i'm not dead!

hello. i'm still alive.

i'm actually looking forward (believe it or not) to this time next year when hopefully i won't have to write a line like that for a long while.

actually around this time every year i usually return from a little (totally hidden) resort called 'school of interior design'. i mean, deep inside i actually enjoy it but for the most of it, its a struggle once you're inside. its one of those places where as soon as you go in, you disappear within its walls. (let me tell you, places like that DO exist!) its as if the world you know, you knew before walking in, suddenly freezes for the time you're in there. and for the sake of producing great design, many (like myself) forfeit sleep, health, sleep, maybe a social life, sleep again, the relaxing (actually far from it) cycle goes on until you feel your entire body waging war against you to simply say something like 'stop it, you're hurting us'. you lose track of the time and when you DO return from this resort, you sorta don't know what to do with yourself!

ooh. i think i could write more about this resort, in which i'll be returning again early next year but i'll won't. for the time being i just want to say, hello!

indescribable.

since the last entry, i've had an amazing relevation.

if i could share it with ya in just two words:

knowing Him.

everything i ever need, desire, strive for begins with those two words (i realised).

i say, i need more faith.
i say, i want more compassion.
i say, i want to fear You more.
i say, i want to bear more fruits for You ...

in response God said if you want all this, then seek Me first.

i didn't know what to say. dumbfounded, yea a little. speechless, completely.

it only makes so much sense. how did i ever expect to see the outcomes first without the single most important thing? the intimate relationship with the Source of all these things which i so desire. if you think about this, everything comes down to those two words.

absolutely everything.

you want to know the meaning of life?
you're tired taking on all this by yourself?

you see, it inevitably comes back to knowing Jesus, knowing just where we stand and that He has always been waiting for us with arms stretch out wide, waiting to embrace us. again and again and again ...

it is only when we continue in this relationship with God that we will experience the things and life that we earnestly desire manifest itself, naturally (!)

this relevation couldn't come at a better time.

jesse: pt one

as i sat in my room last night, door shut, i heard something so familiar in the kitchen that i haven't heard in a while now. mom was laughing out loud like, always. so nice.

how is she? she's doing great. she's so much more active now (since she's only carrying one iv pack now). though she carries less, her dosage of antibiotics is more. so it may be another couple weeks before everything is cleared out of her. as a result of all this, dad is even less stressed now.

*******

i'm so excited for tomorrow. since its my day "off" school (though i'm in the studio 6 days a week anyways) i'll be having lunch with jesse ! this is a man of God, a brother, i've truly missed since i graduated from jackson. he's one of those unique individuals that you think of out of the blue (b/c ya miss him so)
so tomorrow we're (finally!) going to get a 'scheduled' opportunity to fill each other in our last .. four years (!)

*******

as i walked the 11 minutes of solitude from the bus stop back home (130am) i reflected on God's word i read this morning. God spoke profoundly into my life. i was reminded again (thank you!) that this life simply is NOT mine.

i often (so many many times!) chose comfort + security over the one (and only) thing that i claim means more to me than anything else in this world. its sad but true. how can i be so short sighted? its like choosing the second best (not even! sometimes i don't even know what is best) when the absolute best is offered to you, is handed directly to you, placed in your hands and you still refuse to accept it. yea, i mean, who does that? (me) i make some silly, silly choices. but despite my inadequancy to grasp God's best for me (something which never changes) He renders me to see (in His usual patient and unconditionally loving way) the one and only possible way to live my life ..

"Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit" - yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that." [ james 4.13-5 ]

305am. must continue this tomorrow (or next blog) goodnight! [ zzz ]

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHH! he screams quietly.

flabbergasted. thats what i am.

in the last 5 days i've experienced more politics in school than i've ever wished or asked for. i wish i could unsee, unfeel and unexperience all that i've gone through but i can't. and its scary how much it is affecting my perspective of school + people and my moods. sadly i feel so different. so bitter. so chained. so not me.

though i don't always show it, i'm angry. not at specific people but just at the way things are done.

if i didn't know any better, if i just came into the world this week, there would be 3 behaviours which i would've learned and accepted as a 'norm', if i didn't know any better b/c monkey see monkey do.

(1) as good sound solid constructive advice, it is OK for a prof to encourage students to polish a red shiny apple for another prof - to better the relationship at hand.

(2) the prior view is OK b/c everything is a game - so therefore you must do whatever it takes in order to get what YOU want. anything.

(3) there are particular times/situations that are SO important that, it is OK to manipulate others so to attain those objectives - at whatever the costs.

if someone told me a week prior, about this specific situation, i prob would've told them to simply give it all to God. but now i realised its not as easy as that. yes, i believe that is the way to go but at the same time you have to first understand the why you feel this way. or you might just end up supressing feelings without dealing with them first.

obviously i can't de-experience myself in all that i've witnessed this week. i'm just not sure where the fine line is drawn in understanding what really happens around you and where it starts to personally eat you up. those bitter feelings which you were given without you even asking. according to me, its just not fair. yes, so poor me *pat pat*

BUT at the very end of the day (when i'm done pitying myself and all those silly things we do) its not about me anyways.

so the obvious solution to all this is simply this: i'm going to live in a bubble! (why didn't i think about this earlier? i'm brilliant!)

i'm going to stop there. this is just part 1 of 2. part 2 will be how i have overcome this situation. where you stop is where God begins. of course the choice here is where do you stop. i've obviously pushed my self limit and it is certainly about time that i stopped pretending that i've got it all under control.

less (so much less) of me more (so much more) of Him.

it don't make no sense.

i can't remember a day in which i felt so utterly helpless.

a friend of mine is battling the academic (maybe even personal) bias of a uni prof. in a midterm the prof gave a particular student a 15 year leeway in their answer (marked correct) when my friend was only off by 3 years in comparison (marked as incorrect).

so how would you justify that action? could you?

i mean, where would you even start?

"hi prof, i think you've shown personal bias in marking ______ 's paper, but i was wondering if you could please remark it? if not, could you maybe explain why you don't like me?"

"so you're not going to remark it? but you'll explain to me why you have a bias against me? wow! that'll be great! thanks!"

ok. don't think that would happen anytime soon. but that's something i definitely cannot get it out of my head. its also something i can't do much about. not right now. not in where i'm standing. nor would i even know where to begin to fight a subjective battle such as this.

* though this event lingers abit on the negative side, i'm not feeling negative / bitter / depressed but just discouraged and feeling for my wounded friend. i just can't fully accept yet that this indeed happens right before our very eyes all the time but just makes itself so much more evident in times of midterms /exams / classes.

definitely more on this later.

"potato going down a water slide"

that is what you get for staying up all night. you say some crazy witty things - the crazy part is that you might not even know it. it will almost be 36 hours since i last touched left bed. it calls. not yet. i would like to remember as much of this day before i drop.

therefore, we can deduct from poser's conservation of something something: no sleep makes everyone slower BUT funnier. it's inevitiable.

i was so close to finishing my project. maybe another hour from finishing. of course without jeremy sharing his plastics with me i wouldn't even be able to say ' i was so close of finishing my project'.

this weekend i did something i haven't done since first year uni. i pretty much completed a project within the comforts of home, not in the studio. its been a quiet weekend, especially with the usual studio rats in montreal (returning tonight).

arthur bought johnny a belated birthday present - a mircosoft wireless mouse. johnny was speechless.

we finally have a theme for the upcoming coffeehouse: God's unconditionally love period.

(oy me eyes twitching again, think they're trying to tell me something)

2nd year anna bought me a postcard from montreal. in it, jesus points up, giving what is due to his father in heaven. something i don't do enough.

2 minutes prior, ______ from 2nd year bought me a caramilk for helping her plot. didn't do much but next time (no matter how embarrassing) i must ask her her name or it'll be another one of those 'hey you' situations.

2 days prior i found stanley on friendster. i haven't seen that guy since grade 9 and 10. that guy has the gentliest heart. remember always asking him to come to our church outreach events then in grade 11 i lost contact with him. so glad we spoke again.

"and scene" (brought back from the archives by jeremy from 2nd year)

mom + some random thoughts

mom finally came out of mount sinai - back into the comforts of her own home. though she's still confined - being attached to an iv dripper 24/7. a nurse will visit her every every night @ 6pm for the next two weeks. the doctors decided to 'up' the dosage of antibiotics even more. (even though she's "free", dad is still uneasy.) i must admit, this has been the longest week that i could remember.

here's a scary thought. mom suggested to me today that she didn't know what as scarier: being in a hopsital for having bacteria in your heart or the nurses at mount sinai. both mom and dad have lost complete trust in the quality of the canadian health care services during this last eights days.

just today, a ms nurse toke a whooping total of 3 (!) trys to find mom's main vein in her left arm. (can you believe that?) as a result mom just looks like she got in a serious arm fight before she left.

i'm simply lost for words.

on a much much more giving-all-glory-to-God note, sista gaile finally ties the knot tonight (!)

i've noticed in the last week (or two) my creativity in writing, designing, anything! spiralled downwards.

yesterday a good chunk of my friends went to montreal to compete in an annual architecture competition. i was supposed to go but i guess that didn't work out just as well.

something really neat happened wednesday. cy asked me if he could take my bible to montreal with him. at first i didn't understand why but in the end i gave it to him - told him to read (if he has the time) all that i highlighted and drew little symbols beside. can we say thank you holy spirit?

though this week had been extremely dramatic and slow, i've noticed even more God working in my life this week. can't explain that one yet but i definitely do think it has to do with prayer, yes. less of me, more of Him.

looking back at this week i've also realised that i'm dangerously becoming the 'busy christian'. its overwhelming. must seek that balance.

then alex v1.0 shared something that just pointed my eyes back to where it should be. 2 chronicles 7:14 says

"if my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will i hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."