Later uncle come and catch you!

I was on the train with my mom and I took out my water bottle.

"You're NOT supposed to drink on the train!" Mom said.

"Mom, I have a 1 hour and 30 minute ride to school." I replied.

"If you get caught by the train staff, they will fine you!"

"Mom, I look around before I drink. No green shirts"

"Ah see, see! Green shirt coming already!"

Random stranger walks past.

"Mom... I'm 21 already."

Studying is Tough!

I was studying personal attraction and close relationships today.

Absolutely distracted by the topic.

Every line I read made my mind wonder off.

-

As I walked into the library, I mistook a random girl walking past for another girl I knew.

-

Having studied Freud last week, and having just studied interpersonal attraction, I wondered...

Was that really a genuine mistake?

Was I secretly liking the girl I thought I saw?

And was I subconsciously hoping to see her?

Me

-


I was sitting opposite my gender studies lecturer in her office for consultation. She said,


"The only people who study gender are women, or guys who are sexually marginalized."


That was some time after I told her I wanted to do a minor in gender studies.


-


I was standing opposite one of my fellow youth leaders in church. She said,


"Justin, you're only acting effeminate right? You're not actually confused about your gender right?"


I was taken by surprise. "Acting? What do you mean by acting?" I asked.


-


The photo on top was put up by my sister on Facebook. 

She wrote below the picture, "So handsome! =D"

But I saw it in a different way.




I realized this was me, at my most honest and informal.

I came across so... 

Effeminate.


-


Am I confused about my sexuality? No.

I like girls. I don't like boys.


Am I confused about my sex? No.

I'm a fully functioning male.


Am I confused about my gender? No.

My gender is complicated.



I am not confused, but I confuse people.


My gender, which is the way I behave, is not stereotypically masculine. 


I don't do a lot of things guys do, and I don't treat girls the way guys do.


I'm artistic, I'm emotional, and I'm affectionate. In general.



I cried watching Lilo and Stitch. I take a great interest in colourful beads. I collect rings. I have a pencil case in the shape of a stuffed toy. I have every colour pen in the Steadtler range as well as the Pilot range. My favourite colour is Magenta.


All of these are acceptable exceptions to masculinity, but put together, don't paint a bright picture of me.


Alright look. 



I am not masculine. I've never ever really been.

Almost all my role models in life have been women after all.


I don't have an issue with myself.
I just wish I'm not misunderstood and marginalized.


I know people fear what they do not understand.
But please... don't fear me.


I am different.


But that's coz I'm trying to stand in the gap between them and you.
If you can't take me, you can't take them.

Eh I'm rambling. Oh no what was I trying to say. Oh yes.



I'm not gay. I'm effeminate.

The Week in Pictures

Stress... Leads to strange behaviors.

Necessity is the inventor of a bicycle that can fit in a train (for cycling between trains at the new huge MRT interchanges).

In the movie WANTED, they had tattoos on their hands that continued onto their guns.

Coffee Table

Today, 3 of psychology's brightest minds came together over a cup of coffee for some light banter.

They spoke of future research opportunities, thesis writing and the coming years for the field.

They laughed at how the older psychologist argued back and forth when their own studies got disproved. They would claim whatever trait or concept they were talking about existed somewhere, just that they could not prove it.

The 3 laughed much.

No one else would make any sense of what the 3 were talking about, except maybe a certain segment of a very brief minute, when they turned their attention to the girl in the examination hall who had just collected their scripts.

She was in a sleeveless off-yellow outfit and had a verse tattooed on her left arm, probably from a temple in Thailand. She wore a big black scarf in the cold examination hall that covered half her face. She looked like she had just jumped out from an anime series.

Yes, we 3 sat down today by chance together today and laughed at the world, at the exams, and most of all, at ourselves.

You never know... one day we 3 might actually make it big... Big enough for people to find us worthy of laughing at.

I wrote this for you.

read my mind

When I looked up from my books in the library today, the stranger sitting opposite me caught my attention. Two thoughts immediately passed through my mind, one after the other:

One - is that a girl?

Two - I like her.

(I was studying Freud. Wonder what he would say about that.)

I lived like I was dying

I acted on every chance.

I seized every opportunity.

I lived with a little wild abandon.

No pain, no gain.

I was fearless.

I risked everything.

I lived on the edge.


Yet somehow... for some reason... my driving instructor doesn't seem to like me.

Greek goddess

Lecturer looks at her computer.

Lecturer turns her head round to look at the screen behind her.

Lecturer returns to looking at her computer.

Lecturer turns back to look at the screen again.

Lecturer doesn't realize that her hair flicks are making Justin go into cardiac arrest.

Epic Picture

I don't know if you'll get the joke. It took me a while (and not everyone will understand it). But once I did, I was rolling on the floor. It's one of the funniest pictures I've ever seen. It's so... Chuck Norris.

Almost Every Day

I take a look at YinShuang's picture blog, and then try to live it out.

The "Jesus Christ" Lizard

Yes yes I know I'm spamming, but I haven't posted for almost a week! I'm overflowing with things to write about.

Look Back

When I think of God I think of a parent bringing the kid out to the shopping centre.

The parent lets the kid run ahead.

Kid sees something of interest, and looks back at parent for approval.

Parent smiles, kid proceeds.

Parent frowns at kid taking too many sweets, but kid responds with a cheeky grin and continues taking more sweets.

Parent shows displeasure when kid hits another kid.

By now the kid is no longer looking back at the parent before making decisions.

Kid is running wild in the shopping centre.

Other kids are wondering if the parents of this kid even exist.


Don't be fooled. The parent doesn't want to embarrass the kid in public. But once they get home, there will be suffering and gnashing of teeth.


Kids, our parent knows better than us. We may want many things, but they may not be good for us. Look back to check. See if your parent is smiling or frowning (or worst, crying). You'll know what you should do from there (but that doesn't mean you'll do it).

And yes, our parent is always ready to give us a big hug when we come crying to them saying "sorry".

Narwhals

Kim complains about having 2 songs stuck in her head all day on replay.

Think that's bad?

I just one stuck in my head on constant replay.

This one:



To make things worst, the song is repetitive.

But this is the interesting part. Immediately after I finished watching it the first time, I could not remember the tune or lyrics. But the next day, I was singing the chorus all day.

The following day I watched it again. Immediately after watching it I tried to recall the song, but could only manage to recall as much as I did the day before. But the next day I was singing the entire song (less 2 lines).

How could I forget something immediately after hearing it, but remember it the next day?

I think it has something to do with the images- I could remember the images, and the music fit the pictures so it was somewhat possible to figure it out later.

Still, our cognitive ability baffles me. Thank God we don't need to understand it to use it.

PS: In lieu of the exams, don't worry if you can't remember what you studied once you put your textbook down. Go to sleep, it might just come to you tomorrow.

Dear Church Friends,

With so many birthdays coming in the following month or two, I know many of you will be cracking your heads over general questions like "what would a guy on the start of manhood want for his birthday?"

I'm here to help. The answer lies in this puzzle.



That's right. Think labyrinth marble maze, but in 3D. Ho yeah.

This is the Perplexus. If you can find the Superplexus (same thing plus electronics) you'll make the birthday boy even happier, but it seems to be out of stock.

It's so awesome I wouldn't mind one myself!

Just that I can't find it in Singapore.

The Previous Post

Was my personality psychology mid-term essay.

It was the 1st of the 3 essays I was dying to complete, and the only one that got submitted on time.

It was not written for this blog; It was written for a different audience.

But coz I got an A, I thought it might be of interest to you.

Don't feel obliged to read it.

Extraversion

 I am salient. Thus of the Big-Five personality traits, Extraversion is my most obvious trait. Although I am also high in Agreeableness, the trait of Extraversion has taken up much more of my time and energy and thus deserves the spotlight in this paper.

Extraversion serves fore mostly in the context of socialization. While being Agreeable helps one to win close friends one at a time, Extraversion allows one to attain and maintain a much larger social network, and more particularly to me, helps me to maintain my friendships on Facebook; In an online culture that requires one to “shout out” almost shamelessly about themselves on their friends’ profile pages, being an extrovert helps me take that first step to overcome the awkwardness and stay in touch.

Psychological research has plenty to say of Extraversion as it is the recurring trait in almost every personality inventory. Other than being outgoing, extraverts tend seek out more stimulating environments than introverts would, something that psychologist Hans Eysneck attributed to their biological make up; The ascending reticular activating system of extroverts is not as sensitive as those of their introverted counterparts, thus they take a higher level of environmental stimulation to feel the same level of satisfaction (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1967). This explains why extroverts tend to go to more exciting parties, and tend to drink more at such events (Paunonen, 2003).

I may be an extrovert, but contrary to expectation, I do not like noisy parties and I do not drink. Rather I find the added stimulation I require by actively participating in the things that I am doing, more so than others would. A good example of this is seen in lectures, where most people are contented with just listening quietly, I would sit right in front, laugh loudly, ask questions, and sometimes even add a funny comment to what the lecturer is saying. Thus I do not actively seek stimulating environments (e.g., parties), but rather actively seek to make the neutral environments I am in more stimulating through active involvement.

Most psychologists see extraversion as a positive trait with good lifetime outcomes. Extroverts tend to be task oriented, driven, and ambitious (Hogan, 1983), qualities that give them better chances in reaching managerial positions in their workplace. They also have more successful dating relationships than introverts (Ozer & Benet-Martinez, 2006), which I do believe is linked to their being more positive and optimistic about life (Costa & McCrae, 1985).

While I would agree to a certain extent that I am ambitious (e.g., becoming a platoon sergeant in the army) and successful in dating (e.g., going into a steady relationship with a beautiful Caucasian ballerina), I find it still too premature to talk about how successful I am in the areas of marriage and career. What I am confident to agree with instead is that I am very positive and optimistic. I am cheerful and enjoy life; I seek out stimulus from nature (e.g., watching the sunset, taking nature walks) and enjoy bringing friends out to try new activities that I enjoy (e.g., prawning, kite-flying). Positivity is the part of myself that I feel is attractive to people and thus allows me to have many friends, both in real life, and even online.

What is interesting is that I did not always think of myself as an extrovert, because there has been one significant trait found within Extraversion that I am completely lacking in, which is that is dominance (John & Srivastava, 1999). Whether it was because of my high Agreeableness or my repulsion towards any form of assertion as a result of childhood abuse, I ended up being outgoing but unassertive. This translated into difficulties when I was put in leadership positions, such as in the army. My ambition allowed me to rise up the rank structure in the army, but my lack of dominance made me an inapt leader and I soon lost the confidence of the men under my charge.

Thus I feel that although broad trait of Extraversion can be universally applied to me, the expression of its specific traits like dominance or optimism are dependent on the varying environmental conditions that different individuals experience. So while I may agree with most of what psychological research says about my personality trait of Extraversion, it could only give a generalized idea of what I might or might not be like, being completely off the mark on the trait of dominance. Thus I tend to think of broad based traits as more of an intellectual guess than an accurate measure; I may not have all the specific traits within Extraversion, but I am definitely very extroverted.

Bibliography

Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (1985). The NEO Personality Inventory Manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assesment Resources.

Eysenck, S. B., & Eysenck, H. J. (1967). Salivary response to lemon juice as a measure of introversion. Perceptual and Motor Skills , 24, 1047-1053.

Hogan, R. T. (1983). A socioanalytic theory of personality. In M. Page (Ed.), Nebraska Symposium on Motivation: Personality-Current theory and research (pp. 58-89). Lincon: University of Nebraska Press.

John, O. P., & Srivastava, S. (1999). The Big-Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and theoretical perspectives. In L. Pervin, & O. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed ed., pp. 102-138). New York: Guilford.

Ozer, D. J., & Benet-Martinez, V. (2006). Personality and the prediction of consequential outcomes. Annual Review of Psychology , 57, pp. 401-421.

Paunonen, S. V. (2003). Big Five factors of personality and replicated predictions of behaviour. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 84, 411-422.

This Weekend

A friend younger than I told me who he/she was interested in.

This friend had such a simple and innocent understanding of love.

I was about to tell him/her not to be so idealistic, but I stopped short.

Because in my friend's eyes...

I saw myself, not too long ago.

For how was I to know if my understanding of love now was any better than my understanding of love then?


I knew I had nothing good to say, so I kept my mouth shut, and listened.

I need a psychologist. 

I'm going to pray now.

The New Trend

Back in JC we took a vote on who we thought the Class Prince was.

No surprise that I didn't get voted by my classmates.

But what was surprising was that my teachers unanimously voted for me.

Another classmate concluded, "You appeal to older women."

-

I was at the surprise anniversary dinner for my parents last month, with several other parent couples from church.

Some of the mothers joking asked me if I would be interested in their daughters.

One of the fathers gave me a hand by saying,

"Impressing the mother is one thing, impressing the girl is another!"

-

I have come to believe I do impress older women. But in the past month a newer but no less depressing trend has emerged.

I appeal to younger sisters too.

-

I don't understand why mothers and younger sisters want me to get attached to their daughters/older sisters, while the daughter/older sisters, who are around my age, think otherwise.

Which made my friend ask, 

"Why don't you just date the younger sister instead?"

-

Heh, don't worry about me okay?

I'm not complaining, I'm amused.

I'll complain when I book the church for my wedding again and start looking for a bride.

For now, I laugh out loud.

Like my friend succinctly says, "LOL!"

What Women Want

So I'm at timbre having a pint with 2 of my gender studies classmates. I'm not doing too well on the alcohol tolerance department (they call me a lightweight) and I'm turning red and complaining about women in general.


Women complain a lot about men, and I have tried very hard to avoid all the things that irritate them and be the guy women are looking for. But after all this time, I realized that women in general, don't have a consensus on what they want from a guy.


My friends brought up this example of a TV show that had American women and Korean women come together and talk about cultural differences. On one episode they got a Korean hunk to come and talk about how he'll treat his girl.


He said he'll take care of her, since she is of the weaker sex, and that he'll protect her, provide for her, and allow her to live in comfort and not need to do anything. The Korean girls swooned. The American girls corrected him for calling women the weaker sex, saying that, back home, it was not acceptable (politically correct) for a guy to say that.


So I rambled on of how hard it was to please women.


Then one of my two friends then asked me:


"Okay, never mind what women want. What kind of girl do you want?"


And I did not know how to answer.


I've spent so much time trying to be what women want (I blame the feminist movement for subjugating me) that I had absolutely no answer to that question.


What do I want?


I probably need to finish writing my personal research paper on Attraction soon.

Random Pictures

But nothing is random.

Church building.

This seat is reserved for cats.

This is the cat that came up to me and rubbed its body on my leg.

I seriously thought this was a given.

Life parallels art.

Fish in the sky.

This gallery did not turn out the way I wanted.

Psychotherapy

"I've tried to be the man I wanted to be, I've tried to live like I'm dying, but at the end of the day I realized it was just not me..."


I said that to my psychologist as I recalled what I had just learnt about that very day- Extroverted people are happiest when they do extroverted things while introverted people are happiest when they do introverted things. It doesn't take a professor to tell me that before I believe it, but it takes a professor to tell me that before I take the advise seriously.


"... At the end of the day, I'm just the man in the train folding origami."



To that my psychologist replied:

"Why can't you be just Justin?"


(1 day later and I still can't think of an answer to that question.)

Okay.

I think it's time to cancel the reservation I made of the church building for the purpose of my wedding.

(I meant that figuratively.)

Puzzles

When I set my mind to do something, I never give up on it.


I love puzzles, especially those cast-iron interlocking ones which you have to try to undo. There have been those that I fiddled with for a few hours or days before successfully undoing, while there was one that took me a full 3 months to finish.


Whatever the case, I never gave up, and always solved the puzzle.


I view people as puzzles too. If I can understand them, I solve the puzzle.


But people are much more complex than cast-iron.


And my undying perseverance is sometimes my fatal flaw.


The solving of one such puzzle consumed me in 2008, while another made me falter and fall in 07. The fact that I cannot give up leads me to try all means and ways to solve the puzzle. Sometimes... this involves giving parts of myself away, or doing things I should not be doing.


The worst thing to tell me is that no one else has solved a certain puzzle before. The same goes with someone saying "no one has understood me before" or "no one can ever understand me".


I take it as a challenge, and I never, ever, give up.


And so... I probably lost almost everything in the past 6 months or more. I failed, I tried again using a different method, I failed again.


Never give up.


Yeah right.


To gain something, you'll always need to lose something. I'm tired of losing so much for the sake of saying I never gave up.


I give up.

As the LRT approached my station...

Someone jumped up and ran towards the window.

All eyes were on this suspicious character.

He held his face so close to the glass.


Everyone saw him, but no one saw what he was looking at.

-

I was talking to God in the train.

This year, I became the person I wanted to be.

But what I thought I wanted, was not what I really wanted.

-

It's been a while.

I have felt the silence from God.

The silence that makes me aware that something is not right.

It happens all the time.

But this time, it lasted for so long.

I tried everything to find out what was wrong.

I could not find it.

Eventually I lost hope that I ever would get out of this rut.

That sucked. I was a shadow of my former self.

-

Today I realized what it was.

No one has challenged the things I was doing this year.

None but one.

And that one voice...

Was actually the only voice I needed to hear.


So thank you Kimberly.

-

But I am an idiot.

And I am a sinful man.

And the silence will return.

What then? How will I overcome it?

How can I get out of the silence and live in his light?

-

I think it's like in Farmville.

You need something, you'll never be able to buy it yourself.

You need your friends to help you.

-

So help.

I suck at asking for help and prayer so I'll say it now before I really need it.

I can't do this alone.

If you're a friend, please keep me and my relationship with God in check.

I'm okay now, but 6 months was a little too long for silence.

I haven't blogged for a long time

Because I don't feel right.

Seen and Heard at NUS

2 of my friends were sitting along the corridor in school.

I dropped them some money as I walked past.

-

"What's up!" I said as I passed Hilda for only the 2nd time this year.

"Nothing," she replied. For such is life in school. And in King Lear.