I just finished my assignment and realized that I forgot all about my dinner. So now I'm eating a cold dinner.

I am so relieved that the work is done. And not in the wee hours of the night either. Admittedly I could have done more work, but I'm just so mentally exhausted. Yet it's in a satisfied way.

Sometimes, when I'm frustrated by the lack of progress in college, I forget that I truly love learning. I love doing projects. Looking over my handiwork, I don't feel pride at amazing work. It's really quite simple, and nothing special, but it's solid work. So I'm satisfied.

Marketing is a calling to me. I ran through a million subjects and did all sorts of adequate and some good work on so many things, but in the end, I feel most satisfied when I've connected a target market with its ideal product, or vice versa.

I know some people think that marketers lie through their teeth to sell their products, but marketing is just a tool, like any other. A good hammer can be used to build tables, and it can be used to kill a person. It's a matter of who's wielding it.

Now if I just had Tariq with me, I'd be really satisfied.

The easiest way to change how you move is to change your shoes. Wear high heels, and you would definitely not be walking the way you would in flats.

I adore my nice new three-inch stiletto shoes. I've never bought any before. They've always been too impractical to purchase.

In three-inch stiletto shoes, I feel powerful, despite the inability to run swiftly. I feel like the pointed heel pierces directly into the earth and funnels its energy to me.

So I'm fanciful. Deal with it.

I like knowing that I could really hurt toes with my heels. Stilettos were these giant-sized needles that were actually daggers, favoured for its ease of concealment. Asassins liked using them.

I want Tariq. I shouldn't have worn stiletto high heels while ovulating.

I've nearly forgotten that as my parents zipped around the world pursuing the wealth and comfort I have today, the price I paid was being left with the maid/nurse that was with the family since before I was born. She was so close to me, while I called my mother Mommy, I called her Mama.

She was a very kind-hearted woman who was the real reason I'm a spoilt brat, used to getting my own way. Mama fed me with her own hand until I was eight, I was so spoilt. She cooked my food, tidied up my toys, dressed me for school, drove me a mere block away to religion classes. I refused to drink plain water in those days, and would only drink cordial drinks. You know. Mix 1/8th cordial with water and get sweet drink. She made those for me too. I didn't have to lift a hand, really.

And all those years, she made me feel like I was a useless, spoilt, stupid brat who could never do any of these things myself, because I was so useless, spoilt and stupid. If I tried to make my own sandwich, she said it was lousy. If I tried to tidy up my own room, she told me that tomorrow I'd mess it all up again because I'm incapable of keeping anything tidy. I was so dependent on her to do all the things she never taught me to do and always told me I was incapable of doing.

I was a child. She was my Mama. I never thought that she could be wrong. So I believed her.

I grew into my teenaged years secretly believing that I was incapable of doing basic things like feeding myself and doing laundry. I was terrified that the rest of my family would find out how completely useless I was, so I became adept in pretending that I chose to be a lazy, useless brat. I avoided chipping in with household chores whenever I could, because I was afraid of screwing up the work that I believed I was incapable of doing.

When I found Form One of Secondary School to be more difficult that Standard Six of Primary School, I made the conclusion that I was stupid even in school, not just at daily living. So to cover my stupidity, I just stopped working hard at school. I did only enough to pass. Sometimes, I didn't even do that much, and freely failed. Anything so my parents wouldn't realize what a disappointingly stupid, useless child they had in me.

Mama got worse as I grew older. She would bleach my school uniform blue. Or not bother bleaching it until it was brown. She stopped whitening my shoes and they got really brown. It didn't even occur to me to whiten them myself, because I thought myself so useless. She'd feed me sandwiches for lunch, and the chicken in it wouldn't be fully cooked. I just ate it. Never mind that at thirteen, I'm completely capable of making my own sandwich. I was so entrenched in my belief that I was useless and stupid, and that I was completely dependent on Mama.

And I never told my parents, because to my thinking, Mama was protecting me. Mama was helping me hide how stupid and useless I was, so my parents wouldn't be disappointed.

God, Mama, I loved you so. You said you love me. Why would anyone make their loved ones feel stupid and useless? I ran my life for years with one purpose: to hide my stupidity. My perceived stupidity.

Mama's antics got too obvious and she got fired when I was fifteen or so. Mommy was so worried that I would be upset that Mama was gone. All I could feel was relief. I've never been able to treat a maid as an equal since then. I mean, I am polite and nice, but I deliberately act employer with employee. I can't shake the fear of being so completely dependent on a maid again. Acting employer towards employee reminds me that I'm the one in power, not the other way round.

I know today that I am intelligent, generous and giving. I spent two years of my life with psychologists trying to see that and believe it, trying to fight a paradigm of myself I held for as long as I can remember.

I want to celebrate that. I want to celebrate my freedom and independence. I drive my own car, and will never have to feel guilty for tiring Mama out making her take me home from school. I choose my own food, and will never have to eat half-cooked chicken again just because I have no other choice. I know how to wash my clothes, and will never have to clothes in poor state. Best of all, I am capable. I can do anything I want to and I'm still smart and useful.

I have a lot of things I have yet to do, but I can definitely get them done eventually, because I did the best thing of all:

I learnt to love myself.

Do you have any idea how they make money?!

These evil, monstrous, brilliant people encourage hotels to send them e-mails on last minute low rates for their hotel rooms and publish them on their site, so your common person like you and me, can take advantage of cheaper rates for impulse vacations, and increase these hotels' occupancy. For every person who books these promotional last minute rates through this site, the evil people get a commission fee.

Argh! Argh! I'm in pain!

I read the goddamned site and I was screaming, "But that's so easy!! I could do that too!"

I want an online business that easy, dammit. Why didn't I think of something like that?

Why am I groaning and moaning about some other people's site when I should be thinking up a business plan like that so I can get my own share of online money out there? Excuse me!

Sometimes I wonder if maybe my loss of appetite, my inability to concentrate, and the migraines every other day, are just symptoms of a medical problem. I should get my head checked.

And not just for mental problems, silly!

The problem with shoulds is that they get pushed aside....