Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Antisocial personalities - cancer to the human nature?

I have had a frustrating day with unable to feel sympathetic towards antisocial personalities. Recently, 'antisocial personalities' have dominated my mind for a bit... I guess it's because I am not lack of contact of it recently - on tv and at work etc.

It is hard to believe anybody is able to be so self righteous and self centred. As if that is just the way it should be and why do you people keep thinking I am wrong. I fear slightly for myself as I am about to move into an area full with psychopaths and sociopaths at work this year. It's horrible the stories I have heard, not that I can tell anyone about them and if I did it would scare the hell out of anybody.

I laugh at myself for putting myself into a work setting where it is probably only a notch down from working as medic on a war zone. Colleagues of mine had been injured before too even through I know they are well respected by the clients they see. Working in that setting to come is going to be testing of what I am taught through my formal training as a therapist and as a person who had been brought up in a Eastern culture of compassion and love of the Budha.

Sometimes you just want to tell them 'come on, get yourself together... stop feeling sorry for yourself you are not winning with me!'... I wonder what has psychiatry turn me into? I like psych because it challenges your reality everyday every moment, it challenges your idea of normality and society all the time but at times I wish for the simplicity and unquestionableness of what to do in physical therapy settings.

Do I go for where it is easier to flow or do I struggle for what may potentially be fruitful? For a big part of my life it had never been a question worth thinking - of course I will struggle till my last breath for what I think is right or I should do... when reality is multiple in versions and perspectives, can I really do so sure anymore?

Friday, January 15, 2010

Day one at the Silk Road lecture series of 3

I was amazed by the level of enthusiasm there was for the silk road - it was one of the biggest lecture hall you can find in the university and it was FULL of old people (and yes they were mostly Europeans).

As I listen to the expert (the teacher) talk about things and places and people that I had known since I was a child, I felt ashamed of not knowing more about my own country - my motherland!!! It filled me with quite a bit of sadness to see in one picture from the thousand budha caves that foreigners from the west (possibly a missionary) were given the equal (or at least high) honour of being drew as a close follower of the Budha. It sadden me to think that diverse people used to be that nice to one another - what happened to us? Why all these division now while our ancestors had find ways of getting along? God, where did we go wrong?

I have heard the lecturer saying that invaluable books from a library cave in the thousand budha caves were sold to a foreigner as a way to raise funds to maintain it while Chinese information suggested they were stolen. It sadden me that the truth is so hard to find - perhaps it was a bit of both? Or it was bought at first and then stolen when people wanted more pieces of China?

God, Budha, the almighty being high above; teach us to get along again - please do not let us to forget the humanity that we need to see in each other... I pray that we see the humanity in others and see ourselves in it through our actions