lyrical POETRY

That was what "Jojoushi" means. A poetic love song. But I'm not listen to it for the lovey dopey thingy. Just like the feels of sadness in it.



Twinge and splendid at the same time.

COPE with FAILURE

Only copy-paste-ing article from here. Did it for my own self.
May sounds lame and cliche but way too hard to do right now.
This is hard. Sigh. Sigh.

Okay, so, this is how to deal with failure, they said.

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We all fail at something at some point in our lives. We may fail to make the grade at school, may lose a job, may lose the love of our life, among other things. As you have success, you have failure. They are two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other, even though you wish you experience only successes and no failures. Failure is a fact of life. It is always lurking just around the corner and you have no choice but to learn to deal with failure, if you are to be successful. So, how does one deal with failure? Here are some ways you can deal with failure and turn your failure into a success.

Don't Brood Over the Causes
A lot of people can't help themselves from dwelling over the reasons for their failure. While it is important to learn from mistakes you've committed that may have contributed to the failure, dwelling on it excessively can be mentally exhausting. Doing so will just make you more miserable. Instead, make a few points of the reasons for your failure and resolve to learn from them and avoid repeating them.

Don't Go Into a Shell
Another classic pattern found among people who've experienced failure is the tendency to go into a shell. This is understandable but not desirable or healthy. When you cut yourself off from friends and family and cocoon yourself in your own little shell, all you do is to magnify many times over the failure you've suffered. When you are alone and don't share your feelings, you feel the burden of failure weighing on you more. Instead, keep the channel of communication open. Don't cut yourself off from the world. Yes, you failed, but remember it is just a failure and not the end of the world.

Think Of Your Past Successes
When your failure has you down and depressed, the best way to lift your spirits is to think back to the times when you were successful and achieved success. Apart from making you feel better, it might also help you rediscover some of the things that led to your past successes.

Think of Your Past Failures
This might seem like a stupid suggestion. However, thinking about your past failures might help bring back memories of how you coped then and how you turned that failure into a success. Also, think about the many successful moments you had between your past failure and your present one. It would help motivate you to get out of your present failure.

Know That Failure Is Good Too
You many not normally look upon failure as a good thing, but it is!! Of course, you don't wish failure upon you, but if you do fail, there are just so many things that you can learn from it. Failures always teaches a person valuable life lessons. It prepares you better and makes you a more complete person. If you look back at your many failures, you would realize that had some of those failures not happened to you, many of the good things that subsequently happened wouldn't have happened either. It is surprising that the thing that you thought at the time as the worst thing to have happened to you, turns up becoming the best thing to have happened to you.

Have Faith in You
Believe in yourself, despite your failure. Know your capabilities and have belief in them. Don't doubt yourself. Don't trash talk yourself into believing that you are no good because of your failure. Instead, keep the faith. Know what you are capable of and know that one failure doesn't change your inherent strengths.

Plan for the Road Ahead
Failure does not mean you sit back and relax or waste your time. Failure offers you a break to reassess your priorities and your goals. Make a plan of how you hope to overcome your failure and reach your goals and set about following that plan diligently. Never give up hope!

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There. How to deal with failure. Now wake up.
*tampartamparpipisendiri*

a DAY for the HEROES

Di Hari Pahlawan ini aku kuliah di UI. Kuliahnya jarak jauh, lewat tivi. Yang ngisi kuliah adalah the POTUS; President of the United States, himself; yang mampir sebentar dari kemarin sampai hari ini, less than 24 hours ke Indonesia.

Harus diakui, kharismanya beliau ini memang luar biasa. Meskipun apa yang disampaikan tidak ada yang baru, (around democracy, diversity, bilateral relations and a bit err.. propaganda, about Iraq and Palestine...) but somehow, the way he connected to our motherland surely brought massive attention. Issuenya masih seputar gimmick-gimmick masa kecil, dan bagaimana hal itu kemudian di blow-up secara lebay oleh media kita. Duh.

What I'm trying to say is... Koneksi POTUS dan Indonesia mungkin akan membawa keuntungan bagi hubungan bilateral kedua negara. Maybe. But, it's just... Agak kurang begitu sreg sama kesan 'reuni' yang tercipta pada kunjungan ini. Ya, ngga ada yang salah sih sama reuninya, justru terganggu sama reaksi orang kitanya sendiri. Well yes this is one special occassion. But not so special above all, sampai yang lain-lain dilupain.

Ah, tapi bagaimanapun juga, marilah kita tidak menjadi sceptical citizen. Pandang optimis semua kesempatan, termasuk datangnya POTUS. At least, all eyes on us. Siapa yang tahu manfaat apa yang akan datang di masa yang akan datang karena hal ini.

Anyway, hari ini tetaplah hari Pahlawan. Di tengah ingar bingar kedatangan POTUS, aku sempet nonton feature khusus hari Pahlawan di sebuah stasiun TV swasta, tentang seorang mantan pejuang yang tinggal di bunker karena ngga punya tempat tinggal. Dan kita tentunya juga sering lihat foto yang sumbernya entah dari mana ini :


Miris. This is also something worth to talk to, to fight for. Yang ter-outshine karena datangnya si mantan anak Menteng. Dulu, di acara ini, aku pernah ketemu veteran, mantan pejuang. Sempet ngobrol sebentar, dan kagum sama wawasan kebangsaan yang masih sangat melekat erat di diri mereka. Betapa mereka suka didengarkan, betapa mereka begitu bersemangat menyanyikan lagu-lagu perjuangan.

And from government, all they need is just a little more attention. Aku ngga tau sih gimana hitungan matematisnya... But if we can afford fancy cars, rings and (sometime useless) overseas trip for our state officials... Tidak bisakah kita menaikkan sedikit lagi tunjangan Rp. 250.000 untuk sekitar 800.000 veteran kita yang sudah sepuh-sepuh itu?

Dear Boss of the Universe, semoga di usia senjanya, para pahlawan kami selalu Kau limpahi kesehatan, kesejahteraan dan kebahagiaan. Amin.

603 chapters and COUNTING

*Ijinkan saya fangirling sejenak ya*


Mugiwara Kaizoku, NOW...

... and THEN.

See them change physically? Click image to enlarge.

Reassemble 2 years later. Tougher. Bigger. Stronger.
Makes me shudder, but still ridiculous as ever.

O hail Eiichiro Oda.

but it AIN'T blackberry!

Suatu malam di kosan teman, 3 girls, included me, sat silently in the so called dining room. We weren't having dinner, just sat, chattering around minutes before, and later on we were occupied by our cellphones. Yea, ye know.. Jaman sekarang, HP menjauhkan yang dekat dan mendekatkan yang jauh. Dua temenku itu pakai BB; sibuk twitteran dan BBM-an. My cell wasn't as fancy and popular as theirs, but mine was the one Nokia claimed as BB Killer. Well I don't know (and don't really care) whether it really killed BB or not, though.

Cuma ada suara klutak klutik keypad beberapa saat lamanya, sampai kemudian salah satu temenku ngomong :

Teman A : Dil, lo ngapain aja sih di HP itu?
Aku : eh? ya ngapa2in. Browsing, chatting, SMSan...
Teman A : Ooo, kirain ngapain...
Soalnya lo kan ga pake BB, kok sibuk bener kaya'-nya...
Aku : Lah? ini bisa ngelakuin semua yang dilakuin BB ah.
Yaa emang ngga bisa BBMan sih.
Trus BB juga lebih steady jaringannya.
Tapi ini udah lumayan bisa ngapa-ngapain lah.
Sering buat ngetik kerjaan, trus di-email...
Teman B : Oh? Bisa buat ngetik?
Ada word processornya? Emailnya ngepush?
Aku : Bisa dong...
Teman B : ih gw malah ga punya buat ngetik lho.
Mesti purchase software tertentu gitu.
Teman A : lha trus itu apa? kok geser-geser?
Aku : Ini? ini browser.. Alah itu lho, opera mini...
Katanya suruh nyari jadwal pesawat sama keretaaa..
Teman B : Pesawat sama kereta?
Emang bisa browsing lebih dari 1 halaman?
Aku : Bisa, multi tab kok..
Teman B : Ih, punya gw ngga bisa lho..
Aku : Masa??
Teman A : Wah, kaya' BB ya berarti HP lo, dil..
Aku : Ah? Ahaha...

There there my friend. Apakah BB itu segitu overratednya ya? Aku ngga tau apakah bener BB ngga bisa melakukan fungsi-fungsi yang disebut temen-temenku itu, atau karena memang BBnya belom dioprek aja sama mereka. Atau mungkin justru ''hape bukan BB'' yang segitu underrated-nya?

My cell already fullfilled my needs. Seriously, ini bukan cuma sekedar pembenaran. By economic calculation, I can exchange my cell with BB, yaa yang gemini nyari yang paling murah dapet lah. But I haven't driven to do so. Di HP ini aku bisa chat, non BBM of course, but it doesn't matter for now btw. Aku bisa ngetik, dikirim via email, dan emailnya ngepush. Mungkin memang aku bukan orang paling sibuk sedunia, tapi in particular case, when I'm away and some urgent task came up, those functions are just so helpful. I peek googlemaps when I'm lost and the environment doesn't secured enough for me to ask direction. I blog with thumbs. The browser was adequate. The camera was OK. The Youtube player was OK. The dictionary was OK. The other functions were OK.

No, I didn't bragged on my cell. Toh punyaku juga bukan yang paling canggih. Masih ada iPhone, teknologi Android dan banyak lagi. Aku juga ngga bilang kalo aku begitu handy-nya memfungsikan HP-ku. Masih banyak fitur yang aku ngga ngerti di dalam sini. Cuma aku merasa aku bisa melakukan hal-hal yang aku butuh dengan HP non BB ini. Aku kenal beberapa orang yang memfungsikan BB-nya cuma buat facebookan, BBMan dan twitteran. Bahkan ada satu yang dateng trus buru-buru nyari PC desktop karena katanya di jalan dia ditelpon klien harus segera buka sebuah email penting, padahal dari tadi dia pegang BB. Ada juga yang ngga ngerti kalo dia bisa browsing di BBnya sendiri. Lah? Piye toh? Jangan-jangan malah dipake nguleg?

Maybe this is what we called “when fashion over function.”

I don't want to diss anybody here, folks. Just a thought, really. Aku yakin buanyak di luar sana yang memanfaatkan BBnya dengan optimal. No offense buat yang pake BB dan hanya memfungsikan fitur-fitur gaulnya. I won't say eman-eman for that. It's yours, do as your wish. Semua balik ke kebutuhan dan kesukaan kita sendiri. Cuma kepikiran aja gara-gara dibilang : "Kok kaya'nya sibuk banget sih, kan HPmu bukan BB?"

Oh well. Mungkin suatu hari nanti aku juga pengen pake BB.
And when that time come, I'll make sure I know where the browser is.

hot and cold. LITERALLY.

Belum posting sama sekali bulan ini ih. Bulan kemarin juga jarang banget. Sungguh sebenernya pengen nulis, tapi apa daya...

Ternyata bukan hanya rambut yang rontok. Badan juga bisa rontok. Sebulanan ini bolak balik luar kotaan melulu. Bukan, bukan rekreasi. Kalo dolan mah hore sayanyaa. Yang ini efeknya agak nampol di kepala, badan dan dompet tentunya. Lari sana sini, jalan jauh, kurang tidur, berusaha manage kerjaan yang ditinggal, nyasar, cengar cengir, sepik sepik.. Begitulah.

Tapi itu semua ga seberapa dibanding tekanan psikisnya. Di saat seperti ini, menjaga pikiran untuk tetap fokus susah banget rasanya. Juga untuk memisahkan mana hal-hal yang controllable dan mana yang uncontrollable... Bikin panas dingin. Plus emang meriang pula. Panas dingin beneran deh.

Ah. But one decision has been made. Bismillah. Semoga efek dominonya positif. Godspeed. Amiin Allahuma amiin...