| Lust for Power |
We all crave it and what it embodies. Power. Power to harm our adversaries. Power. Power to determine our own destinies. Power. Power to express ourselves, our thoughts, our beings. Throughout history, man has pursued this ever-elusive quality. Yet what is power? Why do we crave it?
Well before delving deeper into this, we need to understand the nature of power. In ages past, a person’s measure of power would be measured in physical strength, his army, his land. Today, the universal measure of power is economic wealth.
If you are strong, if you have the strength of a hundred men, a rich and physically feeble child could hire two hundred men to beat you up. Far beyond the simplicity of its exercise, power grants us freedom.
Who among us but the poor are forced to adhere to religious codes, ‘moral values’, subjected to mediocre service, racism, and stigma? All the while, the rich go clubbing in Damansara, protected by their wealth, in the echelons of power, yes even those folks that are forbidden from consuming alcohol.
Power is freedom, the freedom to learn all that you can in the short space of the cosmic second that is our life, the freedom to be stupid. Take Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, complete idiots, unable to do anything on their own, and yet rich beyond the wildest dreams of most Malaysians. Yes richer than those of us that study hard, get good jobs and work hard. I am sure that the immense amount of judgements passed against these girls are not without a modicum of jealousy.
But back to power itself. Clearly we all have wants and desires, kind and good, dark and malicious. Yet one must not be confused with one’s true desires, and one’s longing for a way or tool to fulfil those desires. Money, power, they are merely tools which we use to attain that which we crave. The pursuit of money has become the goal, the desire, and this is our greatest failing. I’m all for the pursuit of wealth, as long as there is the recognition that wealth is merely to implement and free myself.
Thus we return to the dichotomy of good and evil, and where power fits into the picture. Who are you? You are a sham. A half person. You lie. You suppress yourself. The grandeur of your soul. The twisted horrors residing deep in the bowels of your being. You creep in the shadows pretending to be something you’re not. You are a prisoner. Tortured in more ways than it would be possible to physically, because you deny yourself.
Before the defensive nature of denial takes over, before you brush this accusation I have made aside, consider this. If you had a billion dollars. How differently would you have lived your life? What would you have said differently, to your parents, to your friends, to girls or boys in nightclubs? What would you have said to that person cutting in line? What would you have done if your lecturer said something stupid? What would you be wearing? What vices would you engage in? What would you have studied in college? Would you have even bothered with the pretence of going to college? Would you be hiding that stash of porn from your parents? Would you have asked that girl you’ve been crazy about for years out? Would you have punched that guy who pissed you off? Would you be happier? Would you really be a nice, good, respectful, down to earth person, who honours their fathers and mothers, who respects their elders etc etc etc?
The last one is a real whopper. So many more questions can be asked, but I think the point has been made. You are there, somewhere on the fringes of that persona you display to the world at large, its been so long that you might have forgotten, but sit in a room with the lights off, there you are.
The saddest part is that most of us spend our time hoping that power will come our way, that we will somehow attain it. A practice no different from hoping that ab-exercise bar you bought on Smartshop will turn you into the Governator, for only 30 minutes, 3 times a week. Power is a difficult beast to tame and it has been my experience that those with power are the ones that attain more of it.
So what are poor people like us to do? Oh how to be free without my money? It’s easy. You see what most people fail to realise is that they can snatch power for themselves. Most humans are meek, frail little things. The crave power, yet are afraid to claim it for themselves, always looking for ways to convince themselves that they’re trying when they’re really not, always resenting those with power.
You can claim power, freedom, though try to avoid going on mass-murder sprees. It is all your choice. Think about it the next time you want to speak your mind, but are afraid to. The next time you want to tell someone off, but don’t want to make a scene. The next time you have a great idea at work, but you think your boss might not like it. The next time someone with supposed authority over you life tells you to do something you don’t want to, and you think just this one last time. Then you will see that you do not earn power, you command it, command respect, and command those around you. All the greatest people throughout history commanded power, commanded authority.
The world is littered with failures, people who couldn’t even be themselves out of some internalised fear that they weren’t allowed too. You’ve all seen it. The genius painter that became an accountant because it was what was expected of him. The talented young girl who became an office worker because acting wasn’t a proper job. The young couple who were too cowardly to continue with their relationship because someone parents were racist. The young executive that thought it better to never speak her mind just in case her boss might get upset, and not amounting to anything.
Life is too short to be spent living in fear. Free yourself. Become the embodiment of power, your power, not power that was given or allowed to you. Do what you want to do. Be who you are, never who anyone wants you to be. You can do this. My plea to all of you who read this, is to think deeply on all the choices you’ve made or failed to make in your life because of fear and powerlessness, and to decide, never again. Never again will we huddle up in our cocoons, convincing ourselves that we aren’t good enough. Never again will we deny our natures and ourselves. Never again will we stand down from a challenge, or be afraid to challenge others. Never again will we fear the glorious splendour of life. Never again will we allow another person to be the master or mistress of our destinies. Our choice. Our will. Our lives.
You have power….you always did. Now what will you do………………? |
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| Love Test |
The Five Love LanguagesMy primary love language is probably
Quality Time
with a secondary love language being
Acts of Service.
Complete set of results| Quality Time: | | 11 | | Acts of Service: | | 7 | | Physical Touch: | | 7 | | Words of Affirmation: | | 5 | | Receiving Gifts: | | 0 |
InformationUnhappiness in relationships, according to Dr. Gary Chapman, is often due to the fact that we speak different love languages. Sometimes we don't understand our partner's requirements, or even our own. We all have a "love tank" that needs to be filled in order for us to express love to others, but there are different means by which our tank can be filled, and there are different ways that we can express love to others.
Take the quiz
____________________________________________- Feel better after a short nap .. decided to come back online and blog a bit more ... Probably junk but don't you just love these online tests .. they are more fun than doing the tests in your sisters girly magazines :P ... at least there are no distracting pics here XD Okay girls , notice that besides spending quality time with me I like to be touched :P ( 7 instances !) and also get lots of "Service" .. ehem ... XP~~~~~ <-- this is supposed to be an emoticon of a cross eyed, tongue hanging, drooling guy .. in short, ME when I start getting fired up .. he he ... ____________________________________________ |
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| Some Funny Pics ... |
I wonder if the kid has that much attitude to pull off this fashion statement or if the parents can't read English ... 
Baby .. the next white meat ...
Thankfully they don't do this in Malaysia ..
Starting to feel a bit sick ... again .. sigh ...
Good night ..
- Dinesh |
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| Windows Not Original |
Windows has come up with a tool which checks your version of windows and tells you if it is pirated. If you are using a pirated version you'll get an annoying pop up screen everytime your system boots up ...
If you are using a pirated versiom of windows you might want to be more selective when installing windows updates , normally most people will leave this on AUTO and end up installing the tool .. to avoid it just make sure that you either disable the auto update and do it manually (not selecting that program) or go buy an original copy of Windows ...
Ok that is all , just wanted to give you all a heads up .. |
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| My First Clubbing Experience |
Now that I managed to find some free time I should blog about my first visit to the Bangsar night scene.
One of my cousin is getting married next week so the Bangsar trip was supposed to be a bachelor's party of sorts. We reached Bangsar at around 10 something. I was too dazzled by the really really hot, nice ... sports cars parked around the area. My cousins were probably irritated as I rattled stats and performance comparision between the cars. I saw RX-7s, a Nissan Skyline R32, a Porsche 911 Turbo, RX-8 and also a very nice looking BMW M3 GTR. Still rambling on about the cars we reached our port for the night. It was called Lockup . My first impresion from outside was " hUh ? " I was starting to imagine sweaty beer bellied guys dressed up as policeman serving us drinks .. Taking a deep breath, I braved the croud and went in ...
Lets just say that after an eyefull, sports cars were the last thing on my mind. The place was packed full with skimpy police uniform- wearing waitresess and lots and lots of girls ( i don't notice guys, my brain autocensors) :P
Trying hard not to drool , I had a seat as my cousins were joined by a good 'acquaintance' .. Jack Daniel  (see pic) :P
I noticed a lot of 'unique' styles of dancing .. there was this one girl who was sucking her fingers while pole dancing a guy ( drool .. drool)
and then there was this guy whose dancing could only be described as : monkey with chilli up it's ass. After downing a few more shots I slowly started to lose feeling in my legs .. some of my cousins were totally plastered allready. My cousing Ganesh started pole dancing another guy .. you should have seen the guy's face .. he was like " Is this guy drunk or gay ?" I laughed my head off !! Dancing and alcoholic beverages dont mix very well , dancing makes you thirst which leads you to drink whatever is on your table .. since everything there is alcoholic it makes you totally high and then you go dancing again and the vicious cycle continues :P
Lots of beautiful women there .. one actually looked at me and smiled (must be my new hairdo :P ) . I toyed with the idea of dancing over to her .... but then I decided not to push my luck and went back to my drink : (yup I can be a real wimp at times)
One thing i noticed when you are drunk ... everything seems funny !
Even noticing someone pick his nose and wipe his booger under the table seemed funny.
The music was terribly loud but a few shots will make everything ok ....
My cousin (the soon-to-be-wedded one) was made to drink ... THE FLAMING LAMBORGHINI !! It is this really cool drink that is made from a mixture of irish coffee and some other alcoholic beverage . Then they pour some more flaming alcoholic beverage making the entire thing catch fire and you are supposed to drink it all up in one go .. it was really cool to see it but I don't think i would care to try one .. singed face might be what I end up with.
Unfortunately my camera phone was still screwed up so no pictures : ( ... i really should get around to fixing it .. )
We finished around 2 but since we were worried about drunk driving we hung out at Mungo Jerry (famous for their Bak Kut Teh) until 4 ... I find it amazing how everything is funny when you are drunk .. I was playing with the chicken and rice and was gigling my head off ... once a measure of soberiety returned we left ... One of my cousin decided to sleep in his car in the parking lot :P
All in all , it was really fun but not really something that I want to try again in a hurry. |
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| For Love of Evil |
It has finally occurred to me the reason behind this. The trigger was quite innocuous, a quick conversation with Warlock a couple of weeks ago. For a great many years, I have been fascinated by all things evil. Villains in movies and comics, demonic representations in video games, the ever-cool Lucifer (Doom! Doom! Dooooom!!!) in our DotA games, Magneto (Overlord of Fatal Attraction), M.Bison (psycho power and all), The Dark Lord Sauron (in Mordor where shadows lie) and Apocalypse (En Sabah Nur to those in the know). To me they are the embodiment of cool, something that on some basic level, I wish I could be.
The question is why? Those that know me almost immediately identify me as the guy most likely to pick a leathery winged, horned avatar (the flaming sword is optional). Yet I am not preoccupied with thoughts of causing harm to living things, except when I utilise public transportation in Kuala Lumpur. So what is the basis for my fascination with evil, or rather personifications of this particular moral state?
The beginnings of my journey began quite simply with the conversation I alluded to earlier. Warlock told me that perhaps it is not evil that I am enraptured with, but rather I identify with the archetype (how very Jungian of him I know), that it is the capacity to commit evil that is appealing, though the act of committing evil may never occur.
Capacity. How many or us feel constrained by definitions of good? Being subject to religious or societal moral codes more often that not leave a bitter feel within most of us. We are taught to feel shame, humiliation, sadness, self-loathing, and so on and so forth. More often than not being what I shall term “good” causes us to feel all manner or negative emotions when we do not adhere to its tenets. It is a prison that prevents us from expressing our hearts desires, who we really are.
We’ve all read or heard of this at some point, that light cannot exist without darkness, no good without evil. Yet being good forces us into a position of being mortified of our evil. How many of us have wished at some time to be able to harm another, to bend and force people to submit to our will, to take revenge against perceived injustices, to satisfy our very base desires for material pleasure. To deny these things would be to deny yourself.
So why does evil appeal? Why is the anti-hero more popular that the boy scout do-gooder? Because evil is freedom. Evil is not the denial or shunning of things good, but rather embracing who you are, the freedom to express yourself, to wear whatever you want to, to do whatever you want to, to whomever you want to. Yet is does not prevent you from doing good, from helping others. Yet you no longer feel like you are doing something “wrong” when you pursue you own self-interest.
I know, it all seems like a bit of a preaching session, but here is an example of evil in operation. You love planting flowers (oh so evil I know), it is your passion, what you want to do with your life, never mind the why behind it, its just what you love. Your parents want you to become a doctor, they love you oh so much and want what’s best for you, fight with you and scold you, push you in that direction with emotional blackmail. They’re doing what any “good” parent would of course.
It boils down to you, do you cave in, do the right thing and study medicine so as not to break your poor parents’ misguided hearts (the good thing to do)? After all, you can always graduate, work a few years to pay off the education loan, then go back to planting flowers. This is what most people do, and it sickens me to the core.
The alternative, is to do what you really want, and keep planting flowers. You may never be rich, but you would not waste the incredibly short span of time that is your life on pursuits that you neither give a damn about nor like doing. They might brand you as a bad person, and they’re probably right, but you’re free.
My parting words on the subject are that I hope those reading will examine their darkest thoughts, their shadows, that part of you that you reject yet can never be rid off, that surfaces every time someone annoys you. Embrace it, for only in confronting the duality of your nature will you ever truly discover who you are, instead of living a half-life trying to be something you know you’re not.
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'To the clean are all things clean' — thus say the people. I, however, say unto you: To the swine all things become swinish! Therefore preach the visionaries and bowed-heads (whose hearts are also bowed down): 'The world itself is a filthy monster.' For these are all unclean spirits; especially those, however, who have no peace or rest, unless they see the world FROM THE BACKSIDE — the backworldsmen! TO THOSE do I say it to the face, although it sound unpleasantly: the world resembleth man, in that it hath a backside, — SO MUCH is true! There is in the world much filth: SO MUCH is true! But the world itself is not therefore a filthy monster!
Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra |
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| Party on Friday |
Well Warlock, I congratulate you on clubbing for the first time. I know it hurts at first and you might feel a bit sore after that, but if you keep doing it, it starts to feel really REALLY good.
Me and some friends over in K.L. are heading out clubbing this Friday. We're going to Bar Savant in Heritage row, which is around Maju Junction and Jalan T.A.R. Quite a popular place it seems. I would like to extend an invitation to all of you to join in the fun, although by no means is this an offer to pay for any of you. Do SMS or call me if you'd like to come.
The killing of your teamate also denies experience to the other guy. I love using Leoric now, no one can kill me late game short of a gangbang plus early game survival is quite easy with Stormbolt + Ring of Basilius + Headress of Rejuvenation = the ultimate pushing combination. hee hee. I am retreating back to using Lucifer again, we resumed our on again off again relationship this Sunday at the cybercafe near my apartment. The passion hasn't died down even though we haven't been together for a few months. There's always that twisted sense of satisfaction when I Doom someone and they run off in a desperate attempt to get to the fountain, only to DIE!!!!!!!! hee hee hee.
I guess I've got to stop running around while I'm barely alive, bad habit I developed due to bloodlust, greed and the mistaken notion that I am invincible. Although, I must add that I haven't walked all the way up to a tower and tried to kill in at Level 1. Either way, I will destroy you Warlock, you're my prime target when Arc isn't around.
Will be back on Saturday morning/afternoon so we can do DotA then and Sunday, heck Monday even. Don't you just love public holidays. Think I might fall ill on Tuesday too....what a shame right. |
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| Head hurts ... A L C O H O L is EVIL !!! |
Dude, no way ! I never thought of killing your dying teammates in DOTA to deny gold t0 the opponents ... hmm , Magnus you have to be careful though ... you tend to walk around with low life .. wouldn't want to end up killing you everytime I pass by your lane ...
Went to Bangsar , clubbing for the first time yesterday (ya, I know it's sad but everyone has to start somewhere) ... would post more about it but for some reason the floor wont stop spinning and I have the daddy of all hangovers so I'll save it for later ... at this point the word a l c o h o l just makes my head hurt even more ... :P
Okie , I'll just post this and get back to sleep .. as soon as the publish post button stops spinning .... |
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| Twisted separation from reality |
I did it!!! I finished Kingdom Hearts 2!!! Easily one of the best games out there for the PS2. Now I gotta go and play it some more to unlock the hidden ending and various weapons I don't need because I'm already able to kick ass in the game. Mickey Mouse beats up people like Yoda.
I'm feeling a lot more relaxed since I don't have to come down to Seremban and be publicly humiliated by the cybercafe boys. Tournament's next week sunday, we could just go check it out but not enter, we have little to no chance since we can't practice. I decided to go to the cybercafe in KL and tell people I NooB!!! I raped everyone with Leoric and Banehallow. I also learned from these guys how to kill your own teamate, useful for when he's gonna die from doom or poison to EXP deny the other team.
I feel bad for making posts without eye candy so I'm gonna try to change all that. I wanted to also add a bit of a rant, but I want to head back to my apartment and play some more video games. |
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| Ravings ... again |
Sorry for the lack of posts ... It seems we are using BitTorrent, it causes an overload on our modem/router which means I couldn't access the Internet as often as I would like.
Asked Sai to fix it so lets see if the line gets back to normal soon ... I reviewed some of the recorded DOTA replays where we got our livers and spleen handed to us on a platter ... man we totally suck as a group :P
Siriuz has a tendency to get zoned out and go do his own stuff on some corner of the map, Magnus tends to get overconfident and stay in the lane with 5 % of his life left ... and the next thing he's dead cause there was an invisible sniper around. Me ? I have this tendency to rush in and try to fight 3 person at once and then die in the most miserable ways ... don't blame me .. it's the blood lust , I see red and the next thing i know I am charging full speed at multiple heroes regenerating at their tower .. nuff said. If we are ever going to go for the tournament , it should be done with no delusions about winning , more like not trying to die :P On a different note, my research seems to bring me nose to wall with another dead end. Sigh ..... who would have thought being a scientist will be this tough ....
Was going through my photo collection on my phone and noticed that I have a lot of different looks ...
The Good Boy Look
(some may argue that this is the Pitiful Look ... whichever )
The 'Don't Mess With Me' Look
and the one that I use most often ...
the Coco Bear look ...
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| DotA Annihilation |
Jar Jar is an abomination!!!!! Seriously though, I always wondered why the 'fans' get so worked up over Jar Jar. Lame as the character is, hate sites just seem like too much effort to me. Hate should not create extra work for you, you must let it wash over you and empower you to greater heights. So goes my rant for the day.
Warlock is right though, we shall face painful humiliating defeat unless we get some major steroids in the teamwork department. We need a team leader. We also need to get our game on in the one weekend we have left before the competition weekend. Finals are end of May so if we actually make it we can put more effort in then. My testicles are still throbbing with arrogance from my streak as Leoric the last time we got together, thus I am suffering from unwarranted confidence that I am sure the cybercafe boys will crush.
Friday night!! Friday night!!! Then Saturday!!! Sleep on Sunday....
I went to see this play called 'Rojak' on Saturday. It was more a collection of unconnected sketches, most of which were quite good. Waiting patiently for 'Ultraviolet' even though Mila Jovovich is just way too skinny. Can anyone say chopsticks? |
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| DoTA Tournament ? |
In the words of Jar-Jar Binks : "We'sa gonna die !"
We will probably just give it a good try though ... maybe I can get Gopi to tag along as the backup :P
...
feeling sick .. so not gonna write much .... good nite |
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| DotA Tournament |
Guys go to www.smm.net.my
No its not a sado-masochism site. These are the guys organising the national DotA Tournament. Its a team event, 5 people plus 1 reserve and it costs RM100 per team to enter. National champs wins RM30K.
Sad news is that the Negeri Sembilan round is on the last weekend of April, giving us less than 2 weeks to prepare, and we all know that our teamwork is sort of lacking. Winning the state round nets us RM6K.
I don't know if any of you guys are up for it but if you are we need to put some serious focus into this.
Incidentally, I have just discovered that my office network doesn't have this site block, even though it says all blog sites are blocked. Hopefully I can post more often. I can almost hear your cries of joy.
So how about it? Warlock, Siriuz, Tien Ho, Magnus plus one other person.
Work is pretty boring, although I did manage to stop by this years PC Fair. does anyone else feel like the prices there aren't as low as they should be, I've seen better deals at Imbi Plaza. The whole fair is basically a ripoff.
Anyway, go check out the site, there's also a F.E.A.R. tourney for all you people that don't suffer from FPS Nausea. E-mail or call me to let me know your opinions on the tournament, that means you Warlock, we need Barathum. |
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| Brief Hiatus |
Sorry haven't been posting for a while. A bit busy ...
Was sick today .. accidentally drank some contaminated water ... there was green stuff growing in the bottle 0_o .. was supposed to throw it away but ended up drinking from it when I woke up at midnight :P
Anyway . I'm still alive .
PLaying Elder Scrolls IV : Oblivion ... really good game ! Too bad it just sucks your social life from you though ...
Well anyway , I probably wont be posting too often for this few days so bear with me ok .. busy busy .. |
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| Wallace & Grommit : Curse Of The Were-rabbit |
Just watched Wallace & Grommit : Curse Of The Were-Rabbit today. Yeah, I know it's a bit on the late side :P
It was really good actually. I enjoyed it a lot and would recommend it to you. Go and watch it ... bring your kids along if you have any. |
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