I tried to read between the lines, I want a simple explanation for what I'm feeling inside.
Thought Du Jour
They say that the truth will set you free, but no one bothers to mention that the truth can be a tricky thing. The fact is that getting to the truth is never easily done. Too often it gets buried or misplaced or tucked away where no one can find it. The real question is, if one day you stumble on the truth, would you even know it? Would you even recognize it for what it was?
So I was initially planning for a recap entry, but somewhere in the middle of my write-up, I just decided to branch off into a totally different topic. So I haven't watched 500 Days of Summer lately, but the certain aspects of the film keeps popping into my mind once in a while. I am awfully fascinated by the way the story was told. With the entirely movie played out in a non-linear order, it acts like how our memories normally work. We never really remember things in linear fashion. Our thoughts would pop up here and there, but it never really starts from the beginning. We like to drawback to our memories to remember the fun moments, the sad moments or just to assess what the heck just happened. Sadly, our memories are not always reliable since we often throw in things to 'fill in the gap' as we go along.
I find myself often going back in my memories to piece together what happened or the assess something that just took place. Most events are not significant and I probably won't even bother to go over those, but the ones I do look back upon are the ones that leave a deeper impression inside me.
I often try my best to look back in an objective manner, but it would be a lie if I said that I can do it all the time. The problem is being able to differentiate what is truly reality and what is merely our own manipulated version of reality. When we fill in the gaps in our memories, we often throw in some little details that probably never existed or perhaps we emphasize on something that wasn’t really all that significant.
Let’s take a simple act of kindness for example. There are times when people hand over a Kleenex after you sneezed or perhaps shelter you from the rain with their umbrella. Just simple acts of kindness. But what if you somehow interpreted that as ‘something more’? It happens, but it might not be in such a simplified form as I’ve mentioned just now. It may consist of several acts over a course of a friendship. That’s why we get those best friends falling for each other scenarios. Ok sometimes there may be hidden intentions to start relationships, but often there isn’t. That’s when you get plenty of those one-sided love scenarios in which there is a Chinese saying that describes it as “自作多情”.
But what if all the signals are there, but it’s just the end result that is all wrong? Is it really our memories messing around with us or perhaps could it be that the others have played us after all? There was a girl I knew a few years back when all the signs were pointing towards a relationship. Yet when I did ask her out, things didn’t quite pan out. At one point I did try to look back at the moments to see if there were signs that she wasn’t into me, kind of like what Tom did when he reassessed his relationship with Summer in 500 Days of Summer. Sadly, unlike the movie, I couldn’t seem to pick out the moments that weren’t so happy-go-lucky. Things aren’t really as clear cut as I want them to be. Before you think my mind was playing tricks on me (though it is definitely a possibility), let’s just say all our mutual friends thought we were actually going somewhere as well.
So I wonder, have you ever been played? Or perhaps have you been the one manipulating someone’s feelings? Let’s take a step back and not look at anyone as the 'bad guy'… have you ever just simply misinterpreted a situation or someone’s intentions?
I suppose it’s true when they say “Men in the game are blind to what men looking on see clearly.” We can often pick out other people’s intentions when they do not directly involve ourselves. We can always tell if someone is interested in another person based on actions like purposely finding every opportunity to get within close proximity to him/her. We can always notice someone’s comfort level with certain individuals. We can always pick out individuals who are deathly afraid of confrontation. Yet somehow when we encounter these things ourselves, we are utterly clueless as to how to respond or react. Funny how life can be sometimes.
Aside from love, just think of situations in general in which our memories or our interpretation of our memories have distorted our expectations in life. Everytime there is an event we’re looking forward to, we often draw from our memories to paint a picture of what we can expect. It tends to come naturally as we try to imagine all the different scenarios of how things can play out. It helps build anticipation and create excitement. While it’s nice to be intoxicated with hope, there should be some precaution taken as it can also lead to a lot of disappointment. I’m sure most of you have experienced a social gathering or a simple hangout with friends that didn’t quite turn out the way you wanted it to. The event may turn out to be a bust because it wasn’t the way you ‘imagined’ (i.e. friends decided to bail last minute or perhaps you felt strangely out of place for the entire night). Our social lives are fairly unpredictable. People’s personalities, the surrounding environment and various other factors combine to create something that’s not necessarily what we imagine it to be. With all these variables floating around, should we even put in the effort to drum up excitement through our wild creative minds? Should we rather pursue life with a blank slate and save ourselves from the chance of being disappointed?
Mind games. We love to say that we hate it. We often want the straight answer and not have to go through loops just to reach the end point. Yet we find ourselves in that very situation quite often. Yes, people have a tendency play mind games with each other all the time. Some purposely let others overheard conversations to give someone a hint. Some would purposely use their friends to relay messages to others. Some like to put a spin on the truth in their day to day conversations. It seems like a common ritual for people to dance around the truth. Thankfully this doesn’t happen all the time and simple non-convoluted social interactions between people does actually exist.
It is expected that people never reveal everything all in one go. It takes time for walls to come down or perhaps it takes time for people to recall something they want to share. It is that time that gives us the opportunity to look back and maybe even reflect on certain things. That’s when things get a bit tricky because during this time, we may manipulate (either intentionally or unintentionally) the moments we all have with each other and that includes the information that is shared between us all. So we might get the simple straightforward answer to something we’re looking for at some point (i.e. figuring out someone's true intentions), but if we happen to be buried so deep in our own little bubble, we become oblivious to the little details in our surroundings. So people aren’t the only ones trying to play mind games with us, we just happen to be messing with our own heads as well.
Let’s end off this entry with one of my favourite scenes in film. The split screen of expectations vs. reality in 500 Days of Summer is a cheeky and fun way of portraying how things never really turn out how we picture them to be. This whole expectations vs. reality thing doesn’t just deal with love. It touches upon a range of things from career aspirations to a simple day trip to the beach. If everything went according to my expectations, I wouldn’t even be here in Australia and I wouldn’t be experiencing the dilemmas that I face right now. Again, that’s a story for another day. Anyway, enjoy the video and check out the movie when you get the chance. Bonus cool points if you’ve seen it and actually liked the movie. ;)
Expectations vs Reality from sleeptalker on Vimeo.
They say that the truth will set you free, but no one bothers to mention that the truth can be a tricky thing. The fact is that getting to the truth is never easily done. Too often it gets buried or misplaced or tucked away where no one can find it. The real question is, if one day you stumble on the truth, would you even know it? Would you even recognize it for what it was?
So I was initially planning for a recap entry, but somewhere in the middle of my write-up, I just decided to branch off into a totally different topic. So I haven't watched 500 Days of Summer lately, but the certain aspects of the film keeps popping into my mind once in a while. I am awfully fascinated by the way the story was told. With the entirely movie played out in a non-linear order, it acts like how our memories normally work. We never really remember things in linear fashion. Our thoughts would pop up here and there, but it never really starts from the beginning. We like to drawback to our memories to remember the fun moments, the sad moments or just to assess what the heck just happened. Sadly, our memories are not always reliable since we often throw in things to 'fill in the gap' as we go along.
I find myself often going back in my memories to piece together what happened or the assess something that just took place. Most events are not significant and I probably won't even bother to go over those, but the ones I do look back upon are the ones that leave a deeper impression inside me.
I often try my best to look back in an objective manner, but it would be a lie if I said that I can do it all the time. The problem is being able to differentiate what is truly reality and what is merely our own manipulated version of reality. When we fill in the gaps in our memories, we often throw in some little details that probably never existed or perhaps we emphasize on something that wasn’t really all that significant.
Let’s take a simple act of kindness for example. There are times when people hand over a Kleenex after you sneezed or perhaps shelter you from the rain with their umbrella. Just simple acts of kindness. But what if you somehow interpreted that as ‘something more’? It happens, but it might not be in such a simplified form as I’ve mentioned just now. It may consist of several acts over a course of a friendship. That’s why we get those best friends falling for each other scenarios. Ok sometimes there may be hidden intentions to start relationships, but often there isn’t. That’s when you get plenty of those one-sided love scenarios in which there is a Chinese saying that describes it as “自作多情”.
But what if all the signals are there, but it’s just the end result that is all wrong? Is it really our memories messing around with us or perhaps could it be that the others have played us after all? There was a girl I knew a few years back when all the signs were pointing towards a relationship. Yet when I did ask her out, things didn’t quite pan out. At one point I did try to look back at the moments to see if there were signs that she wasn’t into me, kind of like what Tom did when he reassessed his relationship with Summer in 500 Days of Summer. Sadly, unlike the movie, I couldn’t seem to pick out the moments that weren’t so happy-go-lucky. Things aren’t really as clear cut as I want them to be. Before you think my mind was playing tricks on me (though it is definitely a possibility), let’s just say all our mutual friends thought we were actually going somewhere as well.
So I wonder, have you ever been played? Or perhaps have you been the one manipulating someone’s feelings? Let’s take a step back and not look at anyone as the 'bad guy'… have you ever just simply misinterpreted a situation or someone’s intentions?
I suppose it’s true when they say “Men in the game are blind to what men looking on see clearly.” We can often pick out other people’s intentions when they do not directly involve ourselves. We can always tell if someone is interested in another person based on actions like purposely finding every opportunity to get within close proximity to him/her. We can always notice someone’s comfort level with certain individuals. We can always pick out individuals who are deathly afraid of confrontation. Yet somehow when we encounter these things ourselves, we are utterly clueless as to how to respond or react. Funny how life can be sometimes.
Aside from love, just think of situations in general in which our memories or our interpretation of our memories have distorted our expectations in life. Everytime there is an event we’re looking forward to, we often draw from our memories to paint a picture of what we can expect. It tends to come naturally as we try to imagine all the different scenarios of how things can play out. It helps build anticipation and create excitement. While it’s nice to be intoxicated with hope, there should be some precaution taken as it can also lead to a lot of disappointment. I’m sure most of you have experienced a social gathering or a simple hangout with friends that didn’t quite turn out the way you wanted it to. The event may turn out to be a bust because it wasn’t the way you ‘imagined’ (i.e. friends decided to bail last minute or perhaps you felt strangely out of place for the entire night). Our social lives are fairly unpredictable. People’s personalities, the surrounding environment and various other factors combine to create something that’s not necessarily what we imagine it to be. With all these variables floating around, should we even put in the effort to drum up excitement through our wild creative minds? Should we rather pursue life with a blank slate and save ourselves from the chance of being disappointed?
Mind games. We love to say that we hate it. We often want the straight answer and not have to go through loops just to reach the end point. Yet we find ourselves in that very situation quite often. Yes, people have a tendency play mind games with each other all the time. Some purposely let others overheard conversations to give someone a hint. Some would purposely use their friends to relay messages to others. Some like to put a spin on the truth in their day to day conversations. It seems like a common ritual for people to dance around the truth. Thankfully this doesn’t happen all the time and simple non-convoluted social interactions between people does actually exist.
It is expected that people never reveal everything all in one go. It takes time for walls to come down or perhaps it takes time for people to recall something they want to share. It is that time that gives us the opportunity to look back and maybe even reflect on certain things. That’s when things get a bit tricky because during this time, we may manipulate (either intentionally or unintentionally) the moments we all have with each other and that includes the information that is shared between us all. So we might get the simple straightforward answer to something we’re looking for at some point (i.e. figuring out someone's true intentions), but if we happen to be buried so deep in our own little bubble, we become oblivious to the little details in our surroundings. So people aren’t the only ones trying to play mind games with us, we just happen to be messing with our own heads as well.
Let’s end off this entry with one of my favourite scenes in film. The split screen of expectations vs. reality in 500 Days of Summer is a cheeky and fun way of portraying how things never really turn out how we picture them to be. This whole expectations vs. reality thing doesn’t just deal with love. It touches upon a range of things from career aspirations to a simple day trip to the beach. If everything went according to my expectations, I wouldn’t even be here in Australia and I wouldn’t be experiencing the dilemmas that I face right now. Again, that’s a story for another day. Anyway, enjoy the video and check out the movie when you get the chance. Bonus cool points if you’ve seen it and actually liked the movie. ;)
You can watch this video on www.livejournal.com
Expectations vs Reality from sleeptalker on Vimeo.