A wishing of peace to all readers
Before I begin, I would like to express what I felt when I heard the news of the wife of MM Lee Kuan Yew moreover after reading an article about it. Because I do not wish digress from the main topic which I would to discuss, I will simply take what I have posted in my Facebook account under my “Wall”.
After all, politicians are humans. Like everybody else, they do shed tears. Probably for the first time, I can understand how painful and agonising it is for MM Lee Kuan Yew to lose a loving companion of 61 years.
Whoever we are, it's never easy to be ourselves. RIP, Mrs Lee.
Upon reading what MM Lee wrote about her wife, I feel deeply touched for all her sacrifices not only towards Singapore but in supporting her husband, just as a saying goes; behind every successful man is a woman. At the same time, I must admit how awe I am as MM Lee mentioned that he sat by her bedside each day the days she had been bedridden.
“She understands when I talk to her, which I do every night,” he said. “She keeps awake for me; I tell her about my day’s work, read her favourite poems.”
Even being a politician, at the end of the day we cannot deny whoever we are, it does not change the fact we are all humans, a flawed creations of God yet with a sense of love and compassion instilled within us.
“I told her, ‘I would try and keep you company for as long as I can,” before adding, “I’m not sure who’s going first, whether she or me.”
I have to admit that I yearn for a life companion as loyal as Mrs Lee and wish that I can be a good and caring husband MM Lee. This is true love; be there for each other at all times as no one in this world can ever live all by his own.
Sources: http://sg.yfittopostblog.com/2010/10/02/mrs-lee-kuan-yew-dies-aged-89/
“I wanted someone my equal, not someone who needed looking after,” the elder Lee later explained in his autobiography.
Pardon me for the digression which took more than half the page of my Word Document. Right, I just want to make things clear, hoping that I am not desiring for fame or praise, let alone a title. After what I will be sharing in my next few entries, it is not my wish or intention to be given names such as “philosopher” or whatever names, although I came across people doing that to me (but personally, my instinct told me such names were only a form of mockery –I knew what their perceptions were towards what I was reading during those times). In the Hereafter, I do not want to bear a responsibility for what people shall do to my works after my death. Let me live as Leonardo Da Vinci, not knowing he would be famous in time to come after his death yet possessed a great curiosity about the world while he lived.
So correct me of my flaw in knowledge.
Speaking of praises and titles given to men, I cannot help but add how swayed the mind of many men today who yearn for power and fame. By the way, I am not referring to any politician in particular here since I mentioned about MM Lee above. I am referring to all of us collectively –or rather those among us who have such selfish wants. May God protect me from all these. This is probably a form of corruption occurring in the world among the hearts of men.
For the very first time, I would like to give a pause to my entry for now and begin with the following words with hopes I utter them with utmost sincerity and honesty without any hopes of rewards;
In the Name of God
The Most Gracious, Most Merciful
And I seek refuge in Him from the accursed devil
And I seek refuge from all sorts of evil
That dwells within me and all around me
Ameen
I am about to share about what I probably “begin” in seeking to hold onto a belief. At the same time, should I be right as what God wants me to believe in, I hope to die having faith in it. I feel there is a need for us to reach the stage of self-actualisation as stated in Maslow’s Hierarchy.
This entry is a so-called introduction to my current set of beliefs or thought process.
Therefore as I am about to open the door of my mind for those of you who wish to enter, there are couple of things which I would like to say, firstly quoting from Descartes;
“I would advise none to read this work to read this work, unless such as are able and willing to meditate with me in earnest, to detach their minds from commerce with the senses, and likewise to deliver themselves from all prejudice.”
Source: Meditations, p. 122 (Meditation III) –see also A Beginner’s Guide to Descartes’ Meditations by Gareth Southwell, p. 11
I must add that I am probably in the shoes of Descartes when he mentioned;
“Everything I have accepted up to now as being absolutely true and assured, I have learned from or through my senses.” (See Meditations p. 96)
But like Descartes, I am not an empiricist but a rationalist. He did not probably even mean that the only way we receive our ideas is through our five senses. I would to add on that all this while, I have been relying on the definition of truth through my upbringing but have yet to take a step back and watch all what I believe in and validate them.
And being a rationalist does not mean trusting in science alone but rejects what cannot be proven empirically e.g. rejecting the notion of God simply because He cannot be seen and therefore cannot be proven. No, I do believe in God because of the connections in my thoughts to link to Him and thus conclude about His existence. Is it proper to use the word “metaphysics” in this case? By the way, being a rationalist enables me even to accept empiricism.
In any case, the next entry will not specifically about my thought process. Instead, it is with regards to philosophy in which I hope people do not regard it as though it is a form of theology. As a student of such subject, I will drop my comments regarding it especially in hopes of explaining why I feel it is advisable of us to learn before making judgements.
Before I end this entry, allow me to share something;
"I wish my life and decisions to depend on myself, not on external forces of whatever kind. I wish to be the instrument of my own, no of other men's, acts of will. I wish to be a subject, not an object; to be moved by reasons, by conscious purposes, which are my own, not by causes which affect me, as it were, from outside…”
By Isaiah Berlin (see Philosophy Goes to the Movies: An Introduction to Philosophy)
Before I begin, I would like to express what I felt when I heard the news of the wife of MM Lee Kuan Yew moreover after reading an article about it. Because I do not wish digress from the main topic which I would to discuss, I will simply take what I have posted in my Facebook account under my “Wall”.
After all, politicians are humans. Like everybody else, they do shed tears. Probably for the first time, I can understand how painful and agonising it is for MM Lee Kuan Yew to lose a loving companion of 61 years.
Whoever we are, it's never easy to be ourselves. RIP, Mrs Lee.
Upon reading what MM Lee wrote about her wife, I feel deeply touched for all her sacrifices not only towards Singapore but in supporting her husband, just as a saying goes; behind every successful man is a woman. At the same time, I must admit how awe I am as MM Lee mentioned that he sat by her bedside each day the days she had been bedridden.
“She understands when I talk to her, which I do every night,” he said. “She keeps awake for me; I tell her about my day’s work, read her favourite poems.”
Even being a politician, at the end of the day we cannot deny whoever we are, it does not change the fact we are all humans, a flawed creations of God yet with a sense of love and compassion instilled within us.
“I told her, ‘I would try and keep you company for as long as I can,” before adding, “I’m not sure who’s going first, whether she or me.”
I have to admit that I yearn for a life companion as loyal as Mrs Lee and wish that I can be a good and caring husband MM Lee. This is true love; be there for each other at all times as no one in this world can ever live all by his own.
Sources: http://sg.yfittopostblog.com/2010/10/02/mrs-lee-kuan-yew-dies-aged-89/
“I wanted someone my equal, not someone who needed looking after,” the elder Lee later explained in his autobiography.
Pardon me for the digression which took more than half the page of my Word Document. Right, I just want to make things clear, hoping that I am not desiring for fame or praise, let alone a title. After what I will be sharing in my next few entries, it is not my wish or intention to be given names such as “philosopher” or whatever names, although I came across people doing that to me (but personally, my instinct told me such names were only a form of mockery –I knew what their perceptions were towards what I was reading during those times). In the Hereafter, I do not want to bear a responsibility for what people shall do to my works after my death. Let me live as Leonardo Da Vinci, not knowing he would be famous in time to come after his death yet possessed a great curiosity about the world while he lived.
So correct me of my flaw in knowledge.
Speaking of praises and titles given to men, I cannot help but add how swayed the mind of many men today who yearn for power and fame. By the way, I am not referring to any politician in particular here since I mentioned about MM Lee above. I am referring to all of us collectively –or rather those among us who have such selfish wants. May God protect me from all these. This is probably a form of corruption occurring in the world among the hearts of men.
For the very first time, I would like to give a pause to my entry for now and begin with the following words with hopes I utter them with utmost sincerity and honesty without any hopes of rewards;
In the Name of God
The Most Gracious, Most Merciful
And I seek refuge in Him from the accursed devil
And I seek refuge from all sorts of evil
That dwells within me and all around me
Ameen
I am about to share about what I probably “begin” in seeking to hold onto a belief. At the same time, should I be right as what God wants me to believe in, I hope to die having faith in it. I feel there is a need for us to reach the stage of self-actualisation as stated in Maslow’s Hierarchy.
This entry is a so-called introduction to my current set of beliefs or thought process.
Therefore as I am about to open the door of my mind for those of you who wish to enter, there are couple of things which I would like to say, firstly quoting from Descartes;
“I would advise none to read this work to read this work, unless such as are able and willing to meditate with me in earnest, to detach their minds from commerce with the senses, and likewise to deliver themselves from all prejudice.”
Source: Meditations, p. 122 (Meditation III) –see also A Beginner’s Guide to Descartes’ Meditations by Gareth Southwell, p. 11
I must add that I am probably in the shoes of Descartes when he mentioned;
“Everything I have accepted up to now as being absolutely true and assured, I have learned from or through my senses.” (See Meditations p. 96)
But like Descartes, I am not an empiricist but a rationalist. He did not probably even mean that the only way we receive our ideas is through our five senses. I would to add on that all this while, I have been relying on the definition of truth through my upbringing but have yet to take a step back and watch all what I believe in and validate them.
And being a rationalist does not mean trusting in science alone but rejects what cannot be proven empirically e.g. rejecting the notion of God simply because He cannot be seen and therefore cannot be proven. No, I do believe in God because of the connections in my thoughts to link to Him and thus conclude about His existence. Is it proper to use the word “metaphysics” in this case? By the way, being a rationalist enables me even to accept empiricism.
In any case, the next entry will not specifically about my thought process. Instead, it is with regards to philosophy in which I hope people do not regard it as though it is a form of theology. As a student of such subject, I will drop my comments regarding it especially in hopes of explaining why I feel it is advisable of us to learn before making judgements.
Before I end this entry, allow me to share something;
"I wish my life and decisions to depend on myself, not on external forces of whatever kind. I wish to be the instrument of my own, no of other men's, acts of will. I wish to be a subject, not an object; to be moved by reasons, by conscious purposes, which are my own, not by causes which affect me, as it were, from outside…”
By Isaiah Berlin (see Philosophy Goes to the Movies: An Introduction to Philosophy)
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