I don’t hear men obsessing about them or about flatter bellies, hairless legs, and whiter skin. Nor do they fret about whether they look older or younger than their age. So unless I’m mistaken, I believe it’s definitely a girl thing.

Whether it’s a case of vanity or low self-esteem or both, I really can’t say except we women seem to be afflicted with this malady in varying degrees. We agonize over the most trifle of beauty imperfections even when they’re visible only to our overly critical eye. And it is utterly mind boggling the lengths we go to just to make ourselves over and the money we splurge on all kinds of beauty treatments, aids and procedures – botox, liposuction, bleaching, cosmetic surgery, breast implants, nose and face lifts.

We’ve spawned a whole new industry that feeds on our weakness and brainwashes us into buying the illusion of hope and beauty. With media upping the ante by flooding magazines and our TV screens with beauty icons that magnify our “plainness”, morphing ourselves into becoming their clones is now almost an imperative.

Even screen goddesses themselves aren’t spared.  Celebrities too feel the pressure to be even more beautiful and to preserve their looks, body and youth. If even celebrities are susceptible to insecurity despite all the beauty potions and ammunitions in their arsenal, what more for us mere mortals?

We sure don’t stand a chance. Not against Nicole Kidman, Angelina Jolie or Julia Roberts. Ah, we don’t even need to go that far. Let’s just take Lucy Torres-Gomez. Blest with a Madonna-like face, an enviable figure, impeccable style and manners, innocent sophistication, a flourishing career and what appears to be a good marriage, she makes me acutely conscious of my “inadequacies”: my moon shaped face, the pimples that have marred and scarred it, the lines that shout my age, and that other chin that seems to second the motion when I nod.

But the more staggering wallop on my self-esteem came when I discovered that aside from beauty, she has brains and loads of talent too! How, I thought can anyone have it all?! Isn’t that the height of injustice?

Perhaps if we were angels, we wouldn’t be affected by these punches to our self-esteem that come from nowhere and without warning. But human as we are we can’t just banish these feelings of inadequacy with the flick of a wrist. Society makes it doubly difficult for us when it feeds and reinforces this collective obsession for youth and beauty with its bias towards the young and the beautiful. As door after door opens effortlessly for them, beautiful people land themselves the choicest parts, the most-coveted deals and the best seats in the house – be it in love, at social gatherings or at work.

Only a woman so sure of her self, with a very strong self-image and a heightened sense of awareness can rise above the tide. But can we afford not to? How will we ever have a moment’s peace if we don’t? You see, in the end we really have only two choices: make peace with what we have or keep on bemoaning our “lack” while piling on the creams, resorting to nips and cuts, insertions, additions, and subtractions…But even if we’d opt for the second alternative, we cannot win the war against age or nature.

So, the sanest thing for us to do according to writer Martha Beck is not to look different or to change one’s looks but to look differently, that is, to change one’s perspective. Spiritual master Eckhart Tolle further says, “Illusion will never satisfy. Only the truth of who you are will ever set you free.”

Deep inside, there in the deepest recess where true beauty resides, those words resonate with me. But until that day when I can fully unearth it and be truly awake, I’d still be lapsing into unconsciousness every so often and doing all the insane things women do in the name of youth and beauty. Hopefully, that day would come pretty soon.

The author, Marianne Williamson says: “Forget your old ideas. Forget the lies they told you. Forget them all and you will begin to remember. There is a realm of romantic enchantment that makes the world we are currently living in seem not so very important, and not even so very real. That realm is entered two by two…”

Williamson believes that the myth of romantic love is a collective lie. She says romantic love is real and that we are meant to experience it if we do not balk at the work that is required of us. And if we understand that the deeper purpose of relationships is to nourish one’s own and the beloved’s spiritual growth, we can create our little piece of heaven right here on earth. This is because relationships are meant to create a healing space where partners can be their true selves, show their worst, do their most difficult emotional work, and yet be accepted and loved.

Problem with relationships is that they are not romantic

Looking at the state of most relationships today, however, it is evident that many married couples or those in committed relationships probably don’t know or have forgotten this truth.

Some go into a relationship either blindly or hastily or both only to discover much later that instead of a healing place, they just created a venue for aggravating or feeding each other’s neuroses. Other couples succumb to the societal pressure for procreation and material security.

Romance is not about past or future, society or worldly routines

Couples either become totally absorbed in achieving financial stability or in prioritizing their children’s interest and welfare above all, neglecting their own and their partner’s needs. In the process, love and spiritual growth are relegated to the background. Before they know it, the romance is over. Everything has become routine, predictable and ordinary. The magic is gone.

Clearly, if we want to have sacred and enchanted partnerships, we must consider priorities beyond procreation and security. Already, our world is very heavily populated and resources have become scarcer. And look at the children we are raising. In our desire to spare them our growing up pains and deprivation, we’ve gone overboard in trying to shield them from life’s harsh realities, pandering to most of their whims and caprices.

Yet despite our best efforts, we seem to have succeeded only in producing mostly apathetic, attention-deficient, dependent, insecure, selfish, weak, undisciplined, grasping, aggressive, lazy, complacent, and even violent children – children who appear to be worse off than we were then.

This is the world we are unconsciously creating today – one where love, romance and magic are very rarely experienced.

Romance is about who two people really are

Somewhere along the way, we forgot that our most important role in relationships is to nourish our love for self and for the beloved so that we can create a happy, healthy, stable and loving environment for our families even as we work for the other things we want in life.

We forgot that the best hope of a bright future for the next generation are parents who are conscious and mature enough to love each other and allow each to reveal one’s neurotic patterns, one’s weakest, darkest aspects so that together, the partners may work on them and heal themselves.

If we can be these kinds of partners, then we need not pass on to the next generation our dysfunction and the very experiences we are trying so hard to keep our offspring from repeating. Then we can transform this world of fear into one of love, creating the perfect atmosphere for raising healthy, happy, and well-adjusted children.

Relationships are meant to create a healing space

This is the magic of enchanted relationships: they liberate and empower us. They push our buttons and show us our walls, our limits, our deepest wounds so that we can heal. They are contracts for a deeper purpose than mere procreation or protection. They are partnerships for growing in consciousness enabling us to birth the miraculous things of spirit.

Unless these are the relationships we are in, we will not succeed in giving our children our best legacy – a healthy psyche – the wellness of mind, body and spirit.

And if the relationships we are in are not sacred or enchanted, then perhaps, it is time to listen to that still, small, but unmistakable Voice within that always knows best what makes life complete. When we do, He will lead us to the path we must take, the choices we must make and the work we must do to create the enchantment we want in our lives.

Before I turned forty, I never thought to ask myself if this is the life I want or if this is the real me. To be asking these questions would have sounded rather silly. Why wouldn’t this be what I wanted? I am living this life, am I not? Why wouldn’t this be me? Who else am I supposed to be?

Something about turning forty and nearing midlife, however, shoves these questions right at you and pushes you to confront your naked self. Sometimes, the awakening happens gently but if you’re like me who can be slow on the uptake, life ultimately strikes you so hard that you land on bended knees. Like what happened to me.

At first I didn’t heed the pebbles life threw at me to catch my attention. Then the stones came, cracking my façade wide open. Eventually, the intensity of the breaking forced me to see the shape shifter I had become. I had let others define me and had shaped my life and designed myself according to their expectations, specifications and standards.

Understand and prioritize roles

Deep within must have been an unconscious desire to impress and to win others’ approval. And so, depending on whom I was dealing with, I’d play a role and take on a certain form. Sometimes, I was daughter, at others, wife, then friend, mother, teacher, student, Catholic, woman, and so on. But regardless of the role, I strove to be the ideal every time.

In my mind, some kind of rule was always dictating my behavior. These rules which were self-imposed or imposed by others convinced me I needed to be a certain size, shape, weight, look, personality and had to be beyond reproach in order to be accepted. I felt like a robot, responding mechanically to internal and external stimuli as though someone had lodged a software program between my ears when I wasn’t looking.

Rigidity characterized my life yet I was oblivious of it. I felt claustrophobic but I couldn’t figure out why. I just felt driven to please people, disowning my opinions and convictions and putting myself last, as I tried to perform all my different roles. I was striving to be perfect but deep inside I was a mess and a mass of contradictions. This was not only exhausting and constricting but also painful.

By the time I realized this wasn’t the life or the “me” I wanted, my true self was almost beyond recognition.

There’s no one else like you, so create the best version of you

To get me on track, every so often life would nudge me gently. But I guess I wasn’t just in deep slumber. I must have been comatose because life had to hit me hard, push me against the wall, knock me off my feet and beat me up several times to rouse me from my stupor.

It took several humbling experiences, illness, family crises, and an almost 360-degree turnaround from a life that promised worldly success to a simple one before I finally faced who I had become.

As I stared appalled at this pitiful imitation of my true self, I knew I had to strip myself of all that were false and inauthentic. I also knew I had to pick up and take back all the pieces of the real me that I had lost or given away to others out of fear.

Reclaiming my true self demanded much courage and strength. But I had to do it despite my fears and even if it meant having to hurt the people I loved because I made them uncomfortable with the changes happening to me.

You’re never as good or as bad as people say

People around me had difficulty accepting I was no longer the people-pleaser I used to be: the one who was so careful about going against the norm, convention, tradition, about defying authority, or offending anybody; the one who wanted everyone to accept and like her, and who couldn’t sleep when someone didn’t.

They found it hard to accept this person who’s now willing to upset the apple cart, question authority, speak her own mind, stand for what she believes and go after her dreams. The change wasn’t easy for me, either, but I knew I couldn’t find peace unless I embrace my true self.

No need to prove your worth to the world

Experience had taught me the painful but liberating lesson that what’s fundamental is not how others see or value me, but how I see and value myself. If I’m okay with myself, then that should be fine with the rest of the world.

In any case, the rest of the world can just come and go in my life as they please. Whereas I, I’m the one who’s here for the long haul – the one who has to live with myself for the rest of my life. I might as well show up as myself instead of all those inauthentic versions of me others want me to be.

There is no device or a quick-fix method to make this feeling go away instantly, to drive away months or years of attachment. Some people even take a lot of time to let something go and move on with their lives. Worst some fail to let go and never move on with their life.

The hardest thing to let go is someone you have loved so much, someone you have shared much of your life and you always thought he or she would be forever there. Once you build this attachment, it is like a habit to you, how your day will be is dependent on how your relationship is going to be with that other person for that day. It is an investment to put your heart completely to another person that when it fails, we go into emptiness.

When I lost the one I love

I never thought of letting go or moving on as an option for my failed relationship. I thought my relationship was never going to end, a fairytale come true. It felt like everything was going the way we wanted. We even planned our future together, believing that we were meant to be in that relationship. The sweet promises of forever, an everlasting love, we had it all. We spent almost two years together, everything was going well until one day she wanted a different life, a life that I am not part of.

Minutes were like hours, days were like months, and months were like years. The cycle was too tiring; I kept on crying, wishing and regretting. It was like I will never move on. It was just too hard, because I had built a world around this person. How can I just move on when I was still in love with her…? I just can’t move.

Why it was hard for me to let go

I fought a painful reality because I could not see myself being with another person, or her with another person. It was just hard to accept but it was inevitable. I tried pursuing her, tried all methods of persuasion, and prayed hard. I did everything that I could do, but she was never coming back. It left me so broken; I felt that I was trapped in the pain of defeat.

No matter how we enrich ourselves, we always feel that we are at a loss, thoughts of that person hang into our mind, dragging us into an abyss full of pain, regret and sometimes self-pity. We become so helpless, we just can’t let go of the fact that he/she is gone, we still want to hold on so much, but we find ourselves alone.

I am not a stranger to pain and to loss, but even with my deep experience I never found an easy way to let go. We love passionately, that when we lose, we become stuck. It is normal to feel this way, the feeling of wanting to hold on to that relationship, to that person, believing so much that things could still work out, or that person will still come back to us and pick us out from the pains of loneliness and heartbreak. But later on we realize he or she is never coming back.

What it takes to let go

Let Go! We have heard this so much, but we simply can’t, we just can’t… or can we? It takes a lot of courage, time and confidence. Courage, to stand and try to live life again. Time, to patiently wait and allow it to make all the hurt go away. Confidence, to believe in ourselves and know that we can be happy again.

What inspired me to move on

It was the fear of letting life go that sparked me the courage to look forward, to try and stand up with my weary legs. I was afraid that if I was too stuck in that moment, life will pass me by and end up miserable. I will not be a spectator of life, rather I will live life.

Most of us see the hardship of letting go as an escape to face life, as an excuse to give up. The champions of our lives are those who strive to live, to move on. We tend to forget that the hardest thing to do is live, at the same time it is the very reason that gives meaning to our being.

We need to live life, we will not try, and we cannot try. “Trying” to live a life is disrespectful to life itself, we don’t try, we will live life. Living demands us to live through the hardship. We can live life through all the pains, hardships because in the end it will help define the beauty of the life we had lived.

Let go, let go and let go. Release that emotional baggage and believe in life the way it believes in you. In this respect, we should realize that people are not under our control, we don’t control how they feel. They don’t owe us anything, nor do we owe them something. We owe life to ourselves, our happiness to our being. If we try to accept that we can’t control other people but only ourselves, maybe we will learn to let go, slowly, sincerely. We all are given the right to live, so exercise that right, get out and celebrate the beauty that is life.

Let go, let God

Life will always be meaningful, no matter how depressing life maybe. Letting go is just one of those struggles that we have to face. Be moved by people who have had the courage to move, to let go. If we find the pain to be too much, He is always there, just hang on a little longer. Remember that the best tip on letting go is praying to Him. No matter how harsh life is, He will always be there and will never let us go…

He will heal everything in His time. We just have to make that surrender and have that security in Him. Because in the end, the best solution is His love for us not the methods we read or the tips that we are advised to follow.

Share me your thoughts…

• What was your experience?
• How did you let go?
• What inspired you to move on?
• How is your life now?

Melinda, the eldest of six children, was born 65 years ago to a poor but hardworking couple in Zamboanga del Sur. Hers hasn’t been a fairytale life. At a very tender age, just to be able to finish her education here in the city, she had to put up with being carted off from one relative to another where she stayed for as long as she was welcome. Away from home, her nights were lonely and the days were tough. Aside from schoolwork, she had to do household chores as a way of paying for her keep. Indeed, life was hard. But she persevered until she became a full-fledged grade school teacher. Her teaching career spanned 41 fruitful years and during this time, she molded countless students, instilling in them the values that she herself models like perseverance, dedication, commitment, endurance, self-sacrifice, loyalty, strength of character, discipline, order, faith and many others. To this very day, she continues to teach the same values to us, her children. In addition, she has nurtured our family and managed to keep us together against all odds. Talk about resiliency. She has risen up time and again, after every fall, despite every challenge. That is my mother. Thank you, Mom. We love you and are proud of you. Now, my daughter…

Before Danielle, although I knew that getting married meant being open to the possibility of motherhood, somehow, I never quite pictured how I’d be as a mother. Only when Danielle came into my life eleven years ago in a totally unexpected way, turning my world upside down, did I find out exactly the kind I’d be. Danielle taught me some of my harshest, deepest, and life-altering lessons. To think I used to equate wisdom only with the old and the grown-up. Danielle proved me wrong, Without meaning to but by just being herself, she taught me how to accept the “unacceptable” and love the “unlovable”. Because Danielle was my exact opposite, at first, it bothered me that she was different and it embarrassed me no end when she’d throw tantrums in public. So I tried hard to mold her to be like me but it was an exercise in futility. I guess, you just can’t win over nature. In the end, I had to simply accept that she’s meant to be different from me. When I did, I slowly learned the art of patience and grace under pressure. And the more I open myself up to and embrace the person she is, more lessons inevitably come well. Danielle teaches me how to seize and savor each moment, how to bring back awe and wonder into my jaded life, how to loosen up and let go, how to be less rigid and structured and how to have fun, to laugh at life, at myself, and at my foibles. Because she dreams big, expecting only the best things in life as though they were her due, and acts as though there are no limits to what she can do, be and achieve, she teaches me faith. In her I see what it means to fully trust the Divine and Life to give us only the best because most times her dreams come true almost effortlessly. And if I ever needed proof that miracles happen, I only have to look at her and I cannot but believe it. These are among Danielle’s many gifts for me. I was not prepared to love her when she came, but because of her, I now know that I can be a good and loving mother and that I can love others better because she has taught me how. Thank you, Danielle. I love you.

I guess I can never quite capture and express in words everything that my mother and my daughter have given me. But this much I know: my life is definitely richer just by their being in it.

To all our mothers and children, thank you for all that you are and for all that we are and have become because of you. We will forever be grateful.

Being the eldest grandchild on my mother’s side, I was lavished with much love by my grandparents. Together with my mother, I lived with them in the province the first five years of my life while my father worked as a teacher here in the city. Because I grew up around my grandfather, his was the masculine presence that had the most influence on me during my early childhood. So strong was the bond between my grandparents and me that when I moved to the city to start to school, I’d skip class just to spend time with them whenever they’d come to visit. We’d dine out, watch movies or go places together. I spent so much time with them during my kindergarten days that my absences were almost half the total number of school days.

My grandfather both inspired and scared me. He awed me with the love he showed my grandmother, Antonia and impressed me much with his self-discipline and healthy lifestyle. He took good care of himself and neither drank nor smoked. He was a man of integrity, consistently punctual, honoring his promises and keeping his word no matter what. And he moved heaven and earth to make a descent life for his family and to turn all his six children into accomplished professionals. He was generous to a fault – always trying to help everyone he could in whatever way he can. I deeply admired these qualities in him that I used to tell myself back then these are what I’d look for in a lifetime partner. But there was also a “shadow side” to my grandfather. He could be terribly stern, unyielding and exacting. Because he was so strict, my sister and I learned not to talk or laugh during meal times and to treat them as formal affairs. We learned to make ourselves scarce, even “invisible,” when there were visitors. When we would watch TV with him, if by chance some funny show made us laugh, we learned to do so quietly, our bodies shaking with mirth yet maintaining absolute silence. And when we’d celebrate Holy Week, it was cloaked in an atmosphere of mourning, like someone in the family had suddenly died. Only much later did the full impact of these early influences of my grandfather on my life hit me. For instance, I’ve long wondered where I got my strong will, my determination, tenacity and resilience, my willingness to put everything on the line, my conviction to speak my truth, and my compassion. Only as I wrote this did I realize I must have inherited them from him. Heaven must have bestowed them upon me when I wasn’t looking. And so, while it would definitely be great if the man I’d spend the rest of my life with possessed my grandfather’s positive qualities, I no longer need to look for them
in another. I already have them in me. On the other hand, my limited exposure to adults and the rigidity with which we were taught to face life at such a tender age made me timid and fearful. These are “handicaps” I’m struggling to overcome even now.

Needless to say, the other man who influenced me much was my father who is an artist and a very intelligent man. He is a writer, a composer, a poet and this must explain why he seems to be lost in a world of his own most times. He has done his best to be a good provider for the family and to be our guide and mentor. My fondest and earliest memories of him are of the times he’d put my sister and me to sleep by telling us bedtime stories. These fed our imagination and creativity. When we started going to school, he constantly prodded us to be the best we could be and was our staunch supporter when we’d vie for some academic honor or be interested in harnessing a particular ability or skill. He pushed us to develop our talents to the fullest and was our number one fan and critic. From him, I got my artistic flair, my tendency to be cerebral at times and my passionate nature. But I must admit I can never hold up a candle to my Dad’s accomplishments, unless, by some miracle I’d suddenly bloom in midlife – something I pray may still happen. Because even if he doesn’t say it, I know deep down, my father probably feels I can be so much more than what I am right now. I know, too, I’ve repeatedly dashed his hopes to the ground and broken his heart every time I turned my back on the wonderful opportunities that have come my way.

Clearly, my father and I have been through so much. We’ve crushed each other’s spirit with the actions we’ve taken and the decisions we’ve made individually. We’ve fought over a lot of things and made up. Fought again and made up all over. But through our ups and downs one thing I know: so much of who I am now is because of him. And as I watch him step closer to the twilight of his life and see our roles reversed – with me taking more care of him now than he gets to take care of me – there’s so much I want to say yet I find myself floundering. Words fail me and until I find the right ones, I hope these borrowed lines from the Net will convey for now even just a fraction of what I wish to tell him:

For most, time is just the ticking of the clock, waiting for that certain tick to end agony, pain, defeat, loneliness or strike the beginning of joy, happiness, togetherness.

Time for some is lengthy, especially in times of hurting, yes, in these instances, time being cruel is an understatement. Time is at the same time short, for those who spend them in happiness, the day ends so fast; that you feel time was robbed off of you. The discontentment lingers in our hearts, why can’t we just shorten time or lengthen time, depending on our need for it. Not even the wisest of men have figured out on how to spend time the most efficient way.

Some die young and unsatisfied, worst; some die old and still unsatisfied. There is this thought in our heads, “There is just not enough time for everything.” Yes, there isn’t. That is the cruelty of life, but have you ever thought for one moment that we have wasted time, worst we have not only put it to waste but also ended up hurting people around us. Definitely, a lose-lose situation. Then how can we really make time matter, how can we make time work for us? I don’t know, it depends on your priorities, on what matters to you, who matters to you.

Time is such a big burden to carry; time spent on something means time spent off something. You give time to someone, it also means you are taking away time from someone. Time is something that can never be taken back; it is a one way street. To make it matter, we should spend it on something or someone that matters greatly to us. There are great sacrifices that we have to make, how important is time to us? What are the things we can trade it for?

Time will never wait for us, it will never stop ticking for us, it won’t care even if we are enduring pain or celebrating happiness… it is in our hands to make time matter, to make it matter to other people… Life is a mystery, some people only start living when they realize that they are running out of time, they are to be put away from this world permanently. Do we always have to wait for that signal to make our life more meaningful? And end up regretting how much time we have wasted? Lucky are we who still have a chance to wake up the next morning, embrace those who matter to us, what matters to us, for we will never know, it might be our last time…

Before my sister and her family moved to the US, I was among those decrying the brain drain resulting from the mass exodus of Filipinos to other countries. I viewed the search for greener pastures by many Filipinos as not only unpatriotic and selfish but proof of an unholy attachment to materialism. For so long, I questioned their values and concluded that they possess a mistaken sense of priorities.

Compounding my ignorance was this image I held of Filipino overseas workers, especially those in the US, as living in the lap of luxury. I assumed they had more money than they knew what to do with. I imagined them living “the Good Life” – vacationing in exotic spots every so often or whenever the fancy strikes them, splurging on anything and everything they wanted. Believing that they had all the fun, I felt we who stayed behind deserved to receive all the dollars they send and the goodies they ship home. However, if truth were told, I guess underneath my sarcasm and condescension was probably envy. Secretly, I also dreamed of a life of financial freedom but I wanted that life without having to leave home and without appearing unpatriotic, self-centered or materialistic.

My views drastically changed when my sister started working abroad. My vision cleared even more when I saw firsthand, during a brief visit to my sister’s place in the US, exactly what Filipinos go through abroad. Yes, they had money but not until they had broken their backs earning it. Yes, they could send us balikbayan boxes filled with the goodies our hearts desired. But not after they have labored for every penny spent on every whim we demanded they satisfy. Yes, they could travel, but not after they have slaved for and saved every single “paid time off.” Realizing all these, I understand better now why my former high school classmate repeatedly tells me that the moment she comes home, she’ll head straight to a leading TV network and debunk the myth about the great American Dream. She vows to shatter the illusion that life in the US is the rosy, perfect, easy life that we’ve all been led to believe for so long. Rather, like what I saw with my own eyes and what I hear my friend repeatedly say, the American Dream is a life fashioned out of backbreaking toil where you have to do everything yourself – job and house chores combined. It is a life carved out of nights spent crying or unable to sleep out of sheer loneliness, disillusionment, homesickness, and even self-pity.

That trip was both an eye-opener and a humbling experience for me. Now I have a deeper respect for most overseas Filipino workers knowing that their search for greener pastures is not necessarily fuelled by self-centeredness or materialism. For most, it is the result of a sincere desire for a better future for their families – even if, for the moment, that future seems to be founded or centered on economic well-being. For others, it springs from the wish to leave life with fewer regrets, “what-if’s” and “if only’s.” And even if their search were indeed prompted by materialism, who are we to question them? They are paying such a high price for making those dreams come true.

That is why these days, every time my sister and her family give me something, I see beyond the gift. So humbled am I by the enormous sacrifice behind it and most of all, the love, that I treasure these gifts as I never have before. Now, I look up to my sister as my hero: she followed her North Star regardless of the price. Between us, hers was the more difficult choice because she had to give up so much – the people she loves, the home she is so attached to and everything that is comforting and familiar – just to find her own place in the sun. And while I am not certain that she has found the grass greener where she is now, that is no longer what matters most to me. What does is her courage to chase after her dreams, make them come true, and find her own patch of green with no excuses and no apologies. I hope I, too, can do the same one day soon.

- Eugene Kennedy

January ushers in a new year that looks more bleak than bright for Zamboanga. With the unexpected spate of power outages, the gloomy weather that hangs over the city like a dark cloud, and more disturbingly, the alarming accounts of kidnappings that seem to spare no one – rich, poor, young, old, the city definitely seems off to a dreadful start. The prospects are dismal and we can’t help but vacillate between feelings of anger and helplessness especially since this run of “bad luck” shows no sign of letting-up anytime soon. (And we haven’t even considered the economic crisis that has been gripping the country, even the world, since last year.)

When the start of the new year fills us with more dread than optimism, when joy comes in trickles and peace appears to be an elusive dream, how and where can we find hope? Do we have to shake it down from the heavens where most of us mistakenly believe it resides? Do we find it only in the miracles that occasionally jolt us from our daily grind making us believe, even just for a moment, that anything is possible? But if these are the only places where hope dwells, then our encounters with it would be few and far between. And for hope to be what it is, it must be nearer and more accessible than we have imagined it to be.

When do we experience hope? Hope surfaces when we muster the courage to face our reality, no matter how terrifying and daunting it may be. It manifests itself when we continue to believe in the goodness – that spark of the Divine- that is inherent in each of us no matter how hidden from sight it may be for now. It announces itself when we make an investment into the world, despite the frightening mask it wears, rather than withdraw from it. It is born when we hold fast to what we share in common instead of our differences and when our concern expands to include the wellbeing of those around us and not just ourselves or our interests. It comes to stay when we refuse to barter our dreams, or to give our lives away as ransom for the fears that hold us hostage. For like love or charity or peace, hope is found inside us. It dwells in our bruised hearts and battered souls and springs forth when we sincerely reach out to respond to each other’s needs.

This is the hope Zamboanga needs in these very trying times when the city’s peace, development and progress are threatened by lawless elements who sow fear, ruin lives and make a profit in the process: hope that is made tangible as we show a united front and brave together this predicament that has befallen our city; hope that is made real as we call out for collective action instead of cringing in cowardice and allowing our city to fall to her knees in defeat and despair. If we can find a way to stand our ground amidst a situation that threatens to snuff out our very lives and our city’s very soul, then we can find hope. And where hope is found, surely the answers to the challenges that threaten to overwhelm us cannot be far behind.

]]> http://www.scribblejoint.com/81/where-hope-is-found/feed 0 http://www.scribblejoint.com/79/when-summer-ends http://www.scribblejoint.com/79/when-summer-ends#comments Wed, 10 Jun 2009 09:48:04 +0000 Jane http://www.scribblejoint.com/?p=79 “Summer’s lease hath all too short a date.”

William Shakespeare

In a few days, May gives way to June, officially marking the end of summer. As the thought sinks in, a hint of sadness seems to creep into our hearts.

What is it about the end of summer that fills us with sadness? Is it because it lets the curtain fall with seeming finality on a season when time appears to be a luxury we can afford? Is it because it heralds the coming of the rainy season that spells gloom and melancholy for the most part? Or is it perhaps because it thrusts most of us into that maddening and frantic pace as another school year starts? Whatever the reason, there’s something about summer that when it departs leaves us yearning for something more.

It is a time when dreams and hopes are re-visited. Signals the end of a long vacation. Provides respite from the killer pace

No other season probably frees our spirit more or brings us closest to our true selves than summer. It is the welcome pause, the break in our stride that provides respite from the killer pace that characterizes most of our days. It is the brief interlude when we remember life’s simple but lasting joys and try to fill our days with them. We let ourselves loose, allowing our masks to fall, as we eagerly reach out to embrace the season’s joys.

Summer is a magical time. Feeling young and carefree, we soak in all that is healthy for our bodies: early morning sunshine, water, and clean air. And we savor all that is good for our souls: friendship, love, tears and laughter. We don our swimsuits and sarongs, put on sunscreen, shades and our havianas, then gleefully abandon ourselves to the elements. We frolic in the sea and on the sand. We feast on ice cream cones, popcorn and cotton candy, grilled hotdogs and barbecues. Like little children, we discover new places, roam festive arcades, fly kites, and conquer our fears on ferris wheel and rollercoaster rides. We delight in nature’s panoramic vistas, in boat rides and moonlit strolls, in the scent of magnolias, and in the festive mood that fills the air. We make time for getaways with friends and loved ones, re-kindling and deepening the ties that bind. We feel less acutely the worries and cares that normally plague us. Sometimes, even momentarily, they are forgotten. We come alive. Our smiles grow wider, our laughter sounds richer and our hearts sing. As we bare more of our flesh, we find ourselves feeling vulnerable, because we succeeded in baring more of our souls, too.

Because summer is also a time when we contemplate and mark where we are in our life’s journey. As the insulation that protects our personal lives wears thin during the long vacation, we catch honest glimpses of our real selves. We come face to face more easily with all that is unresolved and unfinished. We look back on the New Year and see how many of our dreams and resolutions we have fulfilled and kept. We look forward to the end of the year to see how much time we have left to fulfill what we haven’t. We spring clean not just our homes but also the many corners of our hearts where dreams lay shattered. And with more time on our hands than usual, we grapple with life’s deeper questions: How far have we come in our journey? Are we on the right path? Will we get to the future that we have been shaping?

Summer is a season of discovery and renewal – giving birth to countless dreams, giving life to great stories. That is probably why we are tempted to cling to it as it leaves us. We will miss it because it never fails to remind us of all that is good in life and all that we overlook and neglect for the most part of the year. It reminds us of our youth and that time when the sun seems to shine a little brighter, the moon’s glow a little softer, the night’s darkness, just like our memories, a little more friendly and forgiving. It is that time when we seem to be most vibrantly alive, fearless and free. And so we balk as June starts knocking. We fear that its heavy rains and thunderstorms will lay waste not just the garden but will once again throw us into mental and emotional turmoil, leaving us physically spent. We recoil from the bedlam that another school year would surely bring. We cringe at the thought of being stuck once again in routine and the mundane. But we need not cling to summer. We can let it go yet keep it alive in our hearts as we honor life and celebrate its pure joys and small victories. We can keep it alive as we free our minds, keep the connection and stay close to our core. We need not fear its end because it marks but a passage into another season that is also meant to teach us more about our selves and our lives, bringing us closer to home.