I am Loved!

I’ve been struggling to forgive certain people in my life who once meant so much to me and had hurt me unintentionally. In this 1 year plus, I had prayed like crazy, cried and beg God to help me let it go. The times when I feel like I want to tear my hair out wondering what’s wrong with me, why can’t I just let it go?!?!

I want to and I’m willing but no matter how hard I work at it, I still feel the sting whenever I see these people. I feel like it’s such a torture to live with such pain in my life. I know others had it worse, but I do hate this feeling. That said, I do treasure these friendships, and I still hope that it’ll workout.

I met my Pastor for lunch last week. I shared that with him and how much it’s taking a toll on me emotionally & spiritually since my Dad passed on and even more now since my Uncle passed too. You know, sometimes when you are at a place in your life when you know that you needed support the most, somehow things happened the other way around. And you end up even more wounded then helped. Please, understand in anyway that I am in no way pin pointing or blaming. Just pouring my heart out and perhaps some of you out there might be able to identify with what I’m sharing.

But what caught me by surprise was when he share something that I felt like I needed very much to hear. Here it goes…

He briefly quoted Philip Yancey, “pain is a gift from God.” As he had listened to me, he concluded that maybe in the first place it isn’t about forgiving, because he knows that forgiving isn’t the issue for me. God knows that I am more then willing and I want to let it go because I cherish those friendships still. I surely can trust that He can and will help me work that out. But with the understanding that pain is a gift from God, and that if we had traded it with anything else, somehow what we receive from experiencing that pain and hurt cannot be substituted with something else. Nothing produces that kind of fruit Pain bears.

Instantly, something clicked within me. As I think about what it means when he says pain is a gift from God, does it mean I need to move from pushing the hurt and pain away by trying to forgive, to embracing that pain? Suddenly I understood how it was okay to feel that pain, that anger, feel that hurt and cry. But, the essence of it all is how you eventually choose to face it and deal with it.

Some people vent it out on others, some keep it within them until they can’t take it anymore, some sweep them under the carpet pretend nothing happened. While still there are some who would choose to find someone trusted, talk about it and let it sink in. After which, choose to release themselves of the pain a step at a time whenever they are ready and have God help to forgive. Because, honestly, only God can help us to forgive. It has never been possible for us human to do forgiveness, it’s just not in us. My natural instincts is to hold on to it and seek revenge. I want to see the person have a taste of their own medicine. But, we never realise that actually, the person we’re holding prisoner is ourselves. I realise that when I choose to forgive, I free my own soul. That’s why, forgiveness and reconciliation is so vital in every relationship, friendship, marriage etc.

It was almost like God speaking though my Pastor, answering my prayers long uttered to Him to help me understand what is this that I can’t seem to put my finger on. I know that embracing it would be the most difficult thing and I really would want to run away because the last I want to is to come face to face with pain. Oh the thought of it! But you know, I realise I was so desperate for an answer, I felt more relieved then anything else. By then of course, I was all in tears and already had a pile of tissue in front of me and you know why! And I though that was good.

I saw another side of pain and hurt today. It almost felt like, from today on I can see it as my friend. And it takes God’s grace and company daily to include this new realised “friend” as part of my life. Don’t you think I owe my maturity and who I can be today to this “friend”? Of course, God being the one guiding my heart in perspective. Sounds weird but that’s how I see it. heh…

But if I can choose, sure I’d prefer not to have pain in my life. I’d love to smile and be happy everyday, but what would happiness be without understanding what pain is? What would treasures (family and friends) be, without experiencing loss? Who would know how to love, without a man dying on the cross for our sins (hatred, greed, selfishness etc)? And it is precisely there are days so tearful and painful, there WILL BE beautiful moments of dear ones coming alongside if we allow, journeying those tough times with us that relationships blossom. Without pain, what would all these beautiful things be to us? All glory to my Dear Lord Jesus Christ who loves me so unceasingly. What can I say?

Your thoughts on learning to embrace pain in life? And extending forgiveness?

Im feeling really upset that I haven’t been able to spend much time with my mom. There are many times when I think to myself, is it worth it to give so much of my time to the endless activities happening in my life and not spend more time with my mom? Honestly, after losing my Dad I began to think like how more years do my mom have that I can spend with her. Seriously, I also don’t want to wait until my mom grow older or when too late already then I’ll regret not spending enough time with her like for my Dad. So, pretty much thinking about what are the things I can let go of so I can free up more nights to be around at home. After all, I’m getting married in 8mths 30days time and I won’t have much more time to be around at home with her. I do want to cherish all that time I can have with her still living under one roof and just learning to love her in ways that would make her feel loved lor… Im not good at it, but I’m learning…

I had my gown fitting yesterday! Eh, actually more like choosing my gown lar. heh… My sis and cousin went with me and we really had lotsa fun. I tried on like don’t know how many gowns and I had to decide among so many one evening gown and one white gown. I began to realise, I like funky gowns but of course I can’t choose all funky ones lar a bit overkill ah.

But that said, Im deeply grateful to God for how He has been helping us save and providing in times when we need the finances. Like yesterday when we had to pay another $1000 for the bridal package and we just nice managed to save in our joint account a little more then enough to pay for it. And now while we wait for the next upcoming thing to pay for we’ll continue to just save by faith and see how the finances work out from here. kekeke…

I know some people might be wondering how come I’m going for my gown fitting so early in the year when actually my wedding only happens in Dec. Actually I didn’t plan for that to happen so early myself. Honestly, as I looked at my schedule I’m quite thankful for the timeline because start of May till end June, “The Ultimate Road Trip” (TURT) will start. And I believe I’ll be very busy before and during this period therefore the gown fitting happening early is good! And since photo shoot was supposed to happen in June but I can’t make it as TURT is going on, we will need to work that in earlier even. Any later, in the opinion of the photographer it’ll start to rain more often and it’ll be tricky for a whole day photo shoot. YICKS!!

So at least for now, if some stuffs happen earlier I believe it’s a good thing as towards the later half of the year, we’ll need to be busy with our new house. Oh yes, so house hunting can happen in a week’s time!! Cos Drew’s parents finally managed to secure a place in Bukit Panjang already. YAY!! If everything goes well, I anticipate that OCT till DEC will be quite a stressful period cos reno and securing of furnitures will need to happen. Heh heh… I’m excited already!! Bleah… but, let me get thru TURT first!!! AHHHHHHH….

You start to realise that life is so fragile when u see someone you are close to lying lifeless on the bed in the ICU ward. This, i felt before when my Daddy passed on 1 year plus ago. I begin to see that, men, has so to speak, control over their own life when God gives them life. We THINK we can have control over our own life and do whatever we want, but only for a while. Until it dawn on you that your destiny is held in the hands of someone greater then you are, life is meaningless isn’t it? But the love and time spent with family will become so precious. It’s only in moments like this, our hearts sees clearly what should be most important!

Thinking back, I felt like the period when I lose my Dad was the time when my faith was tested, and I’ve grown the most. I believe nobody can see it and say it for me but its something I feel   inside of me when I meet someone who’s going to/has lost their loved ones that’s different.

I find, that God had did something to my heart, something has morphed and grown. I realise I have a new ground to til and work on. I am able to pray and grieve together with that person and the heart i used to want to extend but dare not when I attend a wake, I now want to do without a thought. When I had such a painful and hard time groping around for my emotions then, is now a new ground that God opened for me to feel for others and pray for them. Of course if I had to choose, I don’t want to have to experience such pain, but I lost someone so precious to me, I gained a new heart for those who will go through similar experience and will soon find a new heart, new ground that God opens up for them in time to come, only to be discovered for themselves.

Of course, no one person’s experience of loss is the same. In fact, I believe I will still never be able to fully grasp and understand the pain of another but I know, we can all journey together in a common hope we have in Christ. Because, I continue to hold on to the faith and hope that i’ll meet my Daddy again in heaven and dwell in His presence together with those that I live my life with all that years on earth whom I loved dearly. I just think it’s a very beautiful picture lar… Haha… I also don’t think I will know how to minister to someone

JIA YOU JIA YOU!!!

I haven’t been baking since early last year but since I’ve always have an urgh to bake.

Like this Sunday we’re planning to celebrate a brother’s birthday and my heart leap at the thought of, “Oh! I could bake him a cake!!” I was so excited also as CNY is round the corner and I have been dying to experiment my favourite new year snack, pineapple tart from scratch including the jam ( most people would choose to buy the jam from Phoon Huat cos that’s the most time consuming part, and that’s how unrealistically ambitious I am) I HAVE to try it!! And I was so thrilled at the thought of that I even already went ahead and took one day leave, planning to try it.

But then, i thought of the unpleasant experience I had with my mom whenever I bake, I scrap the idea. I am sitting here still thinking should I just not do the pineapple tart cos I know it’s going to be a messy process. Definitely I will clean up along the way but I doubt I will enjoy the process following with my mom being upset upon knowing I’m baking. Someone baking in her kitchen is equivalent to “I have to clean up after you!”

PLUS, it’s CNY period she has already been asking me to take a day leave to do spring cleaning with her and my sister and I was so unwilling to take a day leave just to stay home to do spring cleaning, I rather sacrifice my weekend on sat to do it. Cos oh well, you know it’s not fun nor relaxing to spring clean with “mom” I don’t know for you but I always come out of the spring cleaning session feeling like I can never do enough and not good enough to my mom’s standard even when I have exhausted all of my energy to do my best of cleaning up (and mind you I do housework often ah) so I am not foreign to it.

With regards to cleaning up the kitchen, her standard is to leave the kitchen smell free and in original condition as it was. Her kitchen is spick and span and the dinning table is clean, nothing is suppose to be on it one. With that, when you bake sure there will be lingering butter or cinammon smells, it’s impossible in my experience to keep it smell free. How do you clean up the kitchen to the point of it totally not smell of those wonderful lingering butter when you are baking a cake?? Maybe some might disagree with me but I’ll tell you why I think this way.

I start baking at 6pm and I finish by 1 or 2am kind. Cos after I am done, I have to mop and scrub and keep ALL utensils into cupboards and everything has to be in total original position. Remember? NOTHING is supposed to be on the dinning table. And of course smell free, so I’ll mop many rounds, wipe the walls many rounds, wash and wipe dry all my baking utensils (they need many rounds of washing cos it’s oily from the butter etc) and all have to go into the cupboard (I can’t leave it at the sink to drip dry and return it next day), spray air freshener MANY MANY MANY times!! Technically it isn’t a bad thing cos cleaning up is good lar.

STILL… the next morning when I get up for work, the first thing I get is, “Aiyo Von ah, kitchen smell of the butter smell you know. And I have to wash all your baking utensils again cos still got butter smell.” I’ll think to myself feeling so sian, “Har? Are you sure?? I wash sooo many times eh!” She’ll continue, “Next time you want to bake you have to clean properly mah! You don’t know how to clean properly don’t bake lar.” By now you can imagine how frustrated I felt, cos to bake something I have to labour till past midnight just so she say I never clean properly.

Of course, my mom has been very gracious already so far. Understanding that she is someone who appreciates a very clean house other then just allowing her to nag at me whenever I bake she does appreciate the pandan cakes etc that I make as compared to a few years ago when I first started. So I am thankful for that. Yet, I still feel really discouraged sometimes whenever I think about how hard it is to just have to bake a cake and feel so stressed that I will not be able to clean to her standard. I rather not.

So, I feel so torn on the inside cos I haven been baking since early last year. I do feel very sad because I don’t understand how hard this is for me to down to baking again at home. Cos honestly baking is suppose to be very therapeutic for me now it’s becoming dreadful and super tiring. And if I do have my own kitchen I know there are many things I would arrange and keep things very differently just cos I’m a baker and my mom isnt and that itself makes things very difficult for me trying to bake in her kitchen.

That said, I do respect my mom’s way of upkeeping her kitchen still. Imagine next time when I have kids and they too want to bake they’ll also feel like they’ll do things different from me. Respecting the fact that veryone of us is very different la… So, I guess I’m just trying to avoid rubbing shoulders with my mom and I do hate getting nagged. So nothing personal against my mom. It’s basically we do things very very differently and our expectations are totally different. Even the way we see things are so different even. So yes lor…

In the end, I decided to put off making pineapple tart. It’s ok, when i get my own place end this year, if God wills, I can attempt my pineapple tart for next year’s CNY. And I can bring it home to my family to enjoy. That sits better with me for now.

*pineapple tart… sob sob*