write to health

Maud Purcell said in her article, The Health Benefits of Journaling,  ”The act of writing accesses your left brain, which is analytical and rational. While your left brain is occupied, your right brain is free to create, intuit and feel. In sum, writing removes mental blocks and allows you to use all of your brainpower to better understand yourself, others and the world around you. “

James Pennebaker, a psychologist from the University of Texas contends that regular journaling strengthens immune cells, called T-lymphocytes. Other research indicates that journaling decreases the symptoms of asthma and rheumatoid arthritis. He believes that writing about stressful events helps you come to terms with them, thus reducing the impact of these stressors on your mental and physical health.

 The following are some practical advice from Dr. Pennebaker:

Find a time and place where you won’ t be disturbed. Ideally, pick a time at the end of your workday or before you go to bed.Promise yourself that you will write for a minimum of 15 minutes a day for at least 3 or 4 consecutive days.Once you begin writing, write continuously. Don?t worry about spelling or grammar. If you run out of things to write about, just repeat what you have already written.You can write longhand or you can type on a computer. If you are unable to write, you can also talk into a tape recorder.

You can write about the same thing on all 3-4 days of writing or you can write about something different each day. It is entirely up to you.

What to Write About 

1. Something that you are thinking or worrying about too much
2. Something that you are dreaming about
3. Something that you feel is affecting your life in an unhealthy way
4. Something that you have been avoiding for days, weeks, or years.

Me? I just write anything under the sun; trivial, silly, whatever. and when its done, its done. Sometimes, when i read what i have written after a few days, weeks or even years, i would ask myself why did I ever write those? and then i smile or laugh in remembrance. and once its written, no matter how much you want to erase it or no matter how much you want you you should not have written about it, its done. when its done, its really done. even if you burn it or bury it, you know that once, you have written about it. some things just could not be erased especially when they are rooted in memory. but if writing about it has healed or relieved you, then it has done its purpose.

a tuesday like monday

i got slightly burned this morning while pressing my work clothes. it’s ok now. the tingling pain vanished at once. the ironing board is conveniently placed near the fridge afterall. )

i got a call from Sister Idad, my septuagenarian nun friend. the last time i visited her was last July to give her a birthday treat. i went to her convent and then got her out to watch a movie. We had a healthy lunch with a healthy discussion.  We watched Transformer afterwards to make her feel young. Harry Potter was also showing that day but since we are not both HP fans, we opted for another. We brought her sweater and a shawl to keep her warm inside the air-conditioned moviehouse. I tell you, she is a nun like no other and I rather like her unconventional view of things. I meet her around 7 years or so ago. She holds a doctorate degree in Anthropology and she still teaches religious anthropology to undergraduate and graduate students in UP then. We formed a non-profit organization together with another friend and we do outreach projects for the urban poor. I once contemplated becoming a nun because of her. But its not meant to be for some reasons. I guess, i have been too independent and free-spirited for so long; i cannot be curved anymore for a pious and contemplative life. She told me I would be better outside the convent walls or else I will get contaminated, hahaha. I think, my vocation is of a different path.

anyway, today’s a monday tuesday at work. my group received an email from our foreign consultants listing the works we have to deliver before we do the actual workshop. this presage hectic months ahead. our hands are already full these days. i don’t know know how my colleagues feel about all these. i am beginning to see different kinds of faces. some grim and some unhappy and some enthused because of the additional learning and trainings.

there is a scarcity of human resource in our line of work. everybody’s been lured by ‘higher’ pay Singapore, Australia, New Zealand and even Europe. I had been tempted several times; my mind says YES while my heart says another. though I am often perceive as unfeeling and unemotional, i still follow the dictates of my heart. my loved ones are here and i am compensated.

i left the office past 10pm. the took a cab and chanced upon an old and skinny bad-mouthing driver whose age range is around 60-65. he was complaining about the traffic and cursing other drivers who he thinks are unruly and even traffic enforcers. i have met different drivers in my daily rides to and from the office and so this encounter was just an ordinary event. this old man just got me smiling because afterall the times he had been driving, i thought the daily traffic scenes in manila should not affect him anymore. i rather thought that by this time, a resigned acceptance is more appropriate.

i reached our place and rest a little. see what i can eat and had dinner. i switched on the TV and pressed the buttons on the several sports channels. there was a tennis match going on live between Haas and Tipsarevic. this is for the BNP Paribas Masters. It was the first time i am seeing Tipsarevic play. Anyway, i didn’t finish watching them. I switched the TV off right after eating and prepared for the night.

I browsed the 416 pages I brought home but changed it for another. I bought a book at Ink and Stone (a cozy little bookstore at The Podium with exceptional title collections) last Friday. Title is A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill: HAPPINESS  by Matthieu Ricard. When I saw this book, I remember a friend’s SMS asking what is Happiness. My answer then was, “Happiness is just a state of mind”. And loneliness is optional! ü

forum attendance

i woke up today knowing i wouldn’t be reporting early to work. i was asked by my boss to attend a forum conducted by a solution vendor that we use in the office. this is in Manila Peninsula, Makati.

today is charie’s birthday and greeting her is the first assignment i did this morning.  she’s a good friend i met in the previous company i worked for. we’re serving the same master again these days.

 anyway, if i have a choice, i don’t want to attend the forum. topics were on customer intelligence for marketing people. i saw an acquaintance who is working for the vendor and he asked me why am i attending the forum when in fact my line of specialization is on risk analytics and data mining. hahaha, i told him i attended because i was asked to. i would have been happier working in my workstation. anyway, all is not lost because as i always say, one can always pick-up additional information when attending and listening in events like this.

i was seated near the door and so when the Q & A was over, i immediately stand ready to leave. i was briefly interrupted by the acquaintance for a brief chat.

below is a snapshot i took inside the venue to sort of document my so-called attendance.

 

when i arrived in the office before lunch i saw my pc with thematic halloween decor.

the figure above shown is now hollow (holloween ü). it used to have a lollipop inside. after having lunch at Kimono Ken, I craved for something sweet. i looked at my ‘little store’ of goodies and discovered i’ve run out of supply. i aked one close colleague for a candy but she also run out of supply. restless around 3pm and i don’t want to go down to our canteen, i looked around and saw the decor. “what’s inside it?”, i asked my neighbor.  hmmm… i heard the word  lollipop! Yahoo! I smiled and said wow! I carefully unwrap the parcel and pop goes the thing.

Hmmm, i failed the lollipop test just as i am sure I would fail the marshmallow test as a child if i were tested then. My restlessness and my impatience i haven’t conquered until now is in evidence again.

Surprisingly, when two of my colleagues saw me enjoying my candy, they started opening theirs.  I am not the only one who failed the lollipop test afterall. )

 

Marshmallow Test:  Back in the 1960s Walter Mischel, a psychologist at Stanford University, gave marshmallows to groups of four-year-olds and then left the room, promising that any child who could postpone eating the marshmallow until he came back, some 15 to 20 minutes later, would be rewarded with a second marshmallow. Years later, Mischel discovered that the kids who triumphed over their desire had grown into teenagers who were socially, emotionally and academically more competent than the four-year-olds who ate the marshmallow at once.

 

doing what brings you joy

“There is no secret why I am so dominant this year on tour. I’m always very motivated when I play at a tournament. My close friends and many fans give me their support. This gives me the motivation. I work hard each day focused on myself and tennis. I don’t play for the record books. I play because tennis still brings me so much joy.” – Justine Henin, after winning Zurich Open 2007 (October), her 9th title for the season

Why am I quoting my favorite female tennis player here? Its because I was hoping to write about doing things that brings out joy or the high in us but i can’t seem to find the right words. My mind is garbled. Truth be told, I am sad and a lump is in my throat I can’t understand what I am feeling. I think or rather I feel I hurt somebody’s feeling 48 hours ago and I am suffering the same emotion I may have inflicted. I am hurting!

I think the title of this post should be “not doing what causes you pain” instead… and so much for this garbage. I think I may just write another day because what I my fingers are pressing is not pleasing to me and neither would an accidental reader. God, why can’t I just hold my tongue sometimes?

pain inflicted = pain suffered

small hurts

small hurts that pain a lot

taken into heart and refuses to heal

dispirited its hard to recover

take out that heart and cast away the feelings

rip it in shreds till nothing remains

no memories …

                                                       only oblivion!

My uneventful weekend

I went to UP Diliman yesterday. My Saturdays, when I don’t go home to the province, is supposed to be spent for domestic endeavors, like cleaning and laundering. Yesterday was different. I have some materials I want photocopied. To me, UPD’s Shopping Center is the place to go when you want to have  a clear copy of any printed materials at a very reasonable price. Sometimes it even surpassed the original. When copying is done you can a have a choice of how you want it bound, e.g. hard, soft, ring or wire –bound. When I was studying there, I want my copy hard-bound like a book. These days when I go there, I want it wire-bound with acetate front cover and a colored card-board back cover. Very nice!

Ooops, I heard the sound of the rice-cooker. I am alone and cooking while writing this post.   

Anyway, I arrived at Blessings (name of the stall) around 10am, haggled and transacted with the owner, and was told to go back for my materials at 3pm. I have quite a time to spend on my own therefore. I went to the School of Statistics and saw one of my former professors. I even had a brief technical discussion with one contemporary on a hot topic in the industry I am working with these days. Nice chatting with these folks no matter how brief. The School is planning to offer a seminar course in the area we discussed. I might decide to enroll if it’s offered on an after-office time. If not, the materials I had photocopied will suffice for the time being. Its going to be a self-paced learning for me then.  

I ate my lunch at Khas Food House at the UP Arcade. The place basically offers Indian cookings. They have some pretty choices of vegetarian delicacies which are up to my liking. Their Vegetarian Delight was ok. They also offer ‘International” delicacies as they call it. Thai, Korean and Filipino, etc. This is near the International Center (dormitory for foreign students) so that may explain why. 

I also bought a fancy clip at Handog stall. Its handy for clipping reminders. I rather like yellow color, the star shape and the smiley drawing because it encouragingly gives one a bright day. See that?

 

Okay, that was yesterday.  

I woke up late today. Did some actitivities I choose not to write about and here I am.

It is now 7:09pm in my pc clock. My hair is still wet from the bath I took after doing my laundry. Just wrapped in a towel dripping wet, I washed the stuff for cooking rice, got some cupfuls, rinse and then placed them in the cooker. I got dressed after some regimens and then open my pc to write. There are soaked dried Shiitake mushrooms waiting to be cooked and so I will now leave this journaling if I expect to eat some decent dinner.

Uneventful weekend indeed!  

Betting for a bulldozer

Egad! I shouldn’t be writing. I should be resting my eyes. I have been in the office before 8am and have been working non-stop in my workstation since then. Last night I left my program running and arrived in the office only to discover that one month transaction records (out of the 13 months) did not successfully output as expected because the file being referenced was unknowingly zipped by another user Unit. Arrrrrr… sometimes events just don’t cooperate. I have to redo the run. I did that already and I am doing another overnight run.

Change topic…

Today is Thursday and there’s a megalotto draw. I bet 5 combinations of 6 out of 49 numbers costing me a little less than a dollar. The prize money I saw in the lotto outlet window is around 27 million pesos (approximately $0.59MM if computed at the current peso-dollar exhange rate of 44.04).

 Yep, I know! If you compute for the probabilities, the odds of correctly getting the 6 numbers will be around 1/14MM. Very, very small. Shhhhh… I did run an analysis of the past draws to see if the lotto balls are fair (disregarding other  extraenous factors like how often do they change the set of balls, etc.) . I think in the end, it is still random, i.e. if there is no foul play like the rumors that PCSO awards them to some of the gods when the prize gets really too high.

Anyway, where am I leading? Hmmm… I just want to pack my things and go home to the province, do farming and just provide statistical consulting, hahaha. Partly, I am not kidding, hehehe! But I really did bet. And let me get this straight, i don’t bet regularly, hehehe. I only bet when I feel like it. I want to buy a Bulldozer. And there is no Auto Loan that would give me one. If I win in the draw tonight, I can buy that bulldozer next week I saw at Alebaba, harhar. Wish!

Funny, my colleagues been telling me to buy a car because the daily cab fare I spend to and from the office can very well pay for my monthly amortization. Thing is, I want a bulldozer not a car. They’ve been asking me where would I use it and I’ll just answer “SECRET”; which all the more puzzles them. I kind of like their directed weird looks.

I really want a bulldozer. When I get one, I’ll post a picture where I am gonna use it for. It could well erase those puzzling looks.

Think, I’ll just plant that classic kamote? Faaaaaart! )

still in the office

its 9:29PM. that’s the time in my desktop. and i am still in the office. been here for more than 13 hours now. cool?! yeah?! nope!

i am insane. no i am not! i am paid to be SANE, hahaha. as in critically and empirically SANE!!!

i love a silent office. no distractions, no phone, no questions, no nothing. just the sounds of my keyboard and the air conditioner. and my mental mantra Om.

happiness over fullness

so i did go home and occupied my time to the fullest. i even had time to use our old reliable Singer sewing machine to sew the edging of a new bed sheet. Yep, i still know how to run the  thing. My Mom found a treasure of fabrics in the market that are good materials for bedding. Mind you, she really has an eye on those things.

at this very moment, i am running two programs; one running in the server and one local. i am waiting for the outputs. it takes a while to see the results because the sheer number of records involved is overwhelming. and am tracking 12 months of performance for my sample window. hehehe… the stuff! my task bar is crowded as usual because in between runnings and codings there are several windows still on the side. i don’t know why it puzzles my colleagues when they get to see my screen. am i abnormal?

Yesterday afternoon, i travelled back to the City. the more than four hours travel back gave me the time to read the program i brought home. i discovered the macro is really error-free.  its the query before the macro that caused the error last thursday. i assumed the fields were selected when it was not. think, i need those glasses. No!

yep, am back to work. i feel happy i am full and occupied and able to do a lot of things on the sides. good to be busy and happy and the adrenaline there.  i get to argue and write some people and keep life spicier a little.  

my old tambay friends and i are a little busy also with the skirmish we entered. at least, they are encouraged to write and am glad they are writing and siding with me. one for all, all for one!  just like being back to school and enjoying to be teacher’s enemy. Not really! We’re in for a good cause.

Alt-Tab is really handy! i checked my programs; server run is done, local is still running. output looks ok. 

Back to work…

fickle

Today is Thursday and tomorrow’s a holiday. It’s actually a Friday mood thursday in the office. Well almost everyone in my unit except me. I have been looking forward to this day because my sister and I planned to travel province-bound tonight at midnight. Now, I don’t feel like going home anymore.

I have been coding, running and debugging the whole day.  I caught some typos causing the error but somehow there remains something that eludes me. The macro I created is working according to the log file. The numbers in the output are ok. Thing is there are two fields created with missing entries. I can’t trace where they are coming from. I have printed my program already but my vision is blurring. I am hungry… and home is calling.  I guess I’ll just review the codes at home

I will just travel in the morning. 

Just received an SMS from RJA. Says my Morsidy Husin CD is ready for pick-up tomorrow in the province. I feel tired and thinking about picking it up makes me more tired. I should be grateful I have a copy already, right? Yeah, I already thanked him. My good Physics professor and friend.

I should really go home.

Hmmm… a trip to the mountain near our place is a good lure. Good to have a picnic with Mom and the rest of the family. Its good to see some trees also and to ‘ask’ them how did they cope up with the typhoon. I hope they’re not hurt or their flowers ruined. Which reminds me, I have to see the viability of the ram pump I have researched on for use during the summer.

Yes, I think I am going home. There is no place like home no matter how humble! Hmmmmmm… home!