What I cannot change

During last night's mass, Fr. Manny, our parish priest, delivered a very fitting homily regarding the power of Jesus to cast out demons. He started off with a story of a woman who was presumed to be possessed by a bad spirit, which he later found out as having been possessed with another "spirit". It turned out that the woman was having some sort of a nervous breakdown because she was hiding something from her parents-- her pregnancy. Fr. Manny shared this with the woman's parents who fortunately celebrated the coming of the baby into their family. The woman must have felt desperation and hopelessness in her situation, which led her to act as if she was being possessed. She thought her unwanted pregnancy would cause bitterness inside her family, but it turned out that her parents knew better.

Fr. Manny wrapped up the homily with the assurance that God is in control of our lives. And I know, He is.

As he was delivering his homily, I was introspecting, trying to connect the words he was saying to the thoughts and feelings in my heart. The voices around which claim my alone-ness are lying. My God is in control. I'm glad I cannot change that.

Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish

This is the speech delivered by Steve Jobs (Apple Founder) during the 2005 Stanford University Commencement Exercise which always inspires me: 

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

(taken from http://news.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html)

Kaibigan

Nagbasa ako kanina ng paborito kong columnist. Topic niya ngayon ang tungkol sa halaga ng kaibigan sa buhay natin. Totoo namang mahalaga ang mga kaibigan at masasabi kong maswerte ako dahil marami akong kaibigan. Sabi nila, magkaroon ka lang raw ng limang matatapat na kaibigan, ok ka na. Ang swerte ko dahil lagpas pa doon ang meron ako, sa tingin ko.

Karamihan sa mga kaibigan ko madadaldal. Pero merong ilan na sobrang tahimik. Maingay man o hindi, mahalaga sila sa buhay ko. Sana, makasama ko sila kahit sa pagtanda ko. :)

--
Naaawa ako sa naiwang pamilya ni Iggy Arroyo. Ang gulo kasi ng sitwasyon nila.Hindi nila alam kung kanino mapupunta yung katawan niya. Hirap kasi ng higit pa sa isa ang napangasawa e. Malamang malakas ang laban nung Alicia Arroyo kasi siya ang legal wife. Kahit na mas minahal pa kamo ni Iggy si Grace, iba pa rin yung may pinanghahawakang papel. Ang sakit siguro noon. Alam mong mas minahal ka, pero hindi mo mapaglalaban yun. Kasi sa bandang huli, sa papel lang din naman nauuwi ang lahat. Hindi mo pwedeng sabihing mas minahal namin ang isa't-isa, sa akin siya naging masaya. Kasi hindi naman 'yun ang basehan kung kanino dapat mapunta ang isang taong patay na. May mga batas na umiiral na nilalagpasan ang pagkilos ng pag-ibig. Ganyan sa totoong mundo.

---
Pinag-iisipan ko nang husto ngayon kung magpapalit ba ako ng choice na law school. Naeengganyo na yata akong mag-Ateneo dahil sa ilang mga praktikal na kadahilanan. Pero kelangan kong timbangin nang husto. May oras pa ko para mag-isip. Tutal isang taon pa ko halos sa masters degree ko.

-h

Habang nagsesepilyo kaninang umaga, naisip ko

Huwag mong hayaang hawakan ng ibang tao ang spirit mo. Oo, fair lang na ibahagi ang sarili mo sa isang taong nakakapagpasaya sa’yo. Ibigay mo sa kanya ang puso mo, pero huwag ang buo mong pagkatao. Para kapag umalis siya, masaktan ka man, umiyak ka man, hindi ka mababawasan. Oo, may kulang kang mararamdaman, pero ang pagkatao mo, ang values mo, in-tact pa rin. 

Huwag kang magmumukhang kawawa. Huwag kang magpapaawa. Dahil mas malaki ang halaga mo kaysa sa pag-ibig na iniwan niya sa’yo. Tandaan mo ‘yan.

At huwag mong kalilimutang mag-floss pagkatapos magsepilyo. 

-h

Dear Mr. Kupido

Nag-archery training ka ba talaga?
Nagtataka ako sa'yo e.
Madalas kang dumaplis.
Kahit si Anne Curtis, napakanta mo.
Walang-hiya ka raw at nasira ang schedule niya.
Same here.

-h

Ano na?

Nakakamiss rin pala yung may kaaway.

May hinahanap akong kanta

Pelikula ang buhay, bawat eksena may background music.
Kahit katahimikan ay musika, kung makikinig ka lang.

Outrance

Kagabi nakausap ko sa telepono yung ideal boss ko. Inaya niya kong magsulat. Siyempre, gusto ko! Excited na akong magsimula ng bagong kabanata. Cliche na kung cliche pero totoo pala talaga ang mga cliche. Every ending marks a new beginning.

May natapos mang bahagi ng buhay ko, meron namang nagsisimula.

Minsan nasabi ng isang teacher sa Ateneo High School na maganda ang lobong de-patpat, pero mas gusto pa rin daw niya ang lobong de-tali. "Maganda nga ang lobong de-patpat pero hindi naman lumilipad."

Sa nakalipas na mga taon, pakiramdam ko lobong de-patpat ako. Maganda naman ang kinalalagyan ko pero hindi ko naman magawa ang gusto ko. Gusto ko yung mga ginagawa ko, pero hindi gustung-gusto. Tamang gusto lang.

Pero sabi nga ni Karen Kingsburry, "Life is too short for half-hearted connections and meaningless run-throughs." Napaikli ng buhay para makontento na lang sa kung anong nandyan.Kelangang sumugal ng tao hindi lang para maging masaya kundi para maging lubos na masaya. Kelangang sumubok ng tao para kuhanin ang pinakamakakapagbigay kahulugan sa buhay niya. Hindi lahat ng pagkakataon ay pagkakataong maging lubos ang kasiyahan kaya naman kapag dumating ang pagkakataong nagdadala nun, dapat lang na sumugal.

Alam kong tama ang desisyong gagawin ko.

Because today, I've no words to say

Samal Island, 2008

Bantay-Bata ang eksena

Ginagamit siguro talaga ng Diyos yung mga problema at sakit para lalo akong mapalapit sa kanya. Hindi naman siguro siya sadista o anuman, pero sa tingin ko mayroong kakaiba sa sakit na nakakapagpalapit sa akin sa Kanya. Parang bata, kapag natatakot, lalong humihigpit ang kapit sa kamay ng kasamang matanda. Hindi naman kagagawan ng matanda na mapunta sa nakakatakot na lugar ang batang inaalagaan niya. Hinahayaan lang niyang magliwaliw ang bata sa malaking parke tapos kapag nakakita ng nakakatakot na anuman yung bata, tatakbo siya palapit sa bantay niya. Ang Diyos ang bantay, mabait na nakatunghay sa akin. Ako ang bata--- nagliliwaliw. Sa mga oras ng takot at dilim, alam lang niyang sa kanya ako babalik. Pwedeng bukas pag-ibis ng takot, aalis ulit ako para maglaro. Pero nandyan lang Siya, hindi umaalis.

On loving

Below is something I said to a friend via private message last year. In the conversation, he was asking me whether I was in love.

• • Hindi ko alam. Mas malalim na pag-iisip ang kelangan diyan. Kapag sinabi mong gusto mo ang isang tao, inaamin mo na may mga bagay sa pagkatao nya na kinagigiliwan mo. Pero kapag sinabi mong na-in-love ka na sa isang tao, ibig sabihin nun pinagkasundo mo na yung puso at isip mo sa isang desisyon na pwedeng magpabago ng buhay mo. Napakalaking bagay ng pagiging in-love.  Sa ngayon, hindi ko pa masasabing niyakap ko na ang napakalaking (at napakagandang) bagay na yan. Marami pa kong kakaining bigas. At ayokong mabulunan. 

To My Extraordinary Lover

Your extraordinary love keeps me sane these days. It's your love that keeps me moving forward, even if deep within, I want to stop and sob. It's your hand that holds mine so I may continue creating my own path, the one that you desired for me from the beginning, way before I've known happiness and pain.

In family and friends, in dreams and works, in realities and possibilities, you never fail to make your presence known. So even if the ground below shakes, and I don't know which step to take, my heart is at rest because you are with me.

May your extraordinary love take me to where I should be.

-h

Don't touch my hand and call it love

No, I'm not pertaining to anyone upon hearing this song. Don't feel guilty. This is not about you.

In pursuit of a map

I am struggling to find something these days. That something I don't know what but when I find it, I'd know. It may read weird, but that's how I describe it in my head. You know that feeling of wanting something you don't know yet? That's what's been lingering in my head lately.

I feel a sense of restlessness, of wanting to go to someplace else in pursuit of something. Perhaps satisfaction? Because most of the things on my lap right now are dissatisfying? Perhaps answers? because what people give are just cues to them? Perhaps courage? Because I am no longer sure where I want to go? I have this vague idea of where I want to be in life but I don't know how to get there. And that sense of not knowing frightens me.

Or do I have to go someplace else to see these things? Can old folks be lying when they say that things I need in life already lie within me, in a reservoir of light waiting to be tapped? If so, is there a map to go within me so I can finally access it? Or should I just rely on trickles and glimpses of that light?

I'm clueless, restless, in a breathless mode of unknowingly wanting. But I'm moving, walking towards somewhere.

---

For this week, the theme is finding lost things and lost selves. Replays.

This is the thing

This is the thing: When you hit 28 or 30, everything begins to divide. You can see very clearly two kinds of people. On one side, people who have used their 20s to learn and grow, to find … themselves and their dreams, people who know what works and what doesn’t, who have pushed through to become real live adults. Then there’s the other kind, who are hanging onto college, or high school even, with all their might. They’ve stayed in jobs they hate, because they’re too scared to get another one. They’ve stayed with men or women who are good but not great, because they don’t want to be lonely. … they mean to develop intimate friendships, they mean to stop drinking like life is one big frat party. But they don’t do those things, so they live in an extended adolescence, no closer to adulthood than when they graduated.

Don’t be like that. Don’t get stuck. Move, travel, take a class, take a risk. There is a season for wildness and a season for settledness, and this is neither. This season is about becoming. Don’t lose yourself at happy hour, but don’t lose yourself on the corporate ladder either. Stop every once in a while and go out to coffee or climb in bed with your journal.

Ask yourself some good questions like: “Am I proud of the life I’m living? What have I tried this month? … Do the people I’m spending time with give me life, or make me feel small? Is there any brokenness in my life that’s keeping me from moving forward?”

Taken from: http://m.relevantmagazine.com/life/whole-life/features/25956-11-things-to-know-at-25ish?start=1

Ang Dining Table.Bow.

Sa PPC planning and evaluation kagabi, habang naghahapunan, napag-usapan ang isyu ng pag-aasawa. Bagong kasal yung nasa harap ko, sina Kuya Gerry at Ate Sweet, sa gilid ko, si Tito Gary, yung isang church leader namin na matagal nang may-asawa, at isang pari, si Fr. Ferdi.

Pinansin ni Father ang magkatabing bagong-kasal.
Father: Ganyan talaga kapag bagong kasal, di mapaghiwalay. Pero paglipas ng panahon, 'Doon ka, dito ako." (Sabay tawa at tingin sa'kin.) Ikaw ba, may asawa ka na?
Ako: Wala pa po.
Father: Sayang naman ang ganda mo. Ano'ng sabi ng boyfriend mo at di ka pa niya pinakakasalan?
Kuya Gerry: Mali po yung tanong, Father. Dapat, bakit wala kang boyfriend?
Father: Wala kang boyfriend? E di lalong sayang ang ganda mo!

Ngumiti lang ako at tinuloy ko lang ang pagkain.

Maya-maya, kinuwento ni Tito Gary na nung bagong kasal daw sila, wala silang dining table. Lumabas siya ng bahay para maghanap, nang makita niya ang isang bagong-sarang restaurant. Pumasok siya sa loob, at bumili ng isang maliit na dining table.Yun ang naging dining table nila ng asawa niya.

Father: Ang cute! (Sabay tingin sa akin.) Ikaw ba, hindi nangangarap ng ganun?
Ako: Ng dining table po?

Napuno ng tawanan ang hapag.

Makalipas ang ilang sandali, tumayo na si Mama mula sa kabilang table para ayain na akong umuwi.
Father: Kaya naman hindi magka-boyfriend ang anak mo, palagi kang nasa likod.
Mama: May oras para diyan, Father.
Father: Sayang naman ang ganda niya. E di sana ay napamana na niya ang gandang 'yan.

Ang weird dahil kasama ni Mama ang mga amiga niya ng oras na 'yun. At sumasabay rin sa pagsasabing maaga pa para sa pag-aasawa.

Ang cute ng mga matatanda. :)

Chill lang kayo, darating din tayo diyan. Mag-eenjoy muna ko sa dining table, mukhang marami pa akong kwentong gustong marinig habang nagsisimula ako ng sariling dining table tale.

Susubukan ko ulit ngayong araw

Susubukan ko ulit na ayusin ang buhay ko. Malaki-laking trabaho ito, alam ko. Marami akong napabayaang mahahalagang bagay. Mabuti na lang nagising ako ngayong umaga, pwede pa kong bumawi.

Kaninang umaga, paggising ko, nakita ko agad yung baby kong pamangkin. Naisip ko, ang bawat araw ay bago para sa kanya. Hindi siya nag-iisip ng mga nangyari kahapon at nagsisisi sa mga nakalipas na pagkakamali. Nabubuhay siya nang bago sa bawat araw. Susubukan ko 'yun ngayon. Itutuloy ko ang mga kailangang simulan at tatapusin ang mga kailangang tapusin, at higit sa lahat, magsisimula ng mga bagong simula.

Susubukan ko ulit ngayong araw.

A new year for the PYM

We'll be having the first core team meeting for the youth ministry of our church this Friday. I can't wait to get the balls rolling for this year with the rest of the team. We have done quite well last year and with the dedication each of us has, I'm pretty sure we'll make it again this year.

Sta. Maria della Strada PYM made it in the last three years, it will in the years to come. I'm sure of that. AMDG.

Good morning, beautiful.

I start the day with Brad Paisley, my favorite country singer. Hopefully, this day turns out beautiful for me. :)

On the top of my head, I still recall the tea talk we had with a Jesuit priest yesterday, he has the ability to read someone's eyes. He looked into my eyes and said, "In your eyes I see work, work, work. You're in a work phase." I smiled and nodded. Then he added, "I can't see the bedrock happiness. Or you must be tired?" I held my breath for a while.

The old Jesuit priest was right.

Still, I say, "Good morning, beautiful."

This is not a New Year post. This post brings with it last year's feelings dragged on to the changing of the calendar. I freakin' miss you.