19.02 Monthly Review

I've stopped doing my daily / weekly reflections in the last week of February, for 2 reasons:

• I was stressed (for moving) and dead tired (poor quality sleep) so my limited energy went to...
• finishing The Wave before having to return it to Atlanta's public library before my move

I don't feel bad for dropping the bulk of my system, because its suppose to be helping my wellbeing and I've come to reassess my goals with it. I set up the system mostly based on the content from the Goal Setting workshop, which is very focused on how you can be a more productive person. Frankly I don't have that much buy-in to being more productive, because I've never not been decently productive. My work is also very structured (a minor civil engineering pun :p ) so I don't need much beyond the Trello board thatI've set up. Then my leisure time outside of work...is leisurely haha, so no focus on being productive. I also have pre-existing systems set up for cooking / eating and clothing / cosmetics, so "the system" is mostly irrelevant. 

So I'm dropping the daily and weekly reflections. I did like the first question in my weekly reflection of "what was the most profound moment that happened this week", but I can easily make a post about that here. It was also helpful at times to jot down my daily wins and challenges, but the majority of days I've stared blankly at my screen trying to fill in the questionnaire. Now this can easily, and perhaps rightly, interpreted as I'm not being reflective enough. But the truth is at this point in my life, that is really not a priority. I'm just really tried and want to take it easy for a while, fall into a rhythm, and enjoy some stability. 99% sure that this lull will stop at some point in the near future (maybe a year or two) and then I'll be energized and motivated and ready to take on a full system. But in the 1% chance that it doesn't happen, well I'll be content with my life and that's cool too. 

But I'll keep the unstructured monthly reflection, and will still attempt an annual reflection at the end. My goals (or most of them) are still relevant and important, so those will still get tracked and reported on...next month :) 

This month is to recuperate by catching up with my youtube and manga backlog (hurray wifi!), and eat some good food in Houston.

The Waves

The last book I've read in Atlanta...and will be the last book I read in a while.

I picked this up since it was quoted a lot in All the Bright Places, and true to its reviews everywhere, it's a hard read because the style was so experimental. It felt like reading As I Lay Dying. Luckily I came across a passage that I liked early in the book, or else I probably would've dropped it.

When I heard you cry I followed you, and saw you put down your handkerchief, screwed up, with its rage, with its hate, knotted in it. But soon that will cease. Our bodies are close now. You hear me breathe. You see the beetle too carrying off a leaf on its back. It runs this way, then that way, so that even your desire while you watch the beetle, to possess one single thing (it is Louis now) must waver, like the light in and out of the beech leaves; and then words, moving darkly, in the depths of your mind will break up this knot of hardness, screwed in your pocket handkerchief.
...
"But when we sit together, close," said Bernard, "we melt into each other with phrases. We are edged with most. We make an unsubstantial territory."

The last line is a good summary of Bernard's character, which is the most fully developed of the 6.

Overall, I understood little of the book, but did enjoy what I did understand. I got that this work explores identity, by asking both questions of "who am I" (internal) and "how do others affect my identity" (external). And I think the spectrum of answers to these questions, as represented by the characters, are all valid, although by Bernard having the last word, Woolf seem to say that the boundaries that we impose to separate our identify from everyone else's...is artificial and brings a good amount of suffering.

Here's other quotations that I liked / understood:

"Bernard has gone," said Neville, "without a ticket. He has escaped us, making a phrase, waving his hand. He talked as easily [...] to the plumber as to us. [...] But what did Bernard feel for the plumber? Did he not only wish to continue the sequence of the story which he never stops telling himself? He began it when he rolled his bread into pellets as a child. One pellet was a man, one was a woman. We are all pellets. We are all phrases in Bernard's story, things he writes down in his notebook under A or under B. He tells our story with extraordinary understanding, except of what we most feel. For he does not need us. He is never at our mercy.

I do not know myself sometimes, or how to measure and name and count out the grains that make me what I am. 

"Something now leaves me; something goes from me to meet that figure who is coming, and assures me that I know him before I see who it is. How curiously one is changed by the addition, even at a distance, of a friend. How useful an office one's friend perform when they recall us. Yet how painful to be recalled, to be mitigated, to face one's self adulterated, mixed up, become part of another. 

We have come together [...] to make one thing, not enduring - for what endures? - but been by many eyes simultaneously. There is a red carnation in that vase. A single flower as we sat here waiting, but now a seven-sided flower, many petalled, red, puce, purple-shaded, stuff with silver-tinted leaves - a whole flower to which every eye brings its own contributions. 

I cannot make one moment merge in the next. To me they are all violent, all separate [...]. I have no end in view. I do not know how to run minute to minute and hour to hour, solving then by some natural force until they make the whole and indivisible mass that you call life. 

"It is Percival," said Louis, [...] who makes us aware that these attempts to sag, 'I am this, I am that,' which we make, coming together, like separate parts of one body and soul, are false. Something has been left out from fear. Something has been altered, from vanity. We have tried to accentuate differences. From the desire to be separate we have laid stress upon our faults, and what us particular to us.

"Yet these roaring waters," said Neville, "upon which we build our crazy platforms are more stable than the wild, the weak and inconsequent cries that we utter when, trying to speak, we rise; when we reason and jerk out these false sayings, "I am this; I am that!' Speech is false.
We have proved, sitting eating, sitting talking, that we can add to the treasury of moments. We are it slaves bound to suffer incessantly unrecorded petty blows on our bent backs. We are not sheep either, following a master. We are creators. We too have made something that will join the innumerable congregations of past time. We too, as we put on our hats and push open the door, stride not into chaos, but into a world that our own force can subjugate and make part of the illumine and everlasting road.

The last quotation is from the chapter were all six characters dine with Pervical, and the mood reminds me a lot of H&C. Cue warm fuzzies.

rabbit

It's interesting that my favourite outfit of Simon of Permanent Style is one from a hat review xD

But tell me this isn't the most handsome outfit:

Posting mostly so I have a reference photo for the day I commission a bespoke coat just like this one (plus detachable black fur trim for the collars). ONE DAY!

skincare routine: ATL 2019

in which I try high-key backlit photos:

For cleansers, I've been using the travel size Shu cleansing oil that I bought...when I went to Japan? Currently using the anti-oxi (purple) one, and am liking it a lot. The texture is not too thick and not too runny, doesn't sting my eyes like the porefinist (pink one). I'm considering getting full-sized version of this in the distant future (aka after I have a downpayment saved). As for second-cleaner, it's my always reliable Hada Labo foaming cleanser. I am tempted by the heavenly scent of the Sulwhasoo cleanser, but alas now is not the time for skincare inflation.

The rest of my routine is shown above:

• Secret Key FTE: as with all the other FTEs I've used...I don't notice much improvement, but I suppose my skin tone is pale and relatively bright already. Was just using this up, will not be repurchasing any FTE in the foreseeable future
• Hada Labo shirojyun toner mixed with Komeyu rice bran oil: I swear the secret to having a glow is to use facial oil haha
• Melano CC vit C serum (morning only): this "oily" feeling vit c serum has been great in the drier winter times. I felt that my skin's texture has improved slightly, and that my hyperpigmentations are fading faster, at least initially. My PIH fades from a fresh scar to being able to be covered up by base makeup in about a week, which is good enough for me. Will repurchase (actually have a backup tube because I bought 2 by mistake) but am switching to a water-based vit c (Timeless vit C) now that I'm in humid Houston for the spring/summer
• Komeyu rice bran serum (evening only): I love the texture of this serum and how quickly it sinks in. Not sure how much impact it's had, combined with the relative difficulty in sourcing this, I will not repurchase. 
• Hada Labo shirojyun lotion: this will probably never be replaced haha. I was tempted to get a Sulwhasoo water (essential or snowise) but have not found an emulsion or lotion that is noticeably better. 
• Sulwhasoo essential eye cream: still using the sample, this tiny bottle lasts a long time! The pump is prone to over-dispensing product too. I don't have an opinion on this really...since I'm using it preventatively, but it does smell nice and is textually nice. 
• IUNIK tea tree serum (during breakouts only): I don't think this is as effective as the LJH one, but it does work as well. I can notice a reduction in how inflamed (or angry looking) an active acne is the morning after applying this. Won't immediately repurchase as I want to try some cica products to compare the two ingredients. 

Luckily I've used up some these products (the FTE and the serum) at the same time I'm moving to Houston, which is great since I need to use less products in the humid-er climate. Now my regular  routine is probably the most pared-down it's ever been haha, just cleansing, tone (with oil only at night), then lotion and eye cream. 

...

Morning make-up:

After a month of try-harding with mascara almost everyday in Toronto, I'm back to a lazy, no eye makeup routine:

• Mamonde primer: this is an unexpected hit for me, especially since I was convinced into buying this by an SA. But turns out I do really like it. The lavender color correcting primer is very effective, I can see my skin tone becoming brighter and more white (as in less yellow). It also has a high enough sun protection, although I doubt I use enough of this to reap the listed protection. But given that I'm in an office all day, I'm okay with slightly dubious sun protection. Will repurchase.
• Sulwhasoo perfecting cushion: my opinion on this drifted a lot. I didn't think it was all that special in the beginning, but am now fully appreciating its "perfecting" name. It really does just that, it gives your face a soft blur filter. It looks super natural, I swear most people cannot tell that I'm wearing base make-up. The glow from my facial oil also shows through. Although that's also the downside, this cushion has pretty much non-existent coverage of pigmentation. It does wonders for making your skin texture look perfect, but it does show all the scars / redness underneath. This is also why I'm using the color-correcting primer underneath, as it helps even my skin tone so that this cushion doesn't have to. Will repurchase
• Innisfree powder: this goes on my T-zone and wherever my glasses sit on my face. It is really great at absorbing oil, and the effect lasts pretty much the whole workday for me. Will repurchase, although this container has lasted me years. 
• Lipsticks: Mamonde, Aritaum, Burberry. It was such a hard decision picking which lipsticks to bring with me. In the end I settled on a bright red hydrating one (Mamonde), a glossy bright pink one (Aritaum), and a matte MLBB one (Burberry, this one is just slightly cooler and pinker than my natural lips). I tend to default to the Mamonde one, and choose the other two depending on the colours of my outfit

pole

The latest episode of Secular Buddhism "stepping into groundlessness" is a good summary of my lessons learned so far from dating Jeff. I still feel averse to groundlessness, but at least my first reactions are less disruptive and my second reactions are minimized. In fact, let me pat myself on the back here, my reaction to the latest incident went from very negative, to positive (!!), and oscillated between slightly negative and neutral for the couple days after as I processed through the situation.

So that's the short version.

stir

Frozen pizza is the ideal move-out food, it requires no utensils to consume (y)

But before that, I had a kale & white bean pesto pasta:

Lemma again rant about my perpetual problem with taking photos of my dinner: the image is never as sharp as I like because I don't have enough light so I open my lens to max aperture such that only a sliver is actually in focus "orz
Someone buy me nice lighting equipment plz
and a tripod
and the newly released xf 16mm f2.8

Killing Commedatore

This is likely my shortest post on a Murakami book: one quotation and one impression.

The quotation:

Their gaze had a strange radiance - "a frozen flame" was the phrase that leapt to mind. That flame had warmth, but at the same time, it was cool and collected. Like a rare jewel whose glow came from deep within. That light expressed naked yearning when projected outside. Focused inward, it strove for completion. Those two sides were equally strong, and at perpetual war with each other.

The impression:
My feelings about this book is like the underground river setting that the main character ventures into to save Mariye: the river separates absence and presence, and is covered by a white mist