Relationships Matter – Introspection

Self introspection has a gradient area. (Joe Grez/Joup)

Self introspection has a gradient area (Joe Grez/Joup)

Introspection used to be a word that only referred to people. It is now used in software development to describe a capability of some object-oriented programming languages to determine the type of an object at runtime; this ability is called ‘type introspection’. As I am writing about people I have used ‘self-introspection’ to describe our examination of our own behaviour, drivers and motivations and ‘other-introspection’ to describe the same examination of other people which is more commonly known as a form of empathy.

Self-introspection is something we should all do regularly. Unfortunately only the emotionally, intellectually and morally courageous amongst us actually do. Most of us are intellectual, emotional and moral cowards. Having said that all of us are capable of developing intellectual, emotional and moral courage; it just takes a desire to do so and a willingness to bear the discomfort of bad feelings in order to acknowledge and accept them as opposed to ignoring and suppressing them.

Relationships Matter – Dealing with Loss

Reflections (Joe Grez/sesame/joup)

Reflections (photo: Joe Grez/sesame/joup)


The Cost of Campaigning for President on the Environment

Image courtesy of

So I had a YIM chat with my good German friend Sarah this past Sunday as we like to do from time to time. She asked me if I was nervous about the election on Tuesday to which I responded “No, not really. Whatever happens…well… happens.” But she noted that polls were close amongst both major candidates being incumbent President Barrack Obama (D) and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney (R). She as well as much of Europe (and world in my humble opinion) are big Obama supports, but I’ll reserve my judgement as Joup will endorse neither candidate. Not that we don’t have our own personal opinions but Joup is attempting to remain impartial in this election as a whole. But what really sparked in our chat was how much each of the candidates traveled on a daily basis. And to what lengths they are going to become the President of the United States of America. How did these individuals impact our Earth’s environment in going to these lengths? I’ll do my best to give an estimate.

Vegetarian Festival 10-2012 Phuket, Thailand

Acrobat troupe recreate slaying of the dragon (sesame/joup)

Acrobat troupe recreate slaying of the dragon (sesame/joup)


Review: Payung Guest House – Cherating, MY

Payung Guest House Cherating Malaysia

Payung Guest House Cherating Malaysia

Start Seeing the Gifted

Photo courtesy of

Two new shows on evening television, “Touch” and “Perception”, explore the idea of what it means to be gifted in modern society. In “Touch”, a young boy named Jake never speaks and is diagnosed with autism. The state is trying to place him in a special home for children with his disability. The father, played by Keifer Sutherland, isn’t satisfied with this and in his quest to keep his son, stumbles across Danny Glover’s character who has studied children like Jake. Danny Glover describes Jake’s world and says he can see connections between people the same way that nature applies the Fibonacci rule. That is, he sees connections between people, places, and events in the same way we notice the diamond pattern on the husk of a pineapple. The father is later able to communicate with his son using numbers as codes which leads him on adventures affecting characters across the globe.

They Say it’s Your Birthday. It’s my Birthday too Yeah.

Picture courtesy of NASA

So I recently as some of you know celebrated a birthday. I’m the south side of the 30’s now, but thank you for the well wishes I’m sure. A few people told me to not worry because age is just a number. To which I say is true, but a number is a unit of measurement. So what does it measure?

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