Her Honor is My Duty

During this time of caring for my mother, many have asked me how am I doing. Some times I would respond “I’m okay” and other times I would honestly respond “I don’t know.” Some may think it is unhealthy for me not to cry or grieve during this time, others may feel that I’m not doing enough, while others may believe I am strong. The simple truth of the matter is this: my mother’s honor is my duty. As her daughter, I have a duty to stand by her side. As her daughter, I have a duty to advocate for her. As her daughter, I have a duty to care for her with excellence. As her daughter, it is my duty to love her … unconditionally. As her daughter, it is my duty to honor her the way she deserves to be honored and the way she has requested to be honored. My call of duty is to honor her and that is what matters to me.

If you ask me how I am doing right now, I am going to honestly tell you “I’m not sure.” Why? Because that is the truth. My only sense of emotion is my call of duty to the woman who birthed me, made sure I ate, made sure I had a roof over my head, made sure I received medical care when I needed, made sure that she protected me by all means and at all costs, and the woman who I inherited resilience and strength from. Yes, just like any soldier trained for the battle, I have a call of duty to honor my mom by the way I love her and by the way I live my life. Am I going to be perfect at it? … ha … if you have witnessed my growth and development from a little girl to my adulthood, any of you can attest that I am far from perfect. And I have yet to achieve perfection. But to love my mother, to care for her, to respect her, to cherish her, to intercede for her, to carry on for her, to live my life the way God has called me to … that is the Jenny my mother raised and raising Jenny is not an easy process. It is a privileged to be called upon. It is a blessing to be able to love unconditionally. It is an honor to be my mother’s daughter.

Suppressing my emotions? Maybe I am, just a little bit… … maybe. But I do acknowledge the sadness that I feel at times. I do acknowledge my heart breaking at times. Even in the midst of heartache I must press on, I must keep pushing. My heart does not have the luxury to be faint. When one has a sense of duty, there’s a keen focus on executing what’s been called of you.

Don’t get me wrong, even the strong fall some time. My hope and prayer is that God will continue to surround me with loving people who will be strong for me, who will intercede for me, who will hold my chin up when I cannot find the strength to do so, who will speak truth to me even when it is hard to say so, who will open their arms and hearts and receive my brokenness. God has been good to me to have placed some of these people in my life already. I am not strong by my own merit, but rather my strength comes from the Lord, my God, my heavenly Father. It is no one but him who supplies me with what I need. Where does my help come from? From the Lord. (Psalms 121)

Psalms 121 NIV

¹ 

¹ I lift up my eyes to the mountains—

    where does my help come from?

² My help comes from the Lord,

    the Maker of heaven and earth.

³ He will not let your foot slip—

    he who watches over you will not slumber;

⁴ indeed, he who watches over Israel

    will neither slumber nor sleep.

⁵ The Lord watches over you—

    the Lord is your shade at your right hand;

⁶ the sun will not harm you by day,

    nor the moon by night.

⁷ The Lord will keep you from all harm—

    he will watch over your life;

⁸ the Lord will watch over your coming and going

    both now and forevermore.

Speak Truth, Speak Life

This morning I read this: “Idle words are things we say carelessly, without concern for their impact on others.” (Blackaby, 156). It stirred up some thoughts and feelings inside of me. It led me to ask myself, “Am I being careless with my words? Am I aware of the things I am saying, rather promising? How diligent am I with the words I speak? Does it come from a place of truth?”

The phrase “power of words” continues to haunt me, follow me, rather I feel as though God has placed it on a cycle of forever reoccurrence to remind me constantly how much power words hold. We can speak them. We can think them. We can sing them. We non-verbally express them. Whatever the vehicle we choose to express our inner being, it holds power whether it is truth or not. How often do we really think about the words that are spoken from our mouths, texted with our thumbs, expressed telepathetically or spiritually? ANYONE!?!? Does anyone dissect the truth behind their words? IF words hold so much power why are we not more diligent with what we say?

I often find that when people’s words are being put to the test, words were more easily spoken rather than lived out. It is a constant reminder to me to mean what I say and do what I mean. Should I find myself falling short of my true intentions, I pray that it would be met with enough grace for me to amend those words. My conclusion to this thought provoking moment that is impacting my character right now is this: when you learn to speak truth, it is then you can speak life.

"Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.” Matthew 15:17-20 NIV

Blackaby, Henry T., and Richard Blackaby. Experiencing God Day-by-Day: Devotional. Nashville, TN: B & H Pub. Group, 2006. Print.

Happy Mother's Day Mom

(I just realized it has been about 2 years since my last blog post! Yikes!)

You see, growing up as a Lao (Southeast Asian) – American child, I often grew up misunderstanding my mother’s intentions towards me. Mom would say silly things like, “If you let a guy touch your hand, you can get pregnant.” (I know, I know … I know! But it’s kinda true!) After middle school I finally learned about sex education and discovered that that is not how you get pregnant exactly. (I’m having an Adam Sandler “Waterboy” moment here LOL). Mom said the darnest things to instill fear in hopes of preventing us kids from making a very poor choice.

Every day, not just once a year, I’m reminded of the hard work, struggles, trials and triumphs my mother endured to see that I have an opportunity to succeed in life. Just about every parent’s hope is that their child/children will live a better life than they did. Mother’s day is a day to honor my mother’s resilience, hard work, struggles, victories, accomplishments, but most importantly my mother’s love for me. If her life was not about raising and protecting me, I would not be the mother I am today. I am the mother I am to my son today because I had a mother who cared for me beyond measure, who loved me in the midst of my stubbornness and rebellion, who cared about my future existence enough to go out of her way to stop me in my tracks of making the wrong decisions … (Oh yes she did, I’ll share over a cup of coffee should you want to know).

So today this daughter wants to say “sorry mom. I didn’t understand when I was a little girl, but now that I’m a woman and a mother, I understand now. I love you even more today for being an example of perseverance, resilience, boldness, courage, and a force to be reckoned with! I hope and pray that I will live a life that you can be proud of. If anything, I hope to be half the woman you are!" (Mom, I already know what your response is to this statement is: You need to be the woman I am and more because you need to be better! LOL … yes mom, I will be better!)

Happy Mother’s Day Mom! Thank you for teaching me that giving up is not an option for a mother. I love you!

Reflections on Brene Brown's Power of Vulnerability: Why We Struggle

          Brene's lecture on "'How To' Doesn't Work" opens with her sharing, "If 'HOW TO' worked none of us would be struggling." In today's world with immediate access to information at the swipe of a finger, learning how to do it yourself has become a phenomena. But even with open access to all this information, why is the world not yet perfect? Why do we still have obesity, depression, illness, unhealthy habits, bad credit, and all the other problems we should be able to fix because we have "How To" articles and Youtube videos? Personally, "How To" doesn't work all the time for me. However, it is a good resource when I feel as though I'm lacking in something. Ultimately following these "how to" instructions are not effective if an individual cannot understand why the problem exist in the first place. I can't recall at the moment where I heard this from, but this struck a chord with me instantly upon hearing it, "when you don't know why, you are powerless."

"We live in a culture today where somehow this idea that if we're not doing extraordinary, huge, public things, that we are not enough."

        The feeling of inadequacy often discourages me; not having enough, not being enough, not giving enough, ... enough, enough, enough! Why do I feel that I what I have and what I am is not enough; where does this come from?

"…we live in a culture of deep scarcity defined by this: Never enough."

        Living in a world where materialistic things symbolize social status and wealth, no wonder we struggle, because nothing will ever be enough. Envy and competition will increase the demand for individuals to be better than the other. What is better will than set standards defined by the winner ... and even then, those standards of perfection will be gone like the next trend because nothing is never enough. 

       And so it makes me wonder, what are we living for? Why do we struggle with (fill in the blank)? What’s feeding this deep scarcity? If I have the bare necessities to be alive, why is it not just enough to exist? Because we are human. We are a species that long for connection and value. We are a people that need meaningful and purposeful relationships.

Reflection on Brene Brown's The Power of Vulnerability

Recently I've been guided to listen to this series of lectures by Brene Brown, who is a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She also is an author and public speaker. She has spent the last few years researching the topic "Shame" and has come across a common pattern ... The Power of Vulnerability.

As I go through this series, I want to use this blog to personally share some key points from the lectures. My hope is that as I share my personal reflections that it would be a resource and guide for others to seek out self-care in replenishing the soul, spirit, mind and body.  As I am taking the time to do that I hope the in-pouring of my own well-being can be an out-pouring of blessings. I am indebted to those who have taken time and resources to invest in my growth and development to be whole.

Brene Brown's series introduction begins with this:

"Today we live in a culture of scarcity a culture of 'never enough.' This scarcity culture of 'never enough' teaches us that we can never have enough success, money, beauty, or power to be safe. The greatest casualties of scarcity culture are our willingness to own our vulnerabilities and our ability to engage with the world from a place of worthiness."

I don't know about you but being vulnerable sounds like a weak thing to do. In fact, because of many negative situations in my life, TRUST does not come easily for me. You see, to trust is to be vulnerable, be open to anything, to allow good and bad to lift you or hurt you. And that was the kind of risk I didn't like to take. For me, when big events happen in my life, whether traumatic and chaotic, I've learned to suppress my emotions and carry-on. I've learned to smile with a heartache. I tell myself, "Don't let the 'enemy' see where you are bleeding, because that's where he'll strike for the kill." Not knowing who I could trust, I did my best to keep the depths of my inner wounds in a locked secured place so that no one can find it. Because if the world knew where I was hurting most, they would take it and sell it to the highest bidder or spread it around like cancer ... yes my fear is that the world would not know how to treat my vulnerabilities to good health but rather kill me with it. Wounds of that magnitude will only decay over time and a heart that once loved effortlessly will become callused. I know this from my own personal experience and sadly through the testimonies of others.

So why do we try so hard to conceal our own vulnerabilities when we already live in a world that is hurting and dying? Why can't we just own our vulnerabilities and be liberated by it? When we are broken why do we pretend that we are whole? I'll tell you this, for me, there was no corner small enough where I could feel safe enough to be vulnerable. Not even the places where I have sought refuge felt safe enough to be broken. This place of worthiness, where does it exist for broken people?

I am still broken, very broken. Where one piece of me becomes whole, another remains broken or partially filled. And although I am made up of broken pieces, my worthiness comes from a place where I am reminded I am unconditionally and dearly loved ... that place is at the cross where Jesus Christ paid it all.

You can check out Brene Brown here:
http://go.ted.com/bvJ3

Up Next: Reflections on The Power of Vulnerability: Why We Struggle

"One word describing my year is a four-letter word starting with the letter F."

I’m celebrating 30 years of life today.

As the New Year arrived and as this day was approaching, I couldn’t help but reflect on my year in 2014. So much has happened in so little time. And as time waits for no one, my emotions are left like an orphan. The world will go on while I deal with piercing wounds, uncertainty, life-decisions that will dictate the course of everything I do, responsibilities, transitions, and all the things that can feel overwhelming.

One word describing my year is a four-letter word starting with the letter F. 

I have lost many things that I held dear. I have endured many kinds of words that have challenged me. But in the midst of trials, I found enlightenment, humility, grace, understanding, people I can truly call friends, and most importantly renewed strength. It was a year of burn out and burning down; a year of being in the line of fire, on fire, under fire, in the fire … … 2014 was a year of FIRE.

Fire is known for burning things down, destroying, and leaving not a trace of what was once there. But fire is not always a bad thing. Sometimes it is a good thing. Prescribed fire is used for various things such as land modification and making steel. 

As fire is used to mold and reshape things, I'm reminded of the refining process:

"In order to refine the bloom iron into a usable form, the iron needed to be repeatedly re-heated at welding temperature, between 2200 and 2700 degrees F depending of the carbon content, and repeatedly hammered or worked. This welding/forging/welding process reduced or “burned off” the excess carbon in the atmosphere of the forge and essentially “forced out” the other impurities through hammering, bending, and pressing. This made the metal free enough of impurities to make it workable.” (barbariankeep.com)

So where does that leave me now? It’s a new year, I’m getting older … but not aging (thanks Mom & Dad!), and time is counting down, death is inevitable. I’m still in the hammering, bending, and pressing process. Being an independent person since a very young age, I have done many things in my own strength and find it very challenging to ask for help. I have also become accustom to suppressing emotions that I don’t allow myself to feel. After all, who has time to feel when the world is not waiting for you to wipe your tears? You learn to be head strong … heart strong … you learn to be so strong that you weaken the very essence of your existence …

… God. 

“My God is so great, so strong and so mighty there’s nothing my God cannot do,” remember that Sunday school song we were taught when we were little itty bitty kids? It’s so very basic that even my 3 year old can comprehend. So why as an adult, is it so hard to believe that sometimes? We forget. We get distracted. We lose line of sight. We are discouraged. We depend on our own capabilities rather than the power of God. SO that means I have to get back to the basics of obedience through submission.

Moving forward, what is there in store for 2015? 
Renewed Hope. Renewed Joy. Renewed Strength. Renewed Peace. Renewed Spirit. Renewed Faith.

2014 Highlights:
- returning to school. completed my first semester with a 3.75 GPA
- encountered encouragement and healing in unexpected places & people
- working with SRO Housing Corporation for 30th Year Gala (Jan.22) You're Invited!
- surviving 6 months +HandsforAfrica 
- Sean Robert eating brownies:

Words of Encouragement:
"the key is learning to be content with yourself"
"this is not man's army, this is God's army"
"you just have to take it one day at a time"

On Going Projects: 
- learning HTML & CSS via +Codecademy 
- learning video production via iMovie & Final Pro Cut
- seeking avenues to improve database management for non-profit sectors
- 33 more units until Marketing-Management Degree is completed