WHAT I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS.
I have been blessed with fairly reasonable results in school even though I really haven't worked hard as I should. I managed to get a chance to experience science research even though I hardly deserved it. And, I am still able to watch football even though my parents loathe the huge price increase in sports channels. Yet, nothing can compare with what I've felt in Your presence. Thanks for everything, really, everything.
FIrstly, I really hope to serve my friends (all friends) more in the future. I can be very helpful at times, yet, sometimes when I'm just not in the mood, I can be irritating. Very often, whenever I help others, I want recognition. I want others to be thankful, so much so I sometimes get upset when they aren't. This really is a case of having incorrect priorities. Surely, as everyone would know, true satisfaction comes from knowing that you have been of service to someone, and that you've made their day that better / less troublesome / easier.
Secondly, I hope I do not get too fed up and frustrated over trivial matters, and if I do, that I can control myself and my words. The saying goes 'Never say anything when you are angry', because you will regret it. And let me not have to face such guilt too many times in the future.
Thirdly, I want to have that sense of Godliness in me that I have lacked for so long. I will devote more time, and put in more effort for your kingdom's cause, and in return, let me be more mature, spiritually.
Lastly, I know, being the person that I am, that I can easily string a few sentences together which sounds fairly decent, encouraging, and perhaps even inspirational at times. But, talk is cheap, and actions speak volumes more than words do. At times, I have not been 100% sincere or true to my words. As much as I would like to, I cannot afford to keep relying on my words, and instead will have to back them up with actions. Thus, please keep me accountable for my words, be in through that timely reminder, or a straight talk from a friend.
Thank You, once again.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Friday, December 07, 2007
rêves + perception visuelle. AMONG OTHER THINGS.
I'll like to start with dreams, as I've had some very interesting ones as of late. Just yesterday, I was playing soccer with my specs. on and somehow they totally got smashed when i went to score a header goal. I could hear everyone cheering and yet I was feeling so much pain as a piece of broken glass had fell into my eye and my hand that touched my eye was cut with blood too (I can remember this surprisingly vividly for now). Someone was attending to me but obviously that guy knew nuts about how to remove the piece of glass from my eye so I went off and after that I don't know where I went, but i just kept feeling something stuck underneath my eye (scary really) and a lot of pain. When I woke up, I continued to feel the pain in my eye and my one hand was straight away touching it (no blood of course), but I must say the pain felt really real for quite some time after I had woken up. I really wonder, if the pain, the heartbreaks, the happiness we feel in our dreams are really....as they would really feel. There are people who have dreamt of being shot, and said that they really felt the pain of a bullet, even though they have never been shot before in real life. Is it really true? Well I guess like some people who can know stuff through visual perception like Gerry McCambridge (who appears on this very amazing show called the Mentalist on AXN which I highly recommend), we seldom believe such things until we really experience them (and then we find it ridiculous that other people don't believe them). After saying all this, I think the same can be said of God's presence. Yes, God works through people, and it is one way in which we experience His presence, but I think what non-believers find hard to believe is the internal joy and satisfaction that can be experienced during worship sessions among other intangible aspects (This was at least how I felt during a couple of years ago). And really, once it is experienced, the 'why can't people understand' feeling starts to develop. Thus, the difficulty is really in bringing people in to get this first experience of it. And that we really need to put ourselves in the shoes of these non-believers, something I've been struggling to do, I realised. Comparing God's presence to visual perception or mind-reading, I think the latter is so much easier to experience - once will be enough of a shock, and if you need more proof of things it can just be repeated (ask whoever to repeat? watch again? really the things are so specific that it will be really hard not to believe once they are performed on you). The former is quite different in fact, and is certainly not easy to experience as it requires personal effort, not a lot of it but decisive effort. Yet, in this world, there are so many more believers in God than there are believers in visual perception, something testiment to the efforts by people in outreaching to others, and of course, to God's strength and empowerment.
I've probably made many assumptions there and digressed a lot, yeah but that's just something that sprang to my mind just as I thought about dreams and visual perception.
More about my dreams next time perhaps. I've had some really scary ones too! I really do find dreams intriguing. It is an aspect of medical science I am interested in, the other being, of course, sports-related injuries (metatarsals?, haha). Well, so much for not taking bio anyway, haha.
Moving on, JC service recently was just so impactful, from the mere occasion of it, to the atmosphere, and to the people who went on stage to speak, none more so that raph. Also the past few weeks have made me become really grateful to be in the cg that am in, the people and everything, and that I have so much more to contribute. And I'm sure next week will be the time to build on all this spiritual momentum.
No attachment this week so it's certainly freed up my schedule to do other more interesting stuff - exercise, reading up on stuff that interests me, friends. Football is really routine though so it's not classified under 'more interesting' I suppose.
Arsenal are really impressing me more and more. The only reason I have been so frustrated in the past was because they kept missing sitter after sitter, and post-match comments that really got onto my nerves was those that said 'a draw was a fair result' when they really dominated. Now the team is scrapping big time. Against Villa and Newcastle we were dismal and probably deserved to lose both games, and yet we got 4 points out of those games, and even managers admit that the point at Newcastle was 'fair' when in all honesty it was so not. These are really signs of the team establishing a new reputation for itself and I think we will certainly keep contending for top honours although we probably would not win any this year, something which I'm fine with, certainly after offloading Henry. Offloading is really the word to use right now, with 16.1M really looking much better a deal than it seemed.
Was under the weather last week, first time of the year where it was really bad to the extent that I had to stay home all day I think, heh. Thinking in this sort of way puts a positive spin on it, although yeah I really hope it won't happen again at this sort of time next year.
Lastly, I've received a message that it has to be done by this year, and I guess I've waited long enough. I really do hope there will be a sign of when it is most appropriate to be done though, and that it will turn out well.
I'll like to start with dreams, as I've had some very interesting ones as of late. Just yesterday, I was playing soccer with my specs. on and somehow they totally got smashed when i went to score a header goal. I could hear everyone cheering and yet I was feeling so much pain as a piece of broken glass had fell into my eye and my hand that touched my eye was cut with blood too (I can remember this surprisingly vividly for now). Someone was attending to me but obviously that guy knew nuts about how to remove the piece of glass from my eye so I went off and after that I don't know where I went, but i just kept feeling something stuck underneath my eye (scary really) and a lot of pain. When I woke up, I continued to feel the pain in my eye and my one hand was straight away touching it (no blood of course), but I must say the pain felt really real for quite some time after I had woken up. I really wonder, if the pain, the heartbreaks, the happiness we feel in our dreams are really....as they would really feel. There are people who have dreamt of being shot, and said that they really felt the pain of a bullet, even though they have never been shot before in real life. Is it really true? Well I guess like some people who can know stuff through visual perception like Gerry McCambridge (who appears on this very amazing show called the Mentalist on AXN which I highly recommend), we seldom believe such things until we really experience them (and then we find it ridiculous that other people don't believe them). After saying all this, I think the same can be said of God's presence. Yes, God works through people, and it is one way in which we experience His presence, but I think what non-believers find hard to believe is the internal joy and satisfaction that can be experienced during worship sessions among other intangible aspects (This was at least how I felt during a couple of years ago). And really, once it is experienced, the 'why can't people understand' feeling starts to develop. Thus, the difficulty is really in bringing people in to get this first experience of it. And that we really need to put ourselves in the shoes of these non-believers, something I've been struggling to do, I realised. Comparing God's presence to visual perception or mind-reading, I think the latter is so much easier to experience - once will be enough of a shock, and if you need more proof of things it can just be repeated (ask whoever to repeat? watch again? really the things are so specific that it will be really hard not to believe once they are performed on you). The former is quite different in fact, and is certainly not easy to experience as it requires personal effort, not a lot of it but decisive effort. Yet, in this world, there are so many more believers in God than there are believers in visual perception, something testiment to the efforts by people in outreaching to others, and of course, to God's strength and empowerment.
I've probably made many assumptions there and digressed a lot, yeah but that's just something that sprang to my mind just as I thought about dreams and visual perception.
More about my dreams next time perhaps. I've had some really scary ones too! I really do find dreams intriguing. It is an aspect of medical science I am interested in, the other being, of course, sports-related injuries (metatarsals?, haha). Well, so much for not taking bio anyway, haha.
Moving on, JC service recently was just so impactful, from the mere occasion of it, to the atmosphere, and to the people who went on stage to speak, none more so that raph. Also the past few weeks have made me become really grateful to be in the cg that am in, the people and everything, and that I have so much more to contribute. And I'm sure next week will be the time to build on all this spiritual momentum.
No attachment this week so it's certainly freed up my schedule to do other more interesting stuff - exercise, reading up on stuff that interests me, friends. Football is really routine though so it's not classified under 'more interesting' I suppose.
Arsenal are really impressing me more and more. The only reason I have been so frustrated in the past was because they kept missing sitter after sitter, and post-match comments that really got onto my nerves was those that said 'a draw was a fair result' when they really dominated. Now the team is scrapping big time. Against Villa and Newcastle we were dismal and probably deserved to lose both games, and yet we got 4 points out of those games, and even managers admit that the point at Newcastle was 'fair' when in all honesty it was so not. These are really signs of the team establishing a new reputation for itself and I think we will certainly keep contending for top honours although we probably would not win any this year, something which I'm fine with, certainly after offloading Henry. Offloading is really the word to use right now, with 16.1M really looking much better a deal than it seemed.
Was under the weather last week, first time of the year where it was really bad to the extent that I had to stay home all day I think, heh. Thinking in this sort of way puts a positive spin on it, although yeah I really hope it won't happen again at this sort of time next year.
Lastly, I've received a message that it has to be done by this year, and I guess I've waited long enough. I really do hope there will be a sign of when it is most appropriate to be done though, and that it will turn out well.
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