Daily Gratitude Journal

• Reading at poolside. Went to gym for jog then swim. Brought along a book to read along the poolside after swim. Enjoyed the calmness and peacefulness. And there was a cute boy there.-:)
• A fruitful therapy session. The longer session so far lasted for 3 hours. Therapist provided lots of knowledge on positive psychology and different types of relaxation exercise. Very enlightening.
• Sister went to temple and pray, brought back me buddha amulet given by the chief monk. Felt much gratitude towards sister and the chief monk. Appreciate the concern of family and friends.
• A quiet night. Decided to stay at home for some reading when the dinner appointment was cancelled. Enjoyed a quiet and peaceful night reading while listening to music.
• A simple day. Watched a variety show in the morning. went to gym for jog and swim. Attended therapy session. Came back home for a quiet and peaceful night. Enjoyed the serenity.

Call from therapist

My therapist returned my call yesterday. There was a change in appointment booking since my last visit. Therapist suggested that he would check on me on the phone before deciding when should be the next visit. I updated him on my situation and asked him to tell me what was actually wrong this time round and what should be the right path to healing.

He told me that my situation was rather chronic. This was due to the persistent problems from my ELE and was triggered by my recent failed relationship. He thought the best way for treatment was medication cum psychotherapy. He also understood that I was very resistant to medication currently. He hoped he could help solely through psychotherapy by diluting pain derived from ELE and managing present situation from now. He asked me to be patient and at least be prepared for more than six months to see result. I requested him to do a more thorough explanation on the whole case and suggest a framework for treatment during tomorrow visit.

Daily Gratitude Journal

• Met up with two of my previous students for dinner. I see them grow up since Pri 5. It's really happy to see how they grow from a boy to a man now.
• Finished a presentation material to justify for further funding. Quite surprised on the short time taken to complete as I thought it would take longer time then required. Managed to get all story string up logically.
• Received a skype chat from M. Haven't chatted with him for quite a while. Really happy to know his update, though it was not a good one.
• Managed to buy two books regarding self-enrichment. The one by Scott Peck is exactly what I am looking for. Can't wait to start reading the book.
• Having lunch with two guys of my colleague's friend. It was an enjoyable lunch sharing about perspective in life in a light way.
  

My past champion - a love always in my heart

Before H appeared, he had been the past champion in my heart since I met him in 1997. I met him in his country when Shifu brought a group of us to BKK for orientation trip. It was an immediate attraction on my side that everyone knew me would knew about my attraction to him. However, he was already attached when I met him. He was 23 years old then and attached to a British working in BKK. Nevertheless, his relationship didn't deter my attraction to him. Every time when we visited BKK, I enjoyed his company very much. He was cute, adorable, always smiling and gentle in approach. He was well-liked by all our friends actually. He was also highly hospitality. He would spend his time to accompany us all days and nights when we were there visiting. I guess he also knew that I adored him alot. When I like a person, I think it is not possible for him not to feel my passion. My love is always direct, frank and without conceal. I am a typical scorpio, but only the first half of it. It is said that a scorpio has the character of "dare to love and dare to hate".

I had never dreamt of him reciprocating my love. I was just contended to be his admirer and have his company when I was in BKK. We met quite a few times in the following 3 years when I visited BKK. In the third year after I first met him, he finally paid his first visit to sg. All of our mutual friends were so excited about his visit as we all liked him alot. Shifu generosity hosted his sister and him at one of his apartment during his stay here. Certainly, I volunteered myself to be the obedient chauffeur throughout the stay. Shijie was the tour guide to bring him around for sightseeing. We all enjoyed very much during his visit here.

Strangely and not within my expectation at all that something was growing between us during his visit here. He was reciprocating my love to him. We secretly developed our love further. None of our friends knew about this. I flew to BKK few times to meet him, we went holiday in Pattaya together. We talked over the phone everyday when I was back in sg. It was all sweet and fulfilling, but only we both knew that there was a undercurrent to be managed. He was still attached with his bf and I was a third party. It was not easy to be the third party. When he said to me he loved me the first time, although I felt sweet and touched, I felt my heart in guilt too.

We dragged our happiness for another few months until something happened that we had to sort out our relationship. We discussed, we talked, we struggled, we tried to be logical. It was very difficult for both of us but we decided that it was still the best for him to remain with his bf. The perfect love stopped at our mutual understanding. Thereafter, we tried very hard to be rationale. I really admired his mental strength. He really could hold himself very well, much better than me. We finally pull through the period and became the best of friends. In my heart, there was always a place for him.

Daily Gratitude Journal

1. I am able to contend the fear and panic at a manageable level throughout the day till now. When able the fear and panic attack came, I recite the reinforcement mantra that I am strong, I am in control, I will take thing slowly and steadily. I feel that I am a kid now, playing game with myself.
2. I finally managed to update my resume. I promise myself that I will find a job that bases me in sg so that I can develop a healthy relationship that I so desire.
   
3. I submitted my resume to a government agency. I was happy to come across a position that I think I have all the competencies. I took 3 hours to complete the application process as there were so many essays to write. Anyway, happy to see that my job searching has begun.
   
4. I talked to my CFO about tips on investment. I was telling him that I could only get about 1.8% on FD deposit nowadays. He was so helpful and gave me some good tips on managing my money. He also wanted to give me a contact who could give me a higher interest rate of 2.45% on FD.
5. I didn't agree with the SH CEO on his ways of handling work. I managed to discuss with him and put across my view to him. Finally, he accepted my rationale and agreed to follow the suggestion by me.
   

Chapter 1 of Happier

There are two things here attracted me, creating rituals and expressing gratitude. Creating rituals is introduced as a means toward change as compare to focusing on cultivating self-discipline. Building rituals requries defining very precise behaviours and performing them at very specific times - motivated by deeply held values. I will make reading, meditation and writing my rituals from now.

A research shows that those who kept a daily gratitude journal - writing down at least five things for which they wer grateful - enjoyed higher levels of emotional and physical well-being. I see this quite an easy task, will pocket this from now too. The book suggests to write down at least five things that made or make you happy before going to sleep. In retrospect, I will practise writing now for yesterday.

- morning jog: I managed to discipline myself to go for a jog to calm myself and I achieved calmness after the jog.

- Therapy session: Managed to acquire way to sever soul tie and set free my ex. This will help me to move on.

- Listening to Dhama CD : gained some peace from listening to the dharma.

- Bought the book happier : hope to gain some ways to become a more happier person.

- a less stress day at work : Nothing much happening in office. No extra energy required to handle work.

Woke up very early as usual this morning. Sat down for chanting meditation before going to bed again. The fear and panic were still there and I managed to chant "amitabha" continuously to sleep. Woke up at around 745am again, and consciously chanting "amitabha" for a while before going for breakfast.

Reinforcement exercise : I am strong, I have energy and I will deal with problems slowly and steadily.

Fourth session of psychotherapy

I related my up and down experiences in the past few days to my therapist. He couldn't provide any answer. My 17 years old self appeared aggressively while I was jogging trying to calm myself this morning. I started the conversation with him to calm his anger during the jog and I related this to my therapist as well. My therapist did a session helping me to reduce the anger of 17 years old self in me too. He was also exploring quite a bit on my will of patching back with my ex. After all the test, he concluded that I should sever the soul tie with my ex and set him free then and there. He taught me a method of severing the soul tie with my ex and setting him free. I did it again and again, not knowing if this would work in my subconsciousness. With the reassurance exercise, the therapist ended the session. He wanted me to reassure myself I was strong and independent enough to stand on my two feet to face and solve problem.

Went back to office to settle the piling work with much anxiety within me. After work I asked J out for dinner but not much interaction between. I bought a book titled "Happier" by Tal Ben-Shahar. It was the course taught in Harvard Business School. I was asked to read more of this kind of book to self-help healing. H texted to say that he was running high fever. I called him to check how he was and urged him to go doctor. He obviously had overworked himself a bit.

Come back home now feeling a bit calmer or not much feeling. I guess I am initiating my discipline to suppress any form of negative feeling. Not sure if this is good or bad, but I am strong and life is going on.

First day of work in 2008

Thinking of what to write here, but energy is so low that my mind is in the state of great confusion. Panic, fear, tiredness are all back to haunt me again. Look like I will have an interesting year to start with in 2008. Actually I was expecting 2007 was a good year for me based on the fortune forcast. But nothing came good in the year 2007. With the start of the year in 2008 like this, I guess I better reserve all my expectation for this year.

Inner fighting continues.......

Exhaustion of positive energy

haha... have been expecting this would come soon. Finally, the energy instilled into me through hypnosis has been deleted through close contact with reality. Panic attack, fear and phobia, my colorful friends are back again one after the other, after taking a day off to celebrate new year eve. My logical mind has once again been forced to abandon me. Fortunately, the counter didn't reset to zero this time. This at least is the only thing that I feel a bit released. There is also another important learning experience. I need good discipline and confined environment to grow the inner energy, if not the energy will go depleting.

I look forward to the session tomorrow and see how I can progress next.

My limited knowledge on body, mind, soul and spirit

Therapist was suggesting to work on my crunched soul and spirit and build a defense system to guard from further harm. He further stressed that I might need to go back to primary school kind of routine to build up all form of discipline started with simplicity. eg. morning wake up, brush teeth, take breakfast, read paper, go to school, lunch, ECA, dinner, study, sleep. To put it simply, it is just to build up a simple routine and abide to it for a while in order to nurture the growth of soul and spirit. Not till the party was over yesterday that I finally understood what the therapist meant by building a simple routine as a foundation to grow soul and spirit.

The real environment is just too harsh for a crunched soul and spirit. The soul and spirit, without a proper defense system guarding it, is vulnerable to be hurt again and again. This is because one will be rather weak in discipline to manage oneself to react to the reality. I went through the entire process vividly in yesterday party. My ignited inner energy got diluted after some incidences happened. I saw my defense system at work trying to shield it from further harm, but the external force was a bit overwhelming that my feeling was still pretty much been affected.

I always recognized only body and mind in my practice. I would exercise and watch my diet to maintain my physical health and fitness. I would practise meditation, reading, music, etc to build a stronger mind. I always included soul and spirit in the same class as mind. So naturally, I thought my routine to keep mindfulness would take care of soul and spirit. Not until my experience with hypnosis that I realized the dimension of soul and spirit was much more profound than what I had expected.

Hypnosis in action - revival of soul and spirit

I was as usual too exhausted yesterday, went to bed at 1030pm. The moment I laid on the bed, I received a SMS from H "Dear dear.. nite, miss you" I stared at the SMS blankly, didn't know how to react. I had been trying to keep away from H knowing that I had no will to resist him. I texted back my feeling to say I miss him too. He texted back and asked to meet soon for meal. I could only agree to any of his request. I managed to sleep half an hour later. It wasn't a good sleep and I woke up at 2.30am. Couldn't get myself to sleep again, I wrote some of the articles for this blog till 5am. Sunk myself back to bed trying to force sleep but my mind was just too active. I was in real bad angry mood when I dragged myself out from bed again at around 9am. I tried hard to control the emotion in me. I watched a taiwanese variety trying to deviate my attention. The variety finished at 1130am just in time for me to go for my therapy session.

I reached the therapist's office and saw that the office was not opened. I thought the therapist forgot about the appointment. With some disappointment, I sensed my anger rising. I tried to suppress the negative emotion and called the therapist on the phone. When the phone was ringing, I was released to see the therapist appeared from the lift.

We started updating my recent events and I related to him the explosion of landmine few days ago. I told him that I was reset to zero again or maybe even worst now with some anger in me. I later produced a summary of the major disaster in my life since young and went through with him on all the events. I saw myself getting angry with helplessness. Looking at the events unfolding, we both agreed that there wasn't a time for me to breathe since my "O" level. The therapist understood now better why I was in such a bad state. The therapist started analyzing my situation and we explored about healing plan.

He explained that the past experiences had crunched my soul and spirit. He intended to work on healing the soul and spirit. He explained the procedure how to talk to my 8 year old self inside me trying to dilute the pain incurred during ELE. This would help to strengthen inner energy for self growth. I asked him whether hypnosis would work on me. He thought for a while and started hypnotizing me trying to reduce my fear and panic in me.

After a brief procedure, he asked if I could feel any different. I told him nothing was obvious. He explained the procedure and he tried again. I started to feel a bit calmer. He then asked me to sit on a reclining chair. He first asked me to recite after him to strengthen my own belief. He then did the same hypnosis on me. Next, he started using music therapy. He played healing music to sooth me for a while. He followed by reciting some positive statements to strengthen my inner energy. The whole procedure was about 20 minutes I think. I woke up feeling rather calm. He noted that and he suggested that we would do the procedure more often to heal the soul and spirit at the mean time. At the same time, he also would help me to build a defense system to guard my soul and spirit from further harm. I left the office feeling a bit better than when I was there. I deliberately didn't want to judge the effect of the hypnosis, then I proceeded to gym for my jog and swim.

I met C there and we had a good chat. We joked about the new year eve party at his place later at night. I went jogging to the peak of Mt Faber again before I plunged into the pool for ten laps swim. By the time I finished the gym, I felt bliss started to engulf me. Slowly and increasingly, I felt inner energy has been ignited in me. Not too long later, I felt I was out of depressed mode totally. I didn't know how much I could keep the bliss. I tried some of the procedures myself hoping for more sustained peace.

I went back home and napped for a while before taking dinner. I wrote this blog still with much bliss engulfing me till now. It is really a miracle experience for me and I am trying to leverage on it for full recovery.

苏州寒山寺的一百零八钟声

Suzhou han shan si has a big big bell. Han shan si will sound the bell 108 times during the lunar new year day. There was a beautiful story relating to this 108 bells. The way to sound the bell is important and requires meticulous technique. It is said that when the bell is sounded, the hell realm will fill with light during the vibration sound of the bell. The hell realm is normally dark and the beings in the hell realm are suffering for its own karma. The light that comes with the sound of the bell temporary liberates the suffering of the beings in the hell realm and allows them opportunity to read and learn Dharma so as they can get enlighted and be liberated from the suffering. If the bell is sounded too fast and short, there will not be enough time for the beings to read the dharma. If the bell is sounded not continuously, it will be difficult for reading as there will be many interruption in between. Therefore, it requires high technique to keep the sound of the bell continuous and lengthy, slowly, stable and one after the other.

This situation is very similar to my logical thinking. Most of the times, I consider myself residing in the hell realm now without logical thinking. When the logical thinking is back to me, I am just like seeing the light in the hell, I will temporary get enlighted and liberated. I can see clearly my attachment and suffering. I can be mindful and detach easily the unnecessary. When there is no logical thinking, just like there is no light in the hell realm, I am suffering from depression and struggling with all kind of attachment

I need ways to lengthen the sound of the bell in me in order to build inner energy to liberate from my current situation.

师姐的百宝袋

I met up with shijie for dinner on friday night at Sizzler, the restaurant we haunted quite a lot 3-4 years ago when we were still in good term. We didn't require anytime to re-familiarise with each other. The closeness just rekindled the moment when we met. The laugher started right after we met. The time with Shijie could never be boring.

Knowing my down, Shijie was trying all his might to make me feel light. With his 百宝袋, Shijie had got no problem to contend my gloominess. Shijie had a bag similar to 小叮当的百宝袋. She would take up the 宝物 slowly one by one and entertained me. I was very amused on why there were so many things in the bag. And shijie had the power to make all the things in the bag interesting.

Happy times went fast, we chatted till 930pm after 3 hours of dinner and coffee break. I drove her back as usual. We managed to turned back the clock 3-4 years ago. Everything was still the same, except that I was down with depression.

Taking refuge under Buddha

Shifu and I paid a brief visit to Phor Kha See Temple yesterday. PKS was conducting year end Om's retreat till 2 Jan. I was a bit moved when I heard the familiar Om mani Padme Hum Chanting. My ex-colleague happened to call me yesterday and told me that she would be going down after work to join the retreat. As I wasn't free yesterday night, I decided to join her on Sunday

I woke up as usual on Sunday monring. Dragged myself out of bed for paper reading, then went to gym for jogging and swimming. After gym, I headed to temple at around 1110am to join the chanting. I joined both the 2 sessions in the afternoon, 2 hours per sessions. I hardly practised tibetan chanting when I was active in buddhist circle. This was my first time joining such chanting.

I never tried so hard in a meditation like what I did here. I was using all my might to focus, to be mindful, in hope to heal any wound deep inside my heart and build a stronger mind to overcome hurddle in life. I was fully exhausted after the two sessions both mentally and physically. I didn't know if I had achieved my aim but I could at least temporary got hold of my mind when I was chanting. H appeared many times during the chanting and I was able to observe and manage the feeling on him. My failed relationship had also surfaced. I could also let go when I was chanting.

It was the session that I thought I had full control of my mind again. But the mood swing hit me lightly again right after the session. I managed to contend it with the fresh gain minfulness.