Choices

Choice is something every one wants. Its a basic human right, it's what FREEDOM is all about and It's about expression and individuality. As once said in BioShock "... we all make decisions  but in the end, our decisions make us...". 

Choice is all the rage nowadays. Flavored Yoghurt? Mass Effect? Globe My Super Plan? Subway? iPhone, BlackBerry, Android or Windows? Everything and anything is all about choice and the celebration of individuality. You choose what you want and what you want is your choice. Are you an ordinary and conservative vanilla? A bad ass renegade vanguard? or super techy and trendy user? Healthy wheat bread eater? or a hipster with an iPhone? You could actually be all of these at the same time. How would you look like as a whole? 

A Health Conscious yogurt and wheat bread eater that instagrams subway sandwiches and Fro Yohs with their iPhone they got with some super expensive post paid plan while secretly wanting to be a bad ass instead of the skinny and lanky white hipster that he really is.

I'm not that person, i'm just trying to make a point. There are so many choices and decisions made in one's life. All are a reflection of who he is today but their choices can define who they are tomorrow. A righteous person will choose justice, and by choosing justice, makes him righteous. if taken one decision spectrum at a time, who you are to begin with starts with your first choice. Then you keep on climbing (or digging) the same direction for the rest of your life. An angel would choose to do good, by doing so, makes the angel good as well and the cycle persists because the angel would constantly reinforce their alignment to the good and good aligned characters will continue doing good (D&D style). 

The complexity of human character comes from the fact that there is a near infinite spectrum of choices and decisions to make. And several of which are not mutually exclusive, they affect each other. Like choosing how much devotion you have to your Religion and the spouse you choose. A Highly devout Christian would never marry outside of their religion while those that aren't as devout couldn't care less what the religion of their spouse would be. Upon first glance, you would think the first is a blinded devotee that doesn't think for himself and the second an unfaithful hypocrite that doesn't practice what has been preached. But they are more than that. What about the spouse they chose? Schools they studied in? Good deeds that they done? All of which are pushing and pulling each other in several dimensions, some of which can nullify the initial personality assumptions we had for the two. 

Which in the end means that man is a summation of every choice they have made (as one famous philosopher once said, I don't know which one). You could kinda map out a person like a radar chart (google images), except instead of a flat 2D chart, imagine a multi-dimensional chart with a near infinite number of axes (plural of axis! LOL). You cannot judge a man because of the senator he voted for or that one violation he did. You have to see him as a sum of his choices, and from that judge what kind of choices he will make in the future.

Your radar chart can somehow predict how you will decide on future choices. Which brings me to my next point : Do people really change? 

Will the Filipino people keep on voting for the same kind of politicians? will the Politicians keep on doing what they do to stay in power? They probably will, they've made those choices before and keep on making choices in a similar manner for almost everything else. Is there hope for any change? And the much deeper and personal question : Do people change?

One of my friends always (literally always) used to tell me that "PEOPLE DON'T CHANGE". He was cynical then, and his cynicism caused him to make the choice to believe in that statement which made him more of a cynic.Ironically, over the years, he changed. And now he believes that people do change. And conveniently enough, he is no longer a cynic! How did he break the cycle? What was the C-c-c-c-combo breaker? What wrecked his radar chart and made him change?

I never really found out (did i create too much build up there?). But i do have a theory or two on choice and people changing. 

I talked about spectrums and radar charts and how each decision plotted on the graph could push and pull another. Keep on doing bad things, and you push yourself further and further down the bad spectrum. But choosing to do one small deed of good... Does that make you good? Nope, not in the slightest. You'd have to do enough good deeds consistently to pull yourself to the other end of the bad spectrum : good. Two wrong things do not make a right... But does doing one right thing does make man right in himself? So while it is possible to choose decisions contrary to your previous alignment, you'd have to commit to it if you want any real change. 

An easy example : eating and dieting. One end of the spectrum is that you keep on eating and become fat, the other, you start dieting, commit to it, and hopefully become fit. One slice of wheat bread today won't help against the unli rice meal dinner you'll have this weekend. 

It's easier said than done. How can one steer himself into a complete 180 when every action prior has molded him and somewhat committed him to another trajectory? Is there such human will strong enough to break a lifetime of natural human molding and shaping? 

The choice to change is a continuous choice. You cannot change yourself overnight. One momentous event cannot define your life unless you follow through with it. Don't bring up Jose Rizal or Ninoy Aquino. One may argue that their deaths are the defining moments in their lives. A "one time big time". Look closer, look at their lives. All the roads they took lead them to their great sacrifice. It was not their death but their life that defined them. And the same can be said for anyone else. You don't have to die for your country to be a hero, you have to live for your country. 

True change is only wrought from a lifetime of effort. And while one lives, one may continually change as long as they posses the will for it. Death is just the final dot, the "scope of limitation" to judge if a man was good or bad, just or corrupt, fat or thin. (This looks like another paraphrase from another philosopher!)

So how about me? How am I? How's my radar chart?

After 3 years of work in my first job, I didn't like how my radar chart looked. I saw how my choices I made when I was younger made me who I am today. And from that, you could predict how I'd react to things and situations. This is a talent your close friends have because they've seen you mold yourself throughout the years and therefore can really claim to "know" you. 

I was a shy kid. I never wanted to be the center of attention and I hated talking to people. Why did I choose this kind of demeanor? 

1. Most of the things I like doing are solo things (like reading a book or watching TV). I don't like people watching me as I do my thing or put me in a spotlight I didn't ask for. I just want it to be me and the thing. I don't like the whole room listening to my answer in class when the only person that needs to hear it is my teacher, because she alone can (supposedly) give me the best feedback. She is an expert after all. Same goes for everything else. 

2. I don't like talking for the sake of conversation. It's so unnatural and makes the initiating party either seem really fake, or just desperate. A conversation is only worthwhile if there is genuine interest of all involved parties. If this is not mutual, don't talk. 

3. I find it hard to be conscious of everyone else. About how to act and talk in ways that are correct around the right crowd and in the right context. People can get really touchy about things like this. I find it really stifling. 

So I chose to keep to myself and pursue "solo" endeavors like reading goosebumps, animorphs and Harry potter, playing single player video games, and drawing a lot in my kid years. I "refused" to do "popular" things like play basket ball and follow Survivor, American Idol, Heroes, Lost and HIMYM. 

I was the quiet shy kid (reason 1 and 2) but I was really nice as well (reason 3). Looking back, it's strange that I thought that way back then. I think it was because of the saying "do onto others ..." And Santa Claus. 

I was consistently like that. Aloof and alone, but in the way that I liked. I could do the things I wanted to do and I couldn't care less of what others thought of my pursuits and interests. 

And I became the nice guy you know, but never become close to. I chose to be socially detached because I hated dealing with people. I knew and met so many people, a lot of which are still Facebook friends even after the social deaths of Friendster and multiply. But I never really talk to most of them. They add me, I accept since I know them from somewhere and that's it. End of story. Unsocial on a social network. I chose this, and cause of my molded radar graph, the decision is almost automatic. Keep people out so I can do whatever I want... but acknowledge their existence because that's the polite thing to do.

What kind of person did I grow up as?
1. an opposite of a team player, I preferred "soloing" it.
2. I didn't trust people, they were like minefields... you could be the best of friends but one wrong turn (or even word) and they blow up and hate you forever.
3. I had a cynical side, I tried my best to tip toe around the land mine people but the other didn't do the same. My distrust was sometimes turned to disgust and hate.
4. I only trusted a few people that I spent a lot of time with... Because I know where their landmines are (though new ones could be laid or previously unknown ones discovered... this risk never really goes away)

The pressures of "fitting in" in College were the greatest social pressures I've ever experienced. So great in fact that I couldn't understand it. I couldn't understand why it was so important to hangout in bars and get drunk on hard drinks, party in the Clubs, go on "spontaneous" road trips to Tagaytay and to scream your heart out in Araneta. Those activities never really gave me any real joy yet that was what everyone did, and in so doing  founded friendships that would last a life time. But due to my radar chart, I refused to submit to such a model of college life. I found it too fake for me to join in activities just to find friends. My radar chart never trained me for such an environment. Arguably, in my elementary and high school days, all us boys were just the same. I wasn't friends with everyone, but it wasn't hard to make friends with people you were stuck within the same room for 9 to 10 months at a time. But College was different, more open. My early forays into the outside world as a high school student wasn't the same as the "freedom" of college life.

I didn't fit in so much, but not in a bad way. My circles were built around "anchor points" I've made in elementary and high school : Friends I were already comfortable with. I relied on them as starting points into newer social connections. I've made only a few "real friends" in college. Those are the ones I hold most dear, the kind of friendships "that would last a life time". What made them different? They didn't care if I liked or followed the so called "model of college life", what mattered was we were the happiest we could ever be just by being together (not in a Gay way). I could speak out and do the things I liked, and I was accepted and even appreciated for that. There were no land mines, or they didn't hurt. I feel invincible with them. And I hope I make them feel the same way.

In high school and college, I slowly started trusting more people. I still saw a lot of them as land mines, but the list of people i trusted, and the experiences I shared with others expanded. But my radar chart still had its hold on me. I'm not great at meeting new people, my shyness and lingering distrusts puts me on a "wait and see" stance instead of aggressively breaking the ice. But at least I made more friends, and people liked me because I my "un-strong" personality. I was easy to be with because I never imposed anything on anyone nor made them feel small or insignificant.

I was "mabait". It seemed like a moniker, a title, I WAS the living  embodiment of "mabait". Or at least that how I was made to feel from all the praise and "he said, she saids" about me. "Mabait" means "nice". I was the "nice" guy. But I wasn't particularly generous, overly polite or very helpful. I was "nice" because I was safe. All those years of tip toeing around land mines has made me an expert of "not being offensive". Friends came easy, well "friends" as in "Hi Hello" friends, But it was fine. No one needs a ton of close friends, I had enough and had no reason to complain of the shortage. It felt good to walk around campus to say hi and chat (as in genuinely chat) to someone about something. These friendships were safe enough and some of them blossomed into relationships I treasure to this very day.

But did I really change? Not really, as the people I met matured around me, "nice" people were nice to have... safe and harmless. Ironically, I was safe and harmless because of my distrust, or maybe even fear of people. My radar chart did a full 180 on me, but I liked it... and I didn't want that to change...



This post is long enough already... it's been sitting in my drafts for months... so I think I should end it here and post again later as I look back at my life to try to understand my radar chart and the path of what kind of person it is leading me to become...

Here are some of the BIG CHOICES IN MY LIFE that I should think about in future, I'll write about them when I have the time...

NICE or NOT
FIRST JOB
NB or LOY

MBA or NOT

STAY or GO
FRIEND or FOE

I'm Still at Work!

Working late in the office is becoming more and more common lately... I really dont like it.

There was an article i read not long ago about some old marketing guru that passed away... his last words were about how people in his industry and how they bragged about how much time they spent at work... the family dinners missed, recitals of sons' and daughters' forgotten... how people sacrificed so much to make the deadline of a 30 second commercial or product launch. 

"it's not worth it" he said.

It's so hard to believe that... but its true... if you read the article, it makes sense... you can see how single minded these people were... spending 24 hours at the office to churn out business success while sacrificing everything in life... but when you're at work, working for a deadline or target... one can't help but dump your time  there... Drop work once the clock strikes 7PM; Easier said than done...

it's 11:11 PM on a Monday as i write this... i should go home

It's been a while

I treat this blog as a journal. It's a way for me to look back on my past self. To see what I was going through and how I felt about things. I could see how excited I was in some posts and how sad I was in others. I also used to talk in a very weird way on the Internet. I had this very cringeworthy way of writing... Like some kind of kid who just got a hold of Friendster. It's too embarrassing to describe it here, but you're free to dig through the archives of you wanna hurl from pre-jeje blogging.

How are things now?

My first semester is over. I'm now in my second. Taking a lighter schedule now. Though like before, there isn't as much impact to my MBA classes as I'd hope. I think I have to devote more of my very little time to this or it will all be for naught. I can start by being friendlier with my classmates I guess, I should start by talking to them more. My groups this sem aren't as "cohesive" or "stimulating" as the last semester's. maybe it's the mix of people, the topic or the sched... I dunno. I have to try to get more out of my classes and classmates.

Christmas went by quickly and quietly. It's sad that this holiday lost its magic so many years ago... Maybe it's the absence of a solid Christmas vacation or the fact that its getting harder to get friends together. These supposedly bright times aren't as bright anymore and they seem more like social and religious obligation than anything else... I think I'm a Scrooge.

I'm already trying to change my lifestyle bit by bit to curb my rapid weight gain. Already have a gym membership as Gold's Gym. I try to go twice a week. One workout session/treadmill day and one yoga day every Wednesday. Admittedly, I sweat more in yoga than doing the treadmill and chest press machines. Maybe I should try that cycling class on Tuesday nights... As for my diet, I'm ditching breakfast meats and garlic rice for wheat bread, tuna and bran flakes in milk. Better those than all the canned goods I used to eat every morning. I have a friend bring me red rice meals for lunch (for a small fee). I also don't eat dinner some nights. I only really eat a lot on week ends, but even then, I try to share my meal instead of soloing so that I can control my portions. Eating healthy isn't so bad if it all boils down to foods like these. It's just the availability that's the problem. The grocery list at the house has to change or I maybe should just buy my own food.

More stuff at work with more responsibility, friction, clashes and stress. It's a good thing in a way, just a struggles that's all. I still don't have any great victories under my belt yet. And this new responsibility is an even bigger albeit more difficult battle to win. I'm starved for any significant result from my work, for any positive impact on the business. It's a draining thought that visits me every day.

Google opened a Manila office earlier this month. No interesting job openings though. I find myself wondering a lot about what my next job will be like. I'm not resigning anytime soon, but I'm pretty sure my job now isn't the last job I'll be having a. Will I go tech? Food? FMCG? It's hard to think how I'll find new work, apply, get in and learn a whole new business. I don't know how fast and how well I'd adjust to different inustrt.

Those are my major concerns right now as I continue to push through life.

Til the next update then

Still tired... And overweight

I'm still inexplicably exhausted every morning when I wake up.

There are fewer idle moments. Moments I used to hate but now I crave.

I have just accepted the fact that I am overweight. I'm getting too fat too fast. Now what am I to do?

Eating has become more than just a necessity for me, it's a pastime, a celebration, a way to break the stress.

The unrelenting forward momentum of work, school and life always push me to the next meal. Eating is the like an aspirin to a headache. It relieves the discomfort, but the source is undeniably still there.

Life isn't slowing down. In my efforts to be "competitive" and yet still enjoy life, I've pushed and strained myself to my limits... That's when I eat.

Lunch break and merienda are welcome events that "pause" the work tasks of the day and dinner time is the climax.

The thing about dinner time is that's the meal where there is no time limit. It's not like breakfast where I'd be in such a hurry to get to work, or lunch where I have to eat in an hour and a half or less. Dinner time at the end of the day has no succeeding event save for sleep. I take my time and indulge in the home cooked meal before me. That's where I gain the most weight: eating 'till I'm about to burst then going straight to sleep.

I don't set aside time to exercise regularly anymore. Going home late from work discourages any sort of activity at night. The weeknight jogs I used to take are now a thing of a past as staying in the office way past 7 has become the norm... No one is forcing me to stay most of those times. I guess I have to learn when to stop working, to stop pushing myself to do more at work.

I have to stop this weight gain and get some more exercise. The workout might help with my constant tiredness too. So here's what I'll try to start doing.

1. Go home early. If its past 7, it can wait 'till tomorrow.

2. Eat heavy breakfasts and light dinners. At least on weekdays. Saturday and Sunday are cheat days.

3. Exercise! Simple exercises in the morning and ab ripper few times a week. Jog once in a while and contemplate getting a gym membership.

4. Watch what I eat. Less carbs, sugars and deep fried food, more vegetables, fish and lean meats

5. Sleep early. Never stay up past 12 (except for Saturday nights!)

I should print out this list and hang it somewhere. I think I have to remind myself of this.

Going to try eating fresh lumpia for lunch alternating with "Che Che" food and baon and let's see where it goes. That's the easiest thing to start with.

Already squeezed in an an ripper routine tonight, I'll try another one after tomorrow.

And now it's late, so I should sleep. Only had one serving of dinner at 7 and I've been holding myself back from eating the entire night! This is the hardest thing to do on the entire list!

Lord grant me strength! Operation diet!

Very Tired

I'm always very tired lately.

There's always a lot of things to do and a lot of things I want to do... But there isn't enough time anymore.

I want time to myself, time to do nothing at all... But that would be irresponsible... It's either I'm spreading myself out too thin or I'm not that great at life. Or this could be a health concern, I don't really know.

Work is getting more demanding. That's a good thing actually.

But school is just becoming tedious, I'm starting to remember how much I hated school back in college. I guess I just don't find it as exciting or as meaningful... Yet. And I guess that's what makes it so tiring. I spend the good half of my Saturday at school, effectively forfeiting my weekend. The only thing I get to do is eat dinner.

I really have to lighten my schedule next semester.

My legs are always aching and my head gets really heavy sometimes. But the worst feeling I get is that I'm always hungry.

At church last Sunday, the reading mentioned something like " if your hand causes you to sin, then you must cut off your hand...".

Maybe I should cut back on something?

Abandoning the Social Networking Ship

Multiply finally released my content. 

I'm downloading all my photos as I type this entry and I just finished exporting my blog posts to this new blogger site. I'm actually thinking of re-posting some of my older photos on facebook... just to remind people of how carefree things once were.

Feels weird exporting everything and then importing them again somewhere else. Its like getting on a lifeboat and rowing away while looking back at a perfectly good ship in calm waters. Pointless and "necessary" at the same time. Pointless because multiply isn't really sinking that fast, the captain just drilled a hole in the hull; Necessary because I *have* to make sure I preserve everything. The previous generation had scrap books... I have multiply.

Kinda makes me wonder when and how facebook will face the same fate.

Why would facebook die? hmmmmm....

1. a new layout so "radical" it would make timeline look as good as the original FB profile. It would be soooo bad that people would just jump the boat and get on twitter, pinterest or even *gasp* tumblr

2. hack of the century. passwords, photos, personal info... ALL of it hacked, bastardized, deleted and scattered across the web. The combined complaining power of the world's facebook populace would spawn  a GLOBAL court hearing : The people of Planet earth vs Facebook

3. It just stops working and no one knows how to fix it. The ghost of Steve Jobs rumored to be seen in fb data centers around the world.

4. Facebook data grows so fast that it outpaces the production of digital storage. People will start getting "failed" messages on every status update, like and poke to the point that the data centers around the world just explode. Afterwards, people step out of their houses for the first time in decades.

5. Facebook decides that other Social Network sites are becoming more popular due to focused and/or niche services. They then decide to go a) SEARCH ENGINE b) ONLINE PHONEBOOK/DIRECTORY c) WEB HOSTING d) PROFESSIONAL NETWORK ala Linked in e) ADULT DATING SITE

6. Zuckerberg retires early, he makes so much money that he realizes he can just quit now and live with all the earnings he got. Company culture then spirals out of control as he is soon followed by senior employees leaving facebook to be run by a bunch of interns resulting in either one (or all) of the above

Would they let you back it up?

1. probably with some kinda cool shit like XMLAsdvha69 or something. you can even export to friendster, reddit and 9gag

2. Just for $199.68, you can buy a facebook tablet that has ALL of the recoverable data from your account. Its basically just a tablet that shows your timeline and you can click the stuff on it. Its waterproof, dirt proof and solar powered. It can act as your digital tombstone for when you finally log out from the world.

3. ... or maybe they'll take all your data and sell it to some stalkers, pedophiles, perverts and telemarketing companies to pay off for whatever debt they accumulated and to pay for zuckerberg jr's college fund.

I should really be sleeping now, i've got work tomorrow and midterms on saturday. LOL

hello first Blogger Blog post! hope you dont leave me too soon! lololol!

Farewell multiply

I can't sleep, it's always difficult to sleep every Sunday night. I'm in bed now, typing on my phone while I think about what's going to happen to multiply.

I never thought multiply would take down the social side of their site. It was the thing that built up it's popularity: virtually unlimited photo sharing. It was a big deal back then, point and shoot digi cams were becoming cheaper and people took literally hundreds of photos at parties. Multiply was the best way to share those photos and "extend" the experience with comments and replies. Facebook limited photo albums to 50 at a time back then, that was something multiply had an edge on. Multiply even had "faceboxes": the precursor to facebook photo tags. You could box the face of yoir friends in photos not unlike facebook tags today. It just never really caught on back then, unlike the way tags are done now

Then it didn't innovate much from there.

There were new "shareable" media things. Like links, blogs and videos. Then you could share audio. I remember a time you could download songs from multiply, people would rip their CDs and post their favourite songs. Then it became an illegal way to download music. Some copyright dodging later, multiply made it so you could not upload certain types of audio files.

After photo sharing. There was the market. People started selling on multiply, using photo albums to display their goods. Multiply just formalized it with the marketplace we have today by organizing vendors, certifying some, improving fulfillment etc. But it's all just "cosmetic" for me, its the users that made that. Not multiply.

Then there's multiply premium which was an early form of a cloud service. It allowed users to save and download High res photos. You had to pay extra though. I don know the exact price, but it was fairly affordable as a lot of people subscribed. I'm not a fan of the "freemium" model. With people as price conscious as Filipinos, most of them will abuse whatever they can get for free

Now it's all going to be gone soon. Memories from late highschool to early college are going to be taken offline. What about all those fun conversations with my friends? How about my photos and blog posts? It'll all be gone. It just saddens me.

I hardly ever log in to multiply nowadays. In the end, it's not personal preference that drives people to a social networking site, it's popularity. The more of your friends are on it, the more likely you'll go there.

Facebook now owns the "general" SNS pie with twitter a close second while niche sites like instagram and pinterest (even friendster) try their best to find their place in the ecosystem. Multiply is just commiting social suicide ( no pun intended)

Multiply is my scrapbook of my teenage years. It's also a place where I write to let go of my feelings and inner conflicts. With multiply killing the social side of their business. Where will I write?

I hope they make a way for me to export my content to a blogspot or something.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'll miss multiply. It's a reminder of the joys of simpler times and an online haven I retreat to. I just wish multiply would have done something to try to revive it instead of going all "marketplace" on me. There aren't enough people like me left I guess.

I'll miss you multiply, I hoped youd be there forever. But we cant have everything, right? Thank you for all the joy and relief you've give me in the past 6 years. I'll always remember you

"Dont do anything you won't be comfortable with"

"Don't do anything you won't be comfortable with"

I'm typing this as i take a sh*t on the toilet. I'm totally comfortable with that, which is why i can do it. There are other things however that aren't so easily done. The opposite is high stake gambling or *gasp* the stock market *un-gasp*. I'm not comfortable placing large sums on something based on chance. Hence i don't do them, I place my money in mutual funds instead. That's an investment decision im comfortable with.

Rarely in my life have i encountered "hard decisions". I've made a lot of decisions in my life. Some of them very important. Its just that most weren't that hard. More often than not, when coming to a cross road, the journey leading there puts me in a certain mindset. I'm so convinced (or I've convinced myself) that one decision is the right one for me that when it's time to cross the bridge, all i have to do is cross. Take for example college. It all boiled down to UAnP and ADMU. An important decision: choice of college and course can lay the foundations of your career... or at least land you your first job. I easily picked ADMU over UAnP. Though i admit i was very interested in going to UAnP with their smaller population, more focused teachers, dynamic courses and optional 5th year master's course, i picked ADMU. Why? Its near, i liked the Management Economics course description, Papa studied there, a lot of friends were going there, and its along the "very cozy at the time" katipunan avenue. See? important decision, but easily made. I was totally comfortable with the idea of going blue and white from green and white.

(i'm off the toilet now btw)

Sure i did regret choosing Ateneo during my college years. I even contemplated transferring to UAnP. But i stuck with it because i knew the Ateneo name carried alot of weight for fresh grads (despite the questionable faculty at the jesuit campus). It took me sometime to think about, but i convinced myself that staying had its benefits and again, the decision was easily made.

My decision to stay bore fruit during my first job fair. I got in to the Sun Cellular Management Trainee Program. I wanted an MT program because its a good way to move from my lolly gagging college life to the "professional life". My fellow MTs were people i got along with, like a freshman's college block, we were each other's support system and I generally enjoyed working in Sun early on. My decision to persevere 4 years in Ateneo's brutal social hierarchy and endure it's egotistical faculty was an important decision that i was happily comfortable with. 

Lots of things at work happend. It became more and more depressing as i struggled to create any meaningful output. I was in "New Business", a team dedicated to finding new ways to offer products, services or earn revenues for Sun Cellular Postpaid. It entailed understanding business models, networks, systems, financials and business case analysis. I met with lots of people from all over the world and discussed ideas on how to partner up or create the next GSM service. It got tiring after a while. The telecom business is a big and heavy business. I spent a year and a half exploring new business and though it was fascinating, it wasn't fulfilling. I wasn't able to launch anything successful (but i still received 3 promotions over 2 years which isnt that bad). The negative side effect is all my efforts are internal to Sun Cellular, theres nothing i can brag about in my resume since everything i worked on was "confidential". So my next decision was whether to 1.) stay and persevere like Ateneo, 2.) Request for a Transfer 3.) Leave SUN and search for more meaningful work that'll beef up my resume.

I chose option 1.) mostly because i was so accustomed to the work and New Business couldn't afford to lose another team member. It wasn't a hard decision. I thought about it alot and chose to cling on to hope as they do in movies and books. Eventually though, after the MVP's acquisition of SUN. Things were starting to look up. Projects that were "Sure to be approved" were lined up and i was a part of them. Important decision, comfortably made.

Just to top off that story, My boss put me in line for a transfer to the more mainstream Postpaid Marketing Department. I won't be able to finish some of my cooler projects. But at least mainstream business will help me learn a lot and really contribute to my marketability as a future hire elsewhere.

My perseverance seems to pay off for myself now doesn't it?

here's a snippet from an earlier post

http://megeh.multiply.com/journal/item/115/Another_long_weekend..._ends

"My former boss said to me before he resigned: "when you grow old, you make decisions for your family and not for yourself". (referring to his decision to resign a job he liked and look for a more "rewarding" job) Ever since he said that, I started doing anything i want with my life. For when (and IF) the time comes that i choose to settle down, all my choices won't be for me anymore, but for those i love (CHEESY SH*T)"

Right now I'm faced with the first real difficult decision in my life. And the decision isn't just about me, its not just for myself. Past important decisions were easier to make because i alone would carry the consequences of those decisions be they good or bad. I would just have to man up to my decisions and move forward without regrets. But when someone else's life will be greatly affected... its a whole new ball game for me. For the first time in my life. There is no comfortable decision or alternative. Either road i take could spawn something i could regret later on. This is like the first time i encountered risk. The Risk of making a mistake that could scar the both of us.

What do i do when you aren't comfortable with anything?

Lonely day meditations

the frightening reality is that we all die alone

i spent most of the day alone. I'm sick with tonsillitis for over a week now. I'm dedicating his weekend to rest and recovery. I won't get rid of this infection if i tire myself at work everyday.

so im here in my room just facebooking and playing on the PS3. I finished Starhawk 2 days after i bought it. I cant say that i like the multiplayer though. Unlike most other multiplayer games i've played, Starhawk really needs you to communicate with your teammates. In mass effect 3, its possible to stomp around ignoring your team mates and still be fist place. Call of Duty Pros can mop the floor with the other team single handed, same goes for uncharted 3 multiplayer and co-op. But in Starhawk (and maybe to some extent, Battlefield 3), the scale of the battles really makes each individual player's efforts small. Building your base is impossible on your own. my team was owned on the first two games because we couldn't get our act together. Everyone was trying to build what they want then blasting off to do whatever they wanted. But the other team was smart. They saved up money to build up forward bases and tanks. Then bombarded us from well fortified positions. We all counterattacked in small ways. Doing sneaky one man rocketeer stunts and starhawk strafing. But it was in no way done in a coordinated strike the way our opponents did. Yes, we did what we wanted but it was no match for other team's siege strategy. As a contrast, not everyone did something particularly fun on the other team. Some went resource hunting and repairing,  others did the building and some did quick bike and hawk strafes to get to the flag while only 2 tanks were active at a time while the rest supported. Theoretically, everyone on the team could have been rolling on tanks since the forward base was set up, but they didnt. Everyone did their part, even if it wasnt the funnest thing to do. In the end, they won. I never set a foot outside my base.

That was long. but the point i wanted to bring out is that sometimes, for a certain goal to be reached. Somethings have to be done for the greater good, for the long term and all that jazz. So its not really a matter of who your doing it with but more of you guys all doing complimentary actions for the group goal rather than personal preference.

Its a simple concept which im sure most people know and understand. But when putting it in to practice, it can be difficult to execute.

Growing up i've adjusted to a certain philosophy of doing whatever i wanted regardless of other peoples opinions as long as i dont hurt or offend anybody with it. It made me a bit... weird... since i liked and did a lot of things that weren't that mainstream. So i kept to myself when it comes to my hobbies. I dont particularly enjoy basketball depsite the large social benefits one can get by playing and following basketball nor do i particularly follow TV series which got really popular as i hit college. So in the end, i dont really "play" well with others unless it involved eating food which everyone does anyway and it doesn't help with the "greater good" principle either.

Hence the starhawk dilemma. I just wanted to do one man operations like i do in most games but that clearly wont work here. You really have to stick to the team strategy to make the team win. Sticking with a solo strategy will just make you lose alone.

'

I'm in a certain situation now that really stresses this concept of "doing things i may not prefer to do but must do for a greater goal". Though i do want to attain the "team goal", the "things that i have to do" or rather "things that i've been told that i have to do" don't make sense to me. My disagreement and refusal to follow these mandates has derailed us from the attainment of the team goal. Note that these "things i have to do" were not specified by me but by my partner.

Now the question must be asked: Am i wrong for disagreeing? Or "do the things i have to do" wrong to begin with? Do i disagree because i dont understand? Or because i do not accept?

These are the things i dwell on now. Life is full of things you have to do. You may not like them, but if you want certain things in life... to be successful, to be healthy... to be happy, you have to do anything and everything to make them happen.

Do i leave this team? or do i stay?

Failure

Haven't been chalking up any wins these past years. Ever since college, its always been a struggle to rack up any achievement of any kind. 

Achievements that matter... I mean, yeah sure i graduated... but almost everyone did... so that really doesn't count. Yeah, I graduated with a minor in enterprise development because i was part of the SOMBA (school of management business development program) but I hardly got by. Incorporating was real hard, plus I barely scrounged up all the legal stuff. On top of that, the business wasn't sustainable even though on paper it was. As a leader, i failed to make it anything other than an excuse to get a "minor"

Then the start of my working years. Scored a management trainee program at SUN Cellular... seemed like a great opportunity at the time. Though I am learning alot and exposed to a great number of things, most of it is very industry or even company specific. I do alot at work, and go home late almost every night, but work these past few years is "superficial" at best. "Marami akong ginagawa, pero wala akong nagagawa". What I mean is that although I do my part of the work at SUN Cellular, I've yet to significantly contribute the the company's business. I'm afraid this experience is eroding the base of my now cloudy career path. It's strange... sometime ago, early on in my job, I seemed to idealistic of what I do and the goals of my work. Its almost two years and those are unrealized.

There are a couple of other things i tried... Franchising for one. Wanted something small and easy to manage on the side. Put up a small Ice Scramble booth in Shaw boulevard, right in front of JRU. It was a grueling process of finding the right franchise package and location for the business. On top of that, negotiating with Franchise company was unnecessarily difficult.Ending up in arguments with our contact. Even then, I was optimistic. I found a high traffic location that wasn't too far away with a land lord that was really accommodating. Everything seemed right... but lots of shit hit the fan. Sales were slow, my one and only employee was an asshole. Even when we started the booth very early on in the scramble trend, things just didn't. We closed up shop with a net loss and hardly any sales were made. I wasn't comfortable losing money that way.

Today i attempted my first marathon today. Got injured on the 25th kilometer. A classic case of runner's knee. Despite the program i joined and the training I did. The 25th km ended it for me. I attempted to limp my way to the finish line. But the race organizers stopped me on the 36th k. "Cut off time" they said.I can confidently say i have the stamina for this. I wasn't tired. My injury stopped me. And because of that, today I chalked up another failure. I'll continue to run after I recover from my injury and try to redeem myself. Maybe I can complete the run united series (at least the 21K runs)

I'm now trying my hand in investments. Going to try investing in the PSEi once the market corrects itself. I learned about investing in indexes after reading "A Random Walk Down Wall Street" by Burton Malkiel. Its not really to make a killing though. Its just supposed to create a nest egg for me in the future to supplement my other investments in mutual funds. I hope to God that these decisions won't kill me like my previous ones.

Needless to say. I'm really down right now. I need a win in my life. Something to say that I am doing something worth doing. I need to think this through. Is this the so called "quarter life crisis" i'm going through? How do you deal with something like this? I need to win, I need to win bad

Typos

Wheneve it type something here in multiply... ang daming typo. LOL Spelling errors where i pres "o" instead of "i"... shit like that. Then it totally changes the meaning of the work or just makes it look downright stupid sounding.

I dont proofread this stuff, i just rant a click "save & publish". Only when its posted do I see (or other people) see the typos. once tweeted something and typed the word "by" when i really meant "buy". dafuq, that tweet made no sense.

When its up there in the internetz, someone's bound to see it until you edit it. Its like that with a lot of things really... once you post something wrong... it stays wrong until you edit it... but theres always a change someone see that mistake... and that mistake can have an effect on people... 

Thats something you can't really edit away easily

Mga Walang pake

People just don't care.

It's just like that quote I saw over on 9gag. Your friends aren't good to you because you're a good person, it's because theyre good people. The capacity to do good isn't solely based on the recipient of a good deed but on the doer. So when people fuck you up, intentionally or unintentionally. They should fucking rot in hell. They did what they did kasi... Wala silang pake

Is...

Is a cynical twenty something that's mad at everything because he's frustrated and disappointed at what he has become and where he is going. Yes there are still a few gems in his life. Yet most that have chosen to become close to him or have accepted him in their life have either easily drifted away or have regretted being so open. He... Is a rare dish, a dish most have no taste for, only a few can stomach, and even fewer... Enjoy

He revels in his difference, yet he knows it serves him not. He is covered in a gentle and quiet aura, but once you step in, you realize it was but a shroud to reality of he who IS

Inconsiderate Filipinos, Sunday habits, and a dead multiply

rained hard today. traffic came with it. Picking up and dropping off people at church was hell (ironically speaking lol). People just took their sweet time getting off and on their cars.

Its really stupid... happening right on the church driveway. Why the hell does it take so long? you could be out of the car in under a minute. There's a roof on the church driveway! surely the rain isn't the reason right? It was more than 3 quarters into the mass when I finally got in.

its really stupid how inconsiderate people can be. Taking their sweet time as the traffic piles up to 2 or 3 blocks down the street.

lol at least that's out of the way.

Sunday Habit = staying up late, youtubing and eventually blogging on multiply

oh multiply... i hope you will never take down my content like friendster did. I don't want to go out of my way to put a wordpress or blogspot when everything is here. My media locker in the cloud. My memories of a time long gone.

Its sad how dead multiply is

the posts are few and far in between... mostly by ccello. His movie reviews never fail to pop up. The posts are "personal" he says, not for the "public". Even though its on the web, i doubt anyone but me would see those posts. haha. Facebook really did something didnt it?

such a ghost town. I wish it was alive the way it used to be. I remember how much i loved this site. Its definitely not the same as facebook

Another long weekend... ends

i looked at my previous entry... and saw the typos. LOL. I should proof read more. (proof read... is that one word or two?)

So what's happening this week?

Hopefully i find out if my credit card gets approved this week

Only got "work" on wednesday and friday. 

Tuesday night, I'm up typing this when i should be sleeping (and i watched "Predators" today)

Wednesday is my groggy monday as i try to remember what were the stuff I'm supposed to be continuing from last week. Its also Badminton practice for the sports fest

Thursday is training day (social media marketing??)

Friday is back to work

Saturday is the sports fest, plus another commitment

Sunday is the day I spend locked in my room... and mass of course

LOL, got my whole week figured out... and i remember how i used to complain that I've got nothing to do all the time... I had a lot of time to myself today. It was like those stagnant days that i used to have a lot of. The days i hated, the ones that got me depressed. I welcome those days now. Its nice to not "think" once in a while.

My former boss said to me before he resigned: "when you grow old, you make decisions for your family and not for yourself". (referring to his decision to resign a job he liked and look for a more "rewarding" job) Ever since he said that, I started doing anything i want with my life. For when (and IF) the time comes that i choose to settle down, all my choices won't be for me anymore, but for those i love (CHEESY SH*T)

So live life like a shallow bastard, eat, drink and sleep. because right now, I think i (we) deserve it

I'm awake again, dafuq

I'm awake again at 4 am! No, I wont be sleepy in the morning. I'll probably just over sleep.

Lotsa things happening, but I'd rather not write it. Depending on who you are, I might even tell you!

Lets just say my personal and work life are moving... forward at the least. Generally positive, yeah?

The lesson of life that I struggle with alot, (and have yet to accept and learn) is: You can't please everybody. There are just something that go wrong. And from that point forward, some people may not approve of you the same way they used to. That relationship lost. It really pains me to lose something like that... you know? I didn't mean any harm. I never do with those i call my "friends". 

But that's a fact of life. One I still can't fully accept. One that still bothers me from time to time.

But work is moving along... I "support" more than "lead"... but I'm sure someday I'll accomplish something that I can rightfully claim as an outcome of my own efforts. I think I'll get there... just a little longer.

And yeah... weekends are great :p 4 days bebeh! 

Here's to the future! Happy sunday

What's in it for me?

That's what everyone says... Sure they can do this or that, but the question always pops up first: If i do this, what's in it for me? 

I see it everywhere, in everything. How people drive, how they fall in line, how they reply to my messages etc. They won't do it unless there's some kind of benefit or it would help them avoid something bad. That's how everyone thinks. You might be the same.

Everyone from the politicians in office to the beggars on the street. All the same.

So when you try to make something long term with the cooperation of others, they don't care. If there's nothing beneficial for the short term, there's no point. For me, and for them. No one does anything for the sake of doing it... despite the possible outcomes... no money now, no work now. Plain and simple.

This is probably why people migrate... looks pretty hopeless sometimes

Trimming down

It's the end of a Long weekend. And it's nice, strangely... It's not such an abrupt end like every sunday that seems to breeze by. It wasn't a fleeting afternoon, or a midday dash to midnight. It's just moving all so slowly... In a nice way.

I'm in bed now after spending a very wonderful day with a very wonderful person... I'm typing this on my phone while listening to patti Austin. The weekend is "chilling" to an end. It's really really nice, I don't remember feeling this way about any weekend ever.

It's all because I kept the day simple. Not forcing my self to do this or that. Just did the simple things... And I really want to feel like this everynight. Going to bed feeling like I lived a day in my life and not just running through it. And here's what im gonna do: start trimming down!

1. Stop playing Facebook games for hours and hours a day
2. Stop watching you tube too much
3. Stop playing iPhone games all the time (I'd rather boot up the ps3 for my gaming fix)
4. Stop playing with the settings of all my online accounts
5. Stop reading wikis other than Wikipedia

Things I'll keep on doing or should start
1. Be updated on the important stuff via RSS
2. Fix my iPhone with all my digital media needs
3. Watch movies that I missed
4. Spend more time with brandy
5. Exercise
6. Read more books that'll help me, like stuff about marketing, business and read the news too!
7. Get some quiet "me" time every day

8. Talk to people, friendly conversations ;)

yeah, that's what i wanna do... Here's to a mid year resolution!

blog blog

I think i now know why i have trouble sleeping... i read my previous post after leaving it in the "draft bin" for a while. Its because i don't have time i guess... so instead of alotting the 7 or so hours to sleep, i keep it for myself for me to waste on facebook playing games or watching video game walkthroughs on youtube. The end result? In the end I didn't make good use of my free time! haha! how ironic? and the end END result? lower mental functionality due to lack of sleep. LOL. I need to fix that, i need a tranquilizer gun, stun grenades or better yet: A warm bath, soothing ambient music and low cool air con. Its funny that I can sleep anywhere except my bed. Again, the irony of it all!!!

I miss multiply!!!! Facebook just isn't the same... (nothing against facebook, i visit several times a day!) I wonder how its picking up in the marketplace... lol, life is so hard... an apparent reality shoved in my face by the difficulties of marketing in the Philippine Economy... Its just too damn specific

I Don't write on my personal blog anymore

I'm waiting for louie to finish up so we can leave already... went into my multiply to pass the time and I saw how slow my feed was... how the updates were few and far in between... looked at some of my albums and remembered how crazy things were back then when I had a lot more freedom a a lot less "responsibility". 

It was funny how I hated that my studies took up so much time before... but now its nothing compared to my 9.6 hour a day job.

I like my Job, its not bad... and I will get something out of it in the end... Its just that 24 hours doesn't seem enough anymore for me to do all the things i wanna do.

i spend 10.6 hours at work (the extra hour for lunch break)

and around 7 hours of sleep in the morning (if i wake up at around 7 am)

then lets say 1 hour of sleep at night (if i sleep at around 11pm)

so that amounts to 18.6 hours leaving 5.4 for everything else...

That amount is actually less when you count in travel time and stuff...

Its all a tad draining... I'm starting to miss the long breaks, the lunches and dinners at katip, movies and foodtrips at spanky's, going to UP or to the malls, meeting up with Don-Don and Raymond, the hours I grinded in front of the PS3...

Life sure has changed...

I've written this post on Jan 2, 2011 of this year... strange that i didn't publish it right away, but the feeling is still the same... time is fleeting isn't it?