Moving On!

I'm marking a new phase of consciousness, and thought it fitting to start a new blog. :) This site is now inactive. I'm keeping it on the web for archiving purposes only. Connect with me on Facebook, links to my sites will be posted there.

The blank page awaits. Toodles! :)

Pamantasang Hirang

“Back in the 50s, in UP Diliman… It was a wonderful time to be alive, and young, and in love.”
~ Winnie Monsod, Pamantasang Hirang

I was particularly captivated by that part of the concert, my imagination running wild, wondering what it would have been like to have gone to the University back then, in the unadulterated richness of that beginning.

When the bombings during the Japanese occupation forced the University to close temporarily, it left the original UP campus in Padre Faura little more than a pile of rubble. But the insatiable thirst for knowledge has always been the driving force of the University, and it was primarily for the purity and nobility of this pursuit that no national crises could ever be allowed to deter its devotees. The consuming passion for the contemplation of greater things spurred them on despite the hurdles. It was in the postwar days that the move was made from Manila to Diliman, our Oblation finding its new abode in the sprawling campus we now call our home. Amidst the fresh wounds inflicted by the war, the resilient idealism of youth and the University emerged once again. UP reopened, this time in Diliman.

The University, in a way, stood for all things pure and hopeful. It was a little ray of light in a nation plagued by darkness, groping in an attempt to rebuild from the ruins. The University was the seat of both tradition and innovation in the academe, being the common ground where the most seasoned men and women invested sweat and blood to teach, and where the most promising young minds flocked, ready and waiting to be molded into the molders of the nation. Its fierce love for country made it the enduring promise that things could and would still get better. But they were also young, and beginnings are always frightening, made even more so by the scars we have borne and wear. But back then, in UP in the 50s, they, one and all, decided to be brave. They decided to believe again, and hope again. I imagine it must have been easier for the rest of the world to believe and to hope, leaving it to others to move toward its fulfillment; but for them, it was different, because they dared to believe and to hope, and they rose to the call of making it happen.

I was left with a sense of awe, and nostalgia if it is even possible, with the dread that perhaps the best days of the University are trailing behind it, and everything will be downhill from here. Maybe we have been invaded by one too many conyos and have compromised the purity of the Iskolar ng Bayan in the fullest sense of the word. How shameful it would be never to live up to the bar set before us, the excellent standard handed down in the halls of our University. But again, I was reminded of the students in the 50s. It all starts when we believe in great things.

The epitome of the Iskolar ng Bayan has always been the Oblation—a picture of the total giving of oneself. Each generation of the Iskolar ng Bayan is the Oblation; we always give ourselves entirely to one particular thing; it is simply a matter of what. And I believe today, as the Centennial Isko, we are faced with the challenging prospect of choosing what to give our all to. The worthiness of the Iskolar ng Bayan is not so much in its giving, but in its giving to the most worthy thing. In choosing what to live for, we choose whom to be, and it is here that we must learn to harness the wisdom instilled in us by our education. This is the crucible where the true lovers of the University are seen from those who merely passed through. We live worthy of the name if we are spent for the things of worth. Iskolar para sa Bayan has always been a calling and a challenge presented before us by our mentors, that we give back to our motherland. However, I dare make a bolder suggestion—that we give back to our God. Even nations and independences come and go, but life will always be something we owe to the Almighty, far outlasting the vicissitudes of political and economic strife, both in reward and in value. ~

Come undone.

He had said, “I am a man,” and that meant certain things to her. It meant that he was half insane and half god. It meant that he would drive his strength against a mountain and plunge his strength against the sea. She, in her woman’s soul, knew that the mountain would stand while the man broke himself; that the sea would surge while the man drowned in it… Sometimes the quality of woman, the reason, the caution, the sense of preservation, could cut through his manness and save them all.
~ John Steinbeck, The Pearl (paraphrase)

***

A man more than a name, a life more than a fault
Broken-down walls, traces of light in the dark
Courage hidden in absence, revealed in subtle willingness
Desiring to be known, igniting firestorms of unrest
Echoes of an age-old tale, memories long forgotten
Fresh wounds remaining new, though many suns have set and risen
God standing outside his house, staring in the distance
Home waiting for a son, a heart to break, an ear to listen
Inside a hope still burning, believing, risking, unswerving
Jesus’ arms still open wide, always giving, always loving
Kindness poured out graciously, asking for nothing in return
Let go as he may have, Love minds not being spurned
Man is more than his name, life is more than a fault
New mercies overflow, son being sought by his father’s heart.

losing my religion

“Jesus said to him, ‘If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!’” –John 21:22, NASB

I’m learning that I complicate things beyond necessity by making up rules that distort a relationship into a religion, and by worrying about human opinion which I cannot control. I’m learning that the Christ of the Bible is radically different—far more dynamic, spontaneous, fierce, free—from my own personal brew of Christianity.

“The problem is that many folks try to grasp some sense of who God is by taking the best version of themselves, projecting that to the nth degree, factoring in all the goodness they can perceive, which often isn’t much, and then call that God. And while it may seem like a noble effort, the truth is that it falls pitifully short of who He really is. He’s not merely the best version of you that you can think of. God is far more than that, above and beyond all that you can ask or think… Even though you can’t finally grasp Him, guess what? God still wants to be known.” –paraphrased from The Shack

I’m learning that the only thing that has ever mattered—the only thing that even caused matter to come into existence—is His love, a love that would go to the most unexpected of places. To an obscure planet, to a stinky little manger, to a tiny barangay in the Middle East, to stay in the temple as His parents searched for Him, to dine at a tax collector’s house, to the rescue of an adulterous woman, to driving out moneychangers from the temple, to work on a Sabbath, to linger two more days as His best friend lay dying, to the scorn of men who kept the law and paid their tithes, to wash even Judas’ feet, to plead with God in an olive grove, to remain silent as men mocked Him, to endure when He could have given up, to the Cross.

Formulas, expectations, responsibilities and requirements just won’t cut it. Jesus is surprising and beautiful and alive, and I should expect to be surprised, to stand in awe, and to live. And I am a lot less afraid, because I’m a lot more trusting. I’ve found that the more I trust, the more I am free.

“It was for freedom that Christ has set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.” –Galatians 5:1, NASB

So God is breaking down the towering fortress that has held me captive. I squint in the sunlight, and He takes my hand and leads me ever gently, out of my Christianity and into the true heart of Christ. And as He clears the rubble of old lies from the gloriously unpredictable desert that is my life, I find that all that is left, basking in the heat of the day, all that is left, is Him and me.

Grilled Chicken and Happy Panda

I am sitting in Mama’s room, clinging to a big unopened bag of my favorite Doritos Smokin’ BBQ, eating the remains of my Happy Panda (yes, food on the bed) and I want to cry.

Mama, Tita and I were on a roll wrapping gifts earlier, and when no one would back me up to call 87000 Jollibee delivery for merienda, Pong somehow threatened to die of starvation enough times to mobilize the family into taking quick baths, getting dressed, and going out for snacks and groceries. I needed to finish packing, so I opted to stay home. My request: Doritos Smokin’ BBQ, chocolates of any (or every) kind, you know naman what I like, and, oh, are you going to Figaro? I’ve been dying to have a grilled chicken sandwich. And iced tea… You know what, nah, water’s fine. Just the grilled chicken. Grilled chicken ah. I love their grilled chicken.

My merienda turned into dinner with the Christmas buildup in Alabang. I read a good four chapters of The Shack and finished packing. I used the Billabong bag I usually bring to camps, my laptop bag and a funky handbag. Mama tells me I overpacked.

My chicken and the groceries finally arrived at half past seven or so. I was quite pleased with my patience, and it was with the dignity of delayed gratification that I opened the box of take-out, thinking that it is perhaps with that quiet contentment that I will meet God’s best, if I succeed in this discipline called waiting; I’ve been redeeming the time. I took a few bites, forked at the salad, and sheer horror came flooding into my being. It was sweet. It was chicken Caesar, not grilled chicken. Grilled chicken was pesto and cheese. I wanted pesto and cheese. I had some sort of sweet bacon. I wanted pesto and cheese. I had specifically asked for pesto and cheese. Mama usually orders chicken Caesar. I’m the only one who likes grilled chicken. Mama says the grilled chicken in Figaro tastes like perfume. I love their grilled chicken. I am heartbroken.

I was in too much pain to take another bite. In a futile effort, I asked to borrow the car and go get myself a grilled chicken sandwich from Figaro in Aguirre, perhaps like how a lover would plead with someone who has one foot out the door. Useless, but, you know. We do things. Mama snapped at me. I grabbed the big bag of Doritos from among the groceries and held it tight, maybe like how a little kid would grab her blankie or her dollie when she’s scared. Or maybe her papa or daddy. But I want to eat my Doritos in the car tomorrow morning, or maybe tonight when Papa comes home. It’s no fun without sharing. And I don’t want Doritos for dinner. I want grilled chicken. I saw several packs of Happy Panda in one of the bags and I snatched one. I snapped at Ian before because their real name is Hello Panda, but Ian says the Panda looks so Happy.

I started eating the Happy Panda except that I wasn’t so happy. I ate it with disdain, actually. I’m not happy at all. (This is being written in real time, with me clutching my Doritos, although I have finished the 35 grams of Happy Panda.) And I just feel really guilty because there is so much food in the house and I still feel bad, and Mama, infallible as she is, is probably right that the chicken Caesar tastes better than grilled chicken, but I still want grilled chicken anyway. Simba owned everything that the light touches, but he ventured off into the elephant graveyard anyway. Stupid, stubborn little child. Stupid, stubborn little child.

There’s an entire box of Nestle crunch, a bar of white Toblerone, a bag of Mrs Fields, wholesale packs of Oishi Pillows. I haven’t had time to rummage through the rest of the sinfood. Granted, Pong smuggled some of them out of the pantry into his own private gluttonpen, but still. I am amazed at my own capacity to overlook, or see and give little value to, the many things that I have, just because I am so consumed in the one thing that I want but did not get.

I guess it’s all a matter of focus. I think matters of focus are matters of choice.

I walked into Mama’s room clutching my Doritos, Happy Panda and laptop with a look of unspeakable sadness. Mama asked me what the matter was. I said I was going to blog about how man is depraved and that just because God doesn’t give you what you want doesn’t mean that He doesn’t give you anything. God doesn’t always give you what you want but it doesn’t mean that He doesn’t give you good things. It doesn’t mean that He doesn’t give you the best that He has.

I let Ian get away with calling Hello Panda Happy Panda. I let Ian get away with a lot of things. Ian taught me to play Frisbee on December 7, 2008. God taught me a whole lot more. I never scored a goal, but I laughed. I was praying then, as now, and God said He had other things in mind. I wanted grilled chicken. But grilled chicken or chicken Caesar, or everything the light touches or elephant graveyard, or Hello Panda or Happy Panda, or everything or nothing. Is He not still God? Pastor Jonathan jokes that God changed my life on December 7, 2008, would I like to share my testimony? Pastor Jonathan was right.

Papa just got home. I think I’ll let it go and start eating my Doritos now.

touch

So it’s been months, and since I read Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, I’ve found myself trapped in this sad little bubble of squishy gray matter located inside my skull. I think Haruki Murakami is the one to blame, but then again there was Milan Kundera’s diet book before that, so now I’m not so sure.

I remember that desperate evening when I sat and allowed the ideas to float and swirl in the blue like jazz. I was sitting and waiting. I was waiting for home.

I remember as the realization dawned on me, that it takes touch to pop a bubble, and that this in particular requires raw human touch, or perhaps the unadulterated breath of God, like it’s new, like life is real. Because touch tells you that you’re not alone. That I can reach for you and succeed, that you’re not trapped, because I can reach you. Touch is the miracle of life. Touch is magic.

So it’s been months. And today I got a tight, lingering, honest-to-goodness embrace. And it’s like the bubble popped and all the goo fell out, and I’m a cosmic blob, but what the heck? I can breathe.

And I’m sitting here, with school and ministry breathing down my neck, thinking if I will actually be able to wake up in time to go to Dawnwatch tomorrow,wondering if I really even know how to pray like God wants me to, fancying “Edward” sitting next to me in class, wanting to read, and write a poem, and wondering what the guy named Jake will do with his six-pack of beer, and realizing that the decision is mine.

And I find that I’m still waiting. Waiting for home. Whether to go home, or for home to come to me, I’m not quite sure. And at this point I’m not even sure if an embrace is enough to pop the bubble. Perhaps it takes the breath of God. I don’t really know. Blame it on living alone. Blame it on too much philosophy. Blame it on creative writing. Blame it on me. But whosever fault it is, I’m mighty glad to know that I can be touched. It makes it a lot less scary, because even though I may not be able to escape the squishy gray matter, I at least know that someone can get through it to me.

Of Worldly and Otherworldly Desires: A Wishlist of Sorts

Since everyone's asking, I made a list, which might be helpful, but I do realize that a lot of the stuff I want aren't all tht realistic. Hehe. Oh well, here goes.

I think it would be cool to have...

1. a Hebrew and Greek study Bible! Greek for the Geek :-D
2, dresses dresses and more dresses!
3. funky rubber shoes. B-)
4. a big white bag since I always find myself in need of one.
5. lots of big bags in general. My mom always said, “Pag magbibgay ka ng bag sa nanay, kailangan kasya ang padodo.”
6. strappy black flats. beige flats. hot red shoes. a new pair of flat havaianas.
7. a new watch.
8. a NASB audiobible so I can memorize chapters and books!
9. a maroon UP centennial jacket and a Siglo lanyard! I never had the time to spare to line up in Vinzon’s during the Siglo sales and get one for myself.
10. pens and notebooks for the writer.
11. a Star Wars DVD collection!
12. super Bible software on my laptop—dozens of different versions, commentaries, etc like the one from CCF to help me write devs, messages and materials. And for my own personal study.
13. that perfect pair of jeans from Viktor. I should get myself one if I make it to the summa bracket.
14. BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS *drool* BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS…

• Chuck Palahniuk: “Fight Club” and everything else
• Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre
• The Art of War by Sun Tzu
• Milan Kundera (except The Unbearable Lightness of Being)
• Umberto Eco (except The Name of the Rose)
• Gabriel Garcia Marquez (except One Hundred Years of Solitude)
• CS Lewis: “The Four Loves” and “The Abolition of Man”
• Ian McEwan
• Frederick Copleston’s “A History of Philosophy Series”
• Josh McDowell

15. a new non-techie-friendly cellphone with excellent SMS, contacts and calendar features.
16. an iPod that is more than 1GB, but the one I have is actually ok :-P
17. A CAR ON RAINY DAYS hehehe
18. (to go on) a pilgrimage to the Holy Land!
19. a scholarship to Moody Bible Institute for 2 years (MABS or MAT, I’m still deciding) <3
20. a scholarship to Fuller Theological Seminary for 1 year (ThM!) <3
21. unos on my classcards \:D/

Growing Up with the Eraserheads

S Magazine, October 2008 Issue

I guess you could say that I grew up with the Eraserheads, in more ways than one.

Ely, Raimund, Buddy and Marcus formed the band in UP Diliman in 1989, a year before I was born. My mom met Ely in 1991 when he worked as a copywriter for then-BMG Records Pilipinas, and she would tag me along to shop for Christmas gifts for officemates, Ely included, or so the family story goes. The boys finally got a break and released their first album in 1992. I was one year old.

Growing up, “Eheads” was a word I knew which usually referred to a CD my dad played in the car; Ely was the name of a guy from Mama’s work; and my parents’ child-friendly version of Pare Ko was a song I sang, along with Mary Had a Little Lamb and the theme from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Although I have only a number of memories about the Eraserheads themselves, traces of them—an autographed poster in my cousin’s room, a Moon Man back in my MTV-watching days, pictures lying around the house of my mom and dad with the band in Singapore—are littered generously all over the first ten-or-so years of my life. And for most every other seemingly unrelated memory, their songs are playing in the background.

I got hooked on boy bands during the latter part of my elementary days, which was also around the time that the Eheads disbanded. However, I soon discovered that I was much more of a nerd than a music enthusiast, so during my high school days, I gave up trying to keep up with the “hip” and “in” in the pop music scene. And although I have at least moved from Walkman to Discman to iPod, the music I have always played became a sort of accidental time warp for the glory days of the 90s.

I eventually entered college in UP Diliman, my student number 2007 coming a full two decades after Ely’s 1987. The University experience felt both new and old, like living in a memory. I was discovering for the very first time the things and places made so familiar by the music of my childhood. For every meal in CASAA, I had Shirley playing in my head (Magkaholding-hands papunta sa CASAA). For every trip to UP Teachers’ Village, it was Bogchi Hokbu (Wawawamaginha=Maginhawa, a street I frequented in UPTV). In my freshman year, I lived in Kalayaan Residence Hall, the dorm where they used to live, immortalized in Minsan (Minsan sa may Kalayaan). There were few things I did that had not already been sung about, and the music, raw and witty as it is, became mine just as much as it was theirs.

Since the breakup in 2002, I have been well aware of the sheer impossibility of the Eraserheads ever performing together again. I was quite content with my old CDs and the occasional Pupil gig where favorites like Alapaap would be played from time to time. One can just imagine the skepticism with which I met the news (or more appropriately, rumors) of the Eheads reunion concert. Official statement from the band? Wala pa. How did they manage to convince them? Ewan. But, being the faithful groupie-wannabe that I have always been (and you know I mean always), I decided to abandon my unbelief, let the great thing happen, and just be happy about it. Now where do I get a ticket? Ah, basta, manonood ako.

More information about the concert was revealed as the date drew nearer. CCP Open Grounds. Ooops. The Fort. Free tickets. Register online. I still had no idea how in the world I was going to get a ticket, but I waited prayerfully. I had already been waiting for it all my life anyway; a few more days wouldn’t really be so bad. Finally, Divine Intervention stepped in. I was dancing from utmost delight (and I don’t dance) when I got the text: Ely had reserved 15 slots for my mom on his guest list and all we had to do was give them our names. A cigarette brand was producing the concert, so only those aged 18 and above would be admitted.

I read that second part and abruptly stopped dancing.

I’m only 17.

My instinctive reaction was to pray that the concert somehow be delayed for three months, just to buy me enough time to turn 18. If God could perform the miracle of getting the Eheads together again even for just one night, He could definitely postpone it! I bargained to cancel my debut if it would be rescheduled on the same night. Couldn’t anyone pull some strings and just make one little exception to the rule? Couldn’t anyone smuggle me in? At some point I even wondered if I could shave my head, wear a fake beard, and use my dad’s ID to get in, since I look exactly like him anyway.

The Eraserheads together again, the music of my life, one night only. My cousins were going. My friends were going. My mom was going. None of them still played Overdrive in the car, Kama Supra on their iPods, or sang Para sa Masa in the shower. I did. But I’m only 17.

I was tempted to panic, to despair. God knows how much I wanted to go. I had been waiting for it all my life. But I also knew that the things we want the most are the first things we must learn to surrender. Okay, God. Okay. Without much ado, I shrugged and immersed myself in schoolwork over the next several days, thinking no more of it.

Then, a few days before the concert, when I was home with my family for the weekend, my mom got a phone call. When she put the phone down, she gave me a look of utter amazement and said, “Ang lakas mo.”
“Huh?”
“Eheads. The cigarette’s out. They lowered the minimum age requirement from 18 to 12.”
My eyes widened (and my eyes are tiny).
“But there’s a catch. The names I gave them in the previous list, those have sure slots. You’re not on that list since you’re only 17. So now we need to talk to the new producers of the show to get you one.”
“And?” (My eyes were returning to their normal size at this point.)
“And ang lakas mo talaga. Guess who the new producers are.”
“Who?”
“Sony BMG.”

Sony BMG was BMG Records Pilipinas back in the 90s (please refer to the second paragraph of this article). I started dancing again.

On August 30, 2008, I stood in the Fort Bonifacio Open Field in my t-shirt, tsinelas and ponytail, ready to rock and roll. A little over two hours of waiting, a cheeseburger, a ten-minute countdown. The massive screens showed pictures of the Eheads from back in the day. Four men arose, and then came that familiar guitar tune which made the motley crowd squeal and poise themselves to sing the next words: May isang umaga…

No front act. No spiels. Just the music, with some fireworks on the side. It was the 90s all over again, and 50,000 people, ages 12 to 50++, from Charles and Keith stilettos to Spartan slippers, from Lea Salonga to Aling Pacing, banged their heads, clapped their hands, and sang their hearts out to the anthems of the good old days. I have never danced so much in my life. I don’t dance.

The first set of 15 songs comprised of the hits Alapaap, Ligaya, Sembreak, Hey Jay, Harana, Fruitcake, Toyang, Kama Supra, Kailan, Huwag Kang Matakot, Kaliwete, With A Smile, Shake Yer Head, Huwag Mo Nang Itanong, and Lightyears.

Amidst chants of “group hug” from the audience, we made mental lists of songs we were still waiting to hear, such as Julie Tearjerky, Tamagotchi Baby, Saturn Return, Andalusian Dog, Superproxy, Bogchi Hokbu, Tindahan ni Aling Nena, Shirley, Maskara, Torpedo, Maselang Bahaghari, Maling Akala, Tikman, Spoliarium and Magasin. Three hours would hardly be enough to do justice to over a decade’s worth of hits. We each made our bets on what the last song would be, among them Minsan, Para sa Masa, Pare Ko and Ang Huling El Bimbo; we just didn’t know that we had already heard it.

After the supposed twenty-minute break between sets, Lally Buendia, Ely’s sister, along with Buddy, Raimund and Marcus, and MTV President Francis Lumen, announced that they were cutting the concert short because Ely had been rushed to the hospital. There was a general air of shock, and except for the reverent applause offered by the audience, few people found words to say. The news had not quite sunk in as the crowd began trickling toward the exits. It was surprisingly calm and sober, and as we walked slowly, a man beside me began singing, “Umuwi na tayo. Umuwi na tayo, hey hey hey…”

On August 30, 2008, people from all walks of life flocked to the Fort Bonifacio Open Field, wanting, even just for one night, to be back in that place in time where four college kids played the music of their lives. We anticipated 30 songs, but we only heard 15. My legs hurt from standing and waiting for two full hours, but the concert only lasted for one.

And I still say it was worth it. Well worth it. Because even just for that one set, just for that one hour, we were home.

For the past few days since the half-concert, I’ve returned to playing my old CDs in the car, on my iPod, and singing them in the shower, as I have done for most of the 17 years of my life. See, I grew up with the Eraserheads. And you know what? I don’t think I will ever outgrow them.~

The False Freedom

The Reality of Illusion, Part 3 of 6:
THE FALSE FREEDOM

“When the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave.”
-Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Strength is a most mysterious thing. It takes strength to be able to perform any particular action. A person has to be strong enough to get on his feet and walk away.

Freedom is a most mysterious thing as well. When I hear the word, the image of the severance of bonds, like a prisoner going free, immediately comes to mind. To some extent, walking away implies tenacity and liberty, like it proves that there is really nothing holding you back, that you are free to walk away. But every mystery has its shadows, and in shadows are most surprising things.

It takes a certain amount of “leg power” to get up and walk away, to engage in this active-ity, releasing energy and allowing it to flow. But if you think about it, mere “allowing” does not really account for much strength. There is something else that takes infinitely greater strength, and that is restraint. Restraint, or perhaps better, meekness, is a constant state of command over energy, not a one-time release of it. The regulation or stoppage of flowing energy takes greater power than does the mere allowance for it.

In the case of freedom, walking away somehow would seem to prove that one is not tied down by anything. But isn’t that a trap in itself? The need to prove something, I have always believed, is a form of bondage, of slavery. A struggling desire, even when met, is a prison, not a liberty. True freedom is freedom from the need to prove anything. True freedom is not the absence of desire, nor its fulfillment, but simply the cessation of struggle. True freedom is rest.

The strong are too weak to hurt the weak. I suggest they are too strong. It takes strength to walk way, yes. But it takes infinitely greater strength to stay, to restrain the tendency of uncontrolled flow, of walking away, to keep it contained here, still, firm, confident. A necessary result of this strength is silence. And that is why, in all its cruel irony, no one ever knows. They stay and are silent, and no one ever sees the strong.

I suppose that is why the weak do not leave, because they do not know, because all there is is an apparent absence, because the more excellent active-ity makes no sound. The weak are weak, and even in their absence, in their walking away, they never leave. The strong are always tortured with the color of their absence, and the persistent hope that they eventually will leave, because it is pointless to stay. But the strong are the strong, and they will always stay anyway, and that is why it is the weak who must leave.

The strong feel tied down, and weak, and trapped; silent endurance is their lot. The weak feel free, and strong, and alive; but theirs is a false freedom.

Eraseyourheads - HalaPackUp

What went down in The Fort that night.

The Case of the Inquiring Murderer

The Reality of Illusion, Part 2 of 6:
THE CASE OF THE INQUIRING MURDERER

“This…reveals the profound moral perversity of a world that rests essentially on the nonexistence of return, for in this world everything is pardoned in advance and therefore everything is cynically permitted.”
-Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Immanuel Kant believed that people should never lie. I used to believe Immanuel Kant. But I’ve begun to think that Immanuel Kant is, in the simplest possible terms, a legalist. I will not discuss the Kantian ethical theory in detail, but suffice it to say he was a man who did not account for this beautiful, frightening loophole that has become integral in most every system of principles that mankind has developed, or discovered, this beautiful, frightening thing we call exception.

I am no stranger to what vile creatures of betrayal and deception human beings can become when driven to a corner, pushed to the limit or simply out of the sheer pleasure of it, and it has always been coupled, in my perception, with a diminished dignity. However, now I think it was largely my naïveté that concluded such absolutes. Not that I have become a relativist, no; I suppose I now simply have a deeper grasp of the humanity of the human beings than I had before. Yes, people betray and deceive, and I always assumed that t it was because they were evil and didn’t know better; I just never thought that people would do it for love. Out of love; with love as the main, strongest, and unstoppable driving force motivating deceit; love in all its doomed richness and purity; love itself, that elusive thing we have so long veiled in false ideas and ideals.

Love always protects, I’ve always believed, and I still believe it now. But loving to the hilt in an imperfect world, as I am discovering, is a far cry from the innocent but misinformed conceptions I previously had about it. Sometimes, love is the very thing that puts us on the unswerving course of doing things we would never otherwise do, like lying, not despite “love always protects,” but precisely because of it. Traditional beliefs being shattered one after another, I never thought I would look at love-based-on-trust not as a matter of truth and falsity, but as a matter of best intentions. That sometimes, love is more important than truth. We give each other our best lies, because those are the most excellent things we can give when our hands are tied. Not driven to a corner or pushed to the limit or out of the sheer pleasure of it, but simply in the context of an imperfect world. Sometimes deception is the best way we know to extend grace.

And nobody complains. We do the best we can. Everything is pardoned in advance and therefore cynically permitted. We would never, like Immanuel Kant, prescribe a universal maxim of deceit, but we permit it, we allow for exceptions, because we are human and because we love in an imperfect world.

Because as we go along and see that things don’t always go as planned, as hoped, at some point we have to judge that the most important thing is not about what’s true and what’s not, but about what’s right and what’s best. And we must be stretched, we must learn to love more, to love beyond the facts. And we must be stretched, we must learn to trust more, to trust enough to believe the lies we are told without question, trusting not in what is being said, but in the heart of him who speaks. Tragic as it may sound, believing the best in people in this fallen world sometimes means we must believe a lie. Love always protects. We do the best we can.

Immanuel Kant believed that people should never lie. I used to believe Immanuel Kant. But I’ve begun to think that Immanuel Kant is, in the simplest possible terms, a legalist. Or maybe not. Perhaps Immanuel Kant had simply never loved. ~

The Illusion of Reality

The Reality of Illusion, Part 1 of 6:
THE ILLUSION OF REALITY

“I’ll build my house on your cloud.”
-Jason Mraz, Plane

In a very interesting discussion in a philosophy class I had last semester, my professor posed the philosophical problem of free will and divine sovereignty. Is there really a god? Is he really in control? What is destiny? Are we all really doomed for a particular predefined end? Is everything in the material world a product of mere chance?

One thing that particularly tickled my philosophic fancy was the question of the reality or illusion of choice. People think they choose, and they derive a certain sense of comfort from knowing that they have the capacity to do so. But what if every choice you make is actually something that has already been predetermined for you? What if everything in your life, everything that has made you who you are, was chosen by some higher controlling force, to precondition you to make the choice that you think you are making out of your own free will, but which, in reality, you were already “doomed” to make from the very start? What if there really is no control, and choice does not really exist? What then?

I remember raising my hand. Floating in the sea of philosophic independence, I said, I don’t believe that. But for contemplation’s sake, IF that were the case, IF there were really no choice and no control, what the heck, I don’t think I would mind. I wouldn’t mind not really being in control. I wouldn’t mind being, in a way, enslaved and condemned to the Will. I wouldn’t mind, because I wouldn’t know anyway, because I am given the illusion of choice, of control, and as long as I believe the illusion, I wouldn’t mind, because I wouldn’t know that there was anything to mind in the first place.

Ignorance is bliss. What you do not know cannot hurt you. It sounded very platonic, the idea of the Medicinal Lie, just to protect the heart from unnecessary stress about which one cannot really do anything. Along that line of thought, it can be said that we are safe in the little illusory bubbles of our sincere beliefs.

A few weeks later, in another philosophy class, we were discussing the human phenomenon of falling in love. For speculation’s sake, we were given a dilemma: Say, there was a machine that you could enter and which would simulate all the pleasant sensations and events that come with falling in love, exactly like it happens in real life, but without the heartbreak and unnecessary pains and complications and whatnot. Having established that human beings generally like falling in love, if given the choice, would you choose the machine, or would you want to actually fall in love in real life?

The class’s answer was unanimous. We would all want to actually fall in love in real life. Given the fact of the pains of imperfect love stories and the risk of the devastation of heartbreak, we would all still want to actually fall in love.

My professor smiled. Yes, she said. Yes. Because even though the machine would give you something exactly like the actual falling in love, and even though we lay so much more on the line by making ourselves vulnerable to wounds, deep down, beyond our instinctive attraction to pleasure and aversion to pain, we, one and all, have this one desire: We just want it to be real. ~

chiaroscuro

July the 15^th

The day was young.

Everything was in semi-darkness, with piercing rays of light peeking in through the early morning clouds. Everything was in semi-darkness, including me.

I was not conscious of anything; the scenery drifted past like a gentle breeze, and fragments of thought and recent memory floated through my mind. They were many and they floated, but my heart was heavy.

The sound of harsh words that were spoken and that could not be taken back, pain inflicted and pain endured, lost meanings or perhaps the lack of it, absolute intentions and miserable misinterpretations, the heavy burden of caring and the crushing weight of apathy—these all haunted my dreams at night and rang in my ears in the mornings, and restlessness was all I knew. Such deep wounds, such a short span of time, such indelible scars.

There were some things that had gone and would never return. There were others that had come and would never go away. Neither betrayed any sign of regard for me. That smile was lost in memory.

The world turns.

I was not conscious of anything; the weight was simply there, a state of being I could not quite explain, simply a heaviness. Its face was hidden in the shadows.

The sun rose, quietly taking its place in the sky. Or was it running away? Did it, in fact, belong in wherever it hid during the night?

I was not conscious of anything; I trudged on to the everydays that were awaiting me. But my then-half-asleep self was violently awakened.

I thought I saw a blinding flash of light. I turned my head, and the world slowed momentarily. Somehow I had known what I would see. I gazed at the face that promised the morning, but the smile was lost in memory.

But the world did not stop.

The world turns.

In a heartbeat it had passed, leaving me behind, dazed and broken. An impenetrable cloud of shadow trailed behind it, enveloping and entangling me.

To this day I wonder if it was a blinding flash of light, or a deep overwhelming darkness that awoke me; standing where I am, I find myself unable to tell the difference. ~

beautiful doom

Time doesn’t flow. People do.

One philosophical proposition that particularly fascinated me when I began reading books was the idea that time is not an actual entity that exists in space, but that it is simply a concept that we made up in order to have a better and more orderly grasp of life. I don’t really know how it coincides with the relativist ideas of spacetime, but I thought it to be quite amusing, if not entirely remarkable. It’s like the meter as a unit of measurement, or the geometric concept of a line. These things do not actually exist in the dimension of reality, but we made them up to make life easier. We made up the meter as a unit of measurement and set standards for it so that we could define what a meter is and what two meters are, and so forth, so we can more conveniently relate to each other when referring to distances and lengths. We made up the concept of a line as well, and drew up a pretty crisp definition of it, so that we could form all sorts of geometric figures and consequently use those in practical aspects of life such as longitudes and latitudes. The things that have become so elementary to our existence are not even actual objects. They are concepts. Aren’t they called concepts for the very fact? They are things we conceive in our minds, not things we perceive from the outside world. Concepts. It’s all in your head.

It’s interesting how we become enslaved by the very things we create, not to mention the fact that we created them for us to employ, and not vice versa. I suppose this is so because it’s all in the mind. And the fundamental problems are the ones that take place in the mind. At the end of the day, it’s all inside you, and it’s quite problematic to try to escape from oneself. In a way, it’s a secular kind of legalism—how we are scandalized by departures from the rules, how we are trapped and choked by them. But who made these rules in the first place? Who was it that decided that a meter is the total distance covered by an electron of a particular atom with a particular charge that causes it to cut a cross some metal bar stored in some technology-rigged chamber in some country? (I cannot recall the exact definition of meter according to Physics, but it’s complicated like that. I won’t even pretend to know.) Call me simplistic, but just think of how many generations of high school and college students have slaved over (or perhaps cried over, cheated over, failed over, and who knows what else) the subject matter of Geometry when it, in fact, is not even really a discovery we have made about the world like Biology or History, but simply a little imaginative light bulb that flashed in the mind of some Greek dude in the days before cellphones, speed dating and instant noodles, and which was expounded upon by eager succeeding math geeks. We make up all sorts of rules, draw up all sorts of lines and boundaries that we tell ourselves to obey, but we end up strangling ourselves in the long run.

Time doesn’t flow. People do.

We tell ourselves that we are bound by time. But I dare suggest that that’s just an excuse we make so we won’t have to be accountable for a vast number of things. We say time will heal our wounds and soften our pain, time will grow us into better people, but no. Time doesn’t flow. Time is a concept, eternal, unchanging, not because it cannot be changed, but because we refuse to rise to the responsibility, perhaps because we are afraid, of the fact that we are in complete control of certain things. Because it is much easier and much more comfortable to resign ourselves to the obedience of rules rather than to own up to the kind of power that we really do possess.

We must help ourselves if our wounds are to be healed. We must get up if our pains are to be softened. We must choose to learn if we expect to become better people. It’s not in time’s hands. Time is just a concept. Time doesn’t exist.

I take particular delight in the invention and implementation of Daylight Saving Time in a good number of countries. Perhaps without meaning to, Ben Franklin rose above the secular legalism and showed the world that we are not bound by time; time is bound by us. They succeeded in making millions of people turn their clocks one hour ahead of the norm. It thrills me; it feels like some odd sort of rebellion, some demented taste of victory. We control time. If we say it’s one o’clock, it’s one o’clock. Midnight is just a concept. What we decide goes. There is some perverse sort of power lying somewhere there, and it makes us feel bigger than we really are. But then again, if time doesn’t exist, then there is nothing to take control of. With nothing to control, there is no control. Therefore, control does not exist. In the same way that we have invented time and become enslaved to it, we invented control, and it eats us up. But at the end of the day, the meter, Geometry, time, control? They’re all just concepts. It’s all in your head.

Time doesn’t flow. People do.

It is true that we will never get back the moments in our lives that have passed us by. That perfect mixture of elements, where the sun’s rays hit just the right places, every object in the right place, the just-right presence (or absence) of people, and you, there, all there, in that moment. The moment that your mind wanders to every now and then, and you wonder if life would be any different if you had been brave enough to say or do something then, or brave enough to have been silent and still, if you would be happier, or more miserable, or doomed to the exact same state you are currently in. That moment is gone forever, never to be grasped again, save only in memory—the places in time that we have immortalized and which we claim as our own. But it’s not because time flows. It’s because we do. It’s because we change, and we move. We are the greatest fluid element in our reality. And even when we try to stop, all the world around us, because of the rules that we ourselves have made, will keep moving, and we will get left behind. We ebb and flow, and we’ve forgotten why.

But don’t you think that this enslavement is darkly beautiful, in a way? Allow me to borrow a poignant idea I heard elsewhere: Perhaps this constant state of flux, this non-permanence, the impending death, the fleeting quality of each combination of elements in the now, is precisely what makes it precious. Perhaps if we didn’t flow, there would be nothing remarkable about our lives and our realities. Perhaps the amorous quality of life lies in the frightening truth that no same mixture of elements will ever come again, that no matter how we try, we will never get back the moments in the perfect way that they are here now, that each breath just might be our last. And everything becomes more beautiful that way, because we are doomed, because loss is real, because death is alive. And precisely here, precisely now, precisely because of this, we smile, and we sigh, and we live. ~

when God said no

I knew from that point on that things would never be the same. Things would never be as full and alive as they used to be. Things would always be half-dead from that point on; I would always be half-dead. Because part of me—a very precious part—died that day.

I wanted to go to the beach that weekend, and learn to surf, and unwind. It was going to be my last deep breath of fresh air before plunging into the nightmare that my then-beautiful world was fast becoming.

I wanted to leave for a while, and get myself together. I did not want to be the poison that would kill the very thing I had worked so hard to build. I loved it to the hilt, and I was ready to let it go.

There were so many things to be done, goals to be accomplished, and needs to be met, when all I wanted to do was to drop everything. I wanted to do something drastic. I needed to do something drastic. Life was turning against me, and I was choking. It was all too much; I simply could not function properly. I needed a change. All I wanted to do was to drop everything and sit at Jesus’ feet. I just wanted to drink in His presence, and savor the reality that He was there. I just wanted to hear His sweet voice, and feel His gentle embrace. I wanted to drop everything and just sit at Jesus’ feet. Just Him and me. Get back the things that are rightfully His and mine, reclaim the places no one would ever understand even if they tried, for the simple reason that they’re not us. I just wanted to drop everything and sit at Jesus’ feet.

I was tired of the kitchen. I wanted to be Mary.
For once, I wanted to be Mary.

But He said no.

I wanted to take a deep breath and get myself together. I wanted to be ready. But Jesus said to be prepared in and out of season.

I wanted to sacrifice great things. I wanted to drop everything to be with Him. But Jesus said He wanted my obedience, not my sacrifice.

I wanted to leave. I wanted to do something drastic. But Jesus said the most drastic thing I could do was to stay.

I wanted to be Mary. But Jesus didn’t want me to.

It took me a while, but I eventually learned why.
All this time, Jesus has simply wanted me to be me.