In this age of instant gratification (Internet, 24-hour global economy, technological advancements, etc…), I hope and pray that this generation would be able to:
- determine the things what we should and should not create / pursue
- know how to spend our time wisely
- learn to just stop, think, and reflect
- discern the truth from fallacy (with so much information available today)
… a lesson that I’ve learned from one of my favorite artist, James Taylor. I grew up to be an uptight person; who holds back my emotions; who put up walls from other people to prevent myself from getting hurt. I think that it’s been only just the past year or two that I started opening up to people. It’s not an easy thing to do for me. I’m doing it slowly and deliberately.
By being vulnerable, I’m opening up myself of the possibility of getting hurt. But I realized that by being cold / stoic also separates me from the people who truly cares and loves me. And I think that it’s better to experience hurt, pain & rejection rather than alienating myself from experiencing love. After all, the hurt that one can experience can be healed in time with God’s help.
I think I’m making a lot of progress. I’m taking it one step at a time :)
Shower The People
You can play the game and you can act out the part
Though you know it wasnt written for you
But tell me, how can you stand there with your broken heart
Ashamed of playing the fool
One thing can lead to another; it doesnt take any sacrifice
Oh, father and mother, sister and brother
If it feels nice, dont think twice
Just shower the people you love with love
Show them the way that you feel
Things are gonna work out fine if you only will
Shower the people you love with love
Show them the way you feel
Things are gonna be much better if you only will
You can run but you cannot hide
This is widely known
And what you plan to do with your foolish pride
When youre all by yourself alone
Once you tell somebody the way that you feel
You can feel it beginning to ease
I think its true what they say about the squeaky wheel
Always getting the grease.
Better to shower the people you love with love
Show them the way that you feel
Things are gonna be just fine if you only will
Shower the people you love with love
Show them the way that you feel
Things are gonna be much better if you only will
Shower the people you love with love
Show them the way that you feel
Youll feel better right away
Dont take much to do
Sell you pride
They say in every life
They say the rain must fall
Just like pouring rain
Make it rain
Make it rain
Love, love, love is sunshine.
Oh yes
Make it rain
Love, love, love is sunshine
Yeah, all right
Everybody, everybody
Shower the people you love with love
After watching a documentary about poverty (malnourished children, homeless people) and hearing the experiences of a friend who visited Thailand and ministered to kids with AIDS; I just thought of how blessed I am in life.
What are the things to be thankful for?
Where do these gifts / blessings come from?
For the healthy and able body, I can attribute it probably to good genes and the care that I received from my parents and family. For my skills, abilities and material blessings; I can attribute it to my parents who brought me up well, a good education, opportunities that came along the way and my natural gifts.
But thinking about it further, all of these: my parents / family, genes, education, natural gifts and opportunities can be attributed to one source. The source of all of these is God, the Creator.
What’s the purpose of these gifts / blessings?
The wisdom of the world tells us that success is measured by money, power & fame. To be successful we must be able to acquire all of these as much as we can. But I’ve realized that its pointless to base my life on such things.
If I will make these things the basis / measurement of success it would just be an endless cycle. I imagine that even if I become the richest, most powerful and most famous person in the world, there would always be something that I want that I cannot have. Not to mention the fact that all of these are temporary and that we can’t bring these things with us in our graves.
With all the blessings that God is giving to me, surely there has to be a purpose. I’ve realized that I should not keep all of the blessings to myself. I should share it to others so that they will in turn realize that our Lord God wants to bless them as well. I want to be an instrument of God’s blessing to others. My purpose is to be God’s light to other people.
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” [Matthew 5:14-16]
Gods wants to bless all of us because He loves us unconditionally… no questions asked. We just have to be open and accept His love in order for Him to do great things in our lives.
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” [Jeremiah 29:11]
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” [John 3:17]
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” [Yoda - Star Wars Episode I]
Of all the Star Wars characters, I like Yoda the best. He is small in stature but very powerful and has a lot of wisdom. He’s the kind of character that I want to be. In my honest appraisal of myself, I’m already halfway of being Yoda with the third of his character well taken care of (having a small stature… well not really small… just average). As for the Jedi like powers and wisdom, I still have a long way to go.
Yoda has many great quotes in the Star Wars Trilogy but this one for me is the best. There’s a lot of truth in that line.
A lot of us have fears (both real and imagined) and a lot of times we feel weak facing them. I myself do have many. One of which I’m dealing with right now is causing me to be angry because it’s difficult for me to let go / face. God is putting them into the light for me to see clearly. He is calling my attention to face them; to stand up and stop soaking in them. It’s unhealthy to remain in these negative feelings. I don’t want them to turn into hate and suffering. They’re only preventing me from realizing my full potential as a son and servant of God.
I would just have to remind myself that if I believe, He would put me through those fears and that everything will be alright. He will be the one to enable me to conquer them. Not by my human efforts but by His Spirit.
2 Timothy 1:7
“For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.”
2 Corinthians 12:9
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
Romans 8:15
“For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
“And He says, ‘All I want is for you to have. A life you love and live. Take from Me all I have to give, because you are in My heart.”
[The Man Who Would Be Santa - Vertical Horizon]
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Our family went out today to MOA to eat dinner and do some Christmas shopping. It’s been weeks since the family last went out. My sister and I treated the family at Savory Restaurant which my dad suggested. As we were enjoying the dinner (and me taking a bite of their Classic Chicken for the first time :D), I realized again how blessed our family are.
There are so many things in life to thank God for. Specifically for me, I’m just happy that I graduated in a good university, have a good job and I can treat my family to eat in a good restaurant. Pardon me if I may sound melodramatic here but I’m just a simple person with simple joys. I’m the type of person who really counts my blessings.
I realized early in life that our family is not rich. Yes we’re a middle class family but I saw how my parents sacrificed a lot for us to give us what we need. Though at times it felt like they were denying us things that other kids have like expensive toys, food and clothes; I later realized that they needed to do that in order to save money for more important things. And because of that I thank them.
They bought books for us to sharpen our minds. They enrolled us in different music and art classes so that we’ll be well-rounded persons. They also spent a lot when we got sick (especially on me because I had a bad case of asthma when I was a kid). If not for what they’ve done I wouldn’t be the person I am today.
I also thank my relatives from my father side (Nanay, titas and titos) for providing for my college education in LaSalle. I was resigned to the fact back then that I will be studying in a public school but they pushed me to have the best education.
It is because of these blessings that I received and is still receiving that I feel that I should share them to others; be it treating my family and some relatives from time to time, helping someone in times of need, or paying forward to our less fortunate brothers and sisters. It’s my way of keeping God’s blessing flowing. That’s how it should be. We should not keep His blessings only to ourselves.
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Lord God, thank You for all of these blessings that you continuously give me. The life that you gave is enough for me but you don’t just stop there. Everything I see, the air that I breathe, the music I hear, the food I taste and things I feel… I praise and thank You for every little thing in my life.
It’s been a while since I last posted and updated you guys on what’s happening. The past weeks had been very busy for me that’s why I didn’t have the time to sit down and blog. Busy with work, ministry, family and our band Elevate. It’s hard to balance these specially when things and issues come up one after the other (sometimes all at the same time) but thank God he enables me to deal with all of these.
Here’s a list of what ate me the past couple of months:
1. Elevate Acoustic Gigs - Our Christian band had our 1st 3 gigs outside the church in a span of about a month. The first 2 were at CAF Coffee and Ice Cream at BF Pilar, Las Piñas. The venue is nice because it’s small and intimate. The coffee shop is a cool place to hang out. There people can play their game boards, sing videoke and watch movies.
Almost all of the people who watched the gig were our beloved die-hard YAMO friends and supporters. Both times were fun and after playing music, we all played Taboo and Boggle. We also got to know the cool baristas and owner of the shop. Playing at CAF was also a good experience and confidence booster as the band aims to play more outside.
The 3rd was at the Cul de Sac of Westgate, Alabang in a Gymboree Play & Music event just last Saturday. Whole families were there and people from other establishments heard us. We covered 70’s songs but our focus was to send the message of our original songs to people. We believe that God really gave this opportunity for us to play a big crowd this early. To cut the long story short, we got this gig when we were rehearsing at a coffee shop one night. The event coordinator at Gymboree who was a few tables from us heard us practicing. She then approached us and asked us if we could play for their event. Now is that an instant gig or what?!?
2. Wrote a song - The night when the Gymboree gig was offered to us, I was restless. I can’t believe what just happened. The thought of playing at Westgate in 2 weeks time was running through my head. I was so overwhelmed that I was able to finish the lyrics for a song in 3 hours (that’s quite fast for me). The band will be working for the music in the coming weeks and hopefully the outcome will be great. 
3. Work - Ahhhh… that never-ending system speedup issue. Client’s been having system slowdown for months now and the team is working hard to improve that. The system has gotten quite big with the modules being added over time. Now were reviewing the design and determining the cause of slowdown. On top of that, a new module is about to be added that might contribute to the problem.
But with all of these I’m not complaining. For me what we’re experiencing is more of a challenge. It’s nice to think of solutions to this kind of problem.
4. Church Ministry Activities - playing drums / percussion, singing backup for praise & worship, yamo VTR, assisting in kids Sunday school, dance number for Pastor and Staff Appreciation… Name it, I’ve probably done it! I’m beginning to think that I’m in the entertainment industry. Hehe! These activities are the ones that keep my life interesting nowadays. It feels like that I’m still in school doing all sorts of extra-curricular activities. I guess these also keep me from being young at heart.
The subjects of my current lineup of books to read are mostly about applying Christian values in everyday life (purposeful living / discipline / dating / leadership). As much as possible I want to finish all of them but I don’t have enough time. What usually happens is I start one and read as long as the need or interest is still there. That’s the wonder of self-improvement / self-help books; you don’t have to finish in order gain and learn things from them.
But thank God for audio books! They are very convenient. I can listen to them while commuting and while at work. That makes it easier for me to finish.
The first audio book that I bought was Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul by John Eldredge (highly recommended to men!). I was supposed to buy it on paper but the bookstore where I asked said that is was out of stock, but they had an audio book version. I was hesitant to buy it at first since I prefer a real book that will go in my collection but I’m glad that I did try. I was able to finish it in a few days.
Today, I bought two more audio books. One is titled Disciplines of a Godly Man by R. Kent HughesThe other is Balancing Work and Life by Bill Butterworth. I hope that I’ll have the time to share some of the important things in these audio books here in my blog as many people can benefit from it.
Surprising? Maybe to a lot of NBA fans but I’m not surprised at all. Dennis Rodman was and still is my favorite NBA player of all time. His antics in and off the court might prove otherwise but if you look deeper into the personality of the player; his dedication to the game is amazing. Others might think that he is just a clown / freak on the court but for me he was a really efficient, hard-working, blue-collar basketball player. He did the little things that contributed to the success of his teams. I bet that Jordan & Pippen wouldn’t have done the Bulls’ 2nd Three-peat without him. I really respect him as a player that I patterned my way of playing basketball to his style (defense and rebound first). He is also the only basketball player whose trading cards I collected (and I still have to this day).
You can read the article here.
Our HR manager forwarded an email about life purpose and I took the advantage by sharing something to our officemates.
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We don’t have to be involved in the church to serve God. Everyday is an opportunity to realize our purpose in life. Here in our workplace, we are always dealing with people; whether they may be officemates / bosses / supervisors / clients. Each time that we deal with people and circumstances is an opportunity to grow and realize our purpose. In this industry we can share our talents and skills, and affect the people around us. We can strive to do our best and offer it to the Lord.
Here’s a thing that I learned while I was on leave last year:
Material Possessions, Power and Popularity –> all are temporary and we can’t bring them with us when we die.
People around us (even our loved ones) –> they can’t always be with us; also they can… and will disappoint us one way or another.
Ourselves –> we even fail ourselves at times because we aren’t perfect.
"In whatever man does without God, he must fail miserably-or succeed more miserably." [George MacDonald]
Through God alone we can get our purpose in life. He is our creator and he knows us well.
"Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me" [John 15:4]
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Yesterday morning, I was on my way to work while waiting for a bus. By the side of the main road, I saw a white butterfly. I thought it was strange to see a butterfly by the roadside since there are no trees and flowers around. But a few meters from the butterfly there was a bougainvillea plant and I said to myself; "If I could only lead that butterfly to where the plant is, it will be safe." But as soon as I thought of that, the butterfly crossed the path of a jeepney. I was trying to see if the butterfly passed safely but I only saw something white on the jeepney’s tire. I’m not sure if that was the butterfly, but I think it didn’t survive.
I don’t know if its a vision… or a premonition…
I should be in Kuala Lumpur by this time but I’m unable to join my officemate friends for a holiday at Malaysia and Singapore. I was denied at the check-in counter by the Cebu Pacific ground personnel because my passport will expire within 6 months. They said that it’s a procedure even if my scheduled return to the country is well within the expiration date of my passport. I was not aware of this policy because I booked the flights online without the help of a travel agent. But nonetheless, they should have put a reminder to those booking online about this policy. I asked the ground crew if this thing usually happens, and she said yes.
If it’s not the job of the airlines to inform the passengers of the policy; the immigration / DFA should have put this in the passport as a travel guideline. It’s a big inconvenience for those travelers who are not aware of this; not to mention the waste of time and money of canceling / rescheduling the trip. I don’t know if I can claim from the travel insurance that I got because of this ignorance of the law.
Even though this holiday trip didn’t push through for me, I’m surprised that I don’t feel that bad about it. My parents also noticed it and they said that it may be a sign of my maturity. I also noticed that the past few days prior to this cancelled trip, I’m not really that excited about it. I’m not sure why… Probably because my mind is preoccupied with other things.
Right now my option is to rebook the flights or cancel it. I don’t think that I’ll be able to follow my friends because the airfare of the next available flight is expensive. Sorry guys. 
Anyway, I think God has a purpose why this happened and I think I have an idea of what it is…
