before i study

It's true that not everything I want is everything I need. I wish I was better at filtering things or people or experiences that I really need, so I don't have to go through the long and tiring process of regret most of the time.

For happier news, I'm looking forward to the UST Med School tour this Friday and Embassy's Yard Sale. I really wish I can go to both events AND still have time to study for the first theo long exam.

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Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/almirauy

3 more thousand to go. :-<

three strikes

Are we done yet? Can I please get myself back on track and forget how shitty I've performed in the last month?

student life satisfaction: 2

because OSCI online enlistment was such a fail

The idea of berry picking seems to excite me, I don't know why. Bananas for breakfast, anyone?

Thank God Ateneo won yesterday. *hoping for a good score in the last Theo quiz*

the saving Facebook app

thank you :)

Almira got a message that on this day, God wants her to know...
... that humans learn only by trial and error, and that includes you.

You've got to live life, not think about it. Step into the midst of things, try and fail and learn and stand up again. The question is not whether you will or will not make mistakes - you will. The question is do you want to learn and grow, or do you want to shrink back and be stuck? Take that step you've been avoiding. You can succeed, or you can get feedback that it didn't work, but in either case you are sure to feel alive.

See what God wants you to know...

June 30 at 1:51am · Comment · Like · Read your Message from God

back to school

It's only the third week of classes and I already feel as if it's midterms season. Hay theo, you are eating me alive.

The days seem longeeeeeer. And I don't like it all. *sighs

Mistakes I wish I never made.

happy mood

I love my friends and the simplest things we can share. Now I want ice cream. Mmm.

The sun's shining.

I should seriously start learning how to set my priorities and responsibilities. You see priorities and responsibilities are two entirely different things and sometimes, what people tend to prioritize aren't really part of the things they are responsible for. Hay.

I need something to cheer me up. Seriously, call me unsatisfied but my chem lecture grade was not enough to lighten me up from the bad news I heard today.

It was mine already, why'd you take it away? :(

bittersweet

After more than a year, I finally got sick, as in the type of getting sick that you have no choice but to stay in bed as you cringe in pain coming from all parts of your body. My head was throbbing worse than it did when I bumped by head twice during judo sparring. At the same time, I felt nauseous and vomited every time I tried to stand up. Aside from that, my tummy wasn’t feeling good as well, forcing me to go to bathroom almost as frequent as vomiting. I couldn’t eat since the smell of food made me more nauseous. I stayed in bed for more than 12 hours trying to sleep everything off. My entire system hurt so much I cried in pain. HAHA. Seriously, I did. But nobody really saw me crying, since they thought I was just sleeping. But the weird thing about that day of getting sick is how I think I miss getting sick and the pain it gives me. For so long I’ve been immune from all kinds of sickness that I no longer remember how it felt to be sick. Not that I’m unappreciative of the healthy body I’ve been blessed with (because dear God I truly am!), it’s just that yesterday made me realize how those kids I visit almost every week in AFP hospital must feel having to endure that much pain I only experience once a year. How can they put up with that dizziness whenever they wake up from their sleep? Or the fuzzy feeling in their tummies that discomfort them? Or at the very least, the muscle pain they get from lying all day doing nothing?

Nonetheless, knowing how painful it must be for the kids to stay in bed all day, I also realized how nice it was to see and feel people taking care of you when you’re sick. Like yesterday, I saw how people in my house went in and out of my room to check up on me while I was “sleeping”. I liked how they checked my temperature by touching my forehead or my neck and how they tried to wake me up and invite me for downstairs while I simply replied with a weak nod. Also, the wet towel on my forehead, for me, is one of the sweetest and most comforting ways anyone can ever do for me. Just like in the movies, when the sick person lies on the bed sleeping while another character patiently waits for the sick to wake up and puts the significant wet towel over the forehead. And then the sick person gets better in the morning to see the other sleeping on his side. Aside from it being romantic, I think it’s one of the simplest yet most caring gestures anyone can do. Add to that warm towel over the forehead a hot soup of cream of mushroom with crackers on the side for the tummy and I feel much better already.

And with that, I realized this morning that maybe the reason why doctors want to be doctors and nurses want to be nurses is because they liked how it feels to make someone better. Maybe, not just them, but also the rest of us has this inner want to be a superhero or a doctor to somebody and help another person get better. As much as we all want to be cured from whatever pain we endure, we also want to provide comfort, warmth or care for other people.

every moment

One of my blockmates posted this in our block e-group. Inspiring in the simplest words. Read on.

In the interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, Rick said:
People ask me, What is the purpose of life? And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were not made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven.
One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body but not the end of me.
I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity.
We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.
Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one.
The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort.
God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy.
We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.
This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.
I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore.
Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.
No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on.
And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for.
You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems.
If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, 'which is my problem, my issues, my pain.' But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.
We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her.
It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.
You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.
Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy.
It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease.
So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72
First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases.
Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.
Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation.
Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.
We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity?
Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?
When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better. God didn't put me on earth just to fulfil a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do.
That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.
Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
Every moment, THANK GOD.

repudiation

One thing I learned from this semester is how to learn to give up on things that weren’t meant for me. There comes a point in our lives that no matter how much effort we can exert on something, it just won’t give in. And I’m not saying this out of bitterness or defeat or whatever sad note the first line may deceivingly entail. It’s actually my way of saying that when we give up on things we can’t get, it makes it easier for us to open ourselves on fresh opportunities, opportunities that may come risk-free and possibly more inviting than the previous.

In developmental psychology, we learned about repudiation. Repudiation is defined as letting go of one's less important identities, attitudes, or behavior. Repudiation can only take place if one successfully establish a concrete identity of himself and learns to be faithful to this identity. Even as the wind blows, this is who I am, that is the ideal identity we all want to achieve. So probably, just probably, this second sem was my period of repudiation, the period when I am (forced) to let go of my different identities, and settle for something better?

3 days

I miss writing and not caring if my psych professors will give me a high mark.

I miss reading books for the sake of simply reading them.

I miss going abroad.

I miss home-cooked meals.

I miss sleeping for long hours during lazy summer afternoons after class.

Surprisingly, I miss work in Batangas.

I miss having someone to go home to.

I miss looking forward to coming home, either to Batangas or to my dorm.

I miss my high school friends and their crazy antics.

I miss talking about how to un-bored(?) myself.

I miss Hana Kimi.

Hay, i miss a lot of things. And I feel like I'm missing out on a lot of things as well. Konti na lang.

stalling

13 days to go until freedoooooom. I can't wait to leave school and this sucky sem behind.

Summer, I shall eat you alive. I promise.


If not today, then tomorrow.

this is not an emo post

I am such a disappointment. I realize I am not good enough, not smart enough, not honorable enough. So now I wish I could be smarter, so you can be proud of me as well. So you wouldn't have to treat me as coldly as you do now.

It sucks when things remain uncertain, unsure and hanging.

There’s something wrong, but I can’t exactly pinpoint what. All I know is that I feel bad about something, that there’s something, and that I should not be feeling this way. I just hope tomorrow will get better. I hope tomorrow will give me answers.

GAAAAAH. Even stress-eating doesn't help relieve this discomfort. Hay.

Kythe flying

Today, I flew a kite, rode a fire truck and painted a smile in little Angelito's face. Despite of the thunderstorm this week has brought, I am happy. I am at peace. I love Kythe and how it can easily manage to make things a lot brighter and lighter for me.

Things will get better.