Great changes

The changing panorama of life shows you fragments of what you wished you had seen long ago when you were overly vexed with problems. A vision poisoned and shrouded with darkness is of no difference than being blind. Being impaired of your ability to think is a dreadful thing.

Anton Chekhov once said, "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass." There's always beauty in brokenness, if one knows where to seek. Life, in its imperfection, can be pretty if one sees it through the right perspective.

The one who affects and the one being affected; is the relationship between us humans and problems just it? What if your problems have been affecting your relationships with the people in your lives? How different would the bonds you share be when you're no longer troubled with obstacles, or at least the way you view them?

Perhaps back then, setting aside our personal problems gave room for bonds to be strengthened and intertwined. I have to say that I haven't gotten used to how immensely different it is now to no longer be in darkness, that even bonds shared with the people around me are much strengthened.

Blessed with light, clarity, beautiful companionship, independence, joy, appreciation, resilience and support. Thank you, God. Thank You for all these people I've met. Thank You for the great changes in my life.

Crossroad

The ticking of the clock instills in you a belief that you're growing towards adulthood, but that can only be true biologically for everyone. As you tread through life's waters, or turn the mundane pages on the calendar, you can believe all you want that you're nearing the point of transitioning into another point of life without any materializing actualization; days seem the same back-to-back, and life, like a train, still rattles on the railway track at the same pace. A mechanical routine. You may think whatever you wish to as you look out of the window and the changing scenery until the train stops at the station and you aboard a different carriage.

Even as you near the marking age, you may not necessarily feel anything; you don't automatically grow a year older upon blowing candles on your cake. Would life be any different as you grow a year older?

Significant happenings may hammer reality into your glass globe. And till then, the clock continues to tick. And tick. 

We can deny all we want that we're still children, that we're still the ones who don't need to pay for their denials. Leaving many homes of the heart and stepping into a crossroad in life that changes your world for the next decade much earlier than your peers ultimately stirs a farrago of sleepy excitement, anxious anticipation, and devastating helplessness. As soon as the confirmation letter arrives, the world will change. There are always sacrifices to be made.

Stranger, stranger things will continue to happen, and that's a prominent sign that God's working His hands in your life. Blessed in ways.

As I waver with uncertainty, I'm grateful for the people who've encouraged and reassured, and continue to. Thank you for the support, love, and care, Jun Nyap, Mei Kay, Keisha and Yihwa. 

Childhood friends : 2013

An adventurous day around KL and PJ with my dearest childhood friends. 8 years of friendship and still going strong.

Though, it's saddening to know that the three of us are, once again, embarking on different journeys. Suria going on a working holiday, Wai Yi starting his first job, and me starting college in a country far away from here.

Distance makes the heart grow fonder. They showed me a kind of friendship that knows no environmental boundaries exist, a kind of friendship which you're assured without a word that it'll last no matter what happens.

I'm thankful for the love, care and joy they've given me. Suria, as the name goes, brightened my days and made them more bearable. And of course, the sisterly love I've never had. Wai Yi made my past year spent with a company and stood there for me like a brother in spite of being more than six thousand miles away. And I'm glad he's back here. And above all else, I'm utterly thankful for the friendship. Family friends, good friends, and siblings. :)

Thank you for always spending time with me. I don't deserve your love.

Thank You for blessing me with such friends, and a strong friendship.

Finding yourself

God shed clarity to my vision again, and saved me from pain. How do You always remind me to watch my step before I fall?

Believing that you can do it is an ecstatic feeling, it's a sleepy joy that comes at you. 

To have grown much more resilient, facing things don't seem quite that difficult now as it would have been. To realize your gifts from God, one by one, through the people around you. My writings and works, my explanations when teaching, my choice of words when consoling, and me being me. To realize that you're loved by friends and family. To realize that you're loved. 

But most importantly, I'm finding myself.

And these all happen at God's right timing.

The forum's over, but what took its place was a farrago of emotions. Exhaustion plagued me to the deepest depths. Thoughts resumed from where they were cast aside, and were further woven into a messy knit that only served to smother me with discomfort. I'm grateful that the state of confusion didn't last as long as I thought it would. Thank You for answering my prayers.

Honesty and patience is forever a great virtue. I sincerely hope this won't turn out to be a deja vu and ends in a nightmare like how it did. But the most important thing is to leave it all to God. With patience.

Feelings' a funny thing.

Time to concentrate and get all powered up for the battle. And I believe that I can do this. God's here!

Gratitude and glory

God, thank You for answering my prayer that day. You blessed clarity to my vision and only then could I stop from staying at the same place. I think things would've been much worse if You hadn't done so. You saved me from a lot of pain. Thank You for always looking out for me, dropping hints, and protecting me like how a Father does to His child.

God, thank You for the results I've gotten. Honestly without You I don't think I could've made it thus far.  For the strength You've given me, for the courage You've bestowed upon me, for the quiet support You've been giving me in everything I do, thank You so, so much. It feels as though my Father is encouraging me.

God, thank You for blessing my dream. It's such a miracle that You and only You are able to do so. You didn't just bless my dad's mind. You gave me a direction. You told me that this is in fact the path You wish for me to take, and that's, I believe, the greatest encouragement and approval that I've ever received. Thank You for having faith in me, thank You for believing me that I can do this.

God, thank You for giving me rest whenever I desperately need it. "Go rest and do not bother about the rest, I will handle it. Now rest, my child." I can imagine You saying this. :) No matter how wrong the way I was dealing with everything, You took care of me, held me together and never allowed me to break down from overworking myself. I felt that You were there. I knew that someone was holding me together. Were You sad? I knew You were there giving me support.

God, thank You for giving me a chance to adjudicate. You gave me much more than I ever expected. I went there just to spectate the competition and support my friends from CHS but You gave me a chance to adjudicate. I started off as just a panel but You made me a chair of a room. After that you put me as one of the adjudicators from the adj core's panel, giving me such a valuable chance to learn. You allowed me to break as student adjudicator and I paneled with another adjudicator from the adj core. You knew I had no chance to debate but You made a way for me. To learn.

God, thank You for giving me a chance to try something I've never once thought of. English forum. Thank You for believing me I can do it, when I have trials to prepare for, three teachers' expectations to meet, sub-editor's work to do, design edits to complete as a design executive, a debate competition to prepare for, and this. I'll try my best.

God has worked so many miracles in my life, each of different magnitudes, but never failed to show that the impossible can be possible in His hands. All of these things have served to glorify Him.

Sometimes, even being happy despite everything glorifies Him.

Blessed

I've been blessed with another miracle, and many more albeit diminutive.

I believe that God drops hints to guide us through, even through our chain of thoughts. God's love is really too immeasurable; He pays attention to the greatest details, even the abstract.

I'm nothing, without Him. Often things happen seemingly without any reason. Like misty sand flowing down the hourglass, they're as hard to grasp and understand. As days grow into years, it sometimes take a decade or two to realize how fortunate you truly are, as though only then does the clarity shaken you.

"I know that when you're determined to do something, you'll go all out till you succeed."
"And of course you can't run away from the first pay-cheque treat too."

The people around me have been giving me a lot of encouragement to live my dreams. Thank you Ms Dawn and Aaron.

Blessed. Inundated with bliss and assurance to know He's in this with me, as I embark on a long journey. No matter how stormy seas may be, I know I'm safe. Because He's with me.

Glass globe of a child

It can take only a day to render decades of effort in building a family to nothing.

Who doesn't desire to live in a house with no quarrels? Anyone back in their younger days would be very willingly to trade their most treasured toys for their parents to stop quarreling, but parents traded in a part of their kids' hearts and childhood instead.

To a child, the things and the people around them in their early years form their world. Their world is small, yet complete and serene. Very serene. But the pillars of their world waver, and pebbles and crumbs fall from the roof while the child witnesses his or her parents hammer the child's opaque, glass-enclosed world. A glass globe no longer. Destruction has always been an easy route. Yells, the sound waves are so capable of shaking the house in the heart, and all the items on the shelf come crashing onto the ground, that echoes and overpowers all the other sound waves. Soon that's all you hear.

I would have traded in a lot for quality time with my family. I wished my dad had done so.

There's no one to blame. There was just the integrity, sense of righteousness and self-control which he was devoid of. And they say it takes two hands to clap. Especially in a family, or even in a relationship. Perhaps this was where problems arose.

I played with water in the garden today. I wished my dad had been willing to share fun moments with us, I wished he had wanted to go on little adventures with us. I wished, but it never happened. An incomplete childhood is like a completed jigsaw puzzle with a piece missing.

There was a thorn, and as time passed the skin around it thickened.

I remember mentioning that to someone. A while ago.

Though, there's no use looking backwards. Repeatedly reading the first chapter of a story with an undesired ending wouldn't change anything, would it?

Just a raw thought.