Relationship

Entering the 4th day of 2013, and yet again I'm faced with the same challenge that I faced in 2012.

There were so many things happened last year, I had to say it's very bittersweet. Traveled places, experienced new emotions and so on. But my biggest challenge in 2012 would be MAINTAINING RELATIONSHIPS.

Yes, you heard me correctly. And relationships are not limited to friends or family, it's including our relationship with GOD. I found a hard time to keep an intimate relationship with God, I had to admit. There were a lot of struggles and some self-pity in my part, but HE is greater than everything. HE showed me little by little that to maintain a relationship with HIM, most of the time HE just wants us to talk to HIM and quietly let HIM do the work instead of trying to so everything by ourselves. I learned my lesson, and I pray that I'll have a more intimate relationship with HIM this year, to experience HIM every single day.

Surprisingly, maintaining human relationships or perhaps friendship is a better term to call it, was just as hard. I built new relationships (meaning: new friends), upgraded some, fixed some and sadly failed one or two.

Since I didn't get a lot of holidays last year, the little spare time I had I used to reflect on myself. Why things happened the way it did, how did I fail on maintaining something that I used to be capable of doing a good job at? I thought I would never find the answer of those but right at the beginning of the new year I finally found that it's all back to my relationship with GOD.

As I struggled with my relationship with HIM, I lost patience, I lost tolerance and I became someone who lost trust in a lot of things. I became selfish and preferred to tend to myself first before others. I broke off relationships that I deemed "won't work anymore" and forgot that God could also do the same to me, yet HE kept me close and helped me fixed our relationships.

So I took time to list down each relationship that I failed to maintain. There's one thing in common, NEGATIVITY. I failed to try to understand why people were suddenly turned negative towards practically everything, I just cut them off from my circle of friends in my excuse not to taint myself with it. But guess what? That didn't make me happy either. I couldn't stop thinking about them nor stop caring. And I realized, there's a fine line between protecting your heart and ignorance. I was not protecting myself from negativity, I was being ignorant to those whom I called "negative friends."

By failing the most important relationship, I fail more of those. One cannot work without the other.

So I promised myself to love more, to do more, to learn more, to give more. I might have my heart broken by my earthly relationships, but my heavenly one will patch me up even more beautifully. And by fixing my relationship with GOD, I know I'll have the strength to rebuild the friendships that I have failed. I hope you can do the same.

Matthew 22 : 37 - 40, King James version

Jesus said unto him, Thou salt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.

And the second is like unto it, Thou salt love thy beighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

the meaning of life

Finally we entered the Year of 2010... I can't help but wondered how many more years will I have in this world. Could be not for long, but I really wish it's long enough for me to enjoy to the fullest. But I also hope I won't be there anymore when the earth ends its cycle... yeah, thanks to Global Warming hahaha

Last year's holiday wasn't long enough as I usually had it in the previous year, and compared to those other years it was an ordinary enough holidays. I didn't get to travel, only managed to get 2 days off (though fortunately Christmas & New Year fell on weekends) but I certainly enjoyed every second of it. Got to spend quality time with friends and families.

On the last day of a short trip with come close friends we went to a Dutch cemetery. Actually, it's a cemetery for Dutch & British soldiers who died in war in our country many years ago. Many are just the cross without a body buried underneath. It wasn't my first visit to the place but somehow this time it left a deep impression. When I looked at rows and rows of the ashes boxes. next to the small chapel... while reading the names and the birth & death dates, I wondered how they died. Was it instantaneously? Did they feel pain before they die? Did they have missing body parts? I couldn't help but wonder.

And of course looking at the white crosses across the green grass made me feel even sadder. Some of the crosses stated that the person died in a young age, not even 20. Maybe they died in war for something that did not believe in. Or maybe they really did die for their country. And yet the fact remain the same, they died for a reason. And for whatever reason it was, they died a hero. It is also a fact that wars are still going on in every part of the world. There will be more crosses without a body, more ashes to keep and more young lives wasted.

I'm already many years over 20... but sometimes I wonder if I really understand the meaning of life. It's one of my resolutions in entering the new year... to find more meaning of life. I'm probably not a soldier going to war, but I definitely have my own war. A war to succeed in works, a war to succeed in life. And I want to fight with faith and believe. That I'm trying my best and going all out in every battle so even when there's no tomb provided for me, somehow my life had become worth meaning. Happy New Year!!