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| Man. It’s been a month plus since I’ve written? Madness.
It isn’t that I don’t have anything to say. On the contrary, I have too much to say. That, and I have little time to write thoughts.
That’s not true.
I just don’t give myself time. This semester has been quite taxing. I used to remember in high school, when I would say that there is rarely any time for me to practice music because I have a busy schedule. In retrospect, I laugh. I mock my old thought. There was always ways to economize my time. I’ve reached a point, this semester, where I’m burning too much of the candle. Seven classes, three private lessons, eighteen hours of practice, plus job position as a TA. It’s a lot. Not too much, but a lot. It’s bad enough by itself, but life has a funny way of throwing emotional jabs, adding to the weight. It gets to a point where all I can cry is “Lord, slow me down!” A slower pace. I think we all can use it.
Sometimes we go too fast. Sometimes I go too fast. When we run, indeed, we get a lot of work done, but we miss out in the life around us. I remember a couple weeks ago, I was super stressed. I had to attend this concert—which would eat a huge chunk out of my time to do sleep and practice—and I had to perform one of my pieces at a friend’s junior recital (problem being, we hadn’t done a full rehearsal since the prior semester and our last performance of the piece was terrible). There was more whip cream on top of the situation—it just evades me at the moment.
Point being, I was stressed.
That friday, I was getting blows from the left and right constantly. I remember walking to the music building stressed and pissed, and my friend Mark Freed commented how lovely the sunset was. My response wasn’t a joyous or sympathetic one. Rather, it was a self-centered and problematic one. “I wish I had time to enjoy it.” I wish I had time to enjoy it. By saying that, I am recognizing that there is beauty and goodness in the sunset. In the same sentence, I am claiming that I do not have time to look and accept the goodness.
I find it a fallacy to say that one does not have time to accept goodness. God’s beauty is all around us. His creation isn’t just for aesthetics. While sunsets may be beautiful and landscapes may be breathtaking, there’s more to creation than just visual pleasure. Just as the rainbow was a promise to Noah, God’s creation is a promise to us. A promise that not only is God bigger than our troubled hearts, but that He is with us in our troubled times. A promise that all will be made well. But how can we see the sunset fade in the horizon if we try to speed our lives too fast? I’m not saying to stop all our works and focus on nature. Not at all. I still go to Loma and still am taking many classes and still need to accomplish the goals my professors set before me. But if we could just stop. Stop and pause to see the bigger picture. To see that our struggles and worries are part of something bigger that we can’t control on our own mere strength, then maybe our burden wouldn’t be as heavy as we make it out to be. Maybe. While my thoughts are rarely profound, I do hope to keep writing throughout the school year.
I just need to give myself time… | | |
| I have been struggling with many things lately. Mostly ideas in the abstract.
What is wrong with relationships today? Why is it hard for people to relate with each other? Where has communication gone wrong?
Of course, I'm not the first to ask these questions and I doubt that this blog will be the last regarding them. Nevertheless, as I ask those questions, I always seem to come back to two words: empathy and sympathy. Both words come from the same root—pathos—yet their approach can make such a difference. Let's strip the words down to it's core. By definition, empathy means to intellectually relate with another's feelings, actions, or thoughts. Sympathy, on the other hand, means to agree in feeling to another's feelings, actions, or thoughts. So difference?
One is to understand intellectually while one is to feel.
Does that make much of a difference?
Yes. It does. I feel like many people use empathy and sympathy synonymously, yet there's a distinct line between the two. To intellectually understand someone's pain means nothing to the victim. We all are capabale of analyzing the pain of a friend. Indeed, we can even give advice to the victim, but how can they receive it? How can they receive such advice that is served on a dry cold platter?
In discussion, it's one thing to be right. But if your recepient can not receive truth, your validity and accuracy means nothing. There's a friend that I've constantly debated against. We've gone through a plethora of topics. Religion, music, love, politics, art. However, I feel as I continue to talk, no progress is made. All the words and advice I say one day fall apart and the next day I'm back to square one. I used to blame him. I used to say that he was so stubborn to agree with the facts.
But there reveals the problem.
My search for truth was more prevalent than my search to be a friend.
Empathy was there. I clearly understood what his problems were. I tried to offer him some good advice. However, my ideas could not be served because I did not take the time and stand in his shoes and feel how he felt. Sympathy lacked. When one merely discusses topics through intellect, they hold the other person in contempt. They see that their views are right and anything the opposing side has to say is wrong. Many times, they are quite valid in seeing this way.
However, the human heart is not a piece of machinery. Mending a heart isn't as simple as replacing a faulty gear with a working one. It's much more intricate. We can analyze it all we want, but until we step down from our world of intellect and just sit down with our friend, hearts will never be healed. When Mary's brother Lazarus died, she cried to Jesus. Jesus did not explain that in the end, we all return to dust. He did not quote scripture to help Mary through her pain. Instead, he sat down next to her and wept. Our Lord wept. The shortest verse in the Bible, yet one with much potency. We cannot win hearts through our minds alone. Indeed, our minds help give us ideas at how to approach things. But our intellect can not carry all the weight. It is through our sympathy. It is through lowering ourselves to our friend's level and just sitting with them in whatever state of mind they might be in. Cold chicken noodle soup is a paradox. So is trying to convince a friend in need with mere intellect.
Best to heat it up by showing care. | | |
| I was talking to a friend tonight.
This kid is someone I admire a lot. She holds many strong and honorable attributes. The only thing is, many times we just don't connect. It isn't that we don't see eye-to-eye or we are on negative terms. Rather, it is that our conversations often run a bit stagnant — rarely a constant flow. A possibility could be because our friendship is relatively new. I'd like to hope that that is merely the case. At this point, many people give up on friendships. Heck. I wouldn't be surprised if I would if I found this person rambunctious, for lack of better word. But I wonder if that's such a good idea. To just give up on someone because you don't click initially. There was one person who I met in beginning martial arts. I first met him when I was paired up with him to do front kicks. My initial thoughts of him were... I don't know. He was a little weird hahah. He reached out, though. I remember kind of talking to him at my 10th grade ASB Ball. He started to IM me via AIM. I didn't really know how to respond to this kid initially. I barely knew him after all. However, I'm glad Jevin didn't give up, because we became really good friends. Now I don't know if my friendship with this person will be as strong as mine with Jevin's, but my past with Jevin gives me a reason not to let go. There is no reason to let go. Worst case is that our conversations remain stagnant. But unless there is no hostility, I don't see why anyone should let go of relationships and bonds. Jon Foreman gave insight on his view of what friendship is. I think that's what a relationship is... not figuring soemone out, putting them in a box and calling that a friendship. But it's a dance really, where you're continually trying to figure somebody out and they're continually to learn who you are. It is a dance. Friendship is a dance. Some people just connect really well and their motions synchronize flawlessly immediately. However, in most cases, when you start out, you and your partner are bound to move in opposite directions, step off beat, or crunch the others' toes. It happens, but that does not mean you just sit down after your first mistake. Now, I'm no great dancer — I barely meet the adequate line for ballroom dancing. However, just by observation, I can see that dancing flows easier when the two know each other well. They know their weak points, their tendencies for transitions, and so on. But that comes in time. Maybe that's what inhibits people from connecting today. Time. In this consumerist society, who has time to waste with a person that might not become a good friend at all? Time is money, afterall, isn't it? Time is short. Those with an hourly wage definitley comprehend this pressure. But life is more than money. Time was never money. (Uh oh... Jon Foreman again)
To extend ourselves to another is more important than getting 8 more dollars to buy something frivolous. To bond with a friendship can last a lifetime. That's something time has no touch on. Toes might get bruised, but in time, who knows how beautiful the two's movements might end up creating. I danced with a friend tonight.
I stepped off beat a couple times, but I think I'm understanding her better. | | |
| there's a lot to write. there's a lot of ideas. there's a lot of "saved drafts."
but i would like to do them justice by giving it time.
mer.
they will be published. rest assured :] | | |
| There is comfort in routine. Uncertainty can many times be frightening, depending on the conext. Thus, routine ensures the idea that things will go as planned. There are definintely proponents to this idea, but I’m glad that something tugged me away from it today. After taking eating lunch outside, routine asked me to go and work on my piano skills — seeing how rusty they are. However, I looked at the ocean that we Lomalites sometimes take for granted and I paused and decided to extend my break a little more. I walked down the stairs, past the golden gym, and stood on top of the fitness building, looking aimlessly around. There was ease in those moments. I began remembering how things used to be. I looked down on the field and remembered seeing Jackie picking up balls as her favorite golf class was ending. I looked over at the benches and remembered cheering on Evan during one of his games. I remembered how I was running around the gate at night after coming back from the library so I could play fugitive and I tripped and skinned my knee. So many memories. I tried to remember how I felt when I first came to Loma. A new boy who had nothing to lose by raising his hand in class. No more conceptions of who I was/what box I should be placed in — at least not yet. A new boy sitting in his room because he didn’t know how to approach his new hall mates. A new boy who spent the whole semester trying to find who the heck that girl was that reached out to him during NSO. So many memories. It made me wonder: why do we reminisce? What gives us the urge to make us remember pivotal memories, be them good or bad (though usually the case of the former)? Many people say it’s a mere yearn for what was good in our lives. However, the realism in us tries to push it away. “We live in the now” our side cries out. “The past is the past. Those good feelings are over. It’s time to move on.”
Yes.
We can’t live in the past. But something inside is trying to tell us something. Is it a mere defense mechanism, a homeostatic response to make us feel good? I think that’s closer to the point, but I would definitely reword it. I don’t see it as a mere chemical reaction. It can’t be. Maybe we reminisce because something inside of us is trying to say that there is still hope. There is still good.
Many times in our lives, we get caught up in the monotony of routine. On, off. Back and forth. Tick tock. Days pass by. Pay day. Buy food. Do the dishes. Pay the bills. Loans. Expenses. Debt. Suicide bombing. Genocide. War threat. Friend dies by gang violence. After a while, all we see are the negative attributes of life. After all, it’s always sorrow that hits the headlines. Heavy stories make for heavy purchases. Negative stories come in bulk.
Nevertheless, the positive events still exist. But they come in small progressions. Does that mean they are outweighed by the negative stories? Not at all! But good is not as easy to see as bad. It takes a bit of looking to see what truly is good. But when do we have time to look? When do we give ourselves time to stop what we’re doing and see the good in things? With such schedules and routines that we give ourselves — and many times rightfully so — when do we have time to see the good in this world? So goodness reaches to us at even closer level.
Our memories. When we reminisce, it isn’t so we can feel good about the past and try to remember the glory days. No. Not at all. The realism in us is right to say that the past is the past. It isn’t about reliving our old experiences. It’s about hope.
Hope that new memories can form.
Hope that there still is good in this world.
Hope that despite our barricades, our snares, our issues in society… despite all the problems that arise around us and within us… there is evidence; there is proof; there is hope that the good we experienced in our lifetime is not over. | | |
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