Loving when it is Hard to Love, Letting Go when Love isn't Love

Didn't have enough space to put this on facebook, so just steal it here

GUESS WHAT TIME OF THE YEAR IT IS???

Yup, after not blogging for two weeeks and a bit... Here's a post to keep this blog afloat! If there's one thing I cherish that I share with people, it's this blog. It's been here for the past five years and essentially is the mental/philosophical/thinking part of my self. No face pictures here: all brain.

So Robyn came to visit this past weekend for our annual trip to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens. It was so lovely. Praise God! It was supposed to rain on Saturday (it did in the morning when we went to get free comics at the local comic store) and by the time we got to the park which was like... 1:30, it was sunny! I was so friggin happy.
All I can say is, praise God!

Anyway I took L for a spin- 'L' is my camera. lol. Yes it has a name. I took over 500 images and my comp is dying with all these photos and thesis work (it warned me that I only had like 75G of space left... lol).

So I hope you enjoy these images. On my free time aka procrastination time, I've been editing all 500 of them and whittling them to a mere sixty to put up on facebook. I love my camera. love love love.


The most AMAZING green tea roll cake! We brought our own little picnic and got this at the local Japanese supermarket.. it was so friggin good.


What I love about the festival is that we can experiment with different composition angles, lighting and poses for future references.


I love macro shots, I love my camera



How great is our God.
It's funny how 'coincidental' things can be: I was watching a Chris Tomlin interview on that particular song and was moved by the simple meaning behind it.. and then we sang it for worship at Senior Grad Night this past Saturday.
Because in the end, all we can say is how great is our God.

And then I was listening From the Inside Out, and we sang it on Sunday! lol. Mind you, I only have a handful of Christian songs so...

But I really love this worship song Shining by Phil Wickham. Love the electric guitar.
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So I'm more or less done my thesis. I completed my defense just yesterday- Monday. It was friggin nervous because there was so much to say and only ten minutes to tell them the essence of my business concept. But the night before I practiced until my mouth couldnt move. Anyway, I think it went well. Standing up there in front of forty something people reminded me of this one particular seminar I had to do for my English class back in Gr11. Now if you understand how difficult English was back in high school, you'd understand why I was hyperventilating (hence the reason why my english is so good... all the hell we went through UHS has made me so thankful because now writing and expressing ideas comes relatively easy. THANK YOUR MR SILVER although you freaked the crap out of me). Anyway when I got up in front of the class back then, an overwhelming sense of peace came over me. It was God then as it is God now. The calmness I felt as I explained my thesis step by step was the very same feeling I had six years ago.

I sent most of you an invite to view my thesis project but if I didn't, let me know and I'll send it to you.
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Life has been good and... hard.
Life has been hard because I've had to face one relationship that I really did not want to face. Yet my heart was convicting me to do something about it because I knew that if I just tried to avoid it, I'd be yet again, running away. I've come to realize, that when a friendship doesn't work out, I usually physically move away as in I leave the country: "oh well, it never worked out but it's not like I have to see them again." Yet I've slowly begun to realize that though the environment around me has changed, the problems are the same because I hadn't internally changed. So while I was presented with a new set of friendships, the same issues would occur because I was too afraid to look within.
I am good at making friends. Really good. I fail at keeping them.
I'm really good at my work and I love what I do. God has blessed me with talent and skills in an industry I am passionate about. I'm a student who does well at whatever I'm called to do. Yet when it comes to relationships I get a straight 'F' every time for none of mine last.
I'm trying to learn to love even when it's hard to love. To love when I feel like others don't deserve any grace, that I am right to dislike them for 'x' reasons. Yet God has been knocking at my hollow head and reminding me that I never deserved the grace that He has showered upon me, therefore, do not those very same people He placed in my life, deserve forgiveness because He forgave me first?

I'm trying to learn to love other people's love languages. We don't care all in the same way: yet I've had difficulty accepting a recent acquaintance who was introduced into our group about a month ago. Initially I disliked her: she seemed really gushy and therefore to me, she was trying to suck up to certain people. Yet I am sure that when people see the lengths I go to do something for someone, they probably find it annoying too.
Thankfully God's been helping me to see her for who she is. That her gushiness is a language of love: to compliment people in order to show her care for others. And with the help of fellow Christians around who were struggling with the same issue, we began to see her desire to feel accepted and this was her way of communicating it.

It's hard, it's so friggin hard. Because the human part of me wants to feel self righteous, the human part of me wants to accept only certain people into my life.
Yet we are called to die to ourselves each day, to forsake all that was old for something new.

As I was prepping for thesis, this passage of Scripture really spoke out to me:
Hebrews 12:1
1Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.

Remind yourselves that the battle has been won, the course has been set. All we have to do is to run it.
That is why I am not really worried about the future for I've been really trying to cling on to the hope that God is in control- that so as long as I set my mind/heart on His Kingdom, He will make my paths straight.

Just run.

You guide me through the dark, you calm my fearful heart. I will rest in You. You give me perfect peace, fulfill my deepest need, I will rest in You. Shining, Phil Wickham

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While I've been struggling to love those who are hard to love, I'm still finding it hard to let go.
Although he's been gone for a while now, I still think of him.

I think this is part of the reason why I've been trying to reject watching too many dramas because they do stir up unnecessary emotions that I do not really need in life right now. If God were to awaken love, it wouldn't be through j-dramas.

It's silly isn't it, that I cling on to this silly hope that perhaps we will one day meet again. I thought, at the time, by sharing this, I could let go all together. But I can't and I know in my head that this is stupid, foolish and pointless. I tell myself that these are temporal, shallow feelings that have no depth or insight. They're just those "tee hee" feelings.

The thing is, is as a Third Culture Kid, I am attracted to other people who are from many places. The issue with that is is that we move a lot therefore are not in one place long enough to get to know each other well.

The other night, I dreamt of him. I don't really remember it but I do recall seeing him again and meeting his girlfriend who was in reality, the girlfriend of a previous interest. All I remember is that I was disappointed though I pretended I was happy for him.
Anyway the day after, it just so happened he popped online. We rarely speak because I've made it a rule never to message him first (emotional-sanity rule) so I hadn't spoken to him since February.
Yet, of course, that day he decided to message me. In my head I was just thinking about the ridiculousness of this event.

And I'm not sure what to make out of these feelings that are constantly worming their way back in. I acknowledge the fact that they are based on the most superficial of love, if you can call it 'love', yet I'm finding it hard to totally reject them.

Sometimes, I wish he got a girlfriend, so my hopes would be crushed and that I could start anew- this time making sure I don't get emotionally close to anyone of interest.

I'm not sure what to do. I've submitted this all to someone far greater than I, yet the only thing I can do is be patient and wait. I'm just not sure what kind of answer I should be receiving.

sighhhhhhhhhhhhh
back to studying for my zhong wen kaoshi.