Adieu and Hello.

            Crossroads. Ample beginnings – beautiful and succulent, you can almost taste it. Disastrous endings – ruining and bitter – your tongue retracts in disgust. Questions about self. Questions about God. Questions about tomorrow. Questions about satisfaction. Questions about happiness. You have them answered, or so you think after digging through tons of ink on paper… scrawling through the worldwide web… listening in on discussions… spending hours mapping out paths in your head. You were wrong. But then it comes like a flood one day – first as trickles, and then bursting into an over-washing torrent. The light comes on. You found yourself – your questions have been answered. And afterwards you run into another block – it is a cycle after all.

       And so for all the times of laughter and tears, screams and muffled sounds, blank oblivion and heightened awareness, enforced confidence and dispersed timidity, graceful acceptances and forced rejections, smiles and frowns – you either shrug in indifference or laugh with assurance. 2010 had them all, 2011 will have them again – simple cycle. The question is, since you know its just all a cycle, how are you going to adjust your attitude for the same recurrences? Yes, the New Year may not have the same exact events, but it will be a camouflage of events past. You could keep pining in anger or indifference or shame or [insert whatever adjectives that describe you putting yourself down], or you could adjust and be happy, smile, be content, welcome wholesomeness, live passionately and without regrets, live contentedly, and [insert whatever adjective to describe that motivating way of living life to conquer all odds]. And how you set about to do it matters, living life beautifully that is.

       As for me, I’ll be making that list and analyzing it for years to come – no not a new year’s resolution (I never keep those). Let’s call it a life list – things that are always at my crossroads, things that I will be possibly working on my whole life. At the core of this life list is be satisfied within His Will, no matter what situation I find myself in. This will produce sweat beads – no doubt, and yet, I have no doubts that within His Will is perfect peace and happiness (which is what we all want anyhow).

       So join me as we toast 2010 goodbye, and raise our glasses to 2011. I’ll be enjoying the freezing air of the big apple as I get ushered into the New Year – see you in January. Happy New Years!!!

'JC's Birthday' aka Merry Christmas!!!

Isaiah 9 (NIV):  


Verse 2:  
The people walking in darkness 
   have seen a great light; 
on those living in the land of deep darkness 
   a light has dawned. 


Verse 6:
 For to us a child is born,
   to us a son is given,
   and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
   Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
   Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 

As I am

I’m always talking to myself about opening up more to people. “Self-acclaimed introvert” as I proclaim to be, I always have an aching to want to be so close to someone that I can feel their heartbeat move in synonym with mine. No – this time I am not talking about God-expectations from people as I did earlier. I am talking about good old-fashioned companionship. Sometimes at the trough of my sinusoidal feelings, I suddenly panic and feel that I have no one to talk to. I know it’s a lie – there are people all around me that I can talk to, that can relate to me. So what stops me from just opening up and saying what bothers me? What prevents me from answering the posed question: “How are you today?” with “I am not okay – I woke up this morning with a hundred things on my mind, all about my tomorrow, and I know I trust Jesus but today I just don’t feel like pushing all my worries on/talking to Him, they haunt me and I just want you/someone physically next to me to listen to me and hear me cry.” Okay so maybe not that response as abashed in its verbatim form, but you get my drift.

I don’t know about you but I am terrified of people seeing me just the way I am – scared. I would prefer to keep it mostly in as a result. If I don’t voice it out it doesn’t become real after all like a friend once said to me. But then the contemplation becomes unbearable in my head – I would just have to say it out. The finale being that she ‘sees’ me – doubtful as I am. He ‘sees’ me – skeptical as I am. They ‘see’ me – docile out of fear of the unknown.

If we all truly showed our inner cores would we be able to deal with it? I keep wanting to open up more – would you/he/she/they accept me as I am? If he/she/they all opened up to me their innermost fragile parts would I run away in disgust pretending I am better? Would I respond that it doesn’t matter because I am the same way and let them know I understand? Or would I sit and do nothing because I am numbed that vulnerability and room for community has come to over take any pride and wallowed pretense?

What would you do?

Sharing 4

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.  Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.


Hebrews 2:14-18 (NIV)

Year One - Gold

It has been days - 365 days to be exact when i crawled out of an already cracked shell and wrote my very first post - YOU. In the beginning, there wasn’t a definite plan you know - I just wanted to write, you know fuel the dream of publishing by age 20. I was already late anyways since I sat depressed on my birthday that year, reflecting in front of my physics textbook and realizing I failed my 15-year-old dream.

Many more dreams died this past year. Like the prince-charming-coming-to-save-the- damsel-in-distress dream. Like the I-should-get-what-I-want-immediately dream. Like the I-want-to-cut-people-up-in-surgery dream. Like the I-shouldn’t-be-struggling-with-these-issues dream.

But that is the beauty of death - any kind of death really... the ashes force you to look into the change. New life begins with two choices - you could keep looking back or you could forge ahead with ashes clutched in hand as a reminder that your perspective needs to keep changing. And so this-change came, and so did the focus of this blog. It is now about healing from the inside to the outside. And it is hard because I am still a sinner in the continual rehab of His Grace. I am realizing that I never had all the answers even though I would like to presume and show that I do. Every time I think I have arrived - I realize I only took baby steps instead.

Life has come from so many new areas. Like his-continual-grace. Like his-continual-corrections. Like the new-depths-of-friendships. Like new-perspectives. Like letting-go-of-the-past. Like realizing-I-was-never-in-control.

And there are many more, each post has a death and new life flow attached to it. I would love to open up more and say which each specific was/is you know - be bare and transparent and show you just how broken I am and let you see for yourself that it doesn’t matter if you are the same way too, more or less because He still is able to turn you around and over. And that is something along the lines of what my friend M spoke to me about. Opening up more, instead of leaving posts still on the periphery. And also, interjecting my faith verbally and physically, rather than just-pen-on-paper. Its a challenge... something that will be life long, even beyond this blog.

So i invite you, dear person whose eyes move across his/her screen, to keep me accountable. If this is your first time, welcome. If you have been here somewhere between day 0 and day 365 - thank you. There is going to be change - there are plans popping in my head, when i think about them, my blood gets warm and i feel my passion re-awakening. And I want to unveil them to you - patience is the key. I will soon share them with you, in excitement. I do hope you keep coming back and that somehow these words, of which i don’t believe originate from me alone, but somehow the Big-Man up there ignited the start of this something, touch you somewhere and inspire you to want to know Him.

Have a great week ahead!

And Happy Holidays in Advance :D - Check this out!

Since you are out Christmas shopping...

Hey There, 


As you plan to spend that $10 - $1,000's shopping this season, don't forget to remember someone out there whose life you could change by donating as little as $10 for mosquito nets. You'll be glad you did :) Cheers!!!


Click on the link here:  2010 Samaritan's Purse Gift Catalog

DON'T EVER FORGET!!!