11.28.2016

Samu't Saring Kyeme 2016

2016 – Grabe ka lang. 7 inch ovarian cyst. My lola’s passing. Benjie’s lola too. Kantar First. Year I said goodbye to SG. Duterte. Trump. Passing of David Bowie, Prince, Thailand’s longest monarchy, Fidel Castro. Brexit. Extension of my probation for the fist time. Marcos’ burian sa LNMB. Ano paaaa? Gaaaaah.

Pero sabi nga, perspective lang ito. Have to look at this as the year that teaches me a lot of things. To look at things on a bigger picture and learnings. To be more prepared and less complacent. To pray more. To reevaluate finance and plan for the future. To live more and worry less. To be more open-minded. To be more understanding. To learn how to stand on my own and ask for God and friends’ help. To be humble. To be positive always. To maintain a positive attitude despite all chaos. To accept things that I can’t change. Unconditional love. Hope. Faith about fate.

There’s a reason why I listened to Steve Jobs’s speech this year about attitude and outlook about failure. About not fearing failure. About drive. About pursuing things that you feel meant for you regardless of what other people think. To fear nothing. To appreciate death. An d to keep going no matter what as there is always hope. Believe in a brighter future.

And I’ve never been prayerful until we faced so many challenges this year. Grabe lang yung bugbog na ko sa challenges pero in fairness, with the help of prayers and friends, I’m surviving an uneasy phase of my life here in Thailand. It hasn’t been easy to be in a totally foreign country, alone, with no friends, and language that I don’t understand. I’m very much willing to learn but this is really not easy, considering that I’m learning how to live alone again, without any social support, and learning how to do CS, how to work along others and understanding our company’s tools. IT IS REALLY NOT EASY. But in God’s grace, I pray that I get this through and become successful in time J

***

2016 has not just disrupted my personal life and the world as well. As we can see with Trump, Duterte, Brexit, Putin and stuff, there is clearly a shift towards a conservative perspective – self-preservation and security but within your group only. Unfortunately, as a result, there is less respect for women, human rights and diversity now. Perhaps, we can see this as a failure of the liberals. We’ve probably become too “atas” and dismissed the opposition’s opinions as dumb and senseless when in fact, we should be understanding them instead and address it in a way that we get their support, rather than alienate them.  The sad cases of Hillary and Roxas were obviously the same – the clamor for decency versus the conservative ideas of Trump and Duterte who promised extreme changes in the government to make the country “great” again. Simply put, the call for “decency” and “intelligence” meant that the opposing groups are indecent and dumb, hence calling them “tards” and all bad names. Gloomily, this strategy had backfired, making the candidates lose despite their high credibility and capability to govern.

Nonetheless, we shouldn’t just get ourselves dragged. Instead, the more that we have to continue fighting but with a different mindset – instead of putting the others’ opinions down, we should challenge ourselves on how we can make them understand our point of view  and why it always right to fight for what is right.

***

Speaking of what is right, the biggest tragedy in Philippine history is when the highest body of justice serves the president instead of the people. Consequently hailing Marcos as legally entitled for a hero’s burial. A N Y A R E  P O??? This just made 1986 People Power useless and our history twisted. That the Marcoses did nothing wrong when in fact it has been proved that they stole billions of dollars from the people. Amount of which we are paying until now. And the scarier part? Marcos Jr has an impending case in the Supreme Court and looking at the trend right now, mukhang mananalo siya sa kaso niya.

God bless the Philippines na lang.

Another form of tragedy though is that instead of people coming together to oppose Marcos’ hero’s burial, they went to their own groups and prioritized their own propagandas. Kesyo ang mga dilawan ay ganire at ang mga pulahan ay ganyan. Anak ng tipaklong! Hindi pa pwedeng magprotesta bilang Pilipino na may malasakit sa bansa at hindi bilang myembro ng kung anumang grupo? Iniisip ko kung mauulit pa ang People Power sa EDSA. Yung tipong kusang nagtipon-tipon ang mga tao. Walang kulay. Walang pangalan ng organisasyon. Yung taos puso lang na nakikipaglaban para sa bayan. Kelan kaya mangyayari yon? T_T

God bless the Philippines na lang ulit.

***

Mabalik kay Steve Jobs… This year, I’ve finally finished all Gladwell books (after finishing David and Goliath). Actually, si Steve Jobs, nasa Outliers. Pero after watching the documentary about him, I’m thinking kung dapat ba siyang nasa Outliers or David and Goliath? He was an adopted child in a not so well-off family anyway. Or pwede sigurong parehas. Anyway, I love both books. I love all Gladwell books nyahaha! Kahit pa sabihin nilang he tends to oversimplify things. Well, he probably does but it does not mean his observations are invalid. He offers other perspectives of looking at things like spaghettis and happiness, how we can change the world, and how one succeeds.
So ang medyo may conflict nga between Outliers at David & Goliath. The former discusses about how advantaged people get successful. And this is good because it is very humbling. It says that one does not simply succeed because of his innate or trained abilities but instead, one is also a product of his time, place, race, culture and specific circumstances. Hence those who already have advantages on these things will of course tend to succeed (in case of Steve Jobs, he grew up in Silicon Valley and have been exposed to programming and computers at a very early age). Whereas, David & Goliath tackles how people with disadvantages (like dyslexia, being orphans, etc) shouldn’t be discouraged because there are ways to battle giants using strategies where they are good at. In any case, I think, to some extent, both books are enlightening and encouraging. That actually, anyone can succeed. And one factor that I’ve noticed is that successful people are driven and game changers and they don’t let other people’s perception hinder them from fulfilling their dreams – regardless of having advantages or disadvantages.

On another note, I also particularly like Gladwell’s podcast about generous orthodoxy. That we must find the balance between the 2 because orthodoxy without generosity leads to blindness – just like the belief in absolute truth may lead to extremists and aggressively putting that belief’s agenda ALL THE TIME. In the same way, being generous or just being open to any other idea and not sticking to one, if not a few, is just shallow and empty. I guess this is something that the world needs right now. Just like seeing that different people like different kinds of spaghettis, we have to learn how to respectfully live in a world with fragmented beliefs while not losing our own beliefs as well. And that’s probably a key to world peace.

May peace be with us all.

J