The cry of the heart of society.

Goh Lee Yin is 36, an engineer and suffering from a disorder called kleptomania. 

Her run-ins with the law started in 2005 to 2007 for theft. She was placed on probation then after being diagnosed with kleptomania. 

But she did not (or could not) stop her actions. She continued to steal in 2011 and was jailed 6 weeks. 

Yet, she stole again 3 months later and was jailed 9 months. Mind you, the amount stolen was not small. The items were worth $30k and $110k. 

Her recent offence was for theft and fraudulent possession and was scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday. 

Lesson? I do not have enough facts to comment on Goh's case. But in 2013, Dr Winslow testified at her hearing, saying that "if Goh was put in prison without therapies..., we are actually condemning her to a long term because we will be seeing her forever and ever again." 

Tragically, we won't. 

Lee Yin was found dead at the foot of a block of flats at Sengkang on Monday, a day before her court hearing. 

Even more tragic is that Lee Yin ironically took the one decision she finally had control over, that is, her own life.

It is reported that "40 people attended a 50-minute Christian service" at her funeral. Lee Yin left behind her husband and a 15-month-old daughter. 

Alas, it is arguable whether it was her uncontrollable impulses to steal or the society's lack of understanding of her condition that was the proximate cause of her death. 

Most likely, it's both. But let me digress a little and comment about our society at large.

We live in a largely tone-deaf society. It is tone deaf to the rallying cry of the minority, especially those whom we consider "abnormal" because they are not like us. 

Our default go-to mode for personal safety and security is that anything or anyone who is different from us is not normal. So, we pigeon hole them. It's our social rule of thumb.

It is like we have an exclusive club in our mind and entry is by membership only. If you are normal, you qualify. But if you should have some unfamiliar ticks or embarrassing quirks that we don't understand or don't have the time to understand, you are rejected outright from the mind club of the majority.

However magnanimous we project to the public, the discrimination, condescension and indignation are palpable and deeply felt by those who are struggling with grades, those who are ashamed of their mental disorder, those who are shunned by society because of their past, and those who are thinking of suicide due to the unspoken stigmatization.

An eight-year-old suffering from a behavioural disorder once wrote this: "Make me have a mum and dad that love me and start my horrid life AGAIN and not have so much sadness in my life." 

I think that's the same cry of the heart of those who yearn for society's understanding, care and help, but have sadly only received judgment, discrimination and abandonment. 

Thomas Jefferson once said that the care of human life and happiness is the only legitimate object of good government.

Let's hope that our society (and government) is kind enough to see beyond the differences and embrace each and every one of us regardless of our past, our stages of development, and our socioeconomic background. 

More importantly, let us all learn to see and nurture the hidden potential in a life, and not just judge a life at a moment's folly, or judge them for that which they are struggling real hard to avoid. 

Sometimes, for some people who are deemed "different" from us, they just need a little more understanding and patience from us to reintegrate and bloom. Treasure every life, and not just our own until we are blind to the beauty of the lives of others.

We should therefore shut down our exclusive mind club for good and keep an open mind to receive all without the labels, stigma or conditions. Cheerz.

I walked with God to New Cross Rail Station, London.

I met God in London and we talked as He walked me to New Cross Rail Station. My first question was, "God I want to understand you." He smiled and said, "Fine, go ahead." "But I don't God. You're incomprehensible." There was a palpable silence from the Creator. The pace then slowed a little and God asked, "Have you stopped understanding me?"

I told him that I have not but it is frustrating to understand someone who is neither here nor there, neither fair nor unfair, neither provable nor un-provable. I told God that he is too encrypted, too surreptitious, too-behind-the-scenes. He is in other words an enigma wrapped in a mystery, triple-locked in a safe, thrown into a black-hole and hidden in a thousand dimensions.

God immediately understood what I meant – he’s God after all - and said, "But didn't you want to understand me?" I nodded and replied, "Yes, yes. I want to but I simply can't." God then asked me whether I am thinking of giving up. And I said I have often reached the end of my patience because I only faced a dead-end, a theological cul-de-sac.

"Son," God said. "If you want to understand me, you need to continue this quest." "You mean I need to continue the journey even when I have reached the end of my road?" I said. God shook his head and said, "Your journey has yet to begin. It seems like you have come to your own conclusions about me even before gaining any mileage."

"You mean there is more to you to discover? But I have read the Bible, studied the scriptures, attended church services, and committed to a few ministries during the days of my youth, and I realized after some time that you are still the same yesterday and today and tomorrow...that is, you are unpredictable, most times inconsistent, if not contradictory, and you appeared to me to be a fence-sitter on some life-and-death matters."

At this time, I knew I was out of line. I knew I was more than disrespectful but it all came out quite unconsciously, spontaneously - more like pent-up frustration. A fumbling catharsis of sort. I apologized to God as we looked out for oncoming cars and crossed the road towards the rail station.

"Son, you have understood me reasonably well thus far…as is humanly possible," God said. I was wide-eyed and was somehow disarmed by that line: "What do you mean God? I am expressing my lack of faith in you." “No son," God said. "You are just discovering how I work. But there’s a long way to go from here."

At this time, I can't say that I understand what God wanted me to understand about him. He was speaking in riddles again and that's the part that confounded me most. "God, let me get this off my pneumonic chest. Pardon me please. Your nature is perplexing. Your love is puzzling. Your promises fell short. Your power is self-constraining. Your coming doesn't seem like it's happening. And your silence is deafening. How does all that count as understanding?"

By this time, we had been walking for the last 20 minutes and the train station was just 100 meters away. God paused in his track for a while and said, "Son, you will always learn new things about me. Your life is a journey of discovery and this journey is not going to be easy. There will be dead-ends, high walls, deep schisms, meandering valleys and bottomless pits. They are there to deepen your quest and make the journey worthy of your time and curiosity. I will always be ahead of you in space, time, knowledge and mystery. You know that right? Your understanding of me will always be limited. You cannot fully understand me. Neither can you pigeon-hole me. You may attempt to make ambitious assumptions about me but they will not come close to who I really am and what my plans for you are. My truth will remain paradoxical just as my love, grace and sacrifices will remain unfathomable. Do you understand all that? Can you accept all that?"

I was trying hard to see the point of all that seemingly pointless merry-go-round explanation from the divine authorship. "So, am I to give up knowing you? Is this going to be a futile search for the one discovery that means everything to a believer?" God paused again and said, "Son, what if I tell you that there is no way you can hope to understand fully how I run this universe or the laws involved in making life and processing death?" I hesitated for a while and blurted out, "Is this a cop out? Are you avoiding the issue?" God smiled: "I will always be beyond your most penetrating epistemological quest to probe and know me. You’re an image of me remember? Not the whole picture…yet."

"So ignorance is bliss?" I muttered, disgruntled. "Not bliss son,” came the quick rejoinder. “It is naive to expect any bliss in this world groaning for answers. The only true meaning in this world is your persistent quest to know me. You give that up, you give up meaning altogether." Now it was my turn to give pause.
"But I will never fully know you right? So what's the point? Why go further? Just to be blissful in my infinite ignorance?"

God saw that we had arrived at the train station and he turned to me, "This is your stop. Take care son." I was ruffled, annoyed even. "God, is this how we end this theological cliffhanger...leaving me still hanging?" He then gave me a handwritten note and put it in my pocket, whispering, "For the time being, this will do." I then rummaged my pocket and pulled out the piece of note and lifted my head to look for God. He was gone, just like a magician disappearing behind a puff of white smoke.

I quickly opened the note and read it:-

"Nice talking to you, son. You seek to know me but what comes after that. Like a textbook or a course, you sign up for it, study it, master it and it is discarded. I am not an academic text or a science project or a self-improvement seminar. I don't come as a well-designed step-by-step-instructions manual. Is knowing me that way your end-goal in life? But if you seek to have a relationship with me, then knowing me becomes just one of its means. Knowing me then embodies a variety of meanings. It means experiencing, surrendering, giving, waiting, caring for those I love, praying in faith, hoping with persistence, doubting even because you don't take yes for an answer, pursuing me with passion, sitting down with me to learn, enjoying the silence, being assured of the silence, being strong amidst the silence, persevering through your trials, trusting, loving and believing, and in all that, you will come to know me even more, much more than what you seek when you first started your journey, that is, just knowing me period. Son, you can know about me or know with me. You can confine yourself to the things you see or allow me to gradually open your eyes to the things I see. It’s not just about knowledge, but faith, hope and love. Knowledge takes you from one point to another, but faith, hope and love take you from one point and beyond. Never forget that. For now, take care my son. Love Dad." 

Cheerz.

When do you judge a life?

When do we judge a man? When he falls? When he succeeds? When he lives to a ripe old age? Or when he is dying on his bed? Because if success is not the end and failure is not final, then when should a man’s deeds be tallied, weighed or measured?

Here, I am bursting at the philosophical seams with these questions: What if it takes a lifetime to know yourself? What if it takes a lifetime to acknowledge your flaws? What if that which one calls true change or transformation is something that happens only after what seems like a lifetime of mistakes and regrets?
 


Here's more of the akin reflection: What if one's maturation is pre-maturation and he strives in all sincerity - but in the mistaken belief - that he is fully mature when his actions could have been more enduring and authentic had he experienced the right maturation that generally comes with time and age? Aren't the triumphs of experience (that which is gained only by age) more redeeming than the experience of triumphs (that which is gained at any point in life, mostly early in life)?
 


If "no man ever steps in the same river twice; for it is not the same river, and he is not the same man," can it be plausible that our fate/destiny is never determined by one or two events, celebrated or otherwise, but a lifelong convergence of inconspicuous and no less momentous ones?
 

So, I always wonder how do you judge a life? Where do you even start? How do you even know that it is reliable? Is success really success? Or failure really failure? Or maybe, it is better not to see success as success and failure as failure per se. Maybe, stripped of all the pre-canned labels, every event that happens to us is a test of our response to it. And every response from us brings about its own events and the mutuality of influences goes on and on. And we only get to peek at the report card at the close of our life's journey.

I know the scriptures forewarned us about judging others; especially not when we are no less blameworthy. But maybe what I am trying to say is that we should constantly judge ourselves on the aspect of judging others. Here, a touching quote comes to mind, "We must give a person what we give a painting: the advantage of a good light."
 


Here is another quote in French that deserves a pause for reflection: "Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose". Translation: "People change, but they also stay the same. And the other way round." I guess the verdict is still out there. As uncertain as a life is, so too is its many twists and turns.
 


In any event, the irony of life is too multifaceted for enumeration. For example, many of us are more of an accidental hero than one of exclusive design. Being in the right place at the right time and knowing the right people always make social celebrities out of ordinary folks. Some mistakes are in fact eureka successes! Some screw ups are in fact heads up to later victories. And what about random luck changing one's fortune completely, even from good to bad? How do you even judge all that?

Recently, one 84 year old Florida widow struck gold at the powerball lottery and won $740 million. No plan, no sweat; just like that. She bought the destined winning ticket when a customer gave up the queue for her. Lesson? Don't ever give up your queue for another? This case only goes to show that there is no such thing as random luck by design. And for those lucky enough to strike a generational fortune, wouldn't it be very tempting to retire into the oasis of self-indulgence for the rest of their life?
 


But then, I am not giving excuses for a life of social passivity, self indulgence or indifference. I am just trying to give a life a little more latitude to prove or redeem itself; because given time, many things can pleasantly surprise us.

If you think about it, most of us, at some point in our life, are more a victim of our circumstances than a creator of it, and whether we stay that way depends very much on how we respond to it. So, the rule of thumb here is this: you only tally up the scores when all is said and done. And when all is said and done, you will then know with confidence that a life and its destiny are truly one.
 


So, let me end with what Mark Twain once said: "The two most important days of your life is the day you were born and the day you find out why." The first condition is a given. We can only talk about lives born and lived and not those unborn and missed. It is only the second condition that, for some, has yet to be realized.

But as long as one is still alive and searching, it is never too late to come to full realization - even if it takes a little longer than we would like. Because, if for any reason and any reason at all, it is in this quote: “Desires make slave out of kings and patience makes kings out of slaves.” (Iman Al Ghazali) And it is this royal patience that is required of us to see another life through to its rightful, fitful and fruitful end. Cheerz.