Jan 25 - Monday "Karma"

FROM http://marieclarisse.tumblr.com

Karma. It’s such a strong truth (aren’t all truths strong?) that I believe in. Not exactly in the line of punishment or retribution but simply as an “extended expression or consequence of natural acts.” From what I picked up in Wikipedia: “Karma means deed or act and more broadly names the universal principle of cause and effect, action and reaction that governs all life.

What goes around comes around.

But why am I putting this in my gratitude journal? Am I thankful for the recent news about how some people (who caused us pain) faced their own karma lately? Is this me having the last laugh after all the mental anguish we’ve gone through? Is it seeing what I knew was definitely coming? The climax to the movie that I said at one point I wanted to enjoy with a bucket of buttered popcorn? The proverbial part where the evil-doer is humbled?

NO. I’m just thankful to be reminded of this truth that keeps my soul in check.

But I must admit that I have mixed feelings about it. I’m not a hypocrite to deny that it feels nice (I’m only human), but then my heart also feels a little sorry. Besides, nothing is officially over for as long as the wheel of life keeps turning. Sometimes we’re up there, sometimes we take an unforeseen vertical drop to the abyss.

God’s Hand touches us and moves us back to the right path when we get derailed — IN SO MANY MYSTERIOUS WAYS! Sometimes it hurts, but it is imperative. I’ve seen it happen at one point in my life and I’ve paid my dues. If you’re a New Age believer, it is the universe’s way of purifying and perfecting you. But, hey, it’s the same thing, don’t you think? Just a different language. God has a way of teaching us lessons. He has a way of balancing life. He will keep our feet on the ground each time we need it and He will teach us how to be humble, how to love, share and understand, how to stand up for peace, how to work harder in order to achieve or own something…and how not to be slothful nor greedy when you have it.

I’ll be afraid for those who will seek not to be fair and those who will do others wrong because one day, the proverbial lesson that’s bound to come…will come in a gruesome package. It’s a fact of life. We get what we deserve. Even pencils get sharpened when they’re dull.

And the epic challenge is…that rule definitely applies to me.

Boy, ain’t that scary? 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lord Jesus, teach me to be generous;
teach me to serve you as you deserve,
to give and not to count the cost,
to fight and not to heed the wounds,
to toil and not to seek for rest,
to labor and not to seek reward,
except that of knowing that I do your will.

-St. Ignatius of Loyola

Bayang Magiliw

The 16^th of January has always been significant in my childhood. It meant the Town Fiesta. It meant food and family and friends and tons of fun.

Today, I celebrated my 4^th one that’s entirely different from the fiestas I’ve known. Close, but not quite. But I’m thankful that even if I’m miles away, I am able to enjoy the day as – by habit and tradition – I should.

I am thankful for the chance to sing the Philippine National Anthem (“Lupang Hinirang”) again with my right hand on my chest. Funny how each rare opportunity to sing it causes tears to well up now. When this is easily taken for granted back home…in schools, government offices or over the radio. Because it is played everyday, perhaps? Maybe because we don’t cherish what we have until the privilege is taken away. I’ll wait for the next Manny Paquiao match and once again sing it with a passion. Sometimes though, I still sing it inside my head. Sometimes in my heart. I just don’t want to forget the lyrics.

It’s amazing isn’t it? Each of us always tries to bring a little piece of home anywhere we go in this world. A movie DVD, some songs in our mother tongue, a hot aromatic pot of some dish we grew up having. Most of the time, we try to put these million little pieces together in order to recreate our lives as one people away from our motherland…oh the million parties and the celebrations! We try as much as we can to preserve the culture and our faith.  And so our roots will remain known and never forgotten, especially by the succeeding generations who no longer had the chance to experience what it was actually like.

But I am sure, these little pieces of home in our hearts are really solely meant for our own selves, so we can go on with our lives away from the home that we know, and in the way that we know best.

  

PS.

http://teacher-c.blog.friendster.com/2007/01/happy-fiesta/ (an article I wrote for the 2007 souvenir program)

"Leopard"

- last week at Coffee, Anyone? --

 

I know that the mysterious color game which pervaded women's Facebook profiles recently has raised a lot of issues. There was a message being passed around women's inboxes to post the color of their bra on the profile sans any explanation, raising the curiousity of the male population and the rest of the clueless.

The sexual innuendo was apparent, but it is actually meant to raise breast cancer awareness, so they say.

What's my take on this?

I hear Machiavelli whispering to me. "THE END JUSTIFIES THE MEANS."

Really?

That is, if you didn't miss the point of it all and have conscientiously launched thyself on a routinary self-check while you were at it. After all, it is what the game was supposed to remind us all as soon as the message hit our inboxes. If only there was an extra line on the message enjoining us to a worldwide self-exam project. I hope you didn't miss the point.

Early detection is the key, so please do your homework if you haven't yet. This is one of the causes that I feel so strongly about, regardless of the kind of publicity gimmick it takes.  It's a long story.

But now you know what I was wearing two days ago. And that I've done my homework.

Have you?

The One

What am I doing with yet another blogsite?

The news is...this is probably gonna be the last one I'll be putting up in a long, long time. I'm not going anywhere! I just believe that I have finally found THE ONE, the ever-proverbial "The One" that suits me and the vision I have for my blogging career path. It's almost tantamount to something I can marry and stick with for life.

Why?

First of all, I'm thinking of retiring my blogsite hosted by Friendster because I'm seriously contemplating on deleting my Friendster profile. Maybe, maybe not. I aim to stick to a single networking site as much as possible and Facebook pretty much answers all my networking needs, including keeping in touch with my friends. I might try and import my original blog contents here, but I'm not sure yet because my being so crazy sentimental is seriously getting in the way. That blogsite and I go along way...like 2005, way before most people jumped into the blogging bandwagon. That's also the only site I have that's squeaky clean, and I mean non-monetized, tag-free, award-free and ad-free too. I don't sell anything there, and the links are carefully chosen by me as necessary to the post, and not because some company wants me to mention it.

I'm liking it here in my new home (it makes me feel less of a gypsy now). And it feels right. Aaaah, the one...

This will be the portal for all my public spaces on the web. I'm happy with how it looks. This is my second time to utilize a template from Falcon Hive (he/she always nails it for me), and my 6th on the Blogger platform. My 2nd own domain.

I must admit...I’m absolutely embarassed by some of my blogsites because they are monetized —so you’ll see ads, product reviews and forced URL links strewn around including on my supposedly “sincerely written” posts (but don’t worry I’m still far from selling my soul, plus they rake in the moolah so I can’t complain about this no-brainer side job, really). If you're curious, check the right side of this site, I have painstakingly listed all my sites down on the side bar. A few of them might come across as narcissistic for you (ouch!), but seriously, who doesn't blog these days? And let me tell you this. I need them. I need to express myself in so many different ways because of my artistic nature. And it's almost therapy for me because it helps me sort through so many things and experiences, put things on perspective and just embrace life -- imperfections and all. I need it too because I yearn to share my experiences with you hoping that one day, there is one soul out there who will pick up something good, and what he needed exactly.

I’m still in the process of tweaking this site here and there. But I promise you that this is going to be clean, hopefully delivering only the vision, no less. Which is…which is…uhm, I’m still thinking-rethinking the process. (Well, maybe some Amazon Affiliate badges on the side won’t hurt…and some Google Adsense banners --Ad’cents’ is a better name for it, if you ask me). Not even. No paid links or entries for sure.

Woohoo!!!

Come back here for some inspiration fill once in a while. Because I'm hoping to offer that exactly!

Under One Roof

The actual date of this post is 10/11/10. Not 01/01/10. But I had to position this here because every post preceding this is actually imported from my first blogsite, my first home, "THOUGHTS AT 3AM" in Friendster which eventually became "TIL THE CRACK OF DAWN" (sort of like a face lift I toyed with when Friendster moved it to Wordpress)...

That site is (or was -- depends on when you read this) co-terminus with my Friendster account which I'm about to delete this Halloween. I am in the process of purging my social network sites because I want to stick to one. Friendster became a redundancy, so to speak, and I just hate the thought of information and photos laying around on something idle and out there and just isn't useful anymore, except for occasional blogging which also became scarce through time.

But I can't bury my memories in my Friendster blog to forgottendom if I let Friendster go! After all, it was my first online journal and the journey goes back to 2005!

I'm sentimental, and waxing nostalgic a hell lot...

WHAT A JOURNEY IT HAS BEEN!!!

I can't expound further. You can read deeper if you want to.

I'm just sayin'.



Well, from this date backward lies a 5-year memorabilia (no, it's not a grave!) of my first blogsite, made possible by an angel named Kaye (http://wahmaholic.com) who imported the entries for me because I didn't have the time. She also made sure the comments and photos came with them. Post after post after post.


Finally, my thoughts are under one roof.

So....

In memory of my first "home".

(click on the button, if it still works, then that means I haven't had the heart to extinguish my Friendster account just yet, if it doesn't work anymore, then I have truly made that leap!)

Good night, Thoughts at 3am. Good night, Til the Crack of Dawn. Good night.