2.38am: God is sooo majorly head-over-heels with me!

just almost done with preparing a teaching for caregroup tomorrow. my first time sharing something from scratch (you know, not like you’ve received the teaching before and then pass it down)

AWESOME! the amount of resources and learnings i receive just by researching and preparing on one topic alone is enough to make my eyes pop.

but anyway, i’m really looking forward to caregroup tomm!!

(p.s. acknowledging the fact that most of the stuff i do in school now are MATH-related – mgmt sci, stats, econs… i’m beginning to find some hope in them. thank God!)

and now… sleep or stats?

time alone with my Maker

power comes from stillness, strength comes from solitude.

- Bill Hybels, Too Busy Not To Pray

the art of writing cards

1. be sincere- mean what you write and write what you mean. the words will flow

2. be real- don’t purposely say things for the sake of sounding ‘nice’, or use common pretty phrases to make the reader feel good. the reader wants to know you’re not ‘mass producing’ the cards!!

3. be specific- if the person who reads my card is someone close to me, i’d know the little things about this person’s life, character traits, victories etc.. and then mention it. it makes the reader feel noticed !

4. write the date. sometimes people write to me and sign off without the date… (okay if you think that’s bad enough, some have no names =( i dont know who wrote the card!) when i recall… i like it how that i remb what happened during the period of time and how the card came about

5. you don’t need to hit an entire page of words, you just need to genuinely want to encourage the recipient of your card. even a line with 10 words, 10 words that comes from the bottom of your heart.. can make a difference.

anyways! not pointing out anyone here or saying that people write bad cards to me. was just rummaging through my box of cards i’ve received over the years. and i am determined to be a sincere and genuine encouragement card writer because i know how much it can brighten up someone’s day, or impart some strength to that person, or even just, lift that person up abit and make him/her feel appreciated (:

Go for it

i appreciate mentors who give me space, time and belief to try out something new, not do so well at it, then improve from it and build it up bit by bit.

just last friday at dance class, choonhui gave us a couple of eights to freestyle before our actual routine. for some reason i was feeling quite gung-ho that day so i tried out some moves (that i watched from online videos but never had the courage or the avenue to try out, but you know, the steps are just stuck in my head). we did the entire piece 3 times, 3 times i tried different moves for the free style, and out of these 3 times i fumbled and stumbled 2 times. but it didn’t get me down. in fact, it made me realise what i could do and what i had to improve on.

just a little more balance at this part.

not to swing my legs too fast at that part.

the parts where i stumbled were really quite cringeable, especially when you’re standing at the first row out of 30 people in the class and the full length mirrors reflect everything you just did.

on my birthday, i did something unthinkable too. it was one of the most cringe-able moments in my life, the ones where when you recall you feel like putting a veil on those images of memories because it’s too painful to look at or think about. in my dictionary, i classify those memories as disgusting. my leaders were there, my caregroup was there, and i can’t even remember exactly what i talked about. but that night was one of the sleepless nights i had, because i felt utterly disgusted with myself and i couldn’t come to terms with it.

now that i look back at that saturday, i am so glad i shared (for the first time, at that). i am so glad i talked about those convictions from the bottom of my heart. the words definitely didn’t come out the way obama would have inspired the americans, but whether i was such a good speaker or not doesn’t matter. the challenges i issued, the promises i made, it came out, and i won’t take it back. after some evaluation with jasmine, i had to calm myself down and at some point needed to scold myself, hey, it wasn’t that bad, is it?

i had to struggle with some low self-esteem and low confidence issues, and even more with the oh-so-high expectations i set for myself. cmon, all of us don’t start out a Choonhui or Ryan, neither do we start out an inspiring speaker or a great worship leader. i’m sure all of those people i know of, had their cringe-able moments too. it must have surely taken some serious hard work, courage to face up to disappointments, guts to evaluate the work done, confidence to move on, and among all these, countless disgusting moments before they are where they are today.

i will definitely choose to move on. those disgusting moments mould me, i should learn to discover what could have been done better, take a laugh at mistakes made, then MOVE ON! if everyone gave up just because their first times didn’t go well, what a waste it would have been. all that undiscovered potential….

just one thought that made me do the both things i mentioned above: if i don’t do it now, when?

sometimes we just need to deny those voices in our heads:

you can never do it.
don’t try it, the rest are so good, you’ll just be humiliating yourself in front of them.
you’re not ready for it yet, not now, the next time okay?

if i’m gonna squander my opportunity to go for it, i’m not gonna be given a chance to grow from it and go another time. there’s never a next time or a time when i am more prepared for it. next times will never come. i have no idea when will be the next class where we’ll have time to seriously consider some freestyling, i have no idea when will be the next time i’ll be able to find time to gather a bunch of busy JC kids, sit them down and talk about serious stuff like that.

there’s never room for failure, only room for improvement. doing something wrong, making a mistake, missing out an important detail etc all these aren’t the formula for failure. they just mean, you’ve done it, it can be better, MAKE IT BETTER THE NEXT TIME ROUND! the only formula for failure that i know of, is when i fail to even give it a shot and deny myself a chance to learn. imagine everything else is in place, you are the deciding factor, but you decide to back out of the deal, then there is absolutely no deal at all. (what’s the use if i have the best dance studio, the best sound system, the best choreographer, the clearest mirrors, but i don’t make use of them? they are just there for the sake of being there, then.)

i was very sure, from the look on choonhui’s face and her encouragement for me after that, she appreciated me trying out the stuff. despite my clumsiness, of course (:

won’t all mentors appreciate such acts too?

whose standards do you hold?

once again, i am so convicted that we cannot be neutral nor ignorant about things in life, because an empty mind would not remain empty. either you fill it up with biblical values and principles, or the world fills it up for you – whether unknowingly or knowingly.

John 10:10
The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

if i dont deliberately feed myself with the right food, something else will fill me up. and frighteningly, many a times, i won’t even know i’ve ‘learnt’ such a thing. simply put it, if we don’t go to Jesus, the devil will come to us – to destroy. if i don’t cling on to God’s standards, the world’s standard will become normal to me, just because everyone else is doing it! no way!

so i’ll make it a point to deliberately go learn. to deliberately go find out about things i don’t know. to deliberately keep myself on the level of biblical standards. to deliberately set myself apart for God.  

this came after a really good talk with my brother last night (hee thanks kor!) touching on certain topics that o.O were really eye-openers for me. like what i always tell people, so blessed to have my brother as MY brother

took some time to rest in God’s presence and just chill this afternoon. been a busy hectic week since monday. i’m really glad that God is a personal God, a personal friend, someone who thoroughly understands everything about me, who knows me in and out, and who stays with me even on my unlovable days.

on a completely different note, i passed my FTT today! (dont mock me all you people who have license already, i will show you small people can control a motorcar better than many of you do. now step back, and watch out for chia.)