Loving yourself.

The one thing everyone is uncomfortable with, and yet it's the one golden key to happiness. It's not exactly a secret, and no one is afraid of you knowing this, because even if you do, it's hard to actually do it. It takes time to learn to love yourself. We were brought up to shut up about ourselves. We were taught to be humble. And we end up turning down compliments. And we end up getting hurt easily by the comments of others.

I'm not going to list out everything you have to do to love yourself, because I believe that it's not a technical process where you can create an algorithm and get the same results in the same amount of time. I believe it's a journey you have to take on your own. Know more about yourself, and accept that. Love yourself like you'd love your child- unconditionally.

I have to say, it took me a long, long time to get to where I am today emotionally. I went through a lot. At one point when I was just 14, my self-esteem was so low that I felt sorry for existing. I felt like I was wasting the frickin air. And somehow, (with the help of a tiny bit of serotonin), today, I'm proud of myself. It takes a while. It's never an eureka moment. It's really just like a wet rollercoaster. There are ups and downs, and occasionally a bucket of doubt splashes over your head. Just don't ever give up on yourself. Keep going no matter what, even though you feel like you're not worth it.

You'll get there one day. <3

Sunday, 26 April 2015.

So yesterday, I finally got my new laptop for school. An Asus Zenbook UX303L. Mom paid for it, but knowing her, she's probably going to try and get that money back. Anyway. I'm really excited to finally have my own laptop, but because our home computer isn't working this is also, in a way, my Mom's laptop as well since she needs it to do adult stuff like job searching or the complicated housing stuff, I don't know. But anyway. I'm still not a 100% satisfied, (yes, I know, ungrateful greedy little bitch) because I want a laptop that's truly mine to own. Mine to be 100% responsible for. Don't get me wrong, I'm still 100% responsible for this one, except because my Mom keeps borrowing it and doesn't know how to care for it, I'm afraid she might make something go wrong by accident and then blame me.

I've always wanted to be independent and responsible, it's always been a part of my ambitions as a kid. I know I whine and bitch about it from time to time, but if and when I succeed, I'd be really, really proud of myself. Recently, I've come to realize what makes a person proud of a country. From what I've read and observed, people usually get really patriotic when the country started from nothing and yet was able to be independent and achieve great success. The thing that made me start to onder over this was a Q&A video Ant and Dec did, answering a question about why geordies are known for being patriotic and love being from Newcastle upon Tyne. If I remember correctly, they had the Tyne River to do imports and exports, and did very well as a region without much help from the rest of the country. This reminded me of Singapore. I won't describe our history because it'll take too long, but all I can say is that I get to be a patriotic Singaporean thanks to what Mr Lee Kuan Yew (and his team) has done for the country. So there.

I've been thinking about opening my own bank account. Just for myself. Since, well, there's a huge lack of communication between me and my parents despite us desperately needing it; and things are too complicated to get emancipated. And that would be a whole new level of terrifying. Anyway. I'm just rambling at this point. I don't know if I'd like these kinds of updates on my blog. I'm gonna leave this here anyway. Bye now.

BOOPBOOP

One of the people whom I admire. Look up to. Hannah Hart does My Drunk Kitchen on Youtube and is absolutely amazing. Basically, the most fun cooking show you'll ever watch. Honestly. I say I admire her because not only do I love her videos and what she does, she kinda taught me more about responsibility and being able to go through tough times. Then again, anyone who's a good older sibling and an amazing person is an inspiration to me because damn Mitchel can be really irritating sometimes.

Everyone has difficult periods of their life. Some have it pretty bad, but everyone deserves to get out of it one day and be happy. But those who survive and come out as a better person with an amazing successful life will always be an inspiration to me. I know it's incredibly creepy that I'm this interested in others' personal lives/backgrounds and I'm a massive stalker, but I still do it. Hannah is such a positive, cheerful person and you'd never think that she'd ever gone through a rough time, but man. I won't list everything out, but I will say- her being able to handle all of that and still manage to be the person she is today is remarkable.

I don't quite remember where I was going with this, I kinda just wanted to write something. ^_^ Just check out her channel.

Creators.

If you don't know who Thomas 'Tomska' Ridgewell is, well, he does the asdfmovies. And recently he tweeted about why he doesn't have and/or want a fandom. And I respect him a lot for this- he wants his audience to like his creations, and not him. Because in a fandom, most fans adore whatever a creator creates, as long as it's not offensive. But I have to say, doing such a brave act in the entertainment industry is really, really risky in my opinion. I feel like he's losing fans and people are starting to lose interest in the asdfmovies- with repetitions and the lack of content (referring to just the asdfmovies), he'll need to work a lot harder to make other content that's not 2-minute long asdfmovies.

He's made quite a few good ones, I really like the real life sketches that he films and not animates- maybe I'm just not interested in cartoons. Unless they're actually done well. Like adventure time. And gravity falls. Personally, I feel like it's not worth writing a good script and then wasting it on half-assed animations.

I probably have no clue what I'm talking about right now, and I may sound incredibly shallow and ignorant about the entertainment industry. But if I could learn more about it and see if I really do have a passion for it, I might just have another thing to be excited about. Because I've been interested, and I've tired reading up on the topic, except I'll never actually be sure of anything that I read online. Perhaps this is just all part of getting into a new passion, except I can't go around talking about it as if I'm highly experienced. And I'm reluctant to just go "Que sera sera" and leave it alone, because that is how dreams die. Or slowly wither and break apart.

Since I'm just admiring others' work for now, may I just mention David Walliams. I loved Little Britain, and I've never watched it but apparently he wrote the Ant and Dec show. I'm sure it went brilliantly, and he sounds absolutely amazing in Ant and Dec's autobiography. He's great in Britain's Got Talent, but I have no clue what he's trying to do with his children's story books. I haven't read any of them, I'll do so soon, but why..? I can kind of understand; I've always wanted to be a creator no matter the form, but I've always been a bit too lazy and the passion was too weak. And this is why I've started to build a career in business or something office-y, since the entertainment industry is such a risky and difficult thing to understand, much less make a living out of it. It sounds horrendously pathetic, but it's true. Especially if you're here in Singapore. Mediacorp needs to up its game. Goodness gracious.

And our words would take us halfway round the world.

I may have finally decided on my one favorite song. And it very well may be staying that way for a while. It's called Always Gold by Radical Face.

It's a song where I can relate to every single lyric because I can understand every emotion that lyric is meant to have. It's a song about friendship, the kind that I want. It's the ultimate friendship goal, or whatever they call it these days. And I like to think that some of my closest friendships are pretty similar to whatever's going on in the song.

Why I relate to it so much will take forever to explain, and anyone who isn't my best mate will never actually care to read and/or listen to it.

So let this be my little inside story between me and my closest friends whom I deeply love.

We were tight knit boys
Brothers in more then name
You would kill for me
And knew that I'd do the same
And it cut me sharp
Hearing you'd gone away

But everything goes away
Yeah everything goes away

But I'm going to be here until I'm nothing
But bones in the ground

And I was there, when you grew restless
Left in the dead of night
And I was there, when three months later
You were standing in the door all beat and tired
And I stepped aside

Everything goes away
Yeah everything goes away
But I'm gonna be here until I'm nothing
But bones in the ground
So quiet down

We were opposites at birth
I was steady as a hammer
No one worried 'cause they knew just where I'd be
And they said you were the crooked kind
And that you'd never have no worth
But you were always gold to me

And back when we were kids
We swore we knew the future
And our words would take us half way 'round the world
But I never left this town
And you never saw New York
And we ain't ever cross the sea

But I am fine with where I am now
This home is home, and all that I need
But for you, this place is shame
But you can blame me when there's no one left to blame

Oh I don't mind

All my life
I've never known where you've been
There were holes in you
The kind that I could not mend

And I heard you say
Right when you left that day
Does everything go away?
Yeah, everything goes away.

But I'm going to be here 'til forever
So just call when you're around.

Thanks, man.

The things role models don't teach you about.

After three long weeks of waiting, Ant and Dec's book finally arrive.

I'm only a chapter or so in, and as the first autobiography I've read, it's really good. But reading about these people that you admire and look up to, who usually have pretty great relationships with their parents, is a little tough when you put the book down and go back to a home that doesn't really feel like home anymore.

No one really talks about it because anyone who does is usually deemed unpopular, but if you think about it, there's no real reason as to why that person should be judged that way. I'm sure every child wants a good or at least decent relationship with their parents, but everyone has flaws and everyone makes mistakes, so what if your parents have made a really big one? They're allowed to make those mistakes, we can all understand, but maybe more of us can also try to understand that their children might've lost some respect for them. No matter who you look up to, who your role model is, if they've made a mistake, losing respect for them is still something that happens.

So I went back and watched Joey Graceffa's Draw My Life video again, because I remembered that he had (or has idk) an alcoholic mother, and he'd lost some respect for her. No one really tells you how to deal with these things, even my psychologist just told me to ignore everything. Yes, Ms Psychologist, it's a hard thing to do, but at the same time it's not something I might even consider doing. And yet these adults (and their brainwashed children) judge us for being rebellious and disrespectful. I don't hate my Mom through and through, I just strongly disagree with many of the things that she does, and sometimes when she doesn't quite understand what I'm trying to say, I tend to raise my voice a little. Then again, so does she.

It's not something that can easily be fixed. But at least listen to our side of the story for a change.

Their names are Ant and Dec.

...I need to stop being interested in men over 35 years. This is starting to feel creepy ._.

Well there. Familiar faces, you feel like you see them everywhere- they're hosts of Britain's Got Talent and a whole bunch of other shows. Except everyone else who's not in the UK just dismisses them off as, well, 'those guys from Britain's Got Talent'.

Recently I've realized why the UK loves them so much. Not gonna go on about why they're so perfect and everything- I just really admire their friendship. I've many great friends, not really, I just keep a few hella good ones. But even these hella good friendships that I have will probably never be comparable to what Ant and Dec have. Like damn. Aside from that, they've made me that much more interested in what goes on in the entertainment industry.

So I've bought their book Ooh! What a Lovely Pair (great title lol not) and have eagerly waited three weeks for it to arrive.

Aaanyway. Graham Norton.

Great show, hilarious host, celebrity guests suddenly have a sense of humour.

I'll never get used to watching a TV host get interviewed; he's usually the one interviewing other people. But today, I somehow stumbled across a video and realized that he's written an autobiography too- called The Life and Loves of a He Devil. I looked it up, it's $30+ (in SGD), so I had to do a little more research on whether it'd actually be worth the money (I'm pretty much broke at this point).

I watched mainly videos of Graham Norton talking about the book and trying to promote it, and from there I stumbled across another video of him starring in an episode of Who Do You Think You Are (another great show- looking into celebrity family trees I think), and watching him talk about his love and relationship with his home country Ireland. I doubt most celebrities would talk about that, so that was interesting to hear. Also, unlike Ellen Degeneres, I don't think Graham Norton talks about his own opinions or life stories on his show a lot. So it'd be nice to get his book and read about him for a change.

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I've realized that I'm a pretty artsy person. I appreciate it, but like everyone of my friends who feel the same way, we all know that we can't go anywhere in life trying to find a career in arts. It's really sad, but it's the truth. Which is why I made the appeal to go from Visual Design to Business Enterprise IT. It's pathetic. I may have to give up my dreams on psychology, even. We'll see how things go in poly.