‪World Suicide Prevention Day‬

To those that think suicide is a selfish act, I want to clearly state that it's never that simple. You can't ever categorise or label someone that simply. You've always got to look at all of the facts for each individual case. Even then, there will always be lots of different ways of looking at. Like looking at it from the dead person's point of view...

When I first heard this view I was shocked. It seems so cold and heartless to me. Yes, suicide is devastating. For the person who did it and for everyone that's left behind. It's hard to cope with someone's death. Not knowing why they did it. If there was something you could have done to help and stop them. At the end of the day, something or somethings has pushed that person beyond devastation, and it has made them want to give up and decide to end it all.

Nothing about suicide is easy or simple. However, if anything, I think if you''re automatically labeling someone as selfish for taking their own life then you're quite selfish for not thinking about them and what they've been going through that has pushed them so far.

You've got to look at it from both sides. That's key. Especially in these types of situations. People will always need others because nobody is fine all alone. People need to reach out to one another and to ask for help when they need it. Again, it's never that simple but that doesn't mean we can't try, right?

We've all had our lows and have helped others during theirs. Sometimes you can't do all the helping though. Sometimes they need to help themselves. So for everyone that's struggling and feels like giving up, here's the best advice I can give and I hope it helps.

1. REMEMBER YOU'RE ONLY HUMAN
2. BE POSITIVE
3. BE HONEST TO YOURSELF
4. LET IT OUT
5. BE MORE SELFISH

REMEMBER YOU'RE ONLY HUMAN

We have a habit of getting down, frustrated and worked up over things that are completely out of our control. We need to remember that people can and will make mistakes - and that includes ourselves. Not everything is in your control. Be rational. What would you say to yourself if you was in your friend's shoes? Don't beat yourself up over something that wasn't your fault. You can't hold yourself responsible for everything that happens in your life. Think and do what you can, and don't regret what you can't do or couldn't prevent. There's no reason why you should blame or be upset with yourself when you wouldn't advise another to do exactly the same.

BE POSITIVE

It's obviously a lot easier said than done, but being, or at least trying to be, positive is really important. I can't stress how important it is. We've all been in ruts where we've pitied ourselves and can only think negatively. Which just becomes an endless, vicious circle. Getting upset, and then getting annoyed at yourself for being upset, and feeling even more crap about yourself ....

You need to realise  when you're being negative. Whether it's about yourself or things around you. If all you can do is think negatively then you'll never see anything positive that's happening or that could give you some happiness or hope. Don't always think about 'if', 'could', 'should' or 'maybe'. They're all auxiliary verbs. They're about possibilities that haven't happened. Concentrate on the here and now, and the future. It's not about if something was different or if you did something differently or if only this or that. It's not about if you were more 'something'. You can't work from 'if's that have never happened and can't happen. It's about the things that aren't in your control, that aren't your fault, and what you can do to make yourself feel better. Separate the two. Do what you can and be positive about what is there or is to come.

BE HONEST TO YOURSELF 

Did you honestly do anything wrong? Can you honestly keep carrying all of the weight on your shoulders? Do you need help? Then be honest about what you're thinking and address the problem. Either to yourself or to others. There's nothing wrong with feeling weak. We all feel like that from time to time. Like the previous point I made, remember you're only human. Asking or needing help, and feeling out of your depth isn't a bad thing.

LET IT OUT

Everyone deals with problems differently. Some methods work better for others and some don't. The best advice I can give is to analyse yourself and the situation. Logically work out what is best for you. While thinking about it might be hard or upsetting, it needs to be done. You can't get passed everything by burying your head in the sand. Go through it in your head and don't be scared to talk to someone or to write it all down. Let out your thoughts and emotions so you can organise them. Try to keep everything in check and to keep yourself in check. It's about you and whatever works best for you.

BE MORE SELFISH

If something or someone is causing you stress, remember you don't HAVE to deal with it. It's not your responsibility. You have a choice! Sure sometimes you can't get away from it. And you definitely can't yell at your boss and tell him where to go. But if there's a way for you to spend less time or no time with the person or issue that's bothering you, then take it. Spend more time on, for or by yourself. It might seem too selfish, but sometimes you have to just think about number one; yourself. If you're not happy then it's hard for you, and you won't be a nice person to hang around with either. People around you will want you to be happy, so why is it bad for you to want for yourself to be happy?

Like I've said repeatedly, summarising and preventing suicide isn't simple. It's far from it. It's complicated. Devastatingly complicated. I think that describes suicide well. It's devastating. For the victim and victims. The one that felt a need to take their life, and those that have to cope and deal with everything afterwards. And it's complicated. Lots of things happen until that point, and a lot will be going through their minds at that very moment. And there will be a lot that will happen afterwards as well.

So before making that life-ending decision, or blaming someone for being selfish or stubborn or whatever, try to remember it's not that simple and it's unbelievably hard and difficult. But that in itself doesn't mean you have to be negative about it. There are ways to feel better, to move passed things and to see things in a different light. Don't always jump straight to one opinion or option. There will always be lots of different ones out there. You've just got to open yourself up to them and try.

Home Adjustments

Returning home has definitely been a bit challenging. It's been rather strange. Oddly enough though, the things that I thought would be difficult wasn't that difficult after all. Everything that I anticipated ended up being the opposite of what I was expecting.

Luckily, I had already mentally prepared myself for unemployed life. Like I've written in past posts, I never expected to find a job or internship quickly and knew a long period of unemployment was awaiting me. So I haven't been as anxious or frustrated as I expected I would be. Although I have been warned it's coming. I'm sure it's coming. It's all part of being unemployed.

I think I've been OK because I've managed to keep a good balance between being productive and relaxing. It's been nice taking some time out for me and not being productive. After tying all the lose ends in Korea, and sorting and organising everything, and then having a jammed-packed month of travelling Asia (which I will write about soon), I have finally been able to stay in one place for more than a couple of days, not having to worry about getting to my next destination, and have been able to relax and do nothing for once. Down time, doing nothing hasn't felt so good in what seems like forever. I finally don't have to feel guilty for selfishly taking time out. I can do things I haven't been able to do for a while, like aimlessly watching TV and movies, and reading for leisure. I've even gone to play badminton a few times. Which has brought back some memories. It's been a nice change. It's made settling back home a lot more comfortable and relaxing.

However, doing something all of the time always gets boring, even when you're just doing nothing. I've always needed to be busy and multi-tasking to preoccupy myself. Especially as doing nothing gives you very limited prospects. I came back to sort my life out and that's what I plan on doing.

I know what I'm doing and am comfortable being unemployed for a while. I thought living at home with my parents would be frustrating and hard. We'd grate on each other; having to adjust to living together again, them dealing with me at home all of the time and me getting annoyed that I'm stuck at home all of the time. I expected them to be nagging at me and asking a billion questions about my future and what I'm doing to get there. But they've actually been great and we stay out of each other's hair, and we've gone back to an old routine. So everything feels OK with them. Sure I miss my independence and my friends in Korea and so forth. But it's not as bad as I thought it would be.

I've been keeping myself busy with a lot of different things. Seeing friends, doing housework and helping out my family (weirdly feeling like a domestic housewife), unpacking and sorting out all of my things (funny how much crap you always end up accumulating) and finally started blogging again (sorry again it's taken so long).

I've actually weirdly been getting more bother from friends and my sister about my job status than from my parents. Unfortunately, it's unrealistic to think you can get a job from hard work alone. Working hard to find a job won't increase job or intern vacancies, and it won't mean they'll all be good opportunities either. I can keep checking different websites, researching about different opportunities and handing out my CV (resume, for my American followers). But at the end of the day, luck will always play a role into anyone getting a job, or anything for that matter. You can call it fate or luck, but either way it's needed. There are different jobs that are ideal for different people, but unless the job's up for grabs or you see the vacancy or even if someone happens to like your application and is willing to give you a chance, there'll be a slim chance of getting the job. I've been keeping this in mind even before I left Korea. Mentally preparing myself for what's to come. And now others seem to be getting more frustrated for me than I am getting frustrated myself. Anyone that is unemployed too, all I can say is don't get frustrated and beat yourself up over it. Do everything within your ability - keep looking, keep applying and keep trying - and leave the rest to luck, because it's out of your hands from there on. So that's exactly what I've been doing. Kept looking, kept applying, kept trying and letting things take its course. That's all I can do.

Another reality check has been my health. I've had to be more selfish in taking care of myself after being ill a few times. As expected, I got a bit run-down after returning to England, just like I did when I last visited home. However, I've been a bit ill on and off since. Just because I went from being constantly dead busy for about 2 - 3 months to doing almost nothing in comparison. So everything finally caught up with me and my body. Then without properly resting with doing so much since coming home, I got really sick. Bare in mind I've always had a good immune system, and even when I've had the flu I've still been able to go to school or work. This time I was unbelievably ill. Coughing, runny nose, temperature, getting hot like my body was a radiator, head pounding and making me feel dizzy and sick, feeling like the whole room was still moving in whatever direction I moved my head .... The works. I finally went to the doctors after a lot of nagging from friends and family (I hate going to doctors at the best of times, but in my condition I couldn't get myself to the doctors without help). My dad took me in and I got blood taken to check I didn't get something while travelling. Which was thankfully negative. And the doctor checked me over despite there being no available slots. It was really nice he took the time to check I was O.K. Basically finding out I had two infections at the same time which had killed a lot of my white blood cells. So I got put on antibiotics, for what's probably only the second time in my life. So these health problems have probably been the worst thing about being back so far.

So yeah, it's been a bit up and down, but not as bad as I thought it would be. I'm finally getting back into the groove of things and it's starting to feel nice. Strange still, but nice. Adjusting hasn't been that hard, but getting used to Korea and that part of my life being over is still taking some time to adjust to. It's now a memory that seems like another lifetime ago. Almost like a dream. Coming back to resuming my life from where I left it makes it feel like I never left. Which is a very sad thought. I'm glad it hasn't been hard to adjust back to England, but I'm also sad that Korea seems to far away; geographically and time wise. I hope to never forget that part of my life as it made such a big impact on me, and I don't think I'll be as happy as I was then for a while now. It'll be hard to get back to that stage; living in a good place with friends everywhere, and doing a job that I love in a place that I also loved. I can only hope i'm lucky enough to achieve that twice in my lifetime.

Career Tests: Can A Test Help You Choose The Right Career Path?

I'm at that stage in my life where I really need to work out what I want to do with my life. You imagine various jobs, careers and lifestyles when you're young. Then you start to really think about options before university or college. What subjects should I study? What would be good? What career opportunities will going to this university and doing this degree have? What do I want to be when I'm older? Then it's suddenly final year and you know you're about to enter the big bad world and need to start thinking seriously about your life choices.

I find it interesting how career tests work. Obviously there are questions that try to determine your personality type. What I find interesting is the theory behind it. The tests that I've done differentiate different personalities by using your answers to see if you're more an extraverted or introverted thinker, a sensing or intuitive information gatherer, a thinking or feeling based decision maker, and if you live based on judging or perceiving things. For the full definition of these four categories click here.

You're not going to be solely one or the other, so your answers calculate what percentage you are of each category. Thereby using the four that you predominantly are to determine what types of jobs are suited for your personality, and way of thinking and living. There are 16 possible combinations so 16 personality types. They are the following:

1. The Visionaries and Inventors
2. The Executives and Chiefs
3. The Inspirers and Advocates
4. The Givers and Mentors
5. The Doers and Persuaders
6. The Guardians and Overseers
7. The Performers and Entertainers
8. The Caregivers and Supporters
9. The Thinkers and Engineers
10. The Scientists and Strategists
11. The Idealists and Dreamers
12. Protectors and Confidants
13. Mechanics and Craftsmen
14. The Duty Fulfillers and Examiners
15. The Artists
16. Nurturers and Defenders

If you want to take a career test then I'd suggest not researching about these personality types. Instead, you should just try a test and then read about the different personality types after seeing and reflecting on your own results. If you follow me on twitter then you know I tweeted about a particular career test. I've taken a few of these online tests and I found this one to be the most accurate.

Example: My Results

I don't want to write too much about my results in case you do want to take the test. I will say that I agree with most of the things said in my results. My sister also took the test. She's a successful High School teacher and she also agreed with her personality analysis and career traits. It described her artistic and practical nature, and a lot of the career traits highlighted corresponded with her actual personality and correlated with her current job as a Technology teacher. She also said she recommends this test.

Mine named how good my people and analytical skills are, how I tackle problems with logic and how I reach my goals by making a plan working backwards with the goal as a starting point. To which I'm quite impressed with. It's a general but quite specific analysis. And as I said before, most of it is quite accurate, too.

Doing these career tests has helped me a bit to workout what I want to do when I go back to England. I wouldn't use it this as a way to decide on a career. It's mostly interesting. But it can also help you to think about what jobs you'd be good at. Either because you disagree or disagree with the answers, or because it recommends things you never thought about before. It's definitely given me a bit more confidence in my strengths and in what I think I want to do. It's also given me some more ideas to look into to. Which is helpful seeing as I'm starting over, from the very beginning again.

If you want to see my results in full then scroll down. If not, then stop and take the test for yourself and analyse your own results. Please feel free to leave a comment about your results and your views on them. It'll be interesting to see.


















Career relevant traits:
• Have intuition to understand situations and people 
• Strong ideals and principles 
• Profound and complex 
• Natural leaders 
• Sensitive and compassionate towards others 
• Service and future orientated. 
• Place value on deep authentic relationships 
• Are reserved about showing their true selves 
• Only like dealing with details when they enhance or promote your goals. 
• Always looking for the meaning and purpose in everything 
• Visionary and creative 
• Intense and highly strung 
• Can work with logic and ration. INFJs use their intuition to understand the goal and work backwards towards achieving it. 

Being an INFJ means you have a quest to live a life of meaning and purpose, and therefore your career needs to be more than a job, but has to be something that can live up to your principles and feel right. As an INFJ, your intuition is mixed with your strong values, you have a sense of knowing and therefore are natural and comfortable as leaders and work well as such, although you can work as a follower if you are taking directions from someone you fully support, otherwise you will not be happy in your situation.
In the outside world, you place a great deal of importance in having things in order, and having the best system for getting things done, whilst always reevaluating the priorities in your life. On the other hand you can operate internally with spontaneity. Your intuition gives you great insight into things, and you are often right about something, even with little background information.
Your penetrating insight into other people and issues, and the internal way you deal with this, means you don’t easily share what information you obtain about others unless you choose to share it. You are deep and complex, usually private and therefore difficult to understand.
However, as an INFJ you are genuinely warm as you are complex, and you have a special place in your heart for those close to you, for which you can see and feel the depth of your caring. In tune to other’s emotions you avoid hurting other’s feelings. Often the perfectionist, you may wrestle with finding peace as you feel that there is more to improve your world and the lives of others around you. Your high expectations means you strive to exist in a state of continual growth and you easily overlook your own accomplishments.
Like other INFJs, your workplace should be one of creatively and independence. You most likely have a natural affinity for art and the sciences, as well as being found in service orientated positions. You should avoid working with very detailed tasks, or else you be in the other extreme, where you are working so meticulously you cannot see the big picture and can be highly critical of others who are not being as meticulous.

Blogging Over The World

Blogging seems to be taking over the world. Since starting in the 90's, blogging has grown in popularity for people who write as well as reads them. Blogging lets us write, discuss, tell our stories and voice our opinions, and we're making full use of it. It's become a worldwide trend to read and write blogs. It began as a simple way to write, share and discuss topics of interests and views. Now it's become a popular hobby and, for some, a money source. There are now thousands of blogs with thousands of readers on multiple blogging sites, as well as a lot of companies paying to be advertised on these blogs. Here's a list and breakdown of the best and most popular blogging websites:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/best-free-blogging-sites/

Luckily Blogger is on the list. Woop woop! Hopefully this is good news for me and my blog. Fingers crossed!

So, why has blogging become a trending hobby?
In all honesty, I know my blog isn't the best blog. I won't ever claim to be great at blogging or writing. I have many skills and I have things I'm proud of, but blogging and my blog isn't one of them. That doesn't deter me from wanting to blog though. I suppose that's one of the appeals to blogging. You don't have to be a great writer or anything. All you need is a device to type your posts and internet to upload your blogs. Both of which most people have thanks to modern day and the advancement of technology.

Like I said, there are thousands of blogs out there all over the internet. They can be accessed by millions of people from all over the world. It's one of the amazing things about blogging. Even if you don't have a target audience, your audience is basically the whole world. Anyone with internet access can stumble upon your blog page or even just one post. They can read one or follow every post your write. They can be young or old, male or female, from anywhere around the world. Depending on how you view it, it can be an amazingly great thing or an amazingly scary thing. But we write for people to read right? So for bloggers this is an amazingly great thing!

If you follow me on twitter (if you're interest then my account is this one: https://twitter.com/KwaiLin22) then you might have seen me tweeting about a particular blog I've been reading. The writer is an old school friend of mine. I've known her since I was 4 because we've been friends and have gone to the same Primary and High schools. I don't recommend her blog because of this. I'm not the type of person to say good things for the sake of saying it. I genuinely think this blog is a good read. She's a good example of why I like blogs. Her perspective and style is great. She's a professional writer and you can really see that in her posts. You also get a sense of her personality. She's a very bright girl; in both sense of the word. She's smart and very upbeat. Her posts are clever, interesting and insightful. When she isn't talking about happy things, she stills shines a light of positivity on negative topics. Not in a corny way or anything. In a realistic, insightful way. Which is quite refreshing. If you want to see what I mean, click on the link below. I honestly think it's worth a read. I particularly find her posts about journalism quite interesting.

http://absolutelylucy.wordpress.com/

I guess Lucy blogs because she loves to write. Hence her following journalism. Also, because it's obviously something she's talented in. For me, blogging isn't so much about talent or career. While I do find it helps me to practice and develop my writing skills I think I mostly do it because it allows me to organise and convey my thoughts, share my experiences and knowledge, and it provides a sense of escapism. It helps me to focus on specifics; distracting my mind from other matters or helping me to block out everything and really analyse and talk about what's been going through my mind.

For a lot of people, I think blogging is a hobby. It's a hobby that some people get and others just don't. Some of you have been amazing and have 'got' my views and where I'm coming from, or at least have read and tried to see it from my point of view. My family haven't read my blogs but they've said they don't know why I feel I need to write and put everything on the internet for any Tom, Dick or Harry to see. I get their point. I can't really explain why. Why can't I just write a private diary or journal? I'm not engaging with you per say. I know you're out there reading and I get feedback, but I'm never talking with you one-on one. Nor am I writing to myself. So what's the point? It does sound a bit strange, doesn't it? But in saying all of this, why not write on the internet for all to see? I'm not hurting anyone. I'm not disclosing personal information that will harm me either (at least I hope nothing I have or will write will be held against me in the future). It might be a generation gap problem. Although I know a lot of older people who blog, twitter, facebook and  are active on other social media websites. So maybe it's just a different ways of thinking problem. I'm not sure.

Either way, it's unarguable that blogging is a trending social media. It's crazy how big it's become. Do you know something else that's crazy? Blogging has not only expanded, but it has also evolved and modernised further. From writing with a pen and paper to blogging, and now we have vlogging. Ever heard of it? It's video blogging. It's also one of the biggest growing trends. It's taken blogging to a whole new level. It's trending worldwide and not only has it led to jobs but it's become a job. Check this link out:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/24726895

It's mental, isn't it? Again, depending on how you view it, it can be seen as amazingly great or amazingly scary. Society's growing, evolving and modernising, and things will keep changing. Expressing oneself has become something that more and more people want to do. People want to be heard. People want to express themselves and have people acknowledge or/and get a reaction from others. This is how blogging and vlogging have come about. They're easy, accessible means to exactly that. There are of course some backlash and problems developing and growing because of this advancement, but that's another story and will be followed up on another post. For now, I want to concentrate on the positivity of blogging and how it's taking over the world by storm. Blogging over the world, if you will. (Bad joke, sorry).