It’s my tradition that, when a new hardware is installed for my desktop, I check up on the general condition of my computer again. After installing the software packaged in the LG DVD writier I bought yesterday (along with the AOC LCD monitor), I was surprised to find out that the Mother Console has less than a gigbyte of storage left! So I proceeded to weed the garden of files in my hard disk (which is a pathetically low 40 GB thing).
After uninstalling a few games, I stumbled upon the ‘relics’ of my old computer files. What’s more surprising is stumbling on a file titled ‘AR’s Journal 2003′. Whoa… and the memories came crashin’ again… [this was the time when either I was ignorant of blogs or the craze hasn't come on yet]
Diggin’ up through the small pile of about 5 entries from January to March 2003, I found this bit, which I’d like to share:
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March 16, 2003
Friday
3:46 am (our clock)
3:16 am (real time)
Project 6 apartment, after coming home from celebrating our 7th monthsary of being brought together by God
I felt the urge to write in my journal because I’ve had revelations recently – one was through a dream, the other was through a book.
On Cooking Sinangag
I dreamt that I was making fried rice for breakfast or lunch but instead of putting salt, I’ve put sugar in it. Sugar of course will make it sweet. But fried rice needs to be salty. Nina has always commented that I was always perky – that I lacked empathy, especially when at times she felt low. I tried to fight of the idea – that I wasn’t always perky or at least I knew how to empathize. But after considering, I think she was right.
That’s one of my characteristics. The way I coed with my life before was to always look at the brighter side of things when things were going wrong. In that manner, I negated whatever negative thing was happening and I think that’s when I lost my ability to empathize. When I had the dream, I shrugged it off as another spurt of my creative unconscious. but then, the meaning of the dream dawned on me this morning and I knew I had to write it down before I forget my lesson. As perky and positive as I was, I was always putting sugar on all things. And yes, even sinangag – which was supposed to be salty. I had to realize that God gave us humans a range of emotions for use in the proper way.
I shouldn’t feel that I always need to cheer up my wife or myself. I should realize that emotions need to be felt – and there’s nothing wrong with that. Salt adds flavor. In times when my wife or I am going through trials that bring about disappointment and a sense of being low, I need to realize that flavor means getting what the lesson is, and never to lose hope. That it’s ok to feel that way because of the events that happened. That I know how it feels in a parallel situation in my life. Fried rice isn’t just salt added to cold rice. It needs to be cooked and subjected to fire and a lot of tossing and turning to get it’s taste even and have the rice heated properly – much like how God cooks us to perfection with all the trials that come our way.
My Wife’s an Angel
I’m currently reading a book entitled ‘Soul Making’. It talks about the desert experience and is a fresh new way to believe in Christianity – a way of believing the hearkens back to the ancient Church Fathers. I’ve been a slow reader and I’m only at the first chapter (after a relatively long introduction). On page 48, the author Alan Jones gives path to the way of believing like the desert fathers and mothers:
1. the need for detachment
2. the belief that nothing is accidental
3. the fact that we are not as free as we think we are
4. the conviction that remembering is an important part of the process of growth
5. the belief that while we have to do much of what we do alone, companionship is essential
6. the necessity of contemplative commitment
7. an appreciation of our “fallenness”
8. the mystery of having to let go of the things and people we love most
I’m now reading a section on no. 5 on the 8 steps – that companionship is essential. It talks about the need for others to bring out revelations in ourselves. Alan Jones talks about these people as Angels of God. Much like his experience with desert monks in Egypt, where he stayed at a monastery and was treated nicely. Asked why the monks treated him well, the monk said ‘you might be an angel’. In fact, that’s the philosophy of the monks who lived in the desert – that all who come their way might be angels of God. He sights three examples on angels in different people. One excerpt was in Franny and Zooey where he talks about the Fat Lady as an angel.
Angels bring about revelations that, without which, would hinder our full potential for growth. Now I truly believe that God has sent my wife as my angel. She has brought me to many revelations about myself. She has made me realize, as in the first revelation I talked about, that I have to come to terms with who I really am. She has made me realize how I’ve let myself be stupid for other people and that in turn has led to them taking advantage of me. But with those revelations, she has come to inspire me to become the person I am meant to be. The Inner Self whom God has created from the beginning. A person who will stand up for the right principles, uphold it with courage, and look through the eyes of love.
I know it’s a continuing process and revelations often shock and are initially rejected. I’m learning.
They say that the beginning of wisdom is the fear of God (one of the Wisdom books in the Bible, I think it’s in Sirach…). The second step is admitting “I don’t know”. That’s when we are open. That’s when God can mould us and teach us our true worth.
Thank God He led me to my angel. And now, She’s my wife – whom I love very much.
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March 29, 2003
Saturday
6:16 am (our clock)
5:46 am (real time)
Project 6 apartment, after coming home from Nina’s workplace due to an overtime
“The believer is concerned with life. Why, then, all this talk of death and pits of terror? We all have to be – indeed, the believer is convinced that this is what God wants for us. The message is unambiguous: If you want to live life to the full, you must surrender life. What a paradox!”
- p. 72, Death in the Desert, Soulmaking: The Desert Way of Spirituality. Alan Jones. Harper Collins. 1989
“To come to this place where one is truly alive, one must hit rock-bottom. There must be a breakthrough to the place of deepest helplessness, ‘Then at last,’ writes Andre’ Louf, ‘a beginning can be made.’”
- p. 83, The Gift of Tears, Soulmaking: The Desert Way of Spirituality. Alan Jones. Harper Collins. 1989
