Been oh-so-busy to blog. As soon as I touched down in Singapore, the meet-ups with friends and FOOT'13 orientation camp in NTU took my time away. But it was worth it :)
Anyway, while waiting for my hair to dry, just wanna pen some stuff now.
1) I'm fine. As always. Not anywhere near death from physical, academic or relational pressures or not entertaining any suicidal thoughts. p/s I never had any to start with.
BUT. I'M DARN FRUSTRATED.
Where do I start? How do I start?
Ok, examples. These coming from (mostly) Bible-believing, close friends of mine whom I dearly treasure:
1) "Hi Jonavan, I'm eating lunch now. Kthxbye." coming from a dear friend of mine with NO apology.
Logic: I have given up meal appointments to eat at least 3 meals with him and THIS IS HOW HE REPAYS ME. *claps claps*
2) "Hey, you driving? If yes, fetch me, if no, bye." *In summary* also coming from a dear friend of mine whom I have written cards to, prayed for and be his Christian brother for years. He'll attest to that fact...and THIS IS HOW HE REPAYS ME.
3) Made some casual remarks about some China and foreign students, LIKE ANY NORMAL LOCAL NTU STUDENT IN ENGINEERING COURSE WOULD, and my friend went "YOU TA PAI JUDGE!". And from there, HE JUDGED ME AND HE JUDGED EVERY WORD IN MY SENTENCES TO LINK IT BACK TO THE FACT THAT I'M A JUDGE-R.
In doing so, he is becoming the very type of asshole he is accusing me of becoming (with his feeble finger pointed at me with very weak supposition). AND HE DOES IT SO SELF-RIGHTEOUSLY. Wow.
Either he's trying to give me a taste of my own medicine...or he's really angry I judged some foreign stranger, or both. AND, I don't discredit every word he says in the manner he is doing. If not, he'd no longer be my friend...and I'd be friendless. Simple. Thus, it is NOT giving me my own medicine but rather, him being an asshole independently.
And the fact is, it's not the medicine I've been administering to others. So, kudos to him. Logic-less, emotional barrage, which I ignored with silence and which he later JUDGED ME "Don't EMO leh". Need I reply an empty vessel trying to find fault with every uttered diction?
4) Miss bff's been hearing things. Accuses me of lying. Like I don't know what I said. The fact is, she didn't even entertain the possibility that the person "reporting" could have heard me wrongly or misinterpreted my words.
HAPPENS ALL THE TIME. And I've checked with a few friends and indeed some of them misinterpreted me.
Ok fine, maybe I'm to blame for letting the person misinterpret to begin with...but still, putting the whole blame on me without trusting me for my unparalleled show of honesty for the past 7-8 months is totally FANTASTIC.
Blah blah blah...
There are many more instances of such things going on. And here's a few things I've re-discovered:
1) People are never consistent. When they call you "deary" or "best friend" or "brother", don't fall for it. Once something happens, all these promises fall away empty. And it's not over some BIG issue, but some shady, grey and not-really-right-or-wrong or unproven issues.
2) From no. 1, you'll discover that PEOPLE WILL ALWAYS FAIL YOU. Screw up, cock up, do a lil' thing that pisses them off and the commitment is easily shaken. I don't offer such shaky friendship. I'm always there to debate, reconcile and make right, quite unlike many people I've met.
3) People DON'T THINK. THEY REACT USING THEIR EMOTIONS, NOT LOGIC. I've trained myself to always put my logic first. To analyse the situation and debate with myself before letting out a reaction.
And once I let them in on my debates in my mind, they usually get offended. -.-" I'll tell them where they've done wrong, how they could do better and I'd tell them how I could've done better and how I could've reacted better and how in the light of our ENTIRE relationship (past, present & future), it doesn't really matter.
More often than not, the discourse of the former will lead to an eruption of angry emotions and they will never get to the latter.
4) Let your joy be found in Christ and Christ alone. He's the only guy that'll never fail you. Sometimes it seems that He's on a month-long holiday or hibernating, but truth is, He's always there, watching, holding, protecting, guiding, loving and leading. We're just sometimes too blind or we need to seek Him in a different way, in a different dimension.
Here are a few principles that I hold fast to when encountering all these heart-breaking moments:
1) I CHOOSE LOVE. Question always comes down to "So, they did all these shit to you, so what're you gonna do? Love 'em? Take revenge? Turn cold and ignore them? Sever all ties with them?"
The question comes down to "Is the person worth keeping in spite of what he/she has done?"
And with that, I'll think our past, look at the present and see what future we might have. Usually after that, I always love them all over again.
There are a thousand questions, debates and struggles like "Why is he/she like that?", "Doesn't he/she remember all the love we shared?".
Fact is, some questions will never be answered, some mistakes you will NEVER get an apology for, MOVE ON.
LOVE COVERS A MULTITUDE OF SINS - 1 Peter 4:8.
So, I - choose - love. It's hard. But that's how God loves us too. Stop calculating and finding fault in your relationships and let God's love flowing through you cover their sins against you.
2) I RECOGNIZE MY SEASON.
I know this season, this period in my life is one of letting go, surrendering. And this includes surrendering all these arguments, debates, questions and sin-log which I hold people accountable for.
So I know God is doing a deep work in my life.
He is using my closest friends to prick me, to offend me, to mould me, to test me and to eventually see if I can still love them the way Jesus has loved me for my uncountable intentional acts of sins done against Him.
SURRENDER JONAVAN! Surrender your pride, your logic, your arguments, your self-righteousness, your EGO, your rattle-off-the-truth-instantly and #justsaying moments.
Here are some of the things I discovered about myself.
1) I think too fast, too far and debate too well, too cogently that people do not have time to digest the truth of my discourse.
Therefore, they react with emotions because I didn't give them sufficient time before downloading a barrage of logic into their SLOW MINDS.
It takes them a day or two to simmer down and realize. For me, I see the end already using my debate-and-logic-it-out-with-yourself-first approach.
Fact is, PEOPLE JUST NEED TIME. For me it may seem small and it'll be alright. But for them, all they're seeing is THE PROBLEM and THE RAGE or THE HEARTBREAK.
So, I needa just, GIVE PEOPLE TIME.
JUST SHUT UP. Because truth spoken at the wrong timing no longer is received as truth.
2) I'm hell of an impatient guy.
Once people don't get me, I don't bother to let them get me. I either brush them away or logic-fy them impatiently.
Thus, making people feel that "I'm always right"
Truth is, I AM. Because even if you debate with me a day later or a week later about the same issue, YOU'RE NOT GONNA WIN.
If you're right and have a point and if I'm wrong and have no point to make, then I'll shut up or I'll brush the debate away.
So if I'm still debating, it means I've gotta point to make. And I bother debating with you because I care. If not, I won't waste time with a loser like you.
So yeah, kinda linked to the first thing I learnt about myself - I'm hell of an impatient guy.
WORKIN' ON THAT.
Many more reflections actually but lemme summarize it all with a word that God spoke to me recently during my prayer & worship session with Him:
"Where arguments fail, let love prevail."
I'm not perfect, I'm learning to love and change and surrender all these BIG things in my life to Him. It's a season of surrender for me now. OF EVERYTHING.
And I know He'll see me through :)
No comments:
Post a Comment