Evil thoughts that I should avoid next time

I can't help it but sometimes I have these evil thoughts. I'd like to write it down here because this blog is public, so my friends can slap me at my face if I voice out these evil thoughts in our conversations. Hahaha.

1) Self-blame
"Why do I keep doing things wrong?"
"I'm horrible. I always do the same mistakes over and over again."

2) Giving up
"I'm tired to try again..."
"Why Lord do you let me fall again and again?"

3) Feel that I have done 'everything' and victimized
"I've said sorry. Why is my friend still angry with me???"
"I've done a,b,c,x,y,z and tried not to do the mistakes. Why can't my friend make a fuss over this 'small thing' again?"

4) Self-pity
(usually I do it in combination of self-blame. Try to get human consolation even though my thought is not reasonable)

Nevertheless, I really thank God that at my last fall, I could still "function". Usually when I'm down, I really cannot push myself to do housework or other works. Very depressing!! But this time Lord gave me the strength to carry on and to let go. And unsurprisingly, despite my complain to God, "Lord Lord why don't you help me this time? Why did you let me fall again?", He's actually helping me in using another way. He has helped me to accept my weakness. He has changed my friend's heart to be more forgiving and understanding. He helped me to carry the small cross of suffering because of my own fault. It's really God's work. Thank you, Lord.

Now I know why we still need to do our norms (prayers, Mass, spiritual reading, etc) even though we feel dry or when we are down, God is listening. He always listens to us. He is with us even though we do not feel anything.

Train your man

One thing the lady shared in the talk was the question that she often got from other people: "How to get a good man as your husband?"
Her answer was, "Train your boyfriend to be a good man, a chaste man" and the same thing for the man,"Train your girlfriend to be a good woman, a chaste woman." Hahaha. Now I think about it, it's really true. In fact, courtship is a training ground for couples.

Initially I had this thought, people say the first 6 months of courtship is a honeymoon period, but I was wondering, why the first 3 months of my relationship already felt tough? I was worried that things will get worse, but I consulted my mum and my mum said it's normal that it's tough at the beginning because you are not hiding yourself. The next step is learning how to overcome the problems, accept each others' strength and weakness, and learn to improve yourself. When I heard this lady shared about 'training your man', I remembered what the different priests have been saying about courtship and the importance of self-control. Each person must take responsibility in terms of knowing the limit, it's a struggle together but each should strive to control oneself.

It's tough!!! But it's beautiful to train oneself and train others. It's not only about chastity, but also on other virtues. Well, I would say that you can't "force" your partner to be what you want, but you can help your partner to be a better person. Sometimes something irritates us and our intention of 'changing' our partner might not be purely for the person, but influenced by this thought, "I want him to change because his behavior irritates me." Here the role of prayer comes. It's really helpful to bring your protest to God and He'll let you see what love is and He'll help you to purify your intention.

Train your man or woman!! ^^
and one more thing that I remember from the meeting with the couple, "The third party is important: God."

The Value of Work

A friend in an 'emo-mood' messaged us, "What's the meaning of this routine? Go to office-go back home and every day is the same. On the judgment day, will it be only a say, 'Oh Lord, I have earned money in my whole life through my work' ."

Perhaps it was God's plan that on that day, my circle topic was on the First Christians. Joyce reminded me that the First Christians were indeed ordinary people like us. They were fishermen!! Suddenly all the formation sessions came to my mind: how work is an opportunity to grow in virtues (e.g., perseverance, patience, etc.), how work is an opportunity to do apostolate (how can we be a good example of Christians if we are careless in our work?), and how we can glorify God through our work, and so on and so forth. However, one thing I can't explain to my friend is the concept of "sanctification of work."

We as Catholics believe that we can 'sanctify' our work. We can offer them up to Our Lord and it can also be a mean to reach Heaven (well, if your work is an avenue to grow in virtues and handle your defects with God's grace, then it is also a mean to help you grow in holiness). Nevertheless, some people think that once you are baptized, you are confirmed that you'll reach Heaven immediately. Some people do not have the concept of Purgatory and do not have the idea of offering the suffering as penance and repentance to shorten your time at Purgatory and reach Heaven faster. Just for a clarification, Catholics also believe that good work is fruit of faith and God's grace. We can't deny the importance of God's grace that enables us to do the 'work'. (That's why we have our multivitamin called "Sacraments" - special channel of grace)

"What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,' but you do not give them the necessities of the body, what good is it? So also faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead. Indeed someone might say, "You have faith and I have works." Demonstrate your faith to me without works, and I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works. You believe that God is one. You do well. Even the demons believe that and tremble."  
James 2:14-19

How beautiful it is to learn that our work here on earth is indeed related to God's plan for us to be holy.
How beautiful it is to learn that our suffering in work (those unending works, annoying friend) can be united with Christ's suffering and can be offered up anytime to Our Lord.
How beautiful it is to remember that work is a mean to glorify Our Lord.

Have a nice weekend!!! ^^

Marriage is a permanent reminder of the cross

Two weeks ago, I went to a couple's house for a preparation for Faith and Reason forum on Church and freedom to love. This couple is a doctor-lawyer couple. The husband is a doctor and the wife is a litigation lawyer. Well, I have heard that they have 6 kids, but experiencing the warmth of the family and the cheerfulness of the couple+the 6 kids in our first meeting was really a special experience for me. Some of the things that the couple shared in the Faith and Reason forum last Monday have been shared by them in the preparation meeting, but there are some stuff that were not shared in the forum, one of which was this post title.

Well, the couple did mention that the true love is a self-giving love. In the meeting, actually it happened after the meeting, when me, Eugene, and Sr Jocelyn were about to leave, the wife said, "Learning theology has helped me to understand the technical terms that we have actually already understood in our life." One of these "terms" is "Marriage as a permanent reminder of the cross." Why? So the lady explained that A sacrificed himself so that B is redeemed, just like how we are redeemed by Christ's crucifixion. I was so amazed and uplifted after I heard that. Isn't that beautiful? B is redeemed to be a better person through A's sacrifice. It happens over, over, and over again. No wonder marriage is a vocation, and it's not surprising that it's a difficult path too.

Of course when it comes to the practice of this 'theory', it's very tough to persevere. To keep hurting your partner hurts you too. To keep sacrificing yourself? Wahhh.. so tough!! But when I remember this sentence, I get a hope and I really think this reality of marriage as 'not a fairytale' is really really beautiful.

My mom

My mom doesn't stand at my side when I'm wrong. She scolded me when other people scold me. She laughs when someone else is angry with me then she'll say, "Nah, you're like that. Change la."

Even when I phoned her and cried, her advice was, "Go bath. It's too late. You can't think now. Sleep. Don't blame yourself because if you blame yourself, you can't change. Just take note of your mistakes. No body's perfect."

She kept telling me to pray. (For me, prayer is getting very very difficult to be done when I'm sad. The only thing I could say to God in my prayer was, "Lord Lord help me. Why are you so mean to me? Why do you let me fall again?) Wrong prayer. Hahaha.

I feel weak.
I really feel very weak sometimes..
Yes I need to trust God to grant me the grace to overcome these weaknesses. But when it just comes over and over again, I really feel tired. I'm really really tired of myself. It's like you know..there's a stone on your skin, and it scratches your skin, I guess something like that it's happening in my heart.

Please let me write some more.
I promise that at the moment I finish writing, I will smile and learn to let go, learn to trust God..

I really admire my mom.
She's a strong woman..
Now I know why when I told my mom's story to Pilar, she said, "Your mom is very strong."
I thank God for giving me this mom, who teaches me a lot about life, about Him!!, about trust, and about the real meaning of prayer.

I want to have hope..
Lord please help me..
Let me rest in You.. Amen...
Let me be positive!!! Let me get up again like what I mentioned in my allocutio once, that Mother Mary watching me like how a mother keeps watching her baby while the baby learns to walk, that Mother Mary will help me to get up again.

Let me always remember last week's circle topic on supernatural cheerfulness.
Please remind me of Fr Mario's advice, "Don't be obsessed with your mistakes. Repent! Admit it that yes, we have weakness. And start all over again."

Ah mom, I really wish you were here now...

Intensive course in my first week in Singapore

This week is a tiring week.
It's not because I have too much work in my office, but it is because of my own personal struggle.
Among my 10 new year promises, I've broken a number of them! Just within the first week in Singapore.
I guess there are some factors that make me feel very tired and frustrated sometimes. Firstly, it's really tiring to keep falling to the same mistakes. Secondly, in the process of making those mistakes, I am hurting another person. It's very sad.

However, yesterday I managed to get a good rest and relaxing Friday. Ya, get up again! The way to solve the problem is to face it and not to run away from it. The most important thing is also to ask God for His help.

Thank you for the fruitful week, Jesus :)

Unpack

and the hardest part is...
to unpack my stuff >.<

Thanks to Legion Christmas celebration, no emo-time this time :)

Vacation Diary 2 ~ Movies revenge

Fyi, I only watched six movies on the cinema this year: ATM (a Thai movie), The Avengers, Taken 2, Suddenly It's Magic (a Filipino movie with a Thai actor), Hobbit, and Life of Pi. During my vacation, I spent most of my time watching movies with my brother (or alone). Nevertheless, most of these movies were watched only from the middle to the end, or from beginning to the middle, hahaha. I finally watched The Lord of The Rings (the first and the third one, but I didn't watch the first one from the beginning). In this vacation, I watched two movies about the use of time: Click and In Time. Good reminder for the new year! :) I also watched some romantic movies; Something Borrowed, What's Your Number, and one movie, title of which I can't remember on two friends that adopted baby of their friends that passed away in an accident.

Lessons from these movies:
Hmm.. Well, Nic is correct. It's kinda tiring to watch American movies; sleep here, sleep there >.<
Nevertheless, a movie like What's Your Number in which the girl had sex with 20 guys in her life somehow still teaches us to guard our purity, to respect ourselves and respect our partner. I love Ally's speech in her younger sister's wedding: "When you are in love you can be yourself." (somewhere along that line hehehe) And the guy that at the end Ally was truly in love with was the one who respects her the most, the one who 'slows down' and respects her decision to not sleep with her!! (even this guy was someone who just slept around easily)

LOTR is beautiful!! I like what Gandalf said to Frodo, "....the important thing is what you do with the time given." (when Frodo kept regretting and wishing that the ring didn't come to him). I also adore Sam's courage and loyalty! Beautiful! My brother said I look like a fool when I watched the third LOTR. (Sorry! But my mouth opens according to the dynamics of the movie!!)

Last four days of vacation! Fully recharged! Hehehehe :D
Please pray for my family's pilgrimage tomorrow. We are going to a shrine of Our Lady at Cisantana :)

Welcome 2013!! ~ New year's eve story

Here we are. We are on the first day of 2013!

Last night my family had new year celebration at our neighbour's house. We already reached my neighbour's house at 6.30pm (I brought along my book just in case I felt bored in the 5.5-hour-waiting-for-new year). Some conversations that were stuck to my mind:

1. I was sitting with my neighbour's daughter. She is 14 years old and she was my catechism kid. First, I asked her, "Which grade are you now?" (once you graduate, you forget how many years difference between you and the 'used-to-be-kids'). Then she asked me, "Oh Jie, you have graduated right? What are you working as now?" So I told her, "I'm a research assistant." Her next question is, "Is it related to psychology?" >.< Ooops, I don't know that a 14-year-old-"kid" even cares whether your job is related to your major or not. I said, "Yes", without further explanation.

2. Around 9pm, my twin-neighbours came. They are one year younger than me so I quickly approached them (happy to find similar-age-accompany). They are active in the Catholic youth group in our neighborhood and in their campus and they asked about what Catholic activity I join in Singapore and how the Catholic students' society in Singapore is like. Their Catholic students society in university in Indonesia even has choir!! Cool! We also shared our difficulties in recruiting people *sigh* and encouraged each other to keep our faith alive. There was one point when our conversation became more 'random' :P They asked me about "what books I've read this year" and "what movies I've watched". Hahaha. Then I was struck by the fact that I have not really read books for 'entertainment' this year. Hahaha.

3. Around 11pm, I felt bored and joined the aunties' group (my mom's and other aunties' group). Now the topic shifted to "life in Singapore". It's a good chance to clarify how life in Singapore is not a 'happily-ever-after' story, to clarify that I'm not under scholarship, but under tuition fee loan, and to clarify that "Yes, psychology needs research!". When they asked whether life in Singapore is good, the only thing I said was, "I can still go around at 11pm :P"

~ looking forward ~
Initially I thought it's very difficult to think of new year resolutions as a young professional. There is so much uncertainty till I don't dare to plan. However, after I found the link of spiritual new year's resolutions , I realized that yes...we still need new year's resolutions. Some people give up making resolutions because they feel that they always cannot fulfill them. Honestly speaking, I also still have difficulties fulfilling my new year's resolutions. This year I separate my resolutions/ promises and my target in various areas of my life. It might still be hard to fulfill my new year's 'promises', but it's a good reminder to separate the process and the result and to evaluate each day that passes by. At the end of the day, my work, my dreams, should lead everything to the glory of God.

Happy New Year!! :) May our eyes always gaze at Our Lord this year :) Amen.