Suspension Tokyo.dragonext

So many years have passed
The dew is still on the roses
I left my childhood
In the garden of green

Come in the garden
And look at the tress
I used to play there when I was a child
Squirrels & birds
Little fairies
Settled down there long ago

A song from the movie Arrietty
The lyrics made me feeling very lonely

Had another awful day
I think the coming year will also be awful

I was hopeful last night
But could not help it
When returned to office
Knowing that ebay had suspended Tokyo
Without warning us previously

Really
What were I doing in the past 6 months
No, 7 months indeed
From the end of May to now
Almost January

Stephen's words was haunting me again
For the hard work in the past half year
You achieved almost nothing
Have you ever doubted
That you had actually walked the wrong path
Heading the Wrong direction?
I think I will remember this question forever

Had a phone conversation with him
Another awful one
Felt so bad
Felt useless & retard

Feelings are something honest
You felt hurt
Then the problem did exist
That the problem did haunt you

Hated it this way
Why were I feeling disgusted
When listening to his speech
I shouldn't should
Because honestly
You are achieving almost nothing
With the resources you were given
Your boss
Any boss
Would have every right to feel displeased
And you are not "happy" when hearing his comments
That he needed to say
"Though you may not like it, I would like to speak it this way..."
Honestly
How dare you
With the trash work that you had done
Who give you the right to be unhappy?

After lunch
Got another msn from Stephen
He said that he would like to have Phoebe
To dedicate completely into the web editor position
And report directly to him
For this reason
Phoebe would not be able to work for product specifications any more
So I might have to hired another person

I asked him the deadline for his
He said 15 Jan 2011
I said ok
And immediately posted an ad online
Hiring a replacement
With tears all over my face

I sort of thought product team was on track
So I could shift my attention to another area
I thought product team could run on its own

I sort of thought HK CS team was on track
So I could stress my attention on SZ CS
I thought HK CS could run on its own

Now Phoebe needed to go
I needed to do things all over again
When I first worked in mainland
Taking care of the descriptions

Now Jess was having problem with Dragonext emails
I needed to monitor her
As if I was monitoring the SZ CS team
Taking care of mail quality & quantity

I realized that I was back to step number 1
Nothing was finished, completed or done
All cases were unclosed, unsettled
I couldn't help feeling tried
Well, I did feel tried
How rare

My work, my job, my career
Are the only things that give me a sense of existence
Only with them
I feel actual & strong
They give me the pride that I need
But now
I felt inferior
And vague

With regards to Phoebe's case
I said nothing
Well, with such bad results
Who gives you the right to say anything
Furthermore
She was hired as a web editor
You knew this long ago
Why even feel sad?

For the results that you had achieved
What you had was what you deserve
No one was being unfair to you
It's just business
It's nothing personal
Result oriented - that's all

When you are doing such lousy job
You are what you have done
So, please do not obstruct the others
Your bosses have plans
You could not fulfill
Then at least do not obstruct

You know that people like Phoebe is hard to be hired in SZ
Then, please do not obstruct Stephen's decision
Please do not say a word
Please do not say no
Please do not suggest
This is the most that you can do

Christmas

This Christmas is a nice one
I feel ok
Because my family is around this year

I love to cook for my loved ones

This Christmas
Well - Not bad
At least I did not think much about my work today
(Though I still filter mails for tomorrow xdxd)
(Better teach Helen on Wed)

The blog for today is really positive

Never The Best Christmas, Never The Wost

Hate Christmas
Simply because of bad mood

Extremely depressed today
Did not even know what I was doing at work
Definitely fooling around
Interrupted
Distrubed
Sat down to see the clock ticking
Did not know what to do

Stop myself from hands-on tasks?
Then what should I do
I do not really have much big plans or strategies recently
If I stopped myself from hands-on tasks
I should turn off the computer
And take a nap

Kept thinking the whole day
Kind of asking myself when would I quit the job
Never intended to quit my job
Questioned myself simply because of depression

Lnnch
Arranged a small party
I showed no energy
Did not really want to join
I did not have much facial expression
Nor did I talked much
Ate little too
Well, simply because there were not much to eat

The protion I prepared were too little for
5 men & 8 girls
I noticed in the morning
I could have fixed it
But simply because of feeling moody
I did not even feel like picking up the phone to order pizza

When I was depressed
I was fully charged by negativity
I did not inatiate anything this morning
I mean I had ordered the food
Prepared them at home
Took a taxi to carry them back
With no one helpping
(except for maggie who helped me to buy wasabi, soya etc)
Felt heavy
And tried
(Yes, I felt tried)
Started to think
If no one was helpping
When should I

Arrived office
Discovered that there were not enough food
Need to resolve this problem...
With no one helpping
I almost gave up
Lost all my energy
Even asked myself why arranging such event
Kind of thought
If food were not enough
Let it be
Who cares?
Yea, I was depressed and angry

I want everyone to be happy
I want to feel positivity
Like we used to be
So I arranged this
I paid it all
Well, sharing is good
I just hope everyone can be happy
But except me
How pathetic

Stephen came into contact with me
I did not want to stay in the same space with him
The humiliation accuminated recently were drowning me
He spoke to me for several times
I did not want to answer
Showed him a more relaxed face later
Simply because I knew I was looking dead
I did not want people to ask why

After lunch
Stephen questioned CS members for a parcel of his
Surprisingly
His order was actually a cat toy for me
Though defective
Becasue we thought it was some wrong items returned by our customers
I was grateful to have it
But felt terrible at the moment
I did not want to be reminded of any recent unhappiness
I could not regulate or cordinate myself
To suffer the humiliation on one day
And feel the joy on the next
Its not my bosses or anyone's problem
It just mind

I hate Christmas
The recent ones just bring me to tears
This year
Its of course not the best one
But turns out thyat its not the worst one
I realised that I have not enjoyed Christmas with my parents for
7 years I supose

I think abot more than I forget, I forgot more than I remember

I am crying quite a lot recently
Crying when travelling on a bus
Crying when walk on the street
Crying when dining with my friends in a Christmas Dinner
Today was a bad day
But I am pretty sure that tomorrow will be worse
Because tomorrow is the Christmas Eve
Mom & dad will be home
I will not even have room to cry
How pathetic

If the incident did not occur
Today should be a flat day
Stephen & Calvin did not come to me
Peggy did not come to me
Spent most of my time doing something "hands-on"
Ordered a lunch box that tasted really bad
Passed it to Peggy & Jess
Well, these were the earlier part of today

After lunch, Matt came into my room
He talked about his concerns towards wholesale
All of his concerns were
Well, out of my control
There was nothing I could do for him
Nor could I explain to him the reason why
Simply because I was ordered not to get into wholesale tasks again
Spoke to Ryan for some advise
No conclusions were drawn

Later, Stephen entered my room
Asked what I were doing in a really flat way
When I say flat, I actually mean "dead"
He spoke to me in 1 tone
With no facial expression what so ever
Well he is not a clown
Why necessary to cheer me up

I told him I was enriching HK's titles
He looked even "dead"
I knew he was trying to see how "hands-on" I was
Whether I had "changed" or "improved" the way he requested last Wed
He did told me that if I stuck to doing "hands-on" tasks
He would directly ask me to report to him
In front of my subordinates
Of course I remember, that was only last Wed

I further explained to him about what I were doing
I also told him that the 2 girls in mainland were listing new items
And they would send reports to me & Janet everyday before 4pm
He then went back to asking me what I were doing
Plus the key question - why couldn't these be passed to the 2 girls?
He asked me - couldn't they be taught?
I said that they could not handle these at the moment
Furthermore, they had to list new items
"That's all" He said
then he turned around and walked out of my room
I asked him - just to stop his steps
"Do you have something to say or ask?"
He said no and went away

What now?!
Was he too "disappointed" that he did not even like to speak an extra word?
He definitely had something to say
He just chose not to say it

Later after 5pm
Got a call from ebay HK
Replying us about London's restriction
Something that had been haunting us for the entire week
They said that we were restricted
Because some of our listings were priced at USD10000
But we sold some really simple, ordinary items
For this reason,
The US Trust & Safety regarded us as a suspicious seller
They suspected that we were money laundering with their platform
I simply replied ebay HK that we were suggested to do so by Wilson
Also a staff of ebay HK
They then told me to remove those listing asap
But London was restricted
How can I revise those?
I wrote an email to Stiffany
To ask for her help
And then I reported this to Stephen & Calvin

At that time, I felt that ebay was really a messed up corporation
Their HK office & US office were not coordinating with one another
I was still positive and I considered that a rather unfortunate incident
Instead of my mistake
But apparently
Stephen was not on my side
Which broke me down totally
I do not want to mention this clearly
Or I will have to type Chinese

Anyway
I felt humiliated
Humiliated by myself
As if I had slapped my face hard
I could not look more bad
When Meg also came to me motioning about the iPhone replacement screen landing page
Asking me for new specifications, products etc.
Wow, the other's team is making a huge success
Girl what are you doing?

I felt humiliated because I could find so many reasonable excuses
For the failure of my ebay business
But at the same time
I could not allow myself to "use" any of these reasons
To make myself feeling better

I started to think about Stephen's 0-10 theory
I doubted myself - maybe I am not meant to be a successful sales person?
I struggled
Because at the same time
I would not accept or admit
That I were weak in that area
Meg can do it
Why cant I

I started to feel where my pressure comes from
From my own fear
Fear about being de-graded by the others
Fear about being considered inferior
But in fact
I were the one
Who considered myself inferior
Its my insecurity that was haunting me

I tried to clear all these negative thoughts out of my mind
Because I had to attend a Christmas dinner in an hour
And I could cry at any point
But I thought more than I forgot
I in fact brought out more than I had expected

I think about more than I forget
I forgot more than I remember
Meaningless negativity is kept in my mind
While all positivity are forgone

Life Coaching Lesson 2

"With every breath you breathe in
You take in energy
With every breath you breathe out
You let you"

Started the 2nd lesson today
Much different from the previous lesson
Allows me to know what coaching really is

This time
We focused on something new
Originally
We were meant to focus on the relationship aspect
Or the something about my work & career
But later
We started to talk about the fragmentation of one self

This happened all the time
And I gave 2 significant examples to Miika

Example 1
When Oscar was not performing up to my expectation
& HK colleagues kept complaining to me
I feel stressful, tried, disappointed & lose-face
And later ran into the angry stage
Eventually, into depression

I struggled
Because the 2 personalities inside are fighting against one another
For the subjective self
I understood how many difficulties Oscar was facing
For that reason
I did not think I should push him extremely hard
In fact
I never thought scolding, punishing
or making him felt bad would be the way out
And I was disappointed when the rest HK colleagues
Were unable to understand the difficult situation
And saw what I saw
For the objective self
I asked myself if I were being too lenient
If I were not tough enough to remedy the problem
I understood that I should not give excuses
To Oscar & myself
And I felt disgraceful & lose-face
When the other point out my team's mistakes
That made me feeling inferior

Example 2
In the case of Rice, Ping & I
Our friendship faded out since 2010
I felt betrayed, disappointed, heart-breaking, disrespected,
Depressed & angry

My subjective self asked myself
Not to blame anyone
Including myself
And I need not to ask why
Or find the reason for this fading relationship
However
For my objective side
I kept asking if I had done anything wrong
If I really were the one to be blamed
And if I were being too self-centered
So that I was not able to realize the problem of myself
As a whole

The 2 "me" are battling against each other
If one said that sth
The other will immediately challenge
And my heart as a whole
Is restless
I feel tried
And depression is always the final stage
Because my brain just does not want to function anymore
I therefore head towards escaping

With a whole session
Sitting in different chairs
Miika discussed my 2nd example with me
She would like to bring up more information from me
I did not trust in the beginning
But in the end of the session
It worked
Miika really let me know what coaching is about
You think you already understand yourself?
No - She brings out more from within
And the best thing about Miika's coaching is that
She never gives you the answer
That you are looking for
She will not even comment about rights or wrongs
All decisions are left for your own self
Which makes life coaching less like consoling to me
And now, I do believe that life coaching is crucial

Anyway
I have now realize that
The fragmentation of myself is for my own protection
I need this kind of protection because
I am insecure
And because
I do not trust

The subjective self comes up naturally
But as I do not trust even myself
The objective self is formed
To capture more concrete information
In order to back up the subjective part
Yet, in order to be "accurate"
The objective self is "only" looking for "concrete" information
Therefore, there is only Black & White
Instead of Grey
Since then, the subjective part also felt clueless
Therefore the 2 fragmented parts
Keep struggling on and on and on

This is what I have to accept
But at the same time
What I have to resolve
This whole system would work perfect as a whole
The key is as always
To strike a balance

I love my complexity
But I also long for simplicity in myself
What will my future be like?

Hands-On

"Honestly, I can manage poeple
Just that I cannot manage myself."
This was what Stephen told me this Wed
Well, he was not really trying to say that he could not manage himself
What he was trying to say was that I could not manage people
That I was too hands-on a specific task
He always means MORE than what his lines verbally meant
Yea, this is Stephen, my boss

I did seriously thought about what to do after that Wed dreadful lunch meeting
To boost sales
There are only few ways out
1. New items (a lot of new items)
2. Price tuning (+ succcessful cost bargining, or price tuning may mean nothing)
3. Keywords/Listing enrichment (Need to do in bulk)

Sadly
1. New items
-->Ryan previous said that logistics did not have such capacity
2. Price tuning
-->Cost bargining are never that successful
3. Keyword/Listing enrichment
-->A massive, crazy task

Returned to HK office on Thu afternoon
Because I did not want to travel to SZ
(Staying there is just tough
Always feeling grim +
Hard to concentrate because people keep asking you things)
Also because I took a half day sick leave
Escaping half day from reality is again
Though wrong & childish
Its reasonable

Back to HK
Had a chat with Fun
Good things started to happen
There were in fact A LOT OF so call "new items" available to be listed in the stock room!!!
Those items were originally meant to be FOR website only
Strange enough, website items should never be stocked
Anyway, I now had over 74 existing "new items"
And I was glad
At least I was not totally stuck

Just 1 problem
There were no photos & HTM for those "new items"
Plus the camera was not even in HK office
Therefore I stayed in HK again on Friday (which is today)
I brought my own DC camera
I took photos all day long
Definitely THE MOST hands-on tasks evaaaarrrrr

Yet this time
I think I had a point
If there were no photos
Nothing could be listed
My entire artwork team was in SZ
It would be impossible if I assigned this to anyone
So I DO IT MYSELF

I am not delegating jobs to the others again
But this time
I think I am right
And
I hope I am right

最初是知而不行, 現在是什麼都不知

Last night was terrible
Pretty sure that I went back to my old track
People never change, right?

Today, its even worse
Had a lunch meeting with Stephen
As always, there was sth that he would like to say
Which brought out my tears in the most shameful way

I know that I am never the type of cold, tough girl
I know I often cry
But are you crying too much recently
That you cannot even control yourself in the public + in front of your boss???!!!
Girl, you are making me sick
How old are you?
Crying is ok
But in front of your BOSS???!!!
You must be nuts
The worst part is that you hate to look bad in front of this man
So now I am feeling shameful, silly & childish
I also feel humiliated
But I am the one who have humiliated myself
Bravo~Give yourself a clap
Because you just made things even worse
This is one of the most disgraceful day in my career life
Though I do admit that you cannot find any relationship between yourself & "Grace"

Felt grim yesterday
Felt busy, tried but pointless
Kind of don't know what to do
I seldom lose my direction
But yesterday, I did
And I even would like to leave the office as early as possible
Which is so "Not Me"

Still fooling around this morning
Don't know what the fuck I was doing
Don't even know why I were here
What I were meant for
Probably too busy & tried
Had my vision only focusing in an extremely narrow scope
Needed reminder
(I hate to admit)
And my lovely boss of course gave me the kind of reminder he liked

This is the least helpful type of assistant that I need
I admit that I need reminders
But I hate to felt like the one "In Need For Help"
Again, Girl, How Old Are You?
You need your boss to babysit you???

The whole talk was constructive
But devastating
Breaks me down totally
I honestly don't like to receive help
Because of my pride?
But what sort of pride does an inconfident girl like you have?
I do believe that
My extremely ironical character is pulling me apart

All of a sudden
I would like to escape
Sth that I would not allow
But would hope to do so
To escape to a space
Where there is no time
Where there is no people
Where there does not even have my existence
So That I can calm down a bit

Stephen said that I was tense
I denied
He said I was
Especially when I worked also on Sat & Sun
He told me to do sth that I liked
I broke down immediately
What he said was like sprinkling salt onto my wounds
Huge grains of sea salts

I Know I have problems
I know what my problems are
I need no one to remind me of my personally, internal problems
If you would like to remind me of my work
Please feel free to
Though I would not like to listen
I would appreciate such reminders
BUT don't send me reminders
Reminding me of my personal problems
Not that I am being too rude or eager
I just do not have guts to bring these topics to the front

I appreciate his attention
His sharing & experience
But that is not going to help me
It will just make me crumble
In public
In front of him
Which make me hate myself after all

Stephen suggested me to do sth I like on holidays
That was the part that got into my nerves
I cried out like a damn (fuckingly insane) baby
And said "I did not even know what to do on holidays."
WoWoWo~ Yea, he brought out the worst part
A problem that had been troubling me
A problem that I would like to solve by seeing a life coach
He then shared with me that
A successful life does not mean a happy life
I told him that I knew and I understood
And honestly
I understood this since I studied in primary
I asked myself what was the point of studying and getting good grades
My answer was to get a well paid job
Because a well paid job could bring me stability
But NOT happiness
Seems that my ironical character had been with me since young
Even myself was amazed to know that
I had developed critical thinking that young
For this reason
My life is meant to be hard
Because my thoughts are just too complicated

And my answer to Stephen's theory was
"知而不行"
Now I suffer more
Because I do not even know what I "knew" in the past

最初是知而不行, 現在是什麼都不知

It is hard
For I even need to look for that long lost answer
That answer was once with me
I chose to ignore it
And now,
It's not with me again
As if I were losing my instinct
All I have are a bunch of questions
Accompanied with a lot of question marks

The more you understand, the more you dont understand

"For every breath you breathe in

You gain more energy

For every breath you breathe out

You let go"

This is the relaxation exercise my life coach did with me in the 1st lesson

But I found myself sinking more and more in

With every breath i breathe in and out



Life has been a struggle

But fate had allowed me to take a short break

In the past 5 years

In year 2010

Life is like the way it was

Back to the tearful, desperate track

I invest in myself

Joining the life coach course

Because I am so sick of my life

After 5 years living in ease

I cannot go back to that painful track

I know that joining life coaching is not the solution

The life coach herself is not the solution

Me myself is the solution

However, the more I dig into myself

The more I feel grim



I always understand myself

But in my case

The more I understand myself

The more I cannot see the key to my problems

Let say -

How can I feel connected?

How can I avoid feeling lonely in or after happy moments

How can I stop crying alone...

The more I dig deep into myself

I more I don't understand

Am I making a fuss?

Are these problems really happening

Or its just me getting crazy

And creating all these "unreal" problems

What if these are not even problems

What if everyone has gone through this stage...



Feelings are however - always honest

You felt sad, desperate, depressed and you want to tear up etc

I can deny a lot of things

Even the problems that I am facing

But not these feelings




I thought my job can save me

From all these unhappiness

But it seems that I am not making any progress as well

Feeling disconnected from almost everything

What should be the next step?




I hope I am angry

Anger is a more positive energy comparing to being depressed

When I feel depressed

I am like stuck

As if I could not breathe

That there is such a strong force over my chest

And I cannot breathe deeply




For more and more often

I want to retreat

From everything that I am doing

I want to escape

This is the worst available option

I just want to stop

Stop everything

But I know that the world will never stop for me

So I cannot stop as well