Little Things 310: When Emotions Speak

I read Leonard Mlodinow’s Elastic last year, and this week I finished another one of his books: Emotional: How Feelings Shape Our Thinking. I got a lot of useful input that I'm going to process and let it simmer in my brain pot for a while. 

Here are the points that really stayed with me and how I’ve seen them play out in my own life (Quick summary!):

1. Feel, don’t fight.
I’ve seen what repressed emotions can do. I’ve been through mental wars and even physical sickness because I tried to push feelings away. Now I try not to lie to myself anymore. I self-assess, face it, and work through it instead of avoiding. Emotions are signals: when I’m triggered, I ask myself; What’s the real message here? When I’m sad, I let myself grieve instead of acting strong. Whatever it is, I let it exist, take note, and go through it.

2. Flip the frame (reappraisal).
Nerves before a presentation? Instead of calling it fear, I tell myself it’s energy I can use to focus. Same sensation, different story. I do this a lot in life: when heartbreak feels like someone’s gripping my chest, I tell myself that I'm in pain, then I lace up and run. I don’t deny the pain, I channel it. That small reframing has saved me from falling into depression more than once.

3. Expression clears the clutter.
Journaling, ranting, drawing, sharing; these aren’t just hobbies, they’re mental decluttering tools. Science says so. (But honestly, I already knew because it works.)

4. Choose your vibe tribe.
Emotional contagion is real. Grow up with an anxious parent, and you carry anxiety. Live with a negative partner, and you slowly absorb that weight. But put yourself in a healthy, kind environment, and you can’t help but soften and be kinder, too. So I curate my emotional environment like I curate my books and playlists, carefully.

5. Emotions aren’t flaws.
They’re not dirt to scrub away. They’re tools, they shape our reality, they reveal who we are. Hard to rewire, sure, but learning about them; why they exist, how they move, gives us options, and maybe can help you to slowly heal.

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I hate it when my dad says I’m “too emotional,” like it’s a defect. It’s not. Yes, if I let my emotions control me, they’ll eat me alive. But I’ve always been curious about people, about the psychology behind it, about why we feel the way we do. My sensitivity fuels that curiosity.

I don’t ever want to stop learning what it means to be human.
At the end of the day, being emotional isn’t a flaw, it’s just part of being alive. And I think it’s okay whether you’re a tad too dramatic, feel a little too much, or fall a bit too intensely. As long as you keep learning and have the tools to manage it, let it be a part of who you are. Kan kan kan.

On the outside, I might seem like one of the most boring people on the social scale. But in my head, I live with a prism of emotions and endless curiosity that keeps me entertained. Without that inner world? I wouldn’t just be boring to others, I’d be boring to myself. So, I'm glad I'm the way I am. 

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I used Speechify to help me listen to this ebook. 

You can read along while it narrates (great for tough concepts), highlight key points to revisit later, and even pick chapters for AI-generated summaries. Basically, it’s the nerd’s dream toolkit. 

Feel free to try Speechify: Here's the link!

Little Things 309: Ophelia Offline, Starlight Online

It’s been four months without my MBP, ever since I turned off Ophelia and decided it was time to let her rest. I’ve been using my office MBP all this time, waiting for the right moment to commit to yet another pricey device.

Now, I finally have a new one to replace my old MBP from 2016. I ordered the new M4 MacBook Air 13-inch, thinking I’ll probably use it for minor editing while letting my iPad handle the heavy-lifting illustration work. Kot. I don’t know.

With God’s plan, I might be with IG for a long stretch of time. It’s cozy here (chaotic, at times), but the people I work with are great. For the first time, I feel like I can actually see our future together. It’s everything I need: consistency, full support, aroha, flexibility, and work-life balance. If I don’t need freelance jobs to fill the gaps, I don’t need a super-powerful MBP, just something reliable for “work” work.

Maybe the MBA + iPad combo is good enough.

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Thought process:

I didn’t buy the base model, I added more RAM and storage. Hopefully, it can handle the design work for another six years and the basic stuff for maybe ten. Downgrading from 15 inches to 13 inches feels significant, but sizes don't matter, I’ve got an extended monitor to make up for it. Plus, I might travel a bit, so I wanted something lighter and smaller.

I’m a bit nervous because the last time I used an MBA was in 2015, and it wasn’t powerful enough for design work. Hopefully, the M4 changes that. We’ll see.

I went with Starlight, the “yellow one”  because my iPad is the bold yellow version, and matching them felt like the right narrative choice. Yellow isn’t even my favorite color, but it pairs well with green, which is my current favorite. Together, they sit on my desk like two cheerful NPCs, plotting side quests for me while I work. Plus, they don’t match my personality at all, which is exactly the point, like I bought the sun and the vibes to balance out my serious tone. (Tapi in reality, langsung tak kuning, just slightly goldish from certain sides).

So here we are: a lighter laptop, a hopeful heart, and the quiet promise to make this one last as long as possible. If Ophelia taught me anything, it’s that our tools are more than tools, they’re archives of our early morning, our good work, and our half-finished dreams. 

Time to start filling this one’s memory banks, and perhaps with a lot of writing. 

Let's call her Starlight and my ipad the Sunlight.

Little Things 308: Peace, Triggers, and Family Luggage

I went on a 4-day family trip last week : Ipoh > Butterworth > Sg Petani > Taiping > Kuala Kangsar > KL.

Family trips always make me nervous because my parents are, let’s just say, very distinct people. Usually, I can slip away to recalibrate when things get overwhelming, but this time, because of certain circumstances, I couldn’t really go anywhere. We were stuck together the whole journey, almost like the old days. I was with my mom and my step dad. And yeah, I also met my dad and my step mom at the wedding on the Saturday.

I get overstimulated very easily. I’m sensitive. I guard my peace like it’s the most valuable thing in my life. That’s why I avoid people, I avoid drama, and I usually cut loose anything that disturbs my nervous system (which explains why I don’t have friends). But family, oh my God, family is like a blessed curse that just lingers. And every single one of us carries a fragile emotional baggage that could rupture with just a poke.

I can’t be myself.

Some people would say this is avoidance, that by staying away from what triggers me, I’m not really healing. There’s this idea that unless you face the very thing that overwhelms you, you’ll never know if you’re truly “over it.” Like, if being around family still makes your nervous system spike, maybe the wound is still open.

And I get that. It makes sense. Healing isn’t just hiding forever; it’s also testing the waters, seeing if you can step back into the old battlefield without collapsing. But it’s not as simple as “face your fears” or “just get over it” or "let them". Sometimes avoiding is survival. Sometimes avoiding is wisdom. And sometimes, you only face the trigger when you feel steady enough to laugh at the poke instead of crying about it.

Family trips are basically free exposure therapy, just without the therapist, and with extra luggage. A crash course in seeing how far I’ve come and how much further I still need to go. And of course, a reminder of why you are scripted the way you are today.

yelp!

Little Things 307: About Writing

 

Last weekend, I thought I just wanted to stop writing. But then yesterday morning I woke up entertained by reading Craig's newsletter - the latest incident in Karuizawa. Here I am back again, inspired by how his writing feels so nonchalant yet personal at the same time. Just writing about life as it unfolds, because we never really know when our last stop will be.

I don’t think I’m done learning and sharing just yet.

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Last week, I also did some self-work, this time on “life purpose” through the lens of Islamic psychology. I wanted to see where my inclinations point, my strengths, my talents, and how all of that might align with purpose. Out of curiosity, I experimented with ChatGPT as a guide. I answered a series of layered prompts, and it came back with a Venn diagram + explanations to help me reflect.

Note: There isn’t such a thing as an “official archetype test” in Islamic psychology. What I did was simply compile ideas and concepts from Islamic teachings as a guide for self-work. That’s all. So please don’t come at me with “ini sesat”, if you’re familiar with self-work, you’ll know it’s about intentional effort to understand yourself better. The process is always the same: introspection, identifying, and then taking concrete steps.

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Here’s the gist:

We broke it into 3 layers : what Allah built in, what life shaped, and what keeps trying to show up. Imagine it as a Venn diagram:

• Circle 1: Fitrah (born-with traits)

• Circle 2: Skills and wisdom forged by life events (Ilm + experience)

• Circle 3: The recurring callings/signs (Ilham)

At the center: your unique divine gift zone.

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After reflecting and answering the prompts, ChatGPT summarized my overlap as:

A quiet strategist–writer who processes deeply, distills wisdom, and expresses it in ways that bring calm clarity to others — not just for now, but to last. Basically, the scribe-philosopher archetype. That archetype is like the ancient version of someone who’s both a thinker and a recorder of thought — someone who processes deeply, then puts it into words that endure.

I was surprised by the answer. I know I love to write, and I use this blog to record my reflections and learnings. But I never realized that answering these prompts would point me to an “archetype” that describes me so precisely. It feels good to see that my gift zone connects to something I’ve been doing all along.

For a long time, I’ve felt like the 18 years I’ve spent here, documenting my thoughts through different phases of life, might be futile. Yet every time I return and cringe at those old posts, I also find myself learning something; about me, about others, about the world. In hindsight, this space has never been wasted. It has been shaping me all along, quietly building the person I am becoming. 

But then, why blog and not personal journal or a diary, right? 

It is different, every post is a deliberate choice to share something from me to the public's eyes. It is always humbling to learn that most of the time, I know nothing and I am in the process of figuring things out myself - and I want to normalize that. Most people like to show only the end product, the success story, the ultimate end goal. But I love the process. I love the journey. I love the "figuring things out" part. 

So, I guess, I will still be here, writing whatever I felt worth note-taking for perhaps many more years to come.

Tooth Story - But Make it Sofi's

Ok, not my story, but Sofi’s.

About a month ago, Sofi had a molar toothache. It was the same molar we’d been fixing with dental fillings. The dentist did an x-ray and, yes, it turned out to be an infection. Sofi had to go on antibiotics and get it treated. The options were either a root canal or an extraction. I didn’t want a root canal on a baby tooth, and extraction on a strong, restored molar felt too invasive, so I asked the dentist to just do another filling, at least temporarily, for as long as it could last.

But since then, she’d been having headaches almost daily, for nearly two weeks. Along the way, she also had other symptoms: chest pain, a high fever (once), and chills. We had her checked, referred to the hospital, and did all the required tests, but everything looked fine because the symptoms didn’t seem connected. Still, I couldn’t keep giving her paracetamol every day. So I decided it was time to go ahead with the molar extraction (assuming the headaches came from the infected molar).

I made the appointment and started preparing her mentally for the procedure.

The dentist suggested using laughing gas to reduce her awareness (basically, to get her a little high), so it wouldn’t be too traumatic. I had a molar extraction last year myself, and yes, it was manageable for an adult without getting high, but for Sofi, it’s different. She’s really scared of anything painful, and molar extraction requires several gum injections while fully awake. So, I agreed to the laughing gas option.

My main worry was: what if I paid for the laughing gas, but they couldn’t proceed for some reason? I’d still be paying RM450 for an untreated molar. On top of that, I still clearly remembered my own extraction and I was nervous imagining Sofi going through it.

But because I knew what would happen, I explained everything to her, step by step. I reminded her daily, even about the painful parts; the shots, the gas, the scary moments. Having to be the adult in the room, with my child trusting me fully, was nerve-wracking. 

The gas took about 20 minutes (on the highest setting, I think) before she was half-conscious. I was massaging her foot the whole time, my way of letting her know I was there (she kind of expected it, since I always do that at the dentist). Once the gas kicked in and she got drowsy, the dentist gave her the multiple gum injections. We asked her to close her eyes so she wouldn’t see the needle. Then the difficult molar extraction began. Since we were already there, I asked the dentist to also pull her loose front tooth. I was literally sweating the whole time.

Alhamdulillah, it all went well.

She was a bit woozy on the way home and even managed to snack a little (while still numb). But about an hour later, when the anesthesia wore off, the real drama began. She started crying, rolling around in pain, the whole ordeal. It took another hour before the painkillers kicked in, and eventually, she fell asleep with an ice pack on her cheek.

Even at midnight, she woke up crying from the pain, and I had to give her another round of medicine. She went to school the next day like a champ (on a painkiller) and I prepared all her manageable foods and snacks for school. We will see how long the pain would last (if I'm not mistaken, around 4 days).

I'm proud of my bb.

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Here's the details:

• Laughing Gas: RM 400
• Mask: RM 50
• Difficult extraction: RM 70
• Loose extraction: RM 40
• Medicine: RM 10

Thank you Dr S for being Sofi's trusted dentist since the first visit. He treats Sofi so professionally and ok with explaining to her about the procedure instead of just talking with 'the adult's in the room (and not all dentists/doctors know how to treat kids so I'm very particular on having him instead of other dentist). 

She's not scared of going to the dentist then, and even after going through this procedure, she is still fine and ok with dental appointments. I don't want her to be scared of dentist, so I'm glad I started early. 

Little Things 306: The Rule of 3 + 1

Are you familiar with the Rule of Three?

It’s the idea that things are better in threes. They’re more memorable, satisfying, and effective than two or four. Our brains love patterns, and three feels complete.

Think:

• “Blood, sweat, and tears”

• “The good, the bad, and the ugly”

You’ll find it everywhere.
Marketers use it to persuade. Comedians use it to set up a joke, two expected beats, then a twist. People set three goals because it’s just enough to focus without being overwhelming. Fairy tales love it too: three wishes, three bears, three fairy godmothers, three pairs of shoes.

But here’s the twist I want to talk about the Rule of Three + One.

In storytelling, three is the world, the structure, the constants. The fourth is the one who grows, changes, or breaks the pattern. The three are the framework. The fourth is the story.

Examples:

1. Goldilocks and the Three Bears

   • Three Bears = Structure (big/medium/small, hard/soft/just right)

   • Goldilocks = Intruder, learner, agent of change
     The story isn’t about the bears. It’s about Goldilocks moving through contrast, extremes, and eventually finding balance.

2. The Three Little Pigs

   • Three Pigs = Three types of choices (straw, sticks, bricks)

   • Wolf = Chaos, test, troublemaker
     The lesson? Build wisely.

3. Howl’s Moving Castle

   • The three: Howl, Calcifer, and The Castle itself

   • The one: Sophie - She changes the most, from a self-doubting hat maker to someone who literally moves worlds (and changes Howl in the process).

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When you notice this “three + one” pattern, you see it everywhere, in fairy tales, movies, even in real life. The three give you the framework. The one who steps outside it? That’s the transformation. I know, I know, in real life it could be 4 + 1, or 8 + 1, whatever the life throws at us lah kan.

In fairy tales, the +1 is the character who grows. In life, that’s you.
You’ll always be given choices, and each one will come with its own lesson. 

That’s how the story unfolds and the ending? That’s still yours to write.

Little Things 305: The Books

The Japanese Modern Classic:

The latest book I read was The Ruined Map by Kōbō Abe. I gave it two whole weeks. Halfway through, I was still lost in the hunt, and not the fun kind of lost. The kind where you keep turning pages hoping for a breadcrumb, but all you get is dust and déjà vu. I realized that I just don’t have the patience for unsolved mysteries right now. I don’t like being stuck in an endless loop of uncertainty, digging for answers that may not even exist. Sure, I love stories with emotional and intellectual complexities, but I need some kind of purpose or clarity towards the end, rather than endless confusion. 

It reminded me of how I felt reading Piranesi. People rave about the twist at the end. Me? It didn’t work. I hated it. Then it hit me. Maybe I hated it because it felt too familiar. The spiral. The confusion. That stagnant feeling. The loop of uncertainty. I’ve been living in that narrative for the past few years.

So no, if reading is supposed to bring me joy or escape, I’m not going to spend my quiet moments wandering another fictional maze that mirrors my own. 

I rarely do this, but I decided to DNF this book. 

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The Literary Fiction:

I’ve been slow-reading There Are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak, going on two months now. And honestly, I love it that way. It’s the kind of storytelling that invites you to take your time, to pick it up whenever, and be gently carried by the lives of these three characters as they move across time and continents. 

Honestly, I could read their stories the way I once watched the first ten seasons of Grey’s Anatomy; dedicated, stretched across years, invested in every ache and arc. I’m learning bits of history and culture without even realizing it. No one weaves the intimate and the epic quite like Elif Shafak. She makes you feel like you’re sipping ancient rain through modern skin. Let me enjoy this for awhile.

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The Japanese Classic Literature:

I tried Ryunosuke Akutagawa's short stories - surprisingly nice and easy to read. Sometimes odd, sometimes bland, but always carrying something underneath. Let me mention the top three that are absolutely worth your time:

• In a Bamboo Grove - A dead samurai. Seven testimonies. No resolution.
  This one’s less about who did it and more about how truth bends under ego, guilt, and self-preservation. It’s basically the original unreliable narrator hellscape. Short, unsettling, and kind of genius. Everyone has their own truth (or lie), and the brilliance is in the contrast, not in what they say, but why and how. You’re left to decide what's real. Or just embrace the confusion.
• Dragon: The Old Potter’s Tale - A cheeky monk plays a prank, announces a dragon will rise from a pond on a certain day. People show up. A crowd forms. Tension builds. It’s not really about the dragon. It’s about belief. About how mass conviction can turn fiction into shared reality. Feels like a silly bedtime story, but hits you later like a quiet philosophy class.
• Kappa - Now this one’s a trip. A man falls into a world of mythical river creatures, the Kappa, and instead of awe, we get a dark, satirical mirror of our own messed-up society. Think Gulliver’s Travels but with more existential dread and passive-aggressive frogs. It tackles mental illness, selective breeding, capitalism, and creative despair, all in under 60 pages. Wildly strange, uncomfortably real. A weird little masterpiece.

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Been reading a lot since last month, I stopped reading after I started working last year because I didn't have the energy (and time). But lately I really make an effort to read, it is hard for me to consume any media since I started working (not even Youtube). I am not sure why. 

I love that I started enjoying reading again.

Little Things 304: Emotional Alchemy

When someone dies, yes, their physical form ceases. But their energy? That doesn’t just disappear. The impact they had, the love they gave, the way they laughed, the way they sat beside you in silence, all of that lingers. Even the atoms in their body return to the cycle of life, finding new homes in wind, earth, or stars. We don’t vanish. We just change state.

That’s the first law of thermodynamics: Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed.

I’ve come to think of my emotions as energy too. Raw, potent, often inconvenient, but deeply mine. I don’t like letting them run wild in my space, so I alchemize them. That heartbreak? I write. That rage? I run. That longing? I draw or move or throw it into a poem. My emotional energy is my currency. And just like any system drifting toward disorder, I’ve learned it takes intention to manage it. To line it up, tame it. I stand at the gate like a quiet guardian, even when I’m the one unraveling.

That’s maybe one of the better things I’ve learned with age.

This maturity. This reluctant grace. This knowing that, really, it’s just you. The love or care you pour into others often goes unmeasured, misread, or evaporates before it’s felt. That’s not on them. That’s just how energy works. It moves. It changes. Sometimes it just fades into silence.

I still roll my eyes at myself whenever I get heartbroken. Like, again, did I not learned anything? But I cry anyway. Because feeling is part of transforming. And I guess that’s the magic and cruelty of it. You don’t get to choose how others receive your energy. 

But you do get to choose what you do with what’s left in you.

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So, dance to your song, plan your trip, write your sorrow, celebrate your pain. 

Because what remains in you, that’s yours to wield. Turn it into something only you can make. Not because the world is watching, but because the energy has to go somewhere. Let it become you.

Little Stories 315: 2 weeks

 

Dear MC,

You left me four days ago. Yesterday was supposed to be your birthday. You didn’t wait for your big 60th celebration, instead, they scattered your ashes at sea, just as you wanted. We had two weeks. It felt too short, yet somehow just enough. We had time to say goodbye. We talked about this, remember? I think it happened the way you would have wanted it to.

I’m still grieving. I can’t believe how quickly it all happened after we found out. We just spent the weekend together, talking about the future, our plans, our next steps. This doesn’t feel like your usual travel gaps. This good bye is forever.

I know you wouldn’t want me to wallow. You never liked a fuss. You wanted to leave quietly. But the problem is I chose you. You were in my circle. The only one I let that close. You had the key. You were my best friend. And now, suddenly, you’re gone. It sounds like I'm romanticizing this. But this pain, it’s unbearable. Because this time, you’re not coming back. We won’t see each other again, not like we used to. I don't have any dates to look forward to anymore. 

Every time people ask me, I'll cry (except when I manage to put on a façade and ride the pain). And even if no one ask me, I will still cry. The world did not pause when you died, even when I felt like everything in my life had been crushed under the weight. You left a big hole in my heart.

It’s a bit fucked up that anyone I care for just leaves. It feels like a curse. 

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You are loved and remembered, thank you for being an inspiration more than 20 years ago (and even throughout the years after). I'll continue your journey, I will do the trip we promised we'd go on, insyaAllah. 

I'm glad we chose each other.

Safe travel, Miss Yann Li ‪‪❤︎‬

Little Stories 314: How much time do I have?

I have this one friend (at this point, this is my one and only friend). We meet regularly, we exchange plans, books, thoughts and ideas. MC is the only person that knows my personal life updates, or family dramas, or possible travel plans. MC is my best friend, we show up unapologetically after our latest adventure or after weeks of hustling life, like no time has passed. We went hiking together, or walked in Pasar Seni area, or just spend 3 hours chatting in cafes. 

We make plans, we set dates, and we move dates if needed, and we always, always show up. 

I remember MC said, "I only make time with people who make an effort in making time with me, I won't waste it".  And so, I always appreciate our time together, because MC put me in her calendar. She makes space for me in her life. She doesn't have to, but she does. 

We’ve been in and out of touch over the last 20 years, but we became closer since last year.

Like I said, she didn't have to, but she did.

I've reached to many people, and she is one of the person that stuck. And I appreciate it so much. I always feel refreshed when I see her, because it feels genuine. Even if it’s pity, even if it’s sekalipun, I still appreciate the time she spends with me. Because I needed the connection, and I was really trying. She gave me that, she gave me a chance to connect. She showed kindness when I needed it. 

She doesn't know how much her presence means in my life. 

It changed me.

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She told me her cancer is back. Advance stage.

And I'm selfish. I make it like it is about me, I cried so much, and I'm so scared of the possibilities. I'm angry and disappointed. Every time I think about it, I cry. This isn't about me, kan. But I just can't stop. I cry every single day since I found out. I didn't even know I process information through tears rupanya. My eyes are now two sad marshmellow, next level puffiness. I have headache all the time.

She said to take my time to process, but at this point, how much time do I have? 

MC, how much time do we have?