Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us, it is in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Friday, June 15, 2012

News flash: You can't please everyone

I'll tell you what now. Being a hero is not even worth it. Not even close. I should know. For the first time in my life, I thought I was a hero today. Turns out... I just caused a lot of drama and problems. And over what? This. Little ducklings. You wouldn't believe the amount of drama over these 5 little guys. You wouldn't believe it because I couldn't believe it and I was smack dab in the middle.
It turns out that rescuing ducklings from the storm drain isn't necessarily the good thing I thought it was. There's a lot of relief and clapping and back-slapping and then there's a pause. What to do now? Should we take them to the duck pond? Should we find the mother? We should definitely give the mom a chance to find her babies, for sure, right? Well, not everybody thought so. Whether a group decision or an individual, not everyone was going to be satisfied. So I set the ducks down in the shade with some water and went on my merry way. I'd done what I wanted to do for them and what happened next was not up to me, but up to the Almighty Creator. Perhaps by rescuing, I was doing a bad thing... survival of the fittest and all of that. Maybe they could have happily survived for a long time in the storm drain as opposed to getting eaten by a cat or run over by a car. Regardless, I did it and it was done. And then people started biting my head off. What did I feed it? It needs more water! We can't leave them alone, they need protection! I give up.

PEOPLE: They're cute, but they're DUCKS!

No good deed goes unpunished. All helpful urges should be circumvented. I'm just sayin'. Elphaba had it right. Morally, there's no right answer so I step away and say, "I just don't care anymore. Please leave me alone and I promise I won't go rescuing helpless animals anymore."

And there you have it.

....

Don't worry. If you fall down a storm drain and can't get out, I'd probably rescue you. But don't ask me to take care of you afterwards.

Friday, June 8, 2012

Vision

The title is for two reasons.

A) My poor doggy is going blind. It is so sad to me. She has been a light in our family for so many years, particularly the years that my mom had cancer and was going through chemotherapy. Her name is Theeb, translated from Thai to mean Angel. And she is definitely an angel. Best dog ever. Our neighbor used to say about our family, "They all have curly hair. Even the dog has curly hair." Yup, that's my little baby.

B) It is currently Vision Conference at work. Think of it as a company retreat. One person said, "We don't use the term 'retreat'. We call it a tactical withdrawal." Let me break it down for you: all of the full time employees are away for two days and all of the students get to play! Ahem. Well, we call it work, but it's basically permission for us to have a little bit of fun without being supervised by our bosses. I spent the time learning 한국의: vocab and double vowels. It's fascinating stuff! I'm also learning the lyrics to the song Love Like This by SS501. Should you like a listen, see here. CAUTION: View with an open mind and an understanding that this is a completely different culture. So don't be racist and make fun of them for stupid reasons. I am very passionate about this and will come beat you up with a noodle. You have been warned. Back to Vision Conference. Lots to think about and lots to plan for in the future. It requires a lot of thought and I am doing my best to look into my future, despite how that's not really possible. But I digress. Life, in each minute, is good and beautiful and I have very little to complain for.

There, you have been caught up.

Shout out to my Brissa! ;)