Shut up and write

- What's the time now?
- 5:46.
- What time did you wake up?
- 5:11.
- What have you done since then?
- Facebook.
- Go to hell, Rosie.

Seriously, I shouldn't spend more time on FB anymore, except for doing useful things.

Now, a note to update things lately. The book is still on track. Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore. I'm going to Indonesia now and the Philippines. Then go back, editing the first chapter and the Cambodia or Thailand part, then send to editors and reviewer. This need to be done before my birthday.

But what I'm not satisfied are:
- Still FB at work (especially the last 2 days when I posted a viral post about English studying)
- Not fully concentrate on the book and work with it fully.
- Not moderate as I used to be. Watched movie and slept at 2AM. Woke up late. No reading or writing in the morning. No exercise. This happened since last week when I started watching How I met your mother. It was damn good. But I need moderation and balance. So I have to resist myself from watching it too much.
- I don't counsel on CV and job hunting lately.

Good things:
- When I don't write the book, I write about other topics for my next book, and it went good. Should keep it this way.
- A student invited me to speak at her school's program about job orientation. Should watch comedies and prepare for it. Things like: "finding a job is like finding your soul mate".
- More followers. Haha.

Now need to work on the bad habits and correcting it. Adjusting myself toward the target.

OK keep it up Rosie.

Stories about happiness

1. Quang Trung met Napoleon. The two kings boasted about their victories, showing each other the strategies in combat, and sharing the pressure of being a leader. It was a fine day. They were sitting on a porch, looking to the street outside. A typical Vietnamese street, vehicles passing frenetically, street stalls and vendors selling everything possible on earth. Quang Trung pointed to a sweet potato seller, who was turning her potatoes upside down on the grills, squinting at the sparks of fire flying out of the grill stove. He murmured: "Look, isn't that girl happier than us? She sells all of her potatoes, coming back home with her husband, and have a peaceful night. We, we have many sleepless nights thinking about battles, kingdoms, tactics". Napoleon nodded. And they both sighed, pondering their lives.

 What is the point of this fable, you may ask. Well, my friend, don't you see that even kings are not happy. It seems that there are some happy people in life, but not ourselves, we ourselves are always miserable. The grilled sweet potato seller seemed to be happier than the kings. But who knows if she always had good nights, or if her dreams were shattered by her fear of starving to death. We all suffer from our own troubles in life.

2. I read a quote on Goodreads: "Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know". Sadly, the quote is so true. Intelligent people are unlikely to be happy. They know the dark sides of the world that not all the people know, they see the corrupted politicians that not many people see, and they notice flaws and faults that others barely notice. And they have their own problems, even if they're super intelligent. I know a man who has IQ of hundred something, everything was easy because he is so smart. He never knows what hard work means since his ability is enough. When he was a kid, school was too easy, read the book, answer the questions, got an A. But smart kid got bullied, so he hid it, hiding himself from other people. Until he went to college, he was asocial and lonely. He got lazy as nothing challenges him and he gets bored easily. And he suffers from depression and addiction. Intelligence doesn't make us happier.

Instead, I'm thinking maybe we don't need to be intelligent to be happy. Happy people aren't necessarily the ones who have high IQ. They don't necessarily know everything in life. In the novel Number the stars, the author says: it is much easier to be brave if you don't know everything, we should know only what we need to know. Like that, I think happy people aren't the one who know everything. They know what they need to know. They know what they don't know. And they know what is enough. They are not the smartest guys. But they are wise guys, who manage to be happy without being ignorant.

We're all going to die, my friend. Being happy or being upset, it's a choice of life. For me, I choose happy - go - lucky.