The Ties that Bind

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Be kind to each and every person you meet for s/he is fighting some kind of battle that you may not know about.  Our blatant exterior differences aside, we are all a lot like each other - we just want to love and be loved.

Random Thoughts # 13

TRIALS

Let us give thanks
to the trials we meet
for with every pain,
we grow.
With every doubt,
our faith intensifies.
With every temptation,
our resolve strengthens.
With every acknowledgment
of our weakness,
God lifts us up.

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To the Bootlicker

Yes, you're on top. You may be deserving but then, how does it feel to be there while others have been relegated to just being your stepping stone, used as a means to your lofty but pathetic end?

I wish you the best despite what you did and still are doing, you know, but I refuse to turn into a shark just because people like you are. But I do believe in karma. What goes around does come around. So remember this and remember this well: It gets lonely at the top. You know why? Because there is no way but down.

And when you fall, remember me. Remember the times when backstabbing was your way of watching my back. When you deemed taking credit for my accomplishments was your due just because you think you're the boss.

Remember too all those that you have been a fair weather friend to. Remember turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to their cries because you were more concerned about getting to the top than being a friend.

Remember us because we will not be there when you fall. We will not be there to gloat. We will not be there to pity you. But we will not be there to cushion your fall either. And that, my dear, will make it the harder to bear.

Because then you'll realize that getting back up after a fall is much easier when you have friends who support and encourage you.

Truly, having it all means nothing when you have no friends to share it with.

Conversations with the Lord

When difficulties arose, I asked
"Why me, Lord? I have been good."
And I heard Him say, "My child, be still.
Learn to trust and obey my will."


When He beckoned me to follow Him, I asked,
"Why me, Lord? I am not worthy. I am sinful,
I am weak. Choose someone else."
But He said , "I chose you and in my eyes, you are wonderful."


When the going got rough, I appealed to Him,
"Enough, Lord. I can take no more."
"Daughter," He encouraged me, "I will never let you
be tested beyond what you can endure."


When my human limitations were evident, I said,
"Look, Lord, I keep on stumbling and making mistakes."
"Do not lose heart," He said, "My way is not easy.
Be steadfast in your faith, remain in me."


“Lord, I finally asked. “Why are you so good to me
despite my failures and iniquities?”
And He replied, “Beloved daughter, do you not see?
My love for you is unconditional and it will always be.”


"I am deeply sorry, Lord, for the times when I doubt.
I now humbly entrust myself to you, what it is that you want?"
"I ask nothing," he answered, "but your openness and generosity.
Respond to my love, love others truly and fully."

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===============

written on February 01, 2004 during my Spiritual Exercises.

i'm with you

if you don't know

what's real anymore,

if fear has taken over,

just remember

the time

when i was

in the same

predicament

and all it took

was for me

to know

that you're with me

to allay my fears.

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==========

for you. i hate to see you in pain and if i can only bear your struggles for you, i will. gladly.

the wedge between us

countless of times

you've said

that i am smart

and intelligent

but it pains me

to realize

that being those

won’t bring me

anywhere closer to you

come to think of it,

those may even have been

what drove you away from me.

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Taken Too Soon

I did not ask for you in my life but I was glad you did come to take part in it. For the first time, I was happy. Really happy. And I knew you were too.

Then you got sick. And that’s when our nightmare began.

“Why did it have to be you of all people?” I kept asking God this question. I had no answer. Yet.

At the back of my mind, I knew no one deserved any sickness but I couldn’t help but feel that it shouldn’t be you. You were too young. Too good a person. You had a whole lifetime ahead of you. Why then should it be mercilessly cut short? Why couldn’t the sick be a criminal? Or the one contemplating suicide? Why take away life from someone who wanted to live it to the fullest, to make the most of it?

I wouldn’t glorify myself by saying I accepted your fate (?) with an open, gracious heart. I did not. I fought it. Hated it. Hated you. Well, at least the part of you who firmly believed that it happened to you for a reason. What could that reason be? To make you suffer? And for what? To torture me?

I hated God. I hated Him for giving you to me only to take you away too soon.

For the longest time, I was wallowing in feelings of bitterness. I was mad. At whatever or whoever really, I couldn’t figure out. Maybe I was mad at the whole world. And at you for being steadfast in your faith. Couldn’t you or your faith nurse you back to health? I was mad at myself. For being unreasonable. I knew that when I would think things over, really think things over, I’d become more understanding. But I was too mad and hurt to think, to let God soothe me. I was specifically mad at Him. His reason for letting you get sick eluded me.

All my pain, my anger, compounded when we lost our battle for your life. Too mad and in too much pain, I withdraw deeper into myself, further nursing my anger, my hurts. Gradually spiraling towards feelings of despair, I stopped believing in anything good.

But something you used to say came back to me. “If there is anything I couldn’t let myself lose, it is my hope.”

Then I remembered. And I couldn’t help but smile as I was reminded of your zest for life, of your boundless energy that was fiercer than ever even when your health was failing.

You were never afraid of death, were you? You lived your life courageously that rather than death claiming you, you embraced it, as calmly as you have embraced life and lived it to the fullest.

While I lived mine in waste.

I couldn’t go back, I knew. But I knew too that I could change my view of things. That even when I still mourned your loss, I could bear it not with anger or despair but with hope.

I still couldn’t understand the reason why you were taken from me too soon. Maybe it was to teach me to be in control of my attitude towards circumstances that were beyond my control. Or maybe it was to teach me something about faith, to bring me closer to God and let me improve my personal relationship with Him. Or maybe it was about teaching me how to truly love someone but to love him in a greater way by letting him go.

Or maybe I just shouldn’t think about the why.

“Let it go,” you said in your deathbed. Then, I didn’t know what you meant. I even thought that the pain might be taking its toll on you that instead of using the personal pronoun “me,” you used “it.”

But now I knew better. For it wasn’t just you that I had to let go of but also those burdensome feelings of anger and placing blame on whomever I could conveniently put the blame on. It might even mean letting go of my quest for the why that I so desperately sought.

Letting go had never been so sweet.

I would always remember you, you knew that, didn’t you? And whenever I would, I knew it would not be just with love but with hope as well.