love story ending at the same time…and gain that respect from the opposite gender.

Would you choose to marry ‘Money’ over ‘Love’ ?

Tags: boys, bus, gold-digging, independent, Love, marriage, money, overheard, relationship, secondary school, society, stereotypes, tai tai

The Designer’s Love Letter

I had such a good laugh over this so I decided to share it on my blog (after editing alil) – Thanks Chris !

Before you came,
my life was as boring as the white Locked BackGround layer,
but now that I have known you,
you have added.. many Layers to my life..
Filters to allow me to see aspects of myself that I have never seen before..
You, have Masked away my flaws, marqueed away my bad habits,
I will head to the Photoshop, to print out as many happy memories as possible..

You Illustrate my life with colour,
I have been Live-Traced by your fingertips.
Vectored into completion

Your body, has more sexy curves than a Sans-serif Font.
I will make a font for you, and together we will attempt every letter.
We can call it the FONTASUTRA..

You are my Lorem Ipsum, the one to fill the empty spaces with words when I have none to use..

I will make our HOME(page), an epitome of perfection,
no leaky sink pipes,
no broken links!
and a comfort to navigate around, even in the dark..
We can Flash each other in this personal space,
where it can be either a fast or slow interactive process,
with your choice of streaming music in the home!

You are my Dreamweaver, even though you still give me the occasional nightmare.
Our home and email inbox will be Comletely Safe and Secure(CSS) from from thieves, burglars, spammers, hackers, nigerian money scammer and the like.
My Personal Hygiene Practices(PHP) means I will shave, never have bad breath or body odur..
and my knowledge of HTML(How To Make Love) will be a cup never filled,
and no table will be spared..(dining room table, kitchen table, living room coffee table..)

You are my (adobe)Bridge that calms my entire extended family(Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, rebel RAWs and Deviant Jpegs)

My diamond ring to you, will only be of the Final Cut (Pro)..

My wedding vows will be lovingly Copywrited..

Our wedding Soundtrack, will not feature anything from Garageband, only Protools and Soundtrack Pro

You are my MacbookPro, we will spend many late nights, either doing absolutely nothing or creating something beautiful and useful.

I will touch you more than I touch my iPhone..

Even when we grow old and senile,
I will make endless podcasts to myself beforehand, so that I wont forget you..
because then this Really Senile Seniorcitizen(RSS) fears nothing, except the loss of happy memories with you,
and his xbox360..

My life, My love indesign for you..

Tags: adobe bridge, CSS, Design, designer, Deviant jpeg, dreamweaver, filters, final cut pro, flash, garageband, html, illustrate, indesign, iphone, layer, lorem ipsum, love letter, macbook pro, mask, photoshop, PHP, protools, RAWS, ring, RSS, san-serif, soundtrack pro, vector, vows, wedding, xbox360

Ever Yours,with Love.

It’s a Saturday afternoon in December of 2008. With a Toffeenut Latte at RafflesCity Starbucks, I was waiting for the boyfriend aka ‘Daryl the Shitfu’ anxiously after long months of him being just a 2D figure on my screen. Months of chatting online till wee hours (since he was in Canada for exchange) and never-ending emails, finally we met up to have our Toffeenut Latte ‘real date’ and xmas presents exchange. Rather awkward to see him again after so long but glad I agreed to meet him instead of waiting for the school term to start ! (What a difference it might have been!)

And the story continues when we evolved into this ‘complicated’ status on Facebook (social media dependents..lol) which eventually became this not-so-complicated relationship of ours. Of course, Love is never perfect- we both shared our emotional ups and downs in the relationship from the start. Somehow, it’s the seemingly bad and counter-emotions that enable us to appreciate the positive emotions or happy times together.

There are moments when we could possibly be the most insensitive prick to eachother’s feelings which resulted in even more communication breakdowns or disagreements. To make matters worse, we’re both just as hot tempered and stubborn to listen or give in when we were arguing. I’m glad we are learning to listen and understand, respond to the other person as who he/she really is, having more patience with eachother now. Not easy to state all the changes he/I have made over these 12 months – Something new for the both of us but I guess it’s a good thing because if  you don’t love and care for someone – you wouldn’t bother to change ?

Not to get all mushy, but we definitely put in alot of love and effort into this ‘long yet short’ one year. Despite our differences, I think we’ve grown alot from this relationship and learnt to appreciate each other more each day. Things may be awkward at times because we don’t know how to handle the situations, but I believe as long as there’s love – we can overcome these obstacles =)

Looking forward to each and every coming anniversaries together, with trust and the love we bear each other, I hope it will be sufficient to make them blessed…Thank you for loving me =)

Love is a magical thing, it just happens – and I may have met my awkward ‘perfect’ match

Happy our Anniversary to all ! Hur.

Tags: 2008.2009, anniversary, boyfriend, canada, christmas, daryl, exchange, facebook, Love, rafflescity, relationship, social media, starbucks, toffeenut latte

Idealism and Illusion

There’s always the ideal relationship which is based on our own expectations, experiences and perceptions. The relationship that we’re currently in has its own set of conditions which then provides a context for these expectations and makes each relationship unique. These relationships have always been “ideal” until they bump into the reality of it that we get into troubles. Troubles in a subtle sense of insecurity or uncertainty or inexplicably feeling awkward at random occasions. And when you let the ideal of  your relationship overshadow the reality – you are lost in your own illusion.

Sometimes you are afraid of losing – losing the familiarity, losing the “love of your life”, losing to yourself for believing in something you thought was “right”. As devastating as it seems, you may have failed to notice something that’s amiss in your relationship and running away from reality instead of confronting it. Romantic illusions are deceptive/seductive but molding yourself or your partner to someone they are not in order to create an ideal relationship is not the foundation of what a true lasting committed relationship is based upon.

Most of the time, you just have to work out the differences together and compromise while accepting he/she for someone you fell in love with in the first place.  If allowances are given to adjust, most of the time I think couples do become stronger under duress and the relationship would most usually endure. However, if problems are failed to be addressed, it’ll just lead to even bigger issues in the future and it gets even more destructive. Regardless how perfect a relationship may first appear to be, it’s usually just a flawed illusion that can be easily destroyed. Those “Happily Ever After” are woven illusions with defects that are never mentioned, sometimes such idealism may just sabotage your life.

Optimists should continue to hope otherwise. Hur.

–

What do I love about my relationship is -  as much as it appeared to be perfect from the start, we do have our hiccups along the way and I dare say it was not exactly smooth transitions during the past 8 months either since we are almost opposite individuals with rather different thinking/value systems. One thing I’ve learnt is that a relationship is not just 2 people being in love but helping each other to grow and discover the good in themselves while not ignoring and letting the worse gets by.  You don’t mold yourself to become someone you’re not but to someone better in general – there is a difference.

Just want to say “Thank You” to the boyfriend for sticking together through the good and bad, happy and sad times.

Tags: boyfriend, conditions, differences, expectations, experiences, happily ever after, Idealism, Illusion, losing, Love, love of your life, optimists, perceptions, reality, relationship, romantic, troubles

AOTW [6] : The Rocket Summer

I think a good singer should always learn to play a musical instrument or two, else they are just “idol singers”.  I prefer to support singers who can write and compose their own music.

Don’t be fooled by the name “The Rocket Summer“, it is not a band but a solo project by @Bryce Avary – who is on twitter too !

I have to say, even though I thought I’ve quit that “rock era” since polytechnic days, I really enjoyed his music because it  really perks me up to blast his songs at night. You can find some of his live performances on youtube which I thought was really good in terms of  vocal quality and the atmosphere.

Apart from the usual rock, I think The Rocket Summer has really good emotional lyrics that I find most important to me when it comes to liking a song.

I like “So Much Love” and “Do You Feel” but I still prefer one of the older songs “That’s So You” which has this rather raw feel to it.

The lyrics is quite meaningful because lately I’m really just having a bad time but having the boyfriend around makes things so much easier to tolerate. I think it is also important to be proud of your other half in a relationship too, who wants to go out with someone whom you’re ashamed of ?! Be it the person as who he/she is or what they do for a living etc. You’re in love not because you love to be loved and wants to be in love – but to love the person as who he/she is wholeheartedly and being proud of his/her achievements, even if it’s just minor things like…er..winning a game on FIFA (haha).

I’m such a  sucker for sweet lyrics, what’s new ! Enjoy the cute fan video, I don’t think they have an official MV for this song =)

That’s So You – The Rocket Summer

It’s a beautiful day
Now I’ll be ok that you’re not away
Yesterday was a terrible day
But now that you’re here I’m ok
Cause you don’t know how much I, I need you
Please don’t go
You’re so wonderful
This I swear, this I know

You, oh you, every single thing you do
I’m so proud of you
What you do
When you do the things you do
They’re so you

So thanks for your help
You shine so bright
You are the star that’s in my sky
And I am yours and you are mine

I’m so proud of you
That’s so you

Tags: aotw, boyfriend, bryce avary, do you feel, emotional lyrics, fan video, FIFA, idol singers, instrument, live performances, love wholeheartedly, MV, myspace, rock, so much love, solo project, that's so you, the rocket summer, vocal quality