Weddings: more than just an event

There was a time when my friends keep telling me of the many weddings they were going to attend and I could not identify with it. I was like, "wow, ok... all your friends getting married...is there really so many people getting married in a year?" Now, it's happening to me ha. 4 weddings in a span of 2 weeks and more to come. Next year will be the highest record for me so far. Already 9 confirmed ones as I counted. 

Probably a few more years down the road, I will be the happy godmother to many cute little ones :)

Yesterday I attended an Indian wedding. It was my first and was certainly an interesting experience. The colourful arrays of colours surrounding me and I felt I was in bollywood :P The bride (my colleague) looks georgeous, just like a queen seated on the sedan. Cameras snapping away constantly, it almost felt like she was a celebrity. I received a lovely door gift with bangles, stickers to place on the forehead and henna which I did for my colleague. My first attempt at it and I am pretty pleased with the results. My indian colleague says that I have a gift for it.

I brought 2 tubes back so for those who wanna have ur hands and arms painted you can come to me :)

Weddings are good times to mingle, catch up with old friends and participate in a special & important event of your friend's life. So, even though my pocket might burn a tiny hole at the end of it all, I feel very priviledged to be part of witnessing these wonderful unions.

I look forward to the year ahead...

The art of balance is not an easy feat

I have received my venue of field placement this morning, not a place I will want to go as it is too far away from my workplace. I can imagine myself stradling between work, internship and the traveling time. I will just end up looking burnt and worn out when I meet my clients. Not exactly a good impression to begin with. I will probably be getting all upset when I have to rush down from my workplace only to find out that the clients have defaulted the appointment. That will certainly break my day. I pray that my request to change the venue will be approved!

The feeling's now is all meshed up, just like the girl in "New Moon" before she was going to jump down the cliff. What's it going to be like? The thoughts of the waves piercing through her body like painful stabs? Or the excitement of overcoming the seemingly fearful. I guess certain things just needs to be done while leaving the brain aside. You never know till you experience it. A short time but it feels like forever. Her look of triumph when she comes up the surface was remarkable. It was as if she was thinking to herself, "I should have done this earlier." Snap and back to reality. Well, at least it was encouraging to begin with.

Sometimes I wonder when is the point of immunity. When we have done something or go through the same motion so many times that we kind of don't feel much anymore. The first time is always the most memorable, sometimes nerve-wrecking or mind blowing. I guess when the novelty is gone, it all comes back to the purpose of the activity. This question will come at some point or another, sometimes strike us at the most unexpected moment. Failing to answer it leads to doubt, uncertainty and inertia. On the other hand, the most well thought through plan may fall flat and leads to great disappointment.

The art of balance is not an easy task. I guess I will never be able to master it in my lifetime...

love is an action verb

"Love is patient and kind.

Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude.

It does not demand its own way.

It is not irritable,

and it keeps no record of being wronged.

It does not rejoice about injustice

but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.

Love never gives up, never loses faith,

is always hopeful,

and endures through every circumstance. "

(1 Corinthians 13:4-7 New Living Translation)

To me, love is an action verb and not a noun. It is something we actively do, as Christ commands: Love one another as Christ loves us. It doesn't matter if the other person is deserving or easy to love. There is no condition tied to it. It's a choice we all can make. Easier said than done but it's the hallmark of a Christ follower because God is love. The song lyrics came to my mind, " how many times have I broken your heart but still you forgive if only I ask...".

God, thank you for loving me so much that nothing I do will make you love me more and nothing that I do not do will make you love me less.

When Good is not good enough

Then the Lord God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil, lest he stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever"- therfore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. (Genesis 3:22-23)

In a way, the Garden is always with us. Our memories of good moments, and our wishes for ourselves and others to be better, keep the image of the ideal in our hearts. At times this encourages us, and at others it torments us, such as when we have thoughts like, "I shouldn't have made that error-I knew better. Why did I let it happen again?"

So the jolting experience of imperfection and the knowledge of good and evil land a one-two punch on most of us, and a dilemma is born. It can be stated this way: I'd like to be the ideal me-living in an ideal world. I can even imagine it. What then do I do with the badness in myself and the world? How do I co-exist with injustice? Failure? Imperfection? Disappointment?

The reason this is such a monumental issue for some of us, such as the perfectionist or the frustrated idealist, is that the kernel of the problem is a fear that bad will overwhelm and contaminate good. The one bad apple spoils a lifetime, thinks the idealist. This is a sign of developmental inability to trust that the good can coexist with the bad.

(Hiding from Love by Dr. John Townsend)

Doing what you enjoy and getting paid for it

Doing something you enjoy and getting paid for it, this thought came to my mind yesterday on my way to work... As I look back, I never thought that I would stay in a job for this long, with at least 3 more years to go. That will effectively make me 7 years in my current job!

After staying for 3 years in the same place, I still look foward to going to work and I still find satisfaction in the things I do and yes, I still love the children :)

I used to dislike it when others ask whether I am a volunteer and whether I get paid at all. Rising in me will be this sense of indignation that we, social workers should be given more recognition. No wonder my trainer says that social work in Singapore is like third world country.

Now, I am proud of it because what I do is what others will want to do in their free time and are willing not to be paid for at all. Yet, here I am, doing this as my job and it's not really a job afterall, it's something which I want to do. It's great to see the different facets of life playing out in front of you, the range of emotions you experience with a person and getting deep into another person's world and being involved in what matters to them. I love being in the midst of the action :)