GOOD HEALTH AND ENOUGH REST

October 29, 2015

I planned to rest the whole day at home today, but sadly, there are still some errands to do, so I have to settle with being only slightly well and doing the best I can in order to both do my duties and strive for healing.

Fortunately, my bouts with these things are just like vaccination.  I only do get them once a year.  Last year it was around the middle of the year, and thankfully this year, it happens before the year-end so there would be a lot of stamina for the ‘more work ahead’.

It’s times like these that I really appreciate investing in one’s good health.  After all, our bodies are really the only thing we have in order to face life sane and happy.  No matter how much money a person makes, if he/she is often sick enough not to enjoy them, then who benefits from that?  On the other hand, if a person is always hard up on cash but the family is healthy and happy, then that person is truly rich. 

The same goes for the mind and the soul.  A healthy mind and soul sees and abides by the truth, lives each moment in love and gratefulness to GOD and to the people He has sent to accompany the person in his journey through life.  And a thankful and loving heart is indeed the best treasure one could ever hope for.

I am often reminded of the funny short story entitled “My Father Goes to Court”, by one of our great national artists Mr. Carlos Bulosan, which I have read when I was in the elementary, and often reread until I went to college.  Mr. CB is like the Clarence Day of the Philippines.  He wrote a lot about family life and that has endeared him to many of his fans in ‘Philippine Literature in English’.  He is on the same league as Nick Joaquin, Leon Ma. Guerrero, Carmen Guerrero-Nakpil and many others whose names I’ve forgotten after almost three decades but whose ideas and stories and life lessons still form part of my psyche.

Anyway the story goes that the father was accused by the rich neighbour of stealing the aroma of the food being cooked in the rich man’s house, so that even if the children of the poor father only had vegetables to eat, they are still healthier than the children of the rich man who often had pork and meat.  The father appeared in court after being summoned, and paid for such ridiculous crime by soliciting for coins from all those in attendance during the hearing and letting them put these in his sombrero, then jingling the coins all around the courtroom, thereby paying the ‘stolen aroma’ with the ‘sound of money’.  What the rich man did not realize that the poor father’s family may not be eating all the nice meats and dainties like he did, but they were full of love and happiness.  The narrator realized that their family is richer because their father truly loves them, and expresses these all with his natural sense of humour.

Such is the value of good health.  The Bible says that ‘a merry heart does good like medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones’.  It doesn’t say nobody who is happy gets sick.  It just says that yes, we could get sick sometimes, because it is a natural part of living, in order to let our bodies adjust to the seasons and the changes within our internal systems.  Getting sick too is a signal that our bodies need to rest once in a while amidst the frenetic pace and the humdrum of everyday living.  But a happy heart indeed gives one hope that no matter the circumstance--in sickness and want--there will be better and rosier times ahead.

FEELING THE BLUES

October 28, 2015

It’s that time of year again, about once or twice, when I get the blues.  The whole works—cough, cold, sore throat, headache.  I still manage to get to work though, but this afternoon, after a 5-day marathon of extreme sweltering heat (last Saturday’s grocery shopping, last Sunday’s gardening, last Monday’s frying under the sun during flag-raising, yesterday’s attendance at a tax briefing, and this morning’s attendance at the GSIS stakeholders’ dialogue), I’ve had enough.  I think I need to take a breather tonight and tomorrow.

And the doggies are feeling it too.  Mom said that Chikay seems to be really energetic playing under the heat of the sun with Summer, but when I get home, she gets all weak and sad and doesn’t like to eat.  Summer too, is joining in the bad feeling and only eating little.  I wish that we didn’t have this strong a bond, but they say your pets absorb your sickness too.  I can only pray we’d all get healed in due time.  But with the extreme heat, no rains in the last several days, exacerbated by the haze which passed over in the last few days and is now in Luzon, who doesn’t get affected?  My cough is heavy, my nasals get clogged every now and then, but thankfully I’m in the process of expectorating.  The three of us make a good chorus—while Summer and Chikay bark at passersby at home, I bark at the office.  Phew!  Arf! Arf!  Wheeze....=(

ACCURACY AND PROFUNDITY

October 27, 2015

A colleague and I attended a tax briefing this afternoon.  While waiting for the program to start, I read a copy of Herman Melville’s ‘Billy Budd’ that I brought along and came across the following phrase from the chapter on Digression “...not accurate as an accountant nor profound as a philosopher”.

It seems Mr. Melville put these two professions on opposite sides of a plane in relating to a person’s way of thinking: on one hand the accountant representing all that stands for what is logical and tangible, while the philosopher represents all that is deep, abstract and almost mystical.

What struck me was that the idea seems not only to be timely, but it is also timeless.  Whatever organization it may be, it seems that the accountant is seen as somebody who is nitpicky, always trying to find fault, always questioning the propriety and validity of things.  In short, the usual impression is that the accountant has been trained and works as somebody who doubts first and foremost, before giving a reluctant form of reliance on the actions and documents of others.  On the other hand, people talk about a philosopher who over-analyzes everything and expresses their thoughts in so many words.  I then realized that almost everybody else around me falls somewhere between these two sides, hence the polarization may seem valid.

Mr. Melville’s character which was the one referred to in the passage is somehow in the middle, and was painted as somebody disinterested, hence, a perfect person to fulfil an unbiased role.

In my case, I believe I am split between the two, since according to Mom, I actually take after these two types of people in her person and that of my father’s, and from my maternal grandmother and grandfather.  Two of them think like an accountant, and the other two think like a philosopher.  One can only guess which.  And yet, sometimes I believe the role switches because at other times, I feel that the accountant turns dreamy, while the philosopher seems to have come down from the pedestal of his thoughts and got down to the hard and cold facts.

Wouldn’t it be nice to just go on like this?  Would people see me as confused, or would they see me as somebody with multiple sides to my personality?  I can only hope that whatever frame of mind I adapt in any given situation, I may not discourage other people.  I may offend them sometimes with my bluntness, but I wish that I am able to impart a part of my mind and heart with them, so that we can learn more about life and be enriched in the journey together.

HORMONAL CHANGES

October 26, 2015

Somebody said today that her boss seems to always pick on her.  She said that her boss should have been a bit more understanding because their unit is located in a far station and they encounter so many difficulties merely trying to relay and submit reports and claims or secure instructions and communications.  When I told her that maybe her boss is undergoing hormonal changes, she scoffed.

I would like to give the boss the benefit of the doubt and not say outright that she just might be nasty, so instead, since it is an eve of the full moon, let us say that the boss is really undergoing hormonal changes.  It would probably also be believable because at her age, I think she might be in or near menopausal stage and subject to erratic hot flushes.

But the bigger issue is not physical but this: Why do a group of people react differently even if they might be exposed to the same stresses and challenges?  I guess psychologists have it right in saying that we are all a product of our genes and environment.  There are some people who I observe must come from families where niceness and generosity runs in the blood.  There are also some who I can see that greed, selfishness and pride were their staple food and basic nutrition in growing up.

But no matter the environment and upbringing, we all have the same set of proteins, although arranged differently, making up our DNAs, and the same number and types of chromosomes in them, unless we have Down’s Syndrome.  In short, we all have the potential to live in harmony with each other and not cause distress and disappointment or discouragement in other people.

I believe these questions could be discussed as an extension to the one I wrote about yesterday on personal conviction.  Maybe because life is indeed larger than us, some people choose to live their lives at the expense of others.  They do not care if they have stepped on other people, giving them resentments and heartaches, as long as they can feel good about themselves, and think that they are superior.  But feeling superior can only be an indication that one felt inferior in the first place, because if a person feels secure and confident about himself/herself, there is no need to prove that you know better and are in a higher position than other people, no?  It’s like people who try their hardest to be pretty and fashionable or macho and handsome.  Why try too much when you have those already?  You should only try to strive for those things that you do not have by nature.  Two good examples would be knowledge and wisdom.  We were not born with them and our whole lives are meant to be one long process of learning.  These should be our priorities—knowing ourselves, others, the world and environment more, and gaining wisdom that we can pass on to others when our times are up.

This is me putting my thoughts on the screen of my computer, in front of the growing moon outside the window.  More than hormonal changes, even though our bodies are 70% water and subject to the gravitational pull of the moon, shouldn’t we also adapt the fluidity of water and do our best to live at peace and in harmony with ourselves, the environment and other people?

PERSONAL CONVICTION

October 25, 2015

Thank GOD for a restful, refreshing and full Sunday.

I want to write today about personal conviction and how being true to who we really are is the one key to a fuller and more meaningful life.

The pastor’s sermon was fitting as he talked on being submerged under the influence of GOD’s holy presence.  He said that even though we call ourselves Christians, if we do not have GOD’s presence in our lives manifesting in the joy and desire for worship of HIM and fellowship with HIM and other people, be they members of our congregation, workmates, neighbours, family and friends, we are fakes and hypocrites.  I understand it to be kind of like being a light wherever.  True sources of light could never be dimmed and could never encounter shutting off due to low battery.  Whereas the kind that needs to be charged always is fake--a parasite even-- that would shut off whenever time passes and its energy bank gets drained.

His message once again is timeless.  He set up Moses, Joshua and David as good examples.  Moses, who grew up to a life of luxury in the palaces of Egypt, gave it all up when GOD called him and gave him a mission to take HIS people out from Egypt.  Joshua, who deeply loved GOD’s presence by always supporting Moses in everything he did, and yet never leaving the Tent of Meeting, was given the next mission to bring HIS people into the Promised Land.  King David meanwhile, was called by GOD from his life as the youngest child of a prominent family yet served as shepherd of his father’s flock, into a life of being Shepherd of Israel.  Though the pastor did not mention it, maybe for lack of time, but in the book of Revelation, JESUS CHRIST declared that David will also be serving as the Shepherd of all people who will be in GOD’s kingdom in heaven.  These three people dwelt in GOD’s presence and lived HIS words in their daily lives.  They might have committed mistakes while being human, still, it was their heart which had the desire to get to know HIM better and more fully, that was given more weight.

Of course, none of this would matter if a person does not believe that the Bible is GOD’s Holy Word and that it contains the recipe for a more abundant life in the here and now, and in the ever after.  But still, daily life makes us see what happens to people who do not have such faith and who believe that we are just random mutations of the evolutionary progression of time. 

I personally have observed these things when I was younger and until now, through all the church groups I’ve attended, school groups I’ve belonged to, work organizations I’ve been employed in, and neighbourhoods that I lived in.  When the pastor talked about many who have the form of Christianity or the form of being a good and nice person, but who lacked substance, he could very well be meaning that there really are more than enough Santo’ng Kabayo to go around wherever we go.  The truth of our nature leaks through the cracks of our persons if we fill the inside of our lives with apathy, callousness, narcissism, pride, and envy.

Sadly, even I sometimes fall to this group of people when I forget how to behave properly, watch what I say, and impose my preferences on others.  So, I guess I need to work a lot more on being submerged deeper.  Hopefully, my efforts will pay off in the end, so that when I leave this life for the next, I would have the privilege of hearing the Commendation of the Good and Faithful Servant, and not a Conviction for the Eternal Damnation of my soul.