May 2021 Musings
Turning disappointments and pain into growth and peace. Positivity in every circumstance
Hey there,
I’m going to start my monthly musings this May. What’s the purpose of writing is to share my learnings, life and keeping track of my goals and projects.
Writing gives people clarity and I have not honed this skill very well. I was not a good writer nor eloquent in the English language. So this is a platform for me to improve my writing.
I have not decided what my monthly musings format should be. For now, I shall be more fluid and see what works for me.
What I hope to achieve through monthly musings are :
- Sharing knowledge about anything — right now I’m interested in self-improvement, entertainment, books, personal finance and business.
- My current mind
- Challenges and victories I’ve faced during the month
- Keeping track of my goals and projects update
- Lastly, improving my writing skills. To become an eloquent and faster writer
Thank you for reading,
Ying Ying
Quote of the month
“The way someone else perceives what you do is a result of their own experiences (which you can’t control), their own preferences (which you can’t predict), and their own expectations (which you don’t set).
If your choices don’t match their expectations that is their concern, not yours.” — James Clear
Challenges & Learnings of the month
Singapore almost Circuit Breaker
We went into another semi countrywide shut down on 16 May due to the spike of Covid cases and a growing number of new clusters infections.
This has impacted some of our wedding plans since our wedding is in July. Depending on how the situation unfolds, it might impact our wedding. The normal reaction of most people might be frustration or panic. But I was relieved since I booked any of the wedding vendors. It will be frustrating trying to coordinate everything together.
Wedding planning took a backseat in my plans and I’m actually less stressed since I could do nothing about it. Everything is on hold till June 13.
What kept me going is this passage:
“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” Colossians 4:2–6 NIV
The Ups and Downs of Trying to own a Home in Singapore
In Singapore, 80% of people live in HDB housing which is a subsidised home from the government. Most people would go through a process of Built to Order where we have to enter into a ballot system in order to have a chance to own a home. I have been trying to get a subsidised home for 4 years.
Earlier in February, Jingles and I were notified by the housing authority that we have finally gotten a chance to own a home in Singapore. But this month, we have received a disappointing letter where HDB had withdrawn the offer for us. The reason was due to the fact that I own an overseas property.
To our dismay, our dreams of starting a home are crumbled. As a young couple, it is challenging trying to start a family in Singapore. Typically, most couples would prefer to live by themselves than to live with their parents. And homeownership is very normal. However, there are many barriers to owning a home in Singapore. Costs are one major factor. Therefore most people get subsidized housing. But to own a subsidized housing, there are many criteria one needs to fulfil.
Balancing this can be tough, since we need to earn enough to able to support our parents and our own needs to buying a place for us. So we will not be getting, or rather, we cannot afford a private property to be able to live in Singapore.
Our other choice would be to move overseas to start our home elsewhere.
Now that we have more time to think about what would make us happier. Thinking of factors such as the high cost of living in Singapore, the financial stress of needing to care for our parents and to pursue our dreams of building a family.
Perhaps, living overseas could be a better option for us instead?
What I have been reading and consuming
When you call someone earnest, you’re making a statement about their motives. It means both that they’re doing something for the right reasons, and that they’re trying as hard as they can.
When people are doing something for the right reasons, they try harder.
This made me reflect on my current job. What are the motives and reasons for working in my job? What am I trying to achieve? Am I earnest in my job?
The frustration I faced and my attitude towards my job does not reflect any earnestness. Being drained by people that I worked with and the feeling of ‘I should not try that hard after all’.
The Erosion of Deep Literacy by Adam Garfinkle
The invention of mobile phones and technology has affected our society and culture. Our increasing dependency and to a further extent, addiction has changed what, how and why we read. This changes what, how and why we write and think.
What is alarming is that the author shared that the emergence of new technology has disrupted our ability to think, making sense and creativity. We simply don’t have time to think.
Deep literacy has the effect of helping us think in abstract ways, pose and answer difficult questions, empowering our creativity and imagination and refining our capacity for empathy. This allows us to generate new insights and shape our minds.
Deep literacy is thoughtful, deliberate reading or writing to enhance comprehension and enjoyment of a text. Reading helps us to form concepts and form relationships. Writing helps us to train and internalise the message. But now, there is no need for us to internalise because everything is searchable. There is no context, no motive — just information. Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom.
The absence of thought stifles imagination and feeds cultural insularity. When a culture refuses to learn about or acknowledge anyone outside of their own tight-knit and single-minded group, this is an example of insularity. We see that in social media where people are superficially educated on things they don’t really understand. Falling into victims of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
Deep reading is an exploration of other worlds and knowledge. It probes us to deep thinking — sorting, sifting, selecting, ingesting and digesting information. Musings help us rearrange, combine, harmonise what was conveyed, illuminating the path towards inspiration, insights and deep meaning. Deep reading is not an escape, it’s not passive, but an active process of discovery.
I’m thankful to chance upon this complicated writing and manage to read through the entirety of it. Revisiting the article multiple times, googling and trying to decipher what exactly the author is trying to say in a short summary above that I have arrived at.
Reflection for the month
It is the first time I tried to write a summary of the month. Looking back, it has been a rather eventful month! I have never been at this stage where I could deeply reflect on my learnings. I never spent time reflecting and internalising my knowledge consumption. I took many days to write this, and it is not easy. And I think I’m growing and shaping my internal self.
As writer Alice Walker on the discomfort of growth:
“Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don’t even recognize that growth is happening. We may feel hostile or angry or weepy and hysterical, or we may feel depressed. It would never occur to us, unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us, that we were in fact in the process of change, of actually becoming larger than we were before.
Whenever we grow, we tend to feel it, as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant. Often the feeling is anything but pleasant.
But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening. Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting, holding its breath, unsure about what the next step should be… for it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that, in all probability, a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.”
This writing is first posted here.
