Love & I.

          Love exists, yet I'm losing faith...

          People say that the ultimate purpose of us human species, like other species, is to survive. Biologically, we are programmed to have hormones and sexual desires to make babies, and that romantic and erotic attraction is a scientific chemical reaction in our brain. But is that love ? Many argues not. You see, everything that you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel are often creations of your mind. The brains senses the world indirectly. And we, as intelligent beings, often creating illusions and subjective truths for ourselves to believe in.

          Love is... an illusion. I want to believe that, I really do. Yet it's just not in my nature. I'm too romantic, and too positive. I know for a fact that intelligence and logic won't make me a happier person, it makes me miserable. For the past few weeks, I've been feeling so emotionally drained. I am a person who's irrational, romantic, emotional, and just all over the place. I mean, that's not who I am as a whole, but it's a big part of whom I've become. And now with the logic, philosophy, intelligence, and political correctness that I've been learning and drowning myself in. I feel like I can't express my emotions, because why express them when it's not rational ? I feel so repressed, by this empowering knowledge, that I know it's not gonna make me happy. I'm not happy.

          If only there is a formula for happiness. Oh wait, there is. It's Love. I know, why don't I just push myself off a bridge right now. But it's true, self-love, and the love for this world makes us humans feel fulfilled and happy. Now does it make sense ? Actually it does, so why am I so caught up on this !? I have no idea, I think I'm just really really tired ! I'm tired of feeling like I'm on this roller coaster call "Life" and have all these emotions. Like I'm not bipolar or depressed, I'm just an emotional person, and it sucks sometimes. I feel weak, and powerless, that's why for my whole life, I crave and seek for the state of perfection. It's about control. And with intelligence, we can control situations. But lately I've discovered, sometimes things just need to happen the way they do. Maybe letting go is the true path to happiness. Well, it's gonna take time, lots of time, and work, for me to really let go. It's okay though, because life is work. Life is about learning how to live, and love. And maybe I need to rethink about this whole thing. Maybe self-love isn't self-knowledge, at least not the way I've been doing it.

          The relationship between me and Love seems like a life-long process, but I enjoy it. We all need to know the concept of love before trying to love. Because believe it or not, it's not always the amount of love given, it's about the way you love. 

Life and Death.

          It's time that we start celebrating, the celebration of life.

          Earlier this week, I had the honor to attend the funeral for my best friend's grandfather. It was a beautiful service and it's actually the second funeral I've ever attended. The first funeral I've ever been at was a few years ago for my grandfather who passed away because of lung cancer. It was a Taiwanese tradition funeral, and I did not understand much of it. But I remembered that it emphasized much on sadness and grieving. And this one, here in Canada, it's happy, it's about the lovely memories of the deceased, and it's about celebrating one's lifetime. I was mesmerized with the message and idea of this way of arranging a funeral. It's simply beautiful and inspiring to me. Of course, it's still sad and unfortunate, yet this way of handling death is much much more healthy for the living, for us.

           Believe it or not, I've never really been thinking about death up until recently. I've always been more of a life thinker. It's not that I'm not afraid of death, it's just that I've always been an over-thinker on life. I simply have no time to worry about death. I have to admit, I have had times where I wonder what death is like and the topic of afterlife. But it was only brought up in the sense of religion. Now, with my transition on becoming a more logical and rational being, I think it's important that we as human beings think about these thoughts, think about life, and death.

          We talk about life a lot, and we question about the purpose and meaning of life almost too often. Yet thinking about life sometimes just isn't enough, we need to start looking into the philosophy of our existence and question the way humans are living, and not just how life events are happening. And with the understanding of death, we can become more aware, more appreciative, and more decisive of our life. With the knowledge of death and suffering, we often will find ourselves in the state of melancholy. It's a simple feeling of sadness, that's calm and subtle. It's a more realistic way of looking at life, acknowledging the suffering of those who are more unfortunate and who deserves more. It's a way to understand that the world needs to change for the better, and I would say that this is the very first step to make a difference as a human being. It's to acknowledge, and to realize a problem.

          I've decided not to think about what happens after death. Because to me, that's a never-ending debate that there's really no point. As much as I love philosophy, sometimes I want and need answers. Now, I acknowledge death, and I am afraid. But the real answer to that fear is the way how we live. So I'm going to focus on life, I want to live my days as fulfilling as possible. I will love, I will learn, I will laugh, I will dream, and I'll live.

          That, is the first step towards the answers of Life, and also my first step to conquer the mystery of Death.

Love & Reality.

          Love may exists, yet the moments and memories of Love are often just an Illusion.

          People say that the ultimate purpose of us human species, like other species, is to survive. Biologically, we are programmed to have hormones and sexual desires to make babies, and that romantic and erotic attraction is a scientific chemical reaction in our brain. But is that love ? Many argues not. You see, everything that you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel are often creations of your mind. The brains senses the world indirectly. And we, as intelligent beings, often creating illusions and subjective truths for ourselves to believe in.

          I mean, I'm not really in a place where I can say what love really is. But lately, I've been discovering more of the logical sides of things. I'm tired of emotions, I'm tired of feeling everything, and I just want to logically analyze everything. I seek for knowledge and the truth, it seems like that intelligence is my new defense mechanism. So right now, I believe that love is an illusion. Well, many who knows me will see that I'm not really believing that, I just really want to. Of course, with no doubt, I'm just as romantic and emotional inside, I'm just trying really hard to bring out the other side of me as much as I can. But like seriously though, what is Love anyway ?

          The truth of Love is that there is no "perfect" or "right" person out there for us. We are alone. We humans are such intelligent yet isolated beings, each of us are all so special, so different, so flawed, and so complex that there's no possible way we can be understood. Perfection is a mind set that we're forever trying to achieve. Why ? Because we're sad. Life isn't always great, and there's always gonna be something better, that's just how we think. We will always want something we don't have, it's human nature. And because of the fact that we're so isolated, and the fact that we're sometimes way too emotional beings, we fall in love with people using the image of them that we've constructed. That's why divorces happen, that's why love fades, and that's way sometimes it just doesn't work out. And the reality is, the memories and moments of love, are just simply illusions. Our brain is constantly lying to ourselves, shaping and changing what we remember. Those moments of love may feel like magic, but magic is also just an illusion. We trick ourselves into love because of the fear. The fear of being more alone than we already are. We desperately want to find someone who can love us, care for us, and understand us. So really, love is an idea that we use to distract us from the existential loneliness and isolation of us human beings.

          Of course, that's a very clear and pessimistic way of looking at not only love, but also life and us humans. But, I don't think there's a right or wrong answer. I want to start being smart about the topic of love. I'm just really tired, tired of rushing into emotions blindly and looking into love in such an optimistic way. Like honestly, I'll be optimistic when there's something to be optimistic about, or else, I'm fine with analyzing everything and learning more about the psychological and philosophical sides of life. Or maybe I'll be able to balance out both within me, I'm not sure, and I'm not stressed. I'm okay with where I am and I'm honestly... just living. After all I think that, most importantly, is still to love yourself.

Love Clinic 2.0

          What I don't understand about love is, how can you love someone even with their flaws and faults ? Now, not saying that you shouldn't love someone who isn't "perfect", but I truly believe that what defines a person is the ideals and flaws that one can have based on his/her actions, thoughts, and motives. I want to find out why people can keeping loving even when the other person's flaws and faults are clearly harmful. Is there a bigger good that we strive to look into ? Or is love just a complicated emotion that's irrational and blinding ? 

          There isn't an answer I could find, not from thinking, not from interviewing my friends who are in a relationship. There seem to be not even a equation formed, and that's why there's no answer. Love is not a formula. Love is, just Love. See, I was born into a family with complicated issues and feelings, sometimes even with toxic twisted ideals, so I strive to find healthier and better relationships in my life. Family is a love I can not escape from, it's a love I can't choose. Yet, even though I understand that we can't choose who we love, can't we choose to love the ones that are "better" for us ? But then again, love sometimes can blind our sense of judgement, making what's "good" and "bad" very debatable. Maybe because I've never been in love, so I'm looking into this issue critically. I only wish that it won't be as complicated when I'm in love with somebody.

          Love 201 : Just because He/She is Broken, doesn't mean You have to be too.

          Sometimes, love can be tiring. Loving someone isn't easy, trust me, I have days where I wish I'm just a cold stone heart bitch. It's messy, it's complicated, because emotions can often reveal and let us discover the worst in ourselves. Yet emotions also bring out the best of us human beings, one of the things that truly make us humans. It's beautiful, but is it worth it ? The worth of a relationship is the impact that it did on you as a person. In my personal opinion, a healthy relationship should be a good influence on each other to make both of them a better person. That's love should be, but it's not what love is. Love doesn't always make us better people, it can sometimes push us over the edge, or even break us. I'm not ever in a position to say whether someone is healthy or not, or if someone is broken or not. But I will say that you shouldn't stop loving them just if/when they're broken, but you should start to love yourself more too. Don't break yourself, because love shouldn't be as exhausting as it can feel. Give yourself a break, and just breathe.

          Break Up 201 : No Need to be "Nice".

          To make it simple, there's only really two general kinds of break-ups, the ones that both agree, and the ones that only one wants the separation. If both agree, it's just the matter of giving each other blessing and taking the time to heal and move on. But it's the ones that only one side wants the break-up that gets messy and complicated. And there's no point to be nice here, let's be clear and see how it is can we ? It's a break up. The nicer you're trying to be, only makes it even harder for them to let go. I'm not saying to rude and harsh, but there's just really no point to sugar coat things anymore. Feelings get hurt one way or the other, and it's often not your job to help them get over you or to move on. If it needs to be done, get it done. It'll be difficult, because you may still care for them, but you have to remember that sometimes separation doesn't mean that the love is dead. Love is never dead.

Feminism.

          It's 2016 and some are still not educated on the issue of Gender Equality... Before I get on my semi educational content semi life rant, I would like to express some personal analysis of these issues. 

          I think that people get stuck behind their views against movements like the Feminist movements, the Race Equality movements or the LGBTQIA+ movements really just because they're afraid. I mean, I have to admit, I have encounter people who do have reasonable understanding statements against some of these movements, but really rare. Most are either just not educated, and/or stubborn and selfish. Those who are not educated, can be scared of the unknown and start gathering information that's incorrect or harmful to the movement. Those who are stubborn and selfish, often only look at themselves or people like them, not really caring or thinking about the other sides' perspectives. I think that sometimes people forget that there's a thing call the past, people forget the history and how much we as a society had went through, and people forget about the future, they forget about how much of a difference we can make to make our society a better place. People can be so close minded that they only look at the present, they look what themselves have, and they want to do nothing else and help no one else.

          1) "What about Men ?"

Well, Feminism is a movement started by women to fight against the Gender Inequality in our society, the first wave movement started all the way back in early-mid 1900's. And that's why it's named "Feminism". Now through the second, third waves and on, the Feminism movement now includes all people including men, women of colour, trans women, lesbian women...etc. because people realize that we have one goal for the movement, and that's "... the social, political, and economic equality between the sexes.". I understand that some radical groups of the movement takes it to an extreme and promotes the idea of angry women hating on men, but that is not what Feminism is about and we can not give in into the backlash of this important movement throughout history. Remember to try educating yourselves on all kinds of social political movements, and don't believe the wrongfully bias-contained ideas of the movements.

          2) "Rape culture, Gender inequality, Female sexualization isn't a thing."

No. Please. Honey, just stop it and go educate yourself. :)

          3) "Women are basically equal to men now in our modern society."

Well, that's debatable, but I understand what you're trying to say. Now, think about the women in other countries, or even women in your community ? Just because you're not living in a home, a community, a city, a country that shows Gender Inequality, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. You will be surprised if you go research and see the statistics of the violence and unfairness towards women even in our society here in North America. You may not see it, hear it, or experience it, but you should acknowledge it and spread awareness for those who experience it.

          4) "... But those Feminazis... angry women... lesbians... men-hating... "

*Sigh*... Really ? Come on, no. Just no.

          5) "Not all women want to free the nipple."

Yes, very true. As a person with a biological male body, I wouldn't want to go shirtless either in a public space, not really anyways without reasons. But Feminism is about choice. The movement fights for the equality for women to choose, and to have the right to do such things if/when they do it. Also, women are constantly being objectified and breasts are NOT sexual organs to begin with !!!

          6) "Women are not being objectified."

If you're saying it because of men are also objectified, I totally understand, and many feminists encourage for people to pay attention to the male issues too. After all, it is about equality of both sexes. Now, some say this because they think that it's okay to objectify women, but do I really need to explain the cause of rape culture and consent ? And just because you're okay with something, doesn't mean it's not a thing or not wrong. Also, the beauty standards in our society is really messed up, it teaches women to even objectify themselves. It's not healthy and not helping the movement at all. Now, men did start the thing, objectifying women and all. Men did invent things like stilettos and bikinis because they wanted women to be sexy, and now girls feel like they're not beautiful enough to impress the boys without meeting all these crazy beauty standards.

          7) "I don't support Feminism because I don't agree with all the movements' ideals and goals."

Personally, I think you can still be a Feminist even if you disagree with some things included in the movement. I've talked to girls who don't identify as a Feminist because she doesn't support abortion. I feel like yes, you can disagree things like that base on your religion, culture, or any other personal views, yet you should still support the movement of Gender Equality. You don't have to free the nipple, and you don't have to have an abortion, but let those women who want to/need to have the right and the choice to do so. Just love, care, and support. That's all you need to do.

           We should all be proud of being a Feminist and support this beautiful and important movement to not only let both sexes be equal, but then to bring them up altogether. We are all humans, we should all stand as one and help each other be better, for a better future and society.