It is not rare for me to run into someone, or hear indirectly, where the conversation goes like this…

I have cut my spending by half in this last month!
I have control my diet (Whatever kind: low-carb, Atkins, full-vegan…) in the last 2 weeks! (Sometimes they celebrate 2 days! Woot!)
I have gone to the gym or exercise everyday for the past week!

Following all these are usually..
“I’m awesome! Time to celebrate! Reward Time!”
To which my response is… *chuckle*

My prediction for these people is, with almost certainty, that they will not last. They will not keep up whatever they are doing. Because they had just demonstrated that they are five-minute enthusiasts (more on why later). And indeed, that is what most people are.

Inevitably, if I do run into those people again in a few weeks or months and ask them about “how they are doing with…”, nearly 100% of the time, they had stopped whatever they were doing. This is excluding those who didn’t even start with all their talks, which there are many. Quite sad.

Am I being pessimistic? I’ll let you decide, but only after you consider the following situations that surround us now. Maybe you are part of it.

The amount of health problems and the issue with obesity.
The amount of people struggling financially.
The amount of people with all kinds of mental, emotional, personal issues.

It is a fact that these difficult situations are with us now. It is also a fact that we have more information than ever on what and how to do to help ourselves. Such irony.

What happens? Inconsistency. We are good talkers. We know the right thing to say. We memorize all the great tips and theories. Yet, we don’t do. And for majority, if we do at all, it is only for short period of time, which does not lead to learning.

So, I mention above about people who celebrate their milestones are more than likely five-minute-enthusiasts. It is not that celebration is bad. A little celebration, patting yourself on the back is all good and dandy, and sometimes necessary encouragement.

However, these celebrations are over dramatization. It is excessive drama of a small step on a journey to become something better, or further, something great — that is, if they truly aspire to be better or great. They had expended more efforts in celebrating than focusing on what they need to continue to do and thus completely miss the point. Therefore, such excitement, celebration, over dramatization is a sign that their effort is doomed to inevitable quitting.

Another problem with over excitement and over dramatization is that people binge on whatever they need to do and then burn out in no time. Not only will that not help but often make matters worse.

They binge on saving for a month, only to spend more than they ever did before the month.
Or they binge from eating for a month, only to eat a crate of chocolate afterward.
Or they binge on exercising for a month, only to burn out and quit, or had overdriven to the detriment of the body causing more harms.
Or they binge on abstinence, only to sleep with 10 people in one night… uh, wait, is this possible?

Anyways… just don’t binge!

Whatever tips, methods, doctrines you follow. Give it your consistency without binging. I can assure, whatever you did, right or wrong, after you’ve given it some time and effort PLUS sincerity, you will learn something. And it will be a type of learning that stays with you forever. And that, will allow you to decide what’s next and how to improve beyond your current self.

Perhaps it is a good idea for you to start doing consistently, and not just reading, thinking, talking, celebrating consistently.

The noise of the day fades away.
The night is quiet and…
Space surrounds the alone being.
Solitude.

The night can be so lonely. Especially if you are alone.

In solitude, how do you feel?

Whatever it is. That reveals truth about you. How you feel when you are utterly alone speaks much about your true self.

As humans, having time to be physically alone is imperative. Imperative in that it lets each of us to feel the true self and thus helps us grow character, a genuine character. Because of the silence, the emptiness around, without noise and distraction, who you are becomes so naked — the amazing, yet scary part. Because it is scary, we always try to run away when alone or begin to feel lonely.

Solitude, aloneness then become amazing.

One of my favorite Taiwan artist Wang Leehom echos this thought and wrote:

I have come to believe that men mature in isolation. Isolation, being along with one’s thoughts can be a form of meditation and enlightenment. Perhaps one matures when he realizes that he is ultimately alone in this world, and that he must take responsibility for his own life, because no one else will.

Physically being alone speeds up this realization. Like Tom Hanks in “Castaway”. I believe in building from the ground up, whether it be corporate models, orchestra scores, or interpersonal relationships. For example, one needs to learn to love himself before being able to love others. One needs to be able to live in harmony with himself before being able to live together with another person. I guess if I look at it that way, I sure am leading the life these days, becoming a secure individual.

Thinking, meditating, feeling, composing,…searching for that rhythm in my soul that will make the whole world tap their feet. Yes, I miss my friends, and loved ones, but tonight, I wouldn’t trade this loneliness for anything.

So too I would never trade the peace that sprouts from emptiness, silence, solitude for anything.

The truth about meditation lies in that it lets you sees, and thus lay down, the identities you take on throughout the day, when you are with others. Thus the practice of meditation is to enable us to bring this observing quality into our daily life, which is why it is called a practice. Solitude is the first level, the physical level of meditation. Physical isolation is the entrance into meditation for modern people.

How is this relevant? Well, if you can face and accept and flow with the overwhelming quality of solitude, of utter loneliness, it cannot be any tougher than to face the daily stress in life — bills, budgets, work, relationships… Knowing that, how can you not be able to act with peace. Hence, we say it’s “ground work”, starting with the self.

I don’t know how to organize them into coherent information so I am doing bullets:

- Be prepared to pay for lodging and transportation. It’s true for all foreign travel, but definitely more so in japan and especially if you want to run between the bit cities. Just the Shinkansen ticket from Tokyo to Kyoto costs 25,000~ yen, and that is after I happened across street vendor that sell at a 1000~ discount. I think that is close to a 2-way plane ticket half way across U.S.

- The other taxi fares, bus, and metro rides will eat you up pretty fast too. If you are also going to shop in Japan, oh boy, good luck with your wallet.

- Allocate extra time to figure out your transportation for bus, metro, and train ride. Unless you are a local or with a local peron who is from that particular city, I’d say you will be reading a lot and asking around a bit. Or you can pay the premium for taxi…

- Food is delicious and not that much more expensive. In fact, ramen is really cheap, yet still very very yummy. The only bad-tasting food I had was a plain yogurt on the side for one breakfast. On the right is eggplant with 2 kinds of miso on top.

- Total expense out of my own pocket is $700~ including the Shinkansen tickets, 3-night hotel, some food and parking in Kyoto. Not bad.

- If you like fruits, definitely eat their produce there. If you don’t like fruits, eat their produce anyway! It’s that good. The melon on the right is called Yubari Melon. It’s the best I’ve ever eaten, and it came from the town, Yubari (duh!), in Hokkaido.

- Japanese are polite and friendly people, especially if you can speak a little Japanese, then they open up more. However, Tokyo is observably less so probably because of big-city-people-syndrome.

- On average, more of them know how to dress suitably and fashionably.

- If you want to know what fat or obese means, do not go to Japan.

- Following that thought, I hypothesize that obesity and many other of our social problems in America have a lot to do with our wastefulness, versus Japanese non-wastefulness (partly because they must on less land and therefore resource, and I am not saying they don’t have their short-comings). Wastefulness has to do with the willingness to understand how to do things effectively, resulting in quality. Conversely, majority of Americans have no genuine desire for quality for their own bodies. I am talking about true intention here. Topic for another day?

- I was lucky and got spoiled on the trip by my friends and their family. They were very hospitable. That reinforces the idea of sharing with others emotionally, mentally, and materially in my mind. It is one of the best gift we can give, and it must come from the heart. And that, I will do.

- Once again, I know that it doesn’t matter where I am. I will be okay, and that I can get used to any place. Of course, I have preferences and things I am used to, but that’s besides the point.

- Finally, I need to take another trip to Japan to go to Okinawa!

Well, because I heart the food in Japan, here’re a few more pictures.

Best miso ramen ever! And it’s only around 600 yen. Plus, it’s not like I haven’t tasted plenty in California.

My favorite dish at Yaki-niku (grilled meat?) — some extremely tender raw beef at Yaki-niku. This place only serves cow related meat. Mmmm, organs.

Even the waffle looks awesome, at a random small restaurant at Kyoto station.

Now look at the cake! You know you want it :) Japanese are using their innovative energy in the right area, me think.

One thing I notice in Japan was smallness. No, I am not insulting their people. No, I am not insulting their men, either. Actually, many girls there are very cute… uh, yeah, getting off track.

I should say — large space does not matter.

Take a look at this picture.

It is a picture of my hotel room in Kyoto. There is barely space between the bed and table for my butt. It reminds me much about the living space from my past years in Hong Kong.

But, I am not complaining.

The common sense we have is — “Oh, we got so many things, we need more space”

In a way, our desire for space is directly related to our desire for things. Conversely, when we get more space in the house, we often want to fill that space with more things. Oh, what a dilemma.

Perhaps, we can consider the following chain of thought — “Oh, we got so many things, perhaps we need to make space by getting rid of things, that we don’t need, or use.”

Personally, I loooooove having space, and also cleanliness. They are very soothing.

Let’s face it, most of our stuffs end up sitting around collecting dusts. Instead, why don’t we carefully consider what we reeeeeeeeeally need, and if we are getting something, make sure it is something we will use frequently?

Oh, I am such a genius. Just kidding.

Another thing that is small is the portion of a meal. Each dish and even hamburgers from McDonald’s are smaller, which sucks for me because I am constantly hungry from my intense gym’ing. But for most Americans, who sit most days in office and sit some more in front of TV at home, can be a great idea.

That leads me to my final thoughts.

Perhaps we can use more limits. Yes, you heard me, limits, instead of more freedom.

Perhaps too much freedom had lead us to lots of indulgence, and indulgence is a result of not being clear about what is truly important. More limits in our environments force us to value what we have and cherish the resources that are available.

In other words, physical limits can be a great catalyst for internal growth.

Using the living space as an example, if you have so few square feets, there are only so many things you can have. And what you have will be what you need or truly find important.

Or if parking size is like this, you think twice before getting an SUV!

Ok, the car example is not very good. The living situation is too different. But about driving in Japan, most people from America probably can’t drive in Japan, uh, due to poor driving skills. I personally DON’T want to drive there.

Anyways, I want to say this…

Evolving the idea on limit. Next time when we are frustrated and want to complain, or feel like we are suffering immensely, or seem to have insatiable desires for other things, consider that, there will forever be somebody somewhere else who are a lot worse off than we are.

Maybe things could be better, but they can be a lot worse. Look at this picture featuring the tight quarters in Tokyo Metro’s human sardines.

I guess that is why seeing the world, experiencing different things, how people live differently, are so important. So we realize how things can be worse.

On this note, I attribute my non-narrow perspective and sometimes unique and bizarre mentality to my fortunate experience (well, also unfortunate because it sucked big times sometimes) of having moved and lived in drastically different places at an age (12) that I could make my own perception already. However, I give myself credits for choosing to look at both sides of things rather than seeing only the green on the other side.

Last thing, totally unrelated, is a picture near the famous cross section in Shibuya, Tokyo by Center Gai (センター街). Pretty, eh? (It was shot in Lost in Translation too — one of my favorite movies)

I had returned from my Japan trip this afternoon. In a few words, the trip was wonderful with the company of friends and their utmost kindness. Despite only a few days, it was very enjoyable, and that definitely includes the food.

On the other hand, it is also good to be home, comfy room, everything I need, and money stop flowing out. But I must say, Japan and California are both hot, the only difference being humidity, which makes it a little worse in Japan.

To deal with jet lag, I am forcing myself to be awake until now which is my local bed time. I am stubborn like this. One of the things I did to during my attempt to stay awake is customizing a theme for a new look for my blog. Geek! Yep! But it’s been awhile and since I am just sitting around, here it is.

Hope you all like it, let me know if there’s any change to make it better. I plan to also rewrite the “About” section and post a little bit more on Japan. Hopefully, I get around to it tomorrow.