170723 A Year On

I’ve forgotten about this sanctuary.

I write in so many different places that it’s hard to keep track. The different journals, mediums, writing style, content..

It’s been a wild year. I dropped out of my previous college and traversed through uncertain paths guided by nothing, not even blind faith. I went from excelling as an Architecture major to learning about communications and media to studying computer science. Now, in my current school, which I’m about to begin my second year in 2 months, I hope to specialise in a track where I can learn technical skills and knowledge in Intelligence Systems, while gain experience in Product Design. It’s a tall order. I also gained new hobbies in the new environment: bouldering, kayaking, 3D Modelling.

It’s a daunting path to thread. I can eschew passion and follow the most lucrative and obvious choice which my friends have taken, to go into Software Engineering. However, during these few months of summer break, I have been interning and working with older colleagues mired in pointless office work. What seemed to be novel at first quickly became dreadful. Before long, I realised that my attitude and outlook towards life have gradually shifted and I was becoming like my colleagues: frustrated with work, ranting about pointless drivel with nothing to dream about but their paycheck and retiring.. My body took its toll too. I used to be able to deadlift sets of 130kg prior to the desk-bound job but now my back is weak and it’s easier to lounge on the couch than hit the gym after work..

I guess my main takeaway from this internship wasn’t any new skills but the realisation that I don’t wanna work dead-end nine-to-five desk-bound job.

Last year this time, I was very in tune with myself. How do I explain it?…I liked who I was and was okay with it, it was the first time when I was okay with my looks, my imperfections, my loneliness. I went into my new school being my most authentic self. I opened up my introvert self and met many new acquaintances and friends, much more than the two years I spent in Architecture. I also met this person who approached me first at the start of school and we became good friends. There was this special aura about them which caused me to be my least guarded self around them. I hit it off really well with them and in the first few months, I had a crush on them. However, they were already attached, I didn’t tell them and I was alright with that. I was alright with that if I hadn’t formed an impression of their partner being a bad person after getting to know them (after umpteenth times where they have confided problems in me, and the lapses in common decency)..Still they are together so I tried to distance myself but I always end up being closer to this good friend…

I have been trying my best to extinguish these feelings I have for them and my worries for them being with a bad person.. I have been trying to forget for months and I don’t know if it will ever go away. My other friends whom I confide in advised me to confess my feelings and if things turn south, then so be it..

This is the only conundrum in my life right now. Pretty dumb… I am knowledgeable and skillful in my domain, I have a pretty healthy body, I think my values are morally sound and my future is promising, yet this is the only thing that bothers me. If anything, I seemed to be becoming closer friends with them unknowingly. I don’t want to and will never do anything to jeopardise this friendship. It’s one of the rarest kinds of friendship and I can never destroy it.

My worry for them may all be for nought too. Even though their partner has treated them abhorrently, and has been a giant red flag, somehow they always manage to patch up and they seem to be able to tolerate the bad behaviours more now. It’s really none of my business to intervene in anything, I’ve mentioned my opinions before and that’s that, I may have the wrong perceptions, and maybe they are right in their decisions and choices. Then again, maybe they’re so blinded by feelings that they fail to see how toxic their relationship is.

Of all the entries on this site, I think this would be my most private and vulnerable one. If anyone who knows me chance upon this, I wouldn’t want them to relate it back to me.

After a whole year of dropping out of my previous college, I realised that a lot has changed. I no longer feel comfortable being me. I haven’t really done much of the things that brings me peace or joy. I have been too caught up in presenting myself as a flawless individual in my new school environment that I seemed to have lost a part of myself. I have been conflating my being alone with my crush on this person.

It’s also been a year since I last spoke with the counsellor from my previous school..It’s been a weird year and I guess I should check out the counselling service in my current school, since therapy outside is too unaffordable.

Why did I ramble and write all these? I am not too sure. I have been journaling in various places and this was one of them which I forgot. I guess I just wanna sort out my thoughts and perhaps dump some of the things that have been bothering me, since there’s no one I can say all these to. The only person who should hear parts of this isn’t available and I don’t want them to hear it because I am afraid of the consequences of breaking ties with them..

Maybe I’ll return to this entry in a year and laugh at how childish my writings are, yet how wonderful it feels to be like a child while in this decaying adult vessel.

Being 250522

I’m not active on this blog, it comes to mind occasionally. I started this blog penning thoughts and feelings (for someone) I had back when I was still a kid but now I pen my thoughts in a physical journal…and I still feel like a kid.

Since the previous post, I took a semester leave from school, learned some stuff and worked a bit. I applied for transfer to other universities and completed a semester taking Comms electives while waiting for any news. It’s been quite an eventful year.

Many things changed: my outlook on life, the stuff I interact with, the things I’m studying, my hopes and aspirations. I’m still somewhat unclear about how my future will turn out, but I’ve learned to take small persistent steps. I’ve also learnt to be more compassionate to myself. I received and accepted an offer from a local university recently and will be majoring in an IT course, which is quite different from Architecture. I think I’ll manage. I have been playing a lot more indie games this past year, some of which were amazing, maybe I’ll one day work in a related field to game development.

I’ve kept a list of quotes from famous people, usually on themes of life, dreams and existential stuff. One of the quotes was by Tupac, and it reads,

“..by keeping its dream, it learned to breathe fresh air…”.

I’ve been reminding myself to do things that I enjoy doing, rather than chase prestige and wealth. It’s a difficult thing to do especially in a meritocratic and capitalistic society but life is so limited and ephemeral, that it’s only wise to do things I enjoy doing. I’m still trying…

It’s nice to post random stuff on an anonymous blog, it’s like venting into the void.

I always draw on worksheets, notes, journals, and any paper, so I guess I’ll add a drawing here too.

If You Live Each Day As If It Was Your Last, Someday You’ll Most Certainly Be Right

After a year in Architecture school, I’ve decided to take a leave of absence.

Yesterday, after barely a month since the start of the first semester of what would’ve been my second year in university, I approached my tutor after our Interim submissions to discuss my candidature going forward. It was a really difficult and psychologically torturous few weeks of school but after consulting, and opening up vulnerably (which I don’t usually do as an introvert with a stoic facade) with my friends and close ones, I decided it was time to get off the speeding train where I’m unsure of where I’m going.

I don’t know what happens from here.

In Singapore, a student like me follows the straightforward and fast-paced route of primary school, secondary school, junior college and then military conscription before joining university. I do not know where I’m supposed to be if I don’t know what I’m supposed to do in uni. I’m an adult now but still feel as lost as I was a few years back. It feels like defeat and weakness to step out of the rat race for awhile. People my age, or even younger, are studying in courses that could promise good careers, are graduating and building up their portfolios, are participating in projects and stuff beyond school curriculum. Meanwhile, all I have is a year of Architecture school credits that will probably go down the drain. I spend sleepless nights on my school work with no time to build the different aspects of my life. I feel like I’m lagging behind others in a competitive race.

The straw that broke my back was the multiple breakdowns I had in the span of the past 10 days. I know I could do the work (I treat my school projects as work which says a lot) I was supposed to do but there was a cognitive dissonance in my mind. The only reason I’m putting up with torturous work was because I was blinding my heart with my past semesters’ good results. I have aced my previous semesters but I do not feel the joy in it. I feel exhausted everytime I did work. I tried taking on a side community architectural project thinking that a sense of purpose was what I needed to propel myself in this course but it was also tedious and dreadful. I don’t dislike Architecture. I love experiencing Architecture as a user and occupant but Architecture school was different.

I have to be honest and true with myself, this is not what my life will be.

I don’t know where I’ll go but hopefully this break will clarify the fog in my mind. I finally opened up about my vulnerabilities and sought the help of many others. I’ve befriended multiple new friends in this short span of 2 weeks of discussing my problems openly. I’ve appreciated how willing people were to go out of their way to help me, even if we had just met if I were to open up and be true.

It’s a weird interstitial moment in my life right now. I’m unsure what will happen after but I will be able to reflect upon it in retrospect.

If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.

Stay hungry, stay foolish. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Steve Jobs’ Standford Commencement Speech

Steve Jobs’ Commencement Speech and Paul Graham’s Essay were inspiring reads that I have come back to everytime I felt how I currently feel.

Maybe I’ll return to the course, maybe I’ll transfer to the Communications and New Media course, and maybe Industrial Design. I don’t know if I truly like these courses or if I crave the prestige or money that the careers hold.

Was the title of Architect a reason I’m here? Yes, partially, and that I thought it was at least more sustainable as a career than drawing and painting.

If I were to choose CNM as my new course with the plan of being a UXUI designer, was it because of the supposed decent salary? Yes, partially. Will I enjoy it? I don’t know. Next, I’ll have to find out How I can know.

The Whole Earth Final Issue Back Cover | Google Images

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I really wanna cry.
But somehow the tears won’t flow out, the welling up in my throat won’t go away. I don’t know what to do.
I know I’m artistically gifted, I knew after since kindergarten. And somehow thats my link and source of feeling not useless, of some purpose or value or something. The only reason for being me, and for being so different. I know I’m weird, I don’t fit in, I shy away from others, I have problems being at ease in new situations. 
I did really well in Sem 1, way beyond what I thought I could be. And I really, really want to hold on to the grade, an affirmation from the outside that I can be better than others. I don’t know what I am.
This semester started out on a wrong foot, I didn’t mentally prepare for the difficulty I would face. I don’t wish for all toughness to go away but I wish I was strong enough to face them. I spent three weeks reiterating and reiterating and reiterating designs that even my professor is frustrated. When he said that my idea wasn’t answering the assignment, and that I have wasted time, my heart dropped. I’m sure he could tell and would very much wish to not waste his own time on a futile student. He told me I hadn’t any more time and that I could only stick with what I have. It felt like the panic attack hit, its that same feeling. The only thing I could muster to ask was 
” is my concept bad, like, would it not make it?”
On hindsight that was an embarrassing thing to say, it definitely made him shun me more and there were my classmates starring at the mess I am. I wish to forget all that and just end it all. He did gave a politically polite answer that it depends on how I develop it.
The ride home, thats the only rumination in my head, that I’m done for. I’m gonna fail. I’m not gonna perform as well as I did last semester, my grades are going to be trashed, I don’t have that many S/U credits and I’m overloading on mods this semester. Like a temple bell, my head echoed those few thoughts. 
I don’t wish to be a difficult person, and I know I’m the cause of my own demise. I can count with half a hand the number of people whom I even talk to on a semi regular basis. None face to face. I don’t even have good relationships with people at home. Sometimes I just wish to sit carefree and talk to anyone, a stranger, anyone who hasn’t known me.
That night I was snotty and teary eyed, I messaged Y cause he’s the only person I have ever confide in but that day I only told him “I miss him”. We proceeded to video call and he could tell but I didn’t wanna be self centred. I wanna know what was going on in his life, maybe that’d lighten my mind. 
But this whole weekend, all I could think about is how utterly destroyed I will be in the final week I have before crit. The crippling feeling of impending doom, that nothing will get better, the crushing defeat I face when I wake up everyday. The comments that will be said before and after the crit, my will to even finish this semester. I’m needy and whinny and selfish. 
I feel like a helpless kid in a huge meaty body, sometimes I wished I could be more and do more than who I am. 


“I am the cowboy of my own trip, and”


If there’s a God above I wonder how he had planned this life. No accomplishment, a background noise, a difficult person, lonely and undeserving. 

Stucked, Stressed and Sad

University has just begun, it’s only been a month or two but I’ve already had a few 48-hours days. The pace is overwhelming; unbearable. My first assignment was done really well. I did better than my peers, partially because of my talent and visual/drawing skills. My second assignment was so-so, it was still quality work but I felt that it didn’t quite hit the mark. Currently I’m on my third assignment, a heavy 10% weightage of my first semester, and the deadline is in 6 hours.

I feel really lost.

My initial proposed ideas for the assignment were turned down by the Prof but somehow my peers got to utilise my ideas after that. I’m stucked with a half-decent idea suggested by my Prof. I know my current work isn’t quality but I can’t give up even if I know it won’t score well.

It’s that lingering feeling of doom approaching.

I’m working towards a hopeless cause. When I consulted my Prof days before, I mentioned my lack of confidence in my current work. She echoed the same opinion, “I’m not confident too”. Like whiplash, sending a jolt through my consciousness, grounding my presence back into the moment. I’m gonna fail. It’s a sick feeling, knowing that failure awaits at the end, and there’s nothing I can do to pause the flow of time. Every effort I make won’t save me, my talent rendered useless. I’m gonna be the only student that regressed and disappoint. I know I’m not fluent or eloquent in my speech to salvage my shortcomings in presentation.

Lately I know I’m also experiencing burn-out, its barely 2 months into school and I’m crumbling. I realised that I haven’t many close relationships to even freely discuss my feelings with. It’s really depressing. The counsellor/therapist I talked to years back also disappeared within 5 sessions and I never sought help for all the knots in my mind. It’s been a decade of ups and downs, many unresolved issues, half of my life.

I’m considering my uni’s counselling service, its supposedly free and they are supposedly helpful. The only thing holding me back is the lack of time (to even sleep) and the spontaneity of school-based learning (currently most lessons are online, a trip back and forth would devour 3 hours of usable daytime).

This is a lengthy rant but also one of few outlets I have as an anxious, depressed introvert. I kind of miss serving the army, it was a different life, I could be detached from my past. I didn’t do well in my junior college exams, back then my mind was entangled 24/7/365. I didn’t have any help, my parents were skeptical of therapy but provided me with a few sessions. Now I feel inferior to my peers, I don’t understand why one of the first things people would want to know about anyone would be my previous school and results, as though that made up the bulk of my existence. I feel like I’ve just scrapped the bottom of the barrel and was lucky enough to get into this course because of my past art experiences. Everyone seems to be progressing so fast, learning and reading so much more. They are eloquent, witty. Maybe it’s an issue on my end, maybe

I’m just not good enough.

Excerpt From My Journal

I tried to meditate today. I wanted to feel my environment, the surroundings. I want to feel the smoothness of the lacquered wooden floor underneath my soles, the hard mattress I laid my palms on. I wanted to internalise the sounds carried by the breeze past my ears, and understand the magnitude of the room, its boundaries and its place in a structure like my place in a universe. I put down the phone, it clouds my eyes, it doesn’t allow me space to occupy my own present daydreaming. I want to go back to how I used to experience the world. The feeling of slithers of wind carried through my hairs, the echo of a distant basketball. The sight of traffic meandering down the roads below. The understanding of how high above in the air, in this room, in this building, I stood. 


To feel again, and see beyond the digital cloud.

 If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you will most certainly be right.

2005 Graduation Speech, Steve Jobs


There’s a disconnect, I cannot feel my ghost in its shell. Rather, my current understanding of myself is more like a mannequin or the clothes it dons, like thin casing/fabric altered to the contours of its environment. I don’t want to continue being a void.

If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I’m about to do today?

2005 Graduation Speech, Steve Jobs

An amalgam of junk

I just can’t shake off this feeling, the cobras singeing my skin. An endless suffocating spiral, crushing my insides, wearing my bones thin. I just wanna shed this facade, write on a fresh block

but my shadow stalks my feet. Like a rusted clock, still strikes in twilight’s fog. An amalgam of junk, a poisonous concoction, I cannot shake off my soul, the parasite leeches, I won’t stab the scab again.