Many years ago, I wrote an entry about the
two-me’s.
Lately, the idea of the Ideal Self has been on my mind a lot. There have
been many occasions where I noticed that my ideas of who I hope to be in
a certain situation often get crushed by the real me.
The Ideal Me wants to be mature in a situation that might be chaotic and
frustrating but the Real Me gets annoyed, acts impatient or irrational.
The Ideal Me wants to explain things clearly and without placing blame
so we can have a productive conversation and resolve our differences,
yet the Real Me gets emotional and can’t think clearly. The Ideal Me
assumes the best and commits to situations where the Real Me freaks out
and makes things unpleasant without meaning to. The Ideal Me is kind and
compassionate regardless of how others treat me, but the Real Me gets
hurt and angry. The Ideal Me wants to make everyone happy but the Real
Me knows that’s impossible and often ends up upsetting everyone instead.
This has caused numerous problems in my personal life, in my work life,
in my friendships and relationships. Most significantly, it has made me
feel like I am continuously letting myself down.
After countless recent such events, I have realized that it’s time to
cut myself some slack and to start becoming more realistic about who I
am, what I can do and what I’d rather not. With a new job and a growing
family, time is quite rare. As I grow older and more responsible, I need
to learn to be who I am. I need to learn to graciously decline, even at
the cost of upsetting people I love. I know that, otherwise, they will
get much more upset when I do something to please them and end up
feeling resentful and frustrated. I need to learn that people get over
things relatively quickly and those who harbor resentment for not
getting their way aren’t worth dealing with.
I need to learn that there’s nothing wrong with the Real Me and that
when the Ideal Me starts taking over, I need to pay attention and make
sure that the Real Me can deliver the promises the Ideal Me makes.
 I actually read The Arithmetic
of Life before Hardboiled Wonderland but forgot to put it up. Found
this book on the recommendation of the O’Reilly
radar. Within a day, the book went from being around 300,000th on
Amazon’s rank to 3,000th. None of the bookstores around Palo Alto
carried it, so I used this occasion to enroll into the Palo Alto library
system and got the book within minutes and read it in hours. I found the
articles interesting and thought-provoking – albeit a bit repetitive.
The writer *really* hates the Congress and makes sure we know it often.
Overall, this book is a great read for those who say math isn’t useful
in their daily lives. The articles are short, easy to read, easy to
relate to and even entertaining.
 After having read 100 Years of Solitude in one
day, I was looking forward to reading Love in the Time of Cholera. A good
friend of mine had said that, of the two, this was her favorite and I
enjoyed 100 Years so much that I couldn’t imagine how much better it
could get. Maybe that’s why, it took me a few years to get the book and
finally start reading it.
I started it in Turkey but I was so tired and sick that I kept having to
put it down. When we got home, I took a break to get over jet lag and I
finally managed to sit and read a large chunk of it in one sitting,
which is when the book got good. Despite its beautiful story,
interesting characters and fantastic writing, I didn’t enjoy this nearly
as much as 100 Years of Solitude. When I finished the book, I did have a
wonderful, satisfied feeling, but I wasn’t as blown away with this story
and I had been with the previous. It wasn’t as epic and magical.
Still, it was a beautiful story and a beautiful book.
 My sister gave me a Turkish translation of The Ultimate Gift when I was
visiting her. Normally, I don’t read these books anymore. Mostly
because I read tons of them at some point in my life and I feel like I
want to take a break from all the advice-giving text. But since she gave
it to me and jet lag was preventing me from reading anything that
requires a lot of attention, I gave it a try. I struggled a lot with the
Turkish translation since it was so obvious that the translator didn’t
make any effort to make it sound more Turkish. Some of the phrases were
direct translations and didn’t make much sense in Turkish.
The “gifts” were relatively obvious to me but I did like a few of them,
especially the idea of the Golden List. Overall, I thought it was an
okay read but I don’t know that I would have missed much if I hadn’t
read the book.
 Now that I am on a
Haruki Murakami kick, I thought I should read Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of
the World. I started the book on the plane to Istanbul and didn’t
feel like I got into it as quickly as the other two I read. That might
have been because it also took me the longest to read (or maybe it took
me the longest to read because I didn’t get into it as quickly as the
other two, who knows?) I felt like this was the most resolved of the
three I’ve read so far and I really liked it a lot by the end. For
reasons I can’t really put into words, Kafka is still my favorite one. I
have three more Murakami books on my shelf and look forward to reading
every single one.
I truly owe a big thank you to the AskMe crowd for introducing me to
this great author.
So it’s been too long, I know. But to be fair, in the three weeks since I’ve made my previous post I found a new place, moved to a new house, in a new city, accepted a new job, changed my addresses everywhere, and said good-bye to one life and hello to another. I’m finally settled in and about to leave for vacation.
It’s been a long and tiring few weeks. After an unbearably long flight, I am hoping to have a pleasant, eventless, and relaxing vacation. I will do my best to post as much as possible, but I am not bringing my computer so it will depend on how much computer time I get on the island.
Be well, more coming soon.
Another from our night shoot from weeks ago. As you can see, these
are not processed as well as they could be. Now, I am especially glad
that we did the shoot since I don’t think I’ll be near a beach at
night anytime soon again. Beautiful La Jolla.
 Since reading Kafka on the Shore, I couldn’t stop
thinking about the book, so recently I went and bought another one by
Murakami. I picked The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle: A Novel
because it’s the novel that made Murakami famous in the US. This book
is considerably longer and thicker than Kafka and more convoluted. It
resolves a bit more but not a huge lot. There were bits that were
common to both novels but that didn’t bother me. I feel like maybe if
I read more of his work, I might get closer to solving the puzzle of
his stories. I now have to go buy all of his books. Easy to read,
difficult to understand.
 Since Google has a reputation
for having harrowing interviews, I thought it best to prepare as much
as possible. Even though I wasn’t sure if The Search would be
helpful, I figured it couldn’t hurt. It turned out to be a
fascinating read and gave me a lot to think about and a lot to talk
about. If you don’t know a lot about the history of search and if it
does interest you, I would highly recommend this read. Despite the
cover design, the book is not solely about Google and explores the
full history of search engines.
 I also read The Google Story,
again, hoping that it might give me some insight or clever
conversation pieces. I’ll be fully honest that I haven’t finished
this one. Partly because I only had ten days between the phone
interview and the on-site one and I read non-fiction much more
slowly. This is much more specific to Google and it’s more personal
and less about search. It’s more about the people behind the story
and about how the company got started. At least so far. More
interesting if you’re into the company story. Also, well-written.
I think these might fill the non-fiction quota of this and last month.
Two weeks ago, Jake, David and I flew to Florida for Jake’s
grandmother’s funeral. While we were there, Jake’s mom wanted to take
a walk by the late and feed the ducks. As an overjoyed David walked
around, talking to all the animals, I tried to snap some photos as I
kept an eye on him. They didn’t come out as well as I had hoped but I
wanted to put up a few just for the memory of it.
Another quote I saved from “How to be an Adult:”
In a relationship, this may mean that both parties do not choose
to use the same freedoms or limitations. For example: You feel great
pain when I form outside relationships, even though they are not
sexual. I feel no pain at all about your outside relating. To be
fair, both of us have equal latitude in this area. To be
compassionate, I give up the exercise of my right since it triggers
so much hurt in you – without asking you the same in return.
Meanwhile with compassion for me, you have committed yourself to
working in therapy on your fear and jealousy so thaat eventually i
can related to others with no consequence to you.” The “double
standard” refers to moral issues but not to consciously compassionate
relationships.
I am a firm believer that relationships are never exactly 50-50.
Sometimes one person gives more and other times vice versa. This is
what keeps the balance together. This means when I’m having a
horrible day, it’s ok for me to ask for 75% and I won’t have to feel
like I am being unreasonable just like I can offer 85% on a day when
I’m great and he’s not. For me, this applies to friendships as well.
The above quote is a similar scenario in my opinion. Two people are
never exactly the same. They had different pasts, different
upbringing, carry different residual pain and frustration. People’s
past tends to affect who they become and what they view as right/
wrong. Therefore, the list of things that bother me in a relationship
and the list of things I don’t care about one way or another could be
drastically different than the one my loved one compiled over the
length of his life.
I believe it’s crucial to treat each person like they are an
individual with their own priorities, thus it’s unfair to set rules/
guidelines for a relationship that are always exactly equal. The
quotes example speaks to me perfectly. I think there are two crucial
keys to make this work.
1. You need to communicate. If you don’t tell me that
something bothers you, you can’t blame me for doing it. Over and over
again. I am not here to read your mind. I can’t do it and you
shouldn’t expect me to. Stand up for yourself, be honest and kindly
explain to me that something upsets you and maybe even try to explain
why if you can. Trust me that I will listen and I will care. I won’t
judge. There’s a reason you picked me to share your life with.
2. I need to willingly give up the exercise of my right.
Regardless of our relationship, I am a free person. I can say and do
whatever I want, anytime I want. Being in a relationship means I
exercise the right to not do many things because our relationship is
more important to me than those things. I choose not to do them, not
because you said I can’t but because I respect you and choose not to
hurt you. The choice has to be mine or it will feel like a chore and
it will soon give rise to resentment and anger: two things that can
kill a relationship quickly or slowly but definitely painfully.
I guess it can be summarized like this: “Tell me what you think and
trust me that I will do my best to respect you.”
I used to be very immature and force the people who loved me to do a
particular thing (or, often, not to do it) and it took me many
painful years but I learned that you can’t force anyone to do or be
anything. You can admit that people are different with differing
needs. You can share your fears and worries and hope like crazy that
the person you are with loves you enough to work on them with you or
is patient enough to wait it through while you’re working on them
yourself.
My heart jumps each time the phone rings. Sinks each time it’s not
“the call.”
I check my mail incessantly, hitting refresh in millisecond
increments. If I leave home for an errand or go to the bathroom, I
travel with all the phones. I rush back to the computer hoping it
came in the two minutes I wasn’t clicking.
I create the worst possible scenario in my mind and get myself all
wound up. Why did I even think it was possible? Who am I kidding really?
I listen to an uplifting song and get my second wind. Maybe not
hearing soon is actually a good sign. Maybe this is possible after
all. Maybe. Maybe not. Good news travels fast, they say.
Waiting is exponentially more devastating than even the worst
possible outcome, sometimes. It’s a place where the hopeless and the
most hopeful collide, leaving me incapacitated.
And still, there’s nothing I can do, but wait.
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projects for twenty twenty-six
projects for twenty twenty-five
projects for twenty twenty-four
projects for twenty twenty-three
projects for twenty twenty-two
projects for twenty twenty-one
projects for twenty nineteen
projects for twenty eighteen
projects from twenty seventeen
monthly projects from previous years
some of my previous projects
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