The Power to Think

I have a host of drafts, drafts of ideas, thougthts, materials that mesmerized me into creating something that I felt worth posting at that time. It all stems from our power to think, make our thoughts soar to an infinite flow of ideas of interpretations, an endless realization of this tremendous gift from God.




Image from spiritwest.com

 Inded, if we don't have that power to think, have our imaginations run wild, we will be eating nothing colorful. I for one will not appreciate the texture, the flavors and the different colors of food. We will be like robots, that don't think and not do anything pleasant. Wait, robots are created by humans if humans didn't think therefore we will not have robots.

It is amazing isn't it that the capability to think is taken for granted and yet without our sense of being will be gone. I wonder if our sense for God will be there.

Empty..

An existence without God can be empty. Branches without leaves, like being in the desert.  All of us have this hole that needs to be filled,. How we chose to fill it is up to us. Do we want to fill it with the living water of God's love?  The love that gives us contentment, inner peace. and that ability to take a rest and lift it all up to him. Or do we want to complete it with material things and worldly desires, where there is no the hole becomes a bottomless pit? There is no contentment, the desire for more is always present.

Believing Out Loud..Let the world know.

A friend forwarded this in an email, I thought I'd share it here..

Please do it right away, before NBC takes this off their web page. Poll is still open so you can vote:

Click here for the poll.

It's Okay to Love Them!

It must be confusing indeed being born to your parents who didn't know what they want.  Without much guidance they tried to live the life that was right, but they were young and not really sure how to survive. They can only dream for a perfect life with as the center.  What they did not figure out was the possibility that because they are young, what they thought of as true love was a young love that cannot withstand the challenges of a grown up world.  Separation was the best solution, that allowed for your growth without the pain of bickering of lost love and therefore lost hope.

Now that your parents are with their adult loves and seemed happy with it, with children of their own, it must be confusing for you. Here you are, you were suppose to be the center of it all, now you are connected to two families. You probably feel left out, alone, and excluded from the equation.  But if you look at it from a different angle, you are lucky, you have your parents, step parents and two brothers, including even the relatives of your brothers, your step families. Wow, that is a big one, a whole lot who loves you. 

Did you feel it is disloyal to love your step relatives? Not at all, they are your family too and deserves your love.  No reason to withhold it from them, it is no one's fault that your parents are not together anymore. Besides what's the point of finding faults, just love them and savor the fact that you are surrounded by a lot of people who loves you..

A Magnified View...

I forgot to have my eyes checked until I found it difficult to read; for a while I relied on this magnifier. The glasses took too long to arrive, of course it has to be a stylish one, which the optician claims was ordered direct from Europe.  Yeah, right and I am the queen of England, eh! And I thought that I won't have to use these implements for a really long time.  But hey, it worked, gave me a bigger perspective.  It is not macro view that is wide  but an enlarged one, I was able to see the littlest specks.

Ah, how refreshing to be able to see things on a higher scale..

I was reminded of my faith sharing at RCIA recounting how I was clearly doing substantial compliance and not really establishing a personal relationship with God in my younger days because of the confusion that the Church and society has imposed itself upon me. Then there were the readings and the Gospels the past weeks and next week, where I was struck with the following verse, "Amen, I say to you, tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God before you. When John came to you in the way of righteousness, you did not believe him; but tax collectors and prostitutes did. Yet even when you saw that, you did not later change your minds and believe him."

My friend reflected that this calls for us to claim ownership on our sins and be responsible for it.  I agree, most of the time we rely on that scoresheet, comparing the gravity of our offenses, searching for something that will mitigate. Truth is, since we are justified by God, we should be righteous by Him, therefore our offenses are against Him too. So, we can't disown others just because they don't think like we do or have a different way of expressing their faith.

The idea was confirmed when my boss called me and a co-employee to share her personality analysis. How flexible is she, how these results can be used to make adjustments so that she can be a successful person both in her career and in her personal life. I was not interested at all, I merely said to her, not to lose herself in the process nor change her personality for that perceived success. I had to check myself, I wanted to say, try God.

 

 

Looking back-a musing of sorts, amusing thoughts in search of my muse

There are so many things worth mentioning, as the past 3 weekends I was caught in a frenzy of being with friends whom I don't see as often as I wish. Then it goes in a cycle, that I would see them at least once a month to catchup mostly and to see if we are still alive and happy.  Hence, the question "Are you happy?".

But I was happiest when I met with this friend, well first she called and in her overexcited tone, gushed, I get it .. I get it, what you have been sharing with me.  What is going on, I am clueless, then she said, in a chuckle, it is all Lordy, I am happy because of Him. So I don't have this, my being complete is having Him in my life, all others don't matter.  Besides I learned not to take things personally.  I am liking this, whew, that took too long. That was momentous, I was almost in tears when she finished with her story. 

Wow, if that is the kind of news I am going to get, I will welcome that every time. 

Relationships that didn't work, we looked at it as a sign from Lordy that he is not the one, that it is time to search for someone whom she can have and hold. She is too busy anyway.  On another hand, there are relationships that are blossoming despite the trials, the differences in personalities, it is all sooo beautiful.

Plans of settling down, the roles that friends will eventually play in rearing children, in family life, I said, yes of course.  Themes, ahh too many to recount, all in a good, happy tone. 

Hotel T is abuzz, guest after guest after guest, she is celebrating these visits with cooking, movies, and short trips, I know she would sneak in a St. Albert's visit or two.:)

Next week is hectic, it seems that the world is revolving around the 21st, too many things going on, I would like to be in all of them, but can't have to choose the first one I said yes to. In the meantime, laundry and sewing will just have to wait for another day.

Coming from an appointment, I had lunch with Umberto Eco and his Travels in Hyperrality at a Vietnamese resto. I love how he weave his words, talk about maniacally faked museum displays.  He is a perfect company to this dish of fried fish in coconut milk with mushrooms and bean threads.  It was priced like dinner though, increasing gas price is affecting the food market severely.  Going back to Umberto, he didn't agree with another outing at a Japanese place with tempura udon, too hard to navigate.  But the Japanese place worked with a friend, now I am bloated to the point of stupor, and I have homework to do.

In the meantime, I am thinking of lavender spice, summer savory, and some marjoram, to grill some aging beets from a farmers market trip of 3 weeks ago.  I am sure it will be suffused with flavor and will make for an enjoyable meal.  That will certainly help extenuate indulgences of the previous days.

Speaking of aging, I was waiting for my ride, one morning at the lobby of my apartment bldg.  The lobby has this big mirror, to give the impression of roominess.  I was examining my morning fresh skin ha ha.. when lo and behold I saw this tiny wrinkles creeping on my neck.  Almost like the one's on your jeans when you pretend that it was pressed but just got creased in the closet but by the end of the day, the fabric would loosen and crease had vanished. In this case, the neck wrinkles will not go away, instead it will multiply, ha ha, I sure wish for every wrinkle there is that will grow on this face there is an equivalent good deed or some amount of wisdom earned.

Finally, to close this hodge podge of unrehearsed thoughts, somebody made a comment on "The sum of all fears" post and claimed that pride and God are synonymous.  Why does it feel like evil and good put together. Oh well, I am not going to respond to that, an oxymoron, that's what it is.

Chikka...

Friday, finally..

Yes, finally, it was a hectic week but I didn't seem to accomplish anything.  Pssst.. I succumbed to the convenience of wash and fold, although, she folded it differently and didn't use the products I gave her, now you can smell my clothes with detergent a mile away, and I'm not scratching yet.  Laundry has always been an issue with me, I never get caught up. So, I did, sorry it is a big deal for me, I never said I am profound ha ha..

Then, in those days that I was quiet, I contemplated, as I always do. Took stock of myself, like my motivation for this exercise.  I am sure it is not some kind of a megalomaniacal stirrings. Otherwise, I will be walking with head support ha ha.

Hey, I was going to talk about my week, yeah this week, it turned topsy turvy for a while there, the Regional Manager (he is new) came had a meeting with us. Before that, I met with him and a reporting dotted line functional manager. His opening salvo  was that we are going to have a fresh start, hmmm what is this all about, are we going to get re-baptized here.  It turned out that our former manager was fired from her functional role, she is a sad person and have slighted almost all of us.  He said something about work sharing, water came, I tell you. I just hate justifiying myself, I am a misnomer, as I am not aligned directly with any technology nor any tech practice, I like it that way, I have some administrative tasks but I have to be billable 72% of my time.  Nuff, it is boring me already.

 Do you notice, how sometimes we let people in our lives slip away and some we just refuse to let go. It is not that we don't have that emotional maturity, it is because we are comfortable with them.  Remember in previous posts, I talked about conversations, how we shouldn't persist. I think some of us get into this misplaced notion that conversation is measured by the amount of words we spewed out, what we have contributed to the topic. I think sometimes it is not that, sometimes listening is what conversation is all about..

My faith theory..

Sorry about the first post, somewhere between publish and save I lost my entry.  No I didn't intend you to meditate on it and find the answer ha ha.. I was just thinking, sometimes we mystify our faith, such that we lose the reali meaning or appreciation of it in our lives. We have this tendency of dwelling of what we should and shouldn't do, how we manifest or exercise this practice, and wonder why we can't seem to fill that longing.

I think that with so much of that separation or compartmentalization, we fail to integrate it in our daily lives and therefore lose it in the process.  Am I making any sense? I feel that if we pray, as praying should be done (is there a different way:) it will encourage goodness in us, therefore will allow us to accept God's grace and therefore bask in His Glory. Surely we can't be prayerful and still be critical of others, or pray and attend mass and lose that compassion to someone, who is not as complete as we are.

You may have read about a post about a friend's claim that God may have made an engineering mistake with how men and women are constructed and I responded that it is the society's fault and not God's, how we define things. Our inabilities now are a result of what we eat, the environmental damage, and all those things that we traded in favor of profit or consumerism. I remember recounting to someone how I grew up with all natural products, we reuse, but we deal with the insects with DDT and we were taking sulfa meds and paregoric, numotizine, etc. all taken off the market because it is not safe for human consumption.

God provided we just messed it up.  What do you thunk?

My theory on faith...

Just listen..

I was told that sometimes I rub people the wrong way, instead of making sympathetic noises I respond with a solution, ruining the moment. The moment of venting, of self abrogation, of sandbagging onself. I got a barage of frustrated, dismal repartee, whoa totally  unexpected.

Maybe, I don't want you to respond.

Maybe, I want you to just listen.

To let you know, I am hurting.

I was silenced, didn't know how to respond, all I wish is for her to be happy, not to carry that load.  It is unto Lordy, now. Sent through a silent prayer.

I got that, so when I met a good friend from college, yesterday.  Translation we were friends when we were barely in our 20s.  Now, we try to see each other once a year, during our birthday in October, we go to Chinatown, eat and shop. Such simple joys, the best time indeed.  So since we didn't meet last year, she had surgery. We met yesterday, updates.  It's funny that when we reach this age, we talk about hypertension, weight, arthirities, and all the bodily ills, before we delve on life, etc. 

I remember the old days, when we would have a ge togethers at my place, we talk a lot of nonsensical things but never did our faith figure out in the conversation. We go to church and pray in our own private way, but nothing is shared.  Now, we readily agreed that it was His grace that left her daughter unharmed after her car was totaled in the freeway, a hit and run by a drunk driver. How she is approaching her 25th wedding anniversary. It was a happy meeting, too bad she had to go to her appointment and I have to go back to work.

Taxi drivers are men too!!

In previous posts I spoke of conversations with cabbies, some more interesting than others.  This time I am noticing something, it is rare that there are caucasian drivers especially in the morning.  He had to stress the fact that he is and he has a brown passenger when he was out of his cab on the pretext of inspecting it.  Then he accosted my consciousness with high falluting words that does not even make sense.  Hah, doesn't he know that it is a downer especially if someone is planning her day.  Oh well, he maligned the other drivers saying that they are not up to par that they don't bring integrity to the profession.  At the back of my mind, I said "honey, I don't really care for all that BS, I need a ride, when I need it he he..

The other morning, the driver was an African guy who decided that he didn't like the fact that the Catholic Diocese is building a multi-million Cathedral, despite the homelessness and other economic issues that need to be addressed.  So, I said but there are hungers that need to be fed too, like the hunger of the soul. I asked him if he is a Christian, he replied that it depends on what a Christian is. I didn't know that there are different kinds of Christians he he.. I asked if he believes in God, Oh that I do, he proceeded. To silence him I said, it is the practice that makes the difference, how some likes to be God, when they should act like God in their love and kindness.

That did the trick.. I don't really undestand these offerings, the pretense of intellect, that what they are saying matters, frankly I couldn't care less. It is what they are conveying that does, what is hidden in those words and the inflections that come with it.

So the other day I got the same cauc guy, he went the opposite way that I am used to, he said there are other factors that the lake is not an exact circle, therefore it has a differing circumference, that the traffic, etc.  I was quiet ( that is grace, mind you) I let him bury himself.  Then he said would you like me to drop you off the other side of the building, you will have to walk a few, no, I don't want to walk.  So of course it took me longer, later than I already am.  Oh well.. I rest my case..

 What a return salvo huh! that I will talk about cab drivers, etc. Well, this has been a busy month for me, I didn't have the time to figure things out before I started the year, so it is as unorganize as it can be. I know it is an oxymoron, organization and I, it was just an idea he he..

I will be posting more..

Julie: A woman

It must be devastating to outlive your child. Childless spinsterhood must have it's advantages. We had brunch this morning with Julie, she was so excited, talked about Fr. Seamus and the passing of his Mom. Julie was hoping that he takes a leave of absence so that he can grieve.Then her daughter Elaine came, was on the phone when we were cleaning up, she gave a note saying, her sister has passed, and she needs private time with her Mom, so that she can tell her.  That is really sad, I feel for her. She is a very realistic woman, prayerful, but moms will always be moms.

Julie was excited this morning about going out shopping with Elaine. Little did she know, that she will be buying an outfit for the memorial of her daughter. Sad, isn't it?

But Lordy knows what he is doing.