In recent years, I have become more observant than I had been in my past. I think the course that I'd chosen to take is slowly changing me. I have to admit that if I want to ignore a person, I am strongly able to do so. That's the part of myself which I am able to either be proud of or scared of. When I have decided to ignore a person, it will be a very unfair part I am playing in that relationship - doesn't matter if it's work relationship, friendship, family... I am not a good person. I get annoyed with people's personalities. I am judgmental, which I should not be if my dream of becoming a psychologist is to be pursued. Even at this age, having lived in the world for three decades, I am still sometimes questioning myself whether am I in the right path, am I wasting my time, am I missing out, am I too late for this, am I making the right decision, and the list is never-ending. As a human being, taking out all the biopsychosocial factors in life which can be quite impossible, we have a natural tendency in competing... we are inclined to compare ourselves to other people. I had just earlier read about an article headline where it says: "Successful people don't compare themselves with others". I speedread the article because it was not an article I was searching for at the time. However, the keypoints I got from the article was that we need to have a learning mindset and not to compare ourselves with others. Mark Twain quoted that "comparison is the death of joy". The article had advised us to observe from the great, and learn. We break down what we learn, and then reconstruct it to make it our own. It's brilliant, don't you think?
Anyway, after such a long introduction, my point of this entry is to tell you about what I had observed yesterday when I spoke to my sister in law. Talking to her made me think about success, personality of course which was obviously from her upbringing, and I reflected on the way I had my words roll out when I conversed with her. I immediately could tell the difference in the way we view things and the way we had expressed ourselves. During the conversation, I noticed that she had barely used any negative expressions or words to describe circumstances. This may sound ironically like a comparison which conflicts the article I talked about earlier, but really, not being in a defensive mode towards my own pre-judgment towards myself (you see my own battle is myself, the fight is just endless. hilarious me.) but it did make me think about our differences - our environment, our faith perhaps, our social groups, our daily encounters, our views and perspectives towards life and people, etc. I had been introduced to her for almost a decade now (pardon my love of using the word 'decade', but I really love it. It sounds very whole.), and even though we talk to each other sometimes twice or thrice a year only, I have always absorbed only positive things from her. The way she's religious and pious but without showing it on purpose, her easy-going aura which makes people (like me, the antisocial freak of the family) feel pleasant and comfortable. She just returned to the city from a more rural state in my beautiful home state, and she's pretty excited about the access and availability and the technological advances of things here. I had asked her how did she like it back there and instead of using the word "boring", she used the word "routine(d)" --> honestly I'm torn between using it as a verb or an adjective. Either way, it's not that important for now. I found myself complaining about my current circumstances, with the use of negative emotional words, of course. I self-entitled the complaining action because I had just recovered from feeling really down to the point where I had brainstormed on ideas for escaping work. Even though it was a short conversation with her, I had learned that I should apply what I had taught to employees from one training session to another in my previous company. Use positive words, not trigger words. Another thing I have realized about myself lately is that I seldom apologize anymore even though I could have been contributing to some mistakes at work. I have become defensive again - the old, as in 2011 me.
Anyway, I find myself struggling or am trying too hard sometimes, when I need to build a reputation for myself while conversing with people... that things turn out the other way round. Dang! Through my whole afternoon of reading online articles related to dealing with people at work, personalities, and qualities of a great person, etc, I came to re-realize that I complain a lot. I badmouth certain people to people who are important to me. In the process of doing so, I might have slowly lost the important people in my life - not physically, but in the name of closeness or trust. Dang!
I'll train my brain to be less sarcastic, to not think of a person badly, and to re-adapt good values in myself. It's not that hard, is it? It is hard, it will definitely take time. Being less sarcastic is going to be a challenge though. Sarcasm, when it comes from me, is funny. I love funny. Okay dang, now I'm being a narcissist. I'll stop talking now, but Allah, please help me to be a better person.
