Tell me what we got, tell me it's a lot, tell me it's the real thing Tell me not to change and always be the same, tell me that's a good thing

Today this man walked into my office and asked me if I could help him. He said that he had a friend in another country who was a nurse and wanted to come to Canada. I told him that I could give him the info for the appropriate person to contact. I had to repeat myself a couple of times because he was hard of hearing. He told me he wasn't very good at talking on the phone so would it be okay if he could talk to someone face to face. Now normally, we don't really have meetings with people who walk in off the street without an appointment. He continued to tell me that he would wait however long it would take for someone to be free. To tell you the truth, if it was anyone else, I would have told them to call the number but this man looked so sincere and almost desperate. I told him I would go and look to see if the consultant was free and ask her to come out to talk to him. I turned to open the door to go and find someone. As I turned my back to him he said, 'Please do the best that you can.' It was almost like my conscience was speaking to me. So I went and found the person and told her what the situation was. She kind of gave me a snicker (not in a bad way). She came out with me and escorted the man to her office to talk with him. I saw him leaving and then he came over to my desk and said thank you. It was a little odd because he was standing off to the corner. I stood up and looked and him and I saw that his eyes were filled with tears that started streaming down his face. I could see the appreciation in his eyes. A true moment. I made sure he looked at me and I said 'you're welcome'. He turned away and I said 'have a good day'. As he walked away he said, 'you have a good day too'.

Later, the consultant that the old man talked to asked me if he said thank you to me. She said that he told her that he wanted to thank me. I told her that he did and that he cried.

I hope he will be reunited with his friend some day soon.

And I will turn off And I will shut down Burying the voices of my conscience hitting ground

When I worked for the Ministry doing workshops in schools, I used to get a lot of letters, card, artwork from students. I have kept it all. There is this one poem that I got from a group of elementary school students after we had visited their school. They put this poem on yellow construction paper and decorated it. They also all signed the back. I have always kept this poem close to me, in fact, I've always put it near my desk at work since. So, I'm going to share it here too because it serves as a reminder to me to not lose myself in the midst of what I do or am trying to become. Ironically, sometimes it's so easy to lose yourself when you are in the process of 'becoming'-- if that makes sense.

THE MAN IN THE GLASS

When you get what you want in your struggle for self

And the world makes you King for a day,

Just go to a mirror and look at yourself

And see what THAT man has to say.

For it isn't your father or mother or wife

Whose judgement upon you must pass,

The fellow whose verdict counts most in you life

Is the one staring back from the glass.

Some people might think you're a straight-shootin' chum

And call you a wonderful guy.

But the man in the glass says you're only a bum

If you can't look him straight in the eye

He's the fellow to please, never mind all the rest

For he's with you clear to the end

And you've passed your most dangerous test

If the guy in the glass is your friend.

You may fool the whole world down the pathway of years

And get pats on the back as you pass

But your final reward will be heartache and tears

If you've cheated the man in the glass.

I want to believe there's something to believe I would live only just to believe I'd love to believe It's not only me that's longing.....to believe

A Man sees in the world what he carries in his heart

-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I'm gonna muster every ounce of confidence I have And cannonball into the water

I read something at the beginning of this past week and have had it in the back of my mind, measuring my life experiences this week to it. Some of what I had on my mind this week was clarified when I read a commencement address given by Steve Jobs in 2005.

Warning: this post is lengthy, but I think anyone who reads it will be provoked to think and be inspired like I was.

For those who are not aware, this month is the 30th anniversary of the first Apple computer. And for those of you who aren't aware of who Steve Jobs is- he is a co-founder of Apple Computers and current CEO of Apple and Pixar Animation Studios. I read a commencement address that he gave to the Stanford grads last year. Very inspiring. It's funny how we 'know' people because of what they do and what they appear to be. Reading his commencement address reminded me that there is always a history and journey behind every appearance. Also, on a personal note, when you truly search for answers, you receive them in the most amazing and unexpected ways.

I have included parts of the address here that related to some of my questions/thoughts/experiences (in italics) this week:

The way in which you come into the world is significant:

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. ...The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on.
Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.


What/who incites your passion?:

.........I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started?

The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.
During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick.

....You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.


Nothing is worth more than this day:

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right."... for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer.... I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

... Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.


To read Steve Jobs' commencement address to the Stanford graduating class of 2005 in full, click below:

The first Apple computer
circa 1976.

And I'll steal you something pretty You'll say 'Man, well aren't I lucky? I've found myself a crooked lady'

Discovery: One of my summer posts was published on Blog Carnival. I think I'm on my way to BLOGGYWOOD....

http://office-max.blogcarnival.com/archives/2005/08/it_takes_no_tim.html

If anyone is wondering.... yes, I have acquired a printer now. No more printer woes.

I watch the proverbial sun rise coming up over the Pacific and You might think I'm losing my mind but I will shy away from the specifics

This weekend I was going through some of my papers and memoribilia. What a walk down memory lane. It's funny how we put meaningful things away sometimes and then proceed to forget about them with time. It's sure nice to re-visit when we find them again.

I found this email to my family that I sent to my brother when I was in Australia. When I came back, he gave me this copy of the letter so I could have it as a memory. I think back to the moment I was writing it-- I felt like I had so much to say but so little time to say it, hence all the short sentences. That made me laugh. The memory of this letter made me feel good. 

Take what's bringing you down Let it go, let it go, let it go Who's hurting you now? Let it go, let it go, let it go

I was having a conversation with my mom this past week, and she said something to me that enlightened me. I don't use the word enlightened very often, but in this case I believe it is fitting. As a result of an issue I was expressing to her, she was talking to me about people who have difficult personalities; personalities that do not appear to adapt or change. Personalities that even appear to be ungiving at times. I was expressing my frustration to her on this topic, and she said something to me that humbled and eased my feelings. Not only that, but it exhaulted me to another level of thinking.

What she said: some people experience negatives things in their life that change parts of them forever. They may hurt others and not even realize it because the hurt they have suffered has changed the way they feel about themselves. It's hard for people like that to change. They might not know as much as you do.... and you know more. They may never change, but the next time you are in that situation, you can change the way you deal with that person. And then, just let it go.

This may sound like fairly simple advice, but I will tell you what effect it had on me. When someone has such high expectations and faith that you can be giving and selfless, it gives you power--even in a situation where apathy towards another person would seem justified. In that moment, I realized the high regard my mom had for me. And when you feel that, you can understand the most difficult people by understanding yourself a little more. It's easy to forget how intimately tied we are to other humans, even the ones that we have issues with. It's through that intimacy that we learn some of the most important life lessons, I think.

It was a long month without my mom. I'm glad that she is finally home.

So just call me whenever you're lonely I'll be your friend, I can be your homey

Tim Tams are all the rage in Australia. Fiji too. My brother put in a request to my mom to bring back some of these chocolate biscuit delights. This request resulted in my uncle in NZ sending 9 packages. That's the kind of guy he is. I think the quantity will do fine. Some Tim Tam history for those who want to know more:

"Tim Tam biscuits first hit supermarket shelves in 1964. They were named after a horse that won the Kentucky Derby in 1958. A member of the Arnott family, Ross Arnott, attended the race day and decided ‘Tim Tam’ was the perfect name for his new biscuit. The chocolate used to make Tim Tam biscuits has been specially developed by Arnott’s to give a slightly caramel taste. The cream flavour is a delicate mixture of vanilla, butter and chocolate that complements the biscuit base and the chocolate. It’s this unique cream which sets Tim Tam apart from any other chocolate biscuit."

If any of you want to taste a Tim Tam, let me know. I have four packages myself and quite frankly, I can't eat them all. It tastes better when you share. My mom does always say, 'sharing is caring.' I guess that holds true for Tim Tams as well.

I dare you to move I dare you to move I dare you to lift yourself up off the floor

"ONE HUNDRED PERCENT OF THE SHOTS YOU DON'T TAKE DON'T GO IN."

-Wayne GRETZKY

And I see all of your creations as one perfect complex No one less beautiful or more special than the next

Prelude: Laura and I just wrote a poem together. She couldn't sleep so she suggested and I obliged. I haven't written poetry in a long time.

On Secret Laughter

Bellows in the hollows of my chest rotate my particular tastes

Merry cries of delight roll up my throat and fly out my mouth
Floating into hungry ears and tickling those who dare to delve

Deep into mirth, into joy, and amusement
And out of the merry- go- round of mediocrity

We emerge.

Your eyes twinkle like Pa's and I know that we have shared something more than laughter.

We emote.

Your eyes tell me a story that I pen into my heart.

Postcript: The road to peace is CREATION.

Everybody seems to be getting what they need where's mine? Cause you're what I need so very but I'm anything but ordinary.....

Today I heard something....I don't remember where I heard it or who said it or the history of it, but it goes like this: If you accept that there's no such thing as an ordinary day, then life won't appear to be so stressful.

So, as I mull over this one for a few moments, I think the logic here would follow that each day is extraordinary. Bigger than we know or can imagine. I like that thought. Surrender to the extraordinary....

Look into my eyes Can't you see they're open wide?

My brother and I circa the good ol' 70s. I dig his Fiji shirt. Dig my country girl dress. That's my kaleidoscope. I had a few when I was young. I still love kaleidoscopes to this day!

My brother is thinking, 'Gee, is this smile ok?... because I need to get to a potty'. Meanwhile, I am contemplating the meaning of kaleidoscopes. The eyes really are the windows to the soul, aren't they? 

It's a new dawn It's a new day It's a new life for me And I'm feeling so good....

As a result of numerous events and tonight's thought provoking experience, the late night discussion concerns Possibilities and Realities. What are the things that are your Possibilities in life? What are your Realities? Are these lists separate or are they on the same page? The hardest question of all is do you want to make your Possibilities into Realities? If the answer is yes, how are you doing it currently? If no, how do you go about doing just that? Makes for very interesting conversation I think.

When I think about all of this, the question of 'what would you attempt to do if you knew you would not fail?' comes to mind. The author of the quote evades me at the moment. This question is one that I have asked myself when I am faced with a decision. I've always found it to lead me to a clear answer, although that has not always guaranteed an easy road. Nothing in life that you desire and feel passionate about it ever easy. I am continually surprised when I witness people spending more time and energy looking for an easy way to do something or doing nothing rather than investing themselves fully into something they want to accomplish. We have an amazing ability to achieve! It's almost a disservice to be stagnant when we are blessed with the ability to turn Possibilites into Realities. Meaningful things take time and effort and hard work. They take discipline and determination. Sometimes to the point where you feel like you are wrung out of those things, howver, the knowing that you will be replenished remains within. And that is the miracle of the creation of meaning. I feel that it is a luxury to me.

What would you attempt to do if you knew you would not fail?

Fast lane High speed On the grind 24/7

In honour of Martin Luther King Day January 16th, 2006:

"If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michealangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the host of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well. "

Hoping for the rest of the week that we recognize and bring meaning to our 'callings'.

So take these words And sing out loud Cuz everyone is forgiven now Cuz tonight's the night the world begins again

Meet my five year- old cousin Priya. She is the pride and little joy of our family. I was fortunate enough to help out at the Kid's Party for Priya's birthday last summer in June. Here's Priya showing me the Dora backpack that one of her friend's gave to her. She loves Dora. Isn't she cute?! One time, I believe she was 3 or 4, we were hanging out in her room and she said to me 'I like being with you.' I was surprised that such a young person would think to say something like that. She sure caught me off guard. Looks like I need to be schooled.

I think that sometimes we forget that a child's view is a human view. With deepness and lightness and novelty. This is what comes from a pure heart. Wouldn't it be nice if we could live more that way everyday and not be bound by fears that hold us back from connecting deeply within ourselves? Children have such a gift for that. Speaking of gifts, I have been having great feelings for this year to come and I hope all of you have made special goals, wishes or whatever you want to call them, that you'd like to accomplish or simply continue doing. I am excited about mine. I hope all of you are excited about yours too. 

Maybe Sunday Come on Monday Baby anytime this week Get an old house Find a backyard Buy some flowers down the street

Here is a photo of me in a sari. Take a good look because it doesn't happen very often! It was one of my first times wearing one. That's my Aunt standing behind me because she didn't want to be in the picture. She did an awesome job of tying my sari on Nina and Punit's wedding reception that day. It was super hot that day and this was taken just before I jetted off. What you don't see in this shot is the hand-held fan on the table that my mom was fanning me with (with some protest) while my aunt busily wrapped, measured, pleated, and tucked right before this picture was taken. I was sweating- not pretty. I have one tiny pin holding everything in place. One pin to hold the drape on my shoulder. Later, I realized that we forgot to put a pin in to reinforce the pleats. Luckily, I had some pins in my purse and I did that at the reception in the bathroom. Two pins is pretty amazing to hold everything together. No sweat. Hehhehheh. 

And I couldn't tell you but I'm telling you now Just let me hold you while you're falling apart Just let me hold you so we both fall down Fall on me

"Never look down to test the ground before taking your next step.
Only the one who keeps an eye fixed on the far horizon will find the right road."

~Dag Hammerskjold, former head of the UN.

I need a different now Where we can wear each other for awhile I'll lend you my tears if I can borrow your smile We'll get through tomorrow somehow

I have been thinking about a lot of things lately. Maybe it is this time of year that brings with it a reflection of the events of the past months and of life in general. When I think it's almost like being at one with your body and looking outwards to something at the same time. I know it probably doesn't make sense to many. But this is what happens to me. It's funny b/c when i see other people doing this, I know exactly what it is. My mom does the same thing. Last week at work, I was at the sink and this lady said to me, you look like you are somewhere far away. She was right. In that moment, it's hard to explain to someone where you actually are because I wonder if they understand and I wonder if they would really want to know?

The truth is, I have been thinking a lot about my Grandparents lately, reflecting on my memories of them, and missing them. They came to Canada twice and lived with us for a short period of time. Once when I was in grade three and once when i was in grade 12. Little did I know about the circumstances under which I would see them again. It was in 1997 at my Grandma's funeral in Fiji, where I would see my Grandpa again. He didn't even recognize who I was because he was very ill. I probably looked very different to him. He looked very different to me. He was so small and frail, so unlike the way I remembered him. He had been very sick and had been given wrong medication for his illness. He was being taken to the hospital in the ambulance and my Grandma accompanied him. She was the one who died unexpectedly by the time they got to the hospital. Ironic-- she would talk about how she would want to die before my Grandpa because she felt like it would be too hard to live without him. It was a shock to all of us when she went. When they finally told my Grandpa in the hospital that she was gone, he said that he already knew. They have such an interesting love story of how they met and lived and one day I will definitely write about it.

I remember this one night that I asked God that if he wanted to take my Grandpa too that it would be okay if he wanted to go. I think that was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in life. I was trying to be selfless and I thought it shouldn't really matter what is more bearable to me, because I still had life to live and my Grandpa deserved the quality of life that he had lived for, so maybe if I acknowledged that, then something good would come to him. I just didn't want him to suffer. I loved him so much. He was my mom's idol. Yes, she idolized him and in her eyes he could do no wrong, even though he had his faults just like anyone else did. He was a very loving man, I saw it in the way he treated others, very soft and kind.

He got better and stronger throughout the funeral and everything else that was going on during that time. I did get a chance to get to know him again and bond with him. I have this memory of standing in front of my Grandpa who was sitting down and telling him that I was going to put socks on his feet because it was cold. And then I did. I know it may sound strange, but this memory is so vivid for me because I felt like it was one thing I could do to take care of him. I hope he knew how loved he was at that time. Because I sure did.

It was during this moment in time that I truly learned what loving and being loved was all about. I had always been afraid of it, running from it in one way or another, or not really understanding my responsibility in it. The day I said goodbye to my Grandpa to come home, was the day that I realized the depth of my capacity to love. After I came home from that trip, my life changed forever. I just began doing things better, more accurately, putting more of myself into the things I did. It is hard to explain in words. But it was a kind of taking stock in life and letting go of the unhealthy and starting the path towards the things I really wanted. It was the beginning of a transition. Three years later, my Grandpa died, and it was right before I would be starting yet another significant moment in life that I had worked so hard to attain in the previous three years. The cycle of death and birth/rebirth is amazing. It's a testimony to how we are all connected.

I wish that I had more time with my Grandparents. I hope they know how much I love them and how even though I didn't have them in my life as much as I would have liked, they were important to me and did something greater for me than they (or I) could understand. And I think knowing that makes missing them more bearable.

The rhymes you hear are the rhymes of Darryl's But each and every year we bust Christmas carrols

The Lost Star Trek Christmas Episode: "A Most Illogical Holiday" (1968)

Mr. Spock, with his pointy ears, is hailed as a messiah on a wintry world where elves toil for a mysterious master, revealed to be Santa just prior to the first commercial break. Santa, enraged, kills Ensign Jones and attacks the Enterprise in his sleigh. As Scotty works to keep the power flowing to the shields, Kirk and Bones infiltrate Santa's headquarters.

With the help of the comely and lonely Mrs. Claus, Kirk is led to the heart of the workshop, where he learns the truth: Santa is himself a pawn to a master computer, whose initial program is based on an ancient book of children's Christmas tales. Kirk engages the master computer in a battle of wits, demanding the computer explain how it is physically possible for Santa to deliver gifts to all the children in the universe in a single night. The master computer, confronted with this computational anomaly, self-destructs; Santa, freed from mental enslavement, releases the elves and begins a new, democratic society. Back on the ship, Bones and Spock bicker about the meaning of Christmas, an argument which ends when Scotty appears on the bridge with egg nog made with Romulan Ale.

Filmed during the series' run, this episode was never shown on network television and was offered in syndication only once, in 1975. Star Trek fans hint the episode was later personally destroyed by Gene Roddenberry. Rumor suggests Harlan Ellison may have written the original script; asked about the episode at 1978's IgunaCon II science fiction convention, however, Ellison described the episode as "a quiescently glistening cherem of pus."

Couldn't have said it better myself. Sorry Trekkies.

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas filled with good food, friends, family and laughter. Peace.

And the joke is When he awoke his Body was covered in coke fizz

I was going through some of my old writing and came across an account of a trip to Victoria that my cousin 'Shaft' and I went on last year. I never finished the story (I hope to someday!) and no one has read what I have so far.... here is a little excerpt:

Pre-lood

This time I wasn’t given much time to decide whether or not the destination of Victoria would be in my future. As you remember (and I know you do), my cousin Shaft and I took our mom’s on our very first overnight weekender to Victoria. Little did we know that we’d be visiting again a over a year later. Life is funny, isn’t it?


Girlz ‘n da Hood

It was Wednesday, October 27, 2004 and I was busy studying for my Accounting midterm that I had to write that evening. I was wearing my white hoodie w/ the hood over my head. Underneath my hood was a mass of unwashed bad hair that wasn’t sure if it was curly, straight or wavy. Pause. I know what most of you are thinking :’Fatima never has bad hair and she doesn't even know what bad hair feels like’--- but I do! I do! Continue. I looked like some crazy woman. I think I truly believed that wearing my hood was preventing any vital information from evaporating from the top of my head. After all, that’s how heat escapes. And isn’t heat linked to brainwaves? And aren’t waves just another term for information? Pretty self explanatory I think.

Exams just do something to you. Maybe it’s the pressure of what a test signifies. You either do well or you don’t. You either meet your expectations or you don’t. You either fail or pass. I’d never describe myself as competitive with other people, however, I’ve got a case of fierce competitiveness against myself. I needed all the help I could get.


That's all you guys are getting. Good night!