Today's the day to...

"Do not dwell on the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment" 

 -Buddha

Happy Wesak Day everybody! I don't think it's too far from the truth to wish Buddha a Happy Birthday, seeing as Wesak is a commemoration of His birth, enlightenment, and death. However one wishes to call the day, let us all take a moment or two to reflect and make a prayer for inner peace and a calm mind for all our undertakings :).

In last year's Wesak post, I made a somewhat crude comment that Lord Buddha is somewhat akin to a lovingly naggy mother (here it is again, sorry Buddha), but I still think the relation stands true. And on this day again, I am reminded of things that hold most importance to me. Heaven knows we all need reminders now and again. What is important is that we take heed of these reminders, and not push them away and think 'I'll do something about it later'. 

I received one such reminder the other day (not from Buddha though, but maybe divine intervention helped a bit), and as hard as the feelings came to me, I am glad for it. I am glad I could feel the stab of guilt, knowing that I am not doing much to propel myself forward to work for my future. Because with that feeling of utter uselessness I am motivated to work harder and not take things -too- easily. I was reminded that it's not all just fun and games, at this point of life it's also about pushing oneself; taking and making opportunities to go ahead from the rest, and not just go with the flow. I hope I can continue to hold on to these feelings of mine, as they are the very reason why I am determined to move forward.

Self motivation is a lot easier than it sounds, and though a lot of us think ourselves as 'self-motivators', there are times in our lives when we lose our drive. That's when you need someone or something to come along and smack you across the face and say 'hey, hey, wake up. Don't forget about working for your dreams.'

I hope this post can help some of you that are feeling a bit down and unmotivated, the way I was! Don't feel lazy, don't procrastinate. Make something happen- today! TGIF everybody! :)

SMASHing Good Idea!

Stumbled upon this pretty awesome ad-vid of SMASH, and scrapbook-cum-journal-cum-sketchbook! I've always liked sketching and sticking and journalling, but SMASH apparently brings all three together and makes it all so much easier and fun :).

SMASH by K& Company

The glue stick/pen combo is incredibly interesting! I would love to have a few of those pens myself. I like how everything is just thrown in anyhow, and I think we could all come up with our own personalized idea books as presented here. It'd be more fun to collect our own favourite tapes and stickers and notepads to further personalize our books. 

Interesting video! I'll definitely keep this in mind for a holiday project. I haven't been journalling at all now since I've got this blog, but watching this has inspired me to do something traditional all over again :D.

Dear Momma

Big shoutout to all the hot sexy mommas! :D. The Google Doodle of the day is absolutely adorable! I love it when the two o's run out and glomp their g mother XDD.

I think everyone has heard their mother complain about how hard it is to be a mother at least once (at least being the key words. Because we all know for women saying something once is never EVER enough =P). Does the sentence 'when you become a mother/parent, you'll understand' sound familiar to you? But since it's obvious we're all not going to be parents anytime soon (touchwood), we shall take today as one of the gentle reminders of the single atomic force behind us all. For without this woman, where would we all be? 

I might not be able to be there in person with my mother today, but I hope everyone else will be able to! If you're not with your momma right now, why not write a letter to her? Or a note. And put it somewhere she will see. I'm going to put mine right here =).

"  Dear Momma, 

   Hello! I'm sorry I can't be there to wish you Happy Mother's Day and give you muaks muaks, but I hope that the father or sister will read this to you so that you can hear all the speeches I won't usually tell you in person =P, and then give you muaks muaks on my behalf.

Firstly, big big BIG thank you for ALL the things you've done for me! From conceiving me then pushing me out into the world, then it's a never-ending decrease of your savings to feed me and buy me clothes and books and toys and almost everything I want and need. I know a lot of times you must have sacrifice the things you wanted for yourself just so that you could buy me things when I asked. And although I don't say it enough, I do appreciate and know that!

Also for all your advice and comfort when I needed them! I think if I didn't have your advice and encouragement I would be a depressed homeless drug addict by now. Without your teaching (and nagging), I don't think I'd ever have the strength to face this world. It's true that you have made me what I am today! Maybe not ALL of it (credit to Dad too la, okay =P), but you helped to lay the foundation of ME! :D. Without you I would never have been able to write or draw or read the way I do, so THANK YOU for that!

I know there are a lot of times when you look at other mothers, and you wish that you could dance, or hang out or drive your daughters around and do crazy things with them. I know you feel very sad that you can't do all the normal things properly; we do too. But I want you to know that because you put in triple the effort to be our mother, that makes you the BEST and we LOVE you all the more for it! Don't push too hard or stress yourself out so much. You should relax more and know that we appreciate all that you have done for us.

To me you are the best mother the way you think your daughters are the best daughters in the whole world. And I would never want to have any other mother. Even if I was given the chance to choose again, I would choose you! And Dad too, of course. Because both of you together make the best parents for me! :D.

Love you and hope that you will have a very Happy Mother's Day!

Muaks muaks from your daughter,

Joanne a.k.a SK2, N2, P.P, BK, LKK, PPU, NK, NZK, 'Girl'.   "

New faces, old memories.

I clicked on Facebook's Timeline button today. Argh, I knew I shouldn't have; I should've known there wouldn't be a revert to old interface button XD. Owh well, nothing much I can do about that.

So since I'd gotten myself into the mood for clicking fancy new shiny buttons, I clicked on the new Blogger interface thingy, and here I am trying it out for the first time. It reminds me very much of Qumana and emails, and it is a tad too white for me. Any chance of customizing the dashboard I wonder? Gotta poke around after this.

I'm going up to KL for the weekend, and that is another funny thing to think about. Back when I was still in high school, a weekend trip to KL would be so much fun; I was actually excited to go up and go shopping and shyt. Now it's like, KL? Bleh. Owhkay.

Guess it's just one of those changes in life we all go through, eh?

I was reading my old journal yesterday night, and when I say old I mean like '07-'09...and oh my god. It's so amazing, just how much I've forgotten. I couldn't actually remember some things that happened. I haven't read my journal from '04 (OMG!), but I can tell it'd be just as astonishing =P. At some point I had to stop and ask myself 'wow, Joanne, I can't believe that was you'.

If I had the chance, back then, to glimpse at the person I am now, today, I think I'd ask myself, 'wow, Joanne, I can't believe THIS is you', lol. But, most of my life in recent years were not recorded down, and to be honest I've already forgotten most of the lesser happenings. It's sad, really, because I'd like to be able to read about happenings now 6 years in the future. But at this rate, I'd have precious little to look back at. And relying on my memory is, well, not one of the recommended methods.

If you have old journals or diaries, it'd be cool to take a look at them now just to see how far you've gone in life. I have 3 journals, the last one with the most amount of gaps, I am ashamed to say. But, well, there's this here blog, so if I'm going to make sure I have something to read when I'm older and grayer, I should wean away from the paper and pen and really get serious into the whole blogging thing. Things would probably get awfully personal, though. Lol. But, yeah. Blog now for the future! =D

That last sentence reminds me of a poster I was planning on doing for myself. Kind of a motivational poster for when I'm not in the best of moods. Let's see if there will be progress on that one in the near future. For now it's back to the watercolours and the 'dandy-lion'. Till next time~