HELP?

A teacher friend of mine is seriously ill recently and asked me to pace his graduating students to complete their work.

As time to final examinations is near, I offered additional time to assist pupils during my free time and received no monetary rewards in return. The first few sessions went on well. Pupils were heading for the right directions and I am pleased with what pupils have achieved. As I was happy with what I see, demands increased. I tried hard to cope with these requests, however, I was annoyed with conditions came along with them. Timing, materials, level of assistance ……. Everything changes, as when I turned down unreasonable demands, things get ugly!

Personally, I feel that the younger generations have been given much today and yet many of them do not really treasure them. As our communities give and give and give, they just take and take and take without thinking about gratitude. Very often when we help, we do not need others to appreciate what we did, but at least on the receiving end, people should learn to make things easier for the people who care about them. By demanding someone to give up their actual job just to cater to some selfish matters, have our young people be able to do them themselves? Have them spare a thought for others? I wonder …………

Good artwork?

Yesterday, Hong asked what is good art? I paused for a moment, thinking hard and yet I couldn't come up with a generic good answer.

Perhaps it is easier to answer what is good art for myself! Personally I believe a good piece of artwork should be loyal to an artist emotion at the point of creation. If someone is happy, the work should look joyful then. That's why I create my works according to my mood. How would I paint a work that I have no idea what it is about? Rich bright colours ran through my canvas as when I felt like it, ink splashed over the clean white papers as when I wanted to add favours to them. The enjoyment over the creation of genuine art pieces is good, the expression of true feeling is good. That's why I follow the teaching of Jingling school of scholars whom advocated the giving free rein to one's own spiritual and emotional impulses in creation.

Another lesson

I love to draw and painting. Most of the time, I would carry papers or a booklet with me and grab every opportunity to draw or paint.

One day, as I was busily scribbling my ideas away, I met an old friend. He saw me with a sketch book, he looked at me and said he don't draw on small paper like mine. He always draw on much bigger piece of paper and he would ........ Hum.......... I am not sure about his thoughts over such a remark, but I certainly have no problem if someone can draw a bigger and nicer piece of work. I will indeed happy for him or her, just as I created nice work for myself. What I don't really understand is why compared? Does it matter someone created a small or big piece of artwork? I think the most important idea behind the work is processes, the joy and attainment you get. Why compare then? So I smiled..........

Caring and Sharing

Quite a number of year ago, Ministry of Education launched the Community Involvement Programme aiming to cultivate the caring and sharing culture among our young. The ministry even included community partnership as one of the accessment areas for schools. Out of a sudden, all students in Singapore involve in community programmes, the questions is whether our society, or even schools, are now more concerned about our community?

Perhaps I should rephrase the sentence to: are the youngs or the schools really care and share with the needy? I really have some doubts! Most of the time, we do alot, but the purpose behind the doing is incorrect. Sometimes, the basic idea behind it is good, but the idea is twisted and bended. In the end, what we do is just a formality. Everything is done on what is wanted.

This is pretty sad though. Especially for school leaders who always on wants and forget about the needs, what is good for the society. Very often, we stress the importance of doing the right thing and not doing thing right! How often do we have the courage to face it? How often do we have the courage to stand up for it?

1st August 2010

Today is 1st August. I planned to publish two posts in July and yet I only managed to publish one.

In life, we planned for many things that we wanted to have, however, plans can change. Sometimes it might be the case of external factors, as for this particular issue, it was purely my laziness. I have been working on many last minutes matters and allowing myself to relax a bit more on others. As a result, plan needs to be altered. Now I have to remind myself not to excuse my laziness to change my plan again.

About feeling good .....

A friend of mine bought a new car recently. An expensive luxury car! She said that she is better respect now after she travelled around in her new car. She is much happier!

I am happy for her indeed. For me, I could only dream to own such a car. However, I am also a bit worried about the feel good sensation comes with it. I have no trouble for her to be happy and own such a car if you love it and able to afford it, but certainly not being happy cause people respect you more when you drive such a car!

We are often blinded by what we see around us, and we failed to see the truth. Most of the time, we choose to see what we want to see and want to believe that we are right. Sadly, what we see is not always true. Its okay that we have good feelings from time to time, but if we are sinking into the ocean of good feelings, we might soon be drown by them.

Short term happiness is the engine that pushes us to move forward. Long term happiness, however, comes from within, the search for our inner soul with understandings of the true meaning of life! As looking for respect that is given by other truly and not affected by factors surrounded you.