Susan's (Mis)adventures

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-24T22:20:00.000-08:00

i thought this was apropos for the holidays~

Magnificat

All that I am
sings of the God
who brings his life
to birth in me.
My spirit soars
on the wings of my Lord.
He has smiled on me
and the blaze of his smile
no woman or man
shall ever forget.

My God is a gentle strength
who has caught me up
and carried me to greatness.
His love
space cannot hold
nor time age
and all quicken to his touch.

My God is a torrent of justice.
He takes the straight paths
in the minds of the proud
and twists them to labyrinth.
The boot of the oppressor
he pushes aside
and raises the lowly,
whom he loves,
from the ground.
With his own hands
he sets a table for the hungry
but the unfeeling rich
suffer the cold eye
of his judgment.

Our mothers and our fathers
he has held in his arms
and the future grows
like this child within me
for the God of whom I sing
bears us his son.

~John Shea

Source: Unknown

2011-09-21T11:25:00.001-07:00

If ours is a piety that does not know how to laugh, a fierce humility that excludes the uninitiated, or even a consuming fire that burns but does not purify, then we have lost our way. We cannot have room for God if we do not have room for our neighbor.... Find space for spontaneity and a generous response. Find a place to welcome the stranger and to throw back your head and laugh with God.

Source: Thomas Hoffman, A Child in Winter

2011-08-26T15:59:00.001-07:00

the raindrops fall softly on her eyelids
drops that landed as she wearily awaited the serpentine train
they trickle down her creased, dirt-stained visage
slowing making their way down
erasing and caressing away years of hard labor, ups and downs, life

2011-01-20T21:06:00.000-08:00

"I asked God if it was okay to be melodramatic
and she said yes
I asked her if it was okay to be short
and she said it sure is
I asked her if I could wear nail polish
or not wear nail polish
and she said honey
she calls me that sometimes
she said you can do just exactly
what you want to
Thanks God I said
And is it even okay if I don't paragraph
my letters
Sweetcakes God said
who knows where she picked that up
what I'm telling you is
Yes Yes Yes"

~by Kaylin Haught

Source: Poetry 180 (selected by Billy Collins)

On Prayer

2010-11-17T18:23:00.000-08:00

tis a good reminder...

Prayer clarifies our hope and intentions. It helps us discover our true aspirations, the pangs we ignore, the longings we forget. It is an act of self-purification.... It teaches us what to aspire to, implants in us the ideals we ought to cherish. Prayer is an invitation to God to intervene in our lives, to let God's will prevail in our affairs; it is the opening of a window to God in our will, an effort to make God the Lord of our soul. We submit our interests to God's concern, and seek to be allied with what is ultimately right.

~Abraham Joshua Heschel

an inspiring quote (and reminder) from the Dalai Lama...

2010-07-12T13:36:00.000-07:00

"if we shift our focus from ourselves to others and to
the wider world and if we turn our attention to all
the crises in the world, all the difficulties and the
sufferings and so on, we will see that many of these
problems and direct and indirect consequences of
undisciplined negative states of mind. and where do
these come from? from this powerful combination of
self-centeredness and the belief in our independent
existence. by shifting our attention to the wider
world in this way, we begin to appreciate the
immensely destructive consequences of such
thinking..."
~Dalai Lama, 2000

2010-07-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

came across an email that I had written in 2003..I was so much more eloquent back then!

---------

dear friends,

excuse my english. just had to put that disclaimer in
there. is it possible for one's english skills to
actually deteriorate? ummm..i'm thinking it might
very well be, as evidenced by my tongue-tied &
inarticulate state of being these past few days.
uh-oh. my citizenship interviews falls exactly two
weeks from now -_-;;

it feels otherworldly to be back in the suburbs of
buffalo grove...especially to see stretches of private
lawns. i miss the sense of a city gone berserk on
sensory overload a bit.

the first thing i'm going to do when i get over jetlag
is go for a long, head-clearing run. one of those
masochistic runs that make you want to never run again
because they hurt your sides so bad. then i'm driving
myself, with the windows rolled down and the pop
charts blaring, to the nearest giordano's. you know,
the stuffed kinds where one slice is equivalent to 2~3
regular slices. hmmmm, aren't they great? :)

twas a bittersweet departure from my motherland,
reexperienced all over since 13 years ago. yes, my
feelings on the place are ambivalent and depending on
which period of my stay you caught me, my descriptions
of the place swung from one extreme to the other.
importantly though, i'm leaving on a good note, thanks
to the warm farewells of the friends i was so blessed
to meet and know these past 10 incredibly...incredible
months.

in my last days in seoul, i took a solo walk in my
favorite part of seoul--Insadong, the traditional
market area. looked around a few art galleries, and
after scratching my head in front of the blobs of
paint on the canvas, i came across a poongmul
(farmer's traditional instrumental dance) performance,
held to gather public sympathy and support on the
plight of Iraqi war victims. it was essentially an
anti-war demonstration and an opposition against
dispatching of korean troops. the grim reality aside
(despite these demonstrations, south korea remains
very much dependent on the US), the accelerating and
decelerating pounding drowned out all the disquietude
for the time being...

anyhoo...hasn't it been a roller-coaster year of a
ride. in korea's case, first the elation of the world
cup games..then the inflammation of anti-american
sentiments. to be followed by the election of Roh Moo
Hyun, a former human rights lawyer and political
activist, and now the anti-war protests.

but even the lonely planet didn't prepare me for the
events that unfolded during our trip in china :p when
my friend tammy and i were in beijing, we heard of
SARS going around china (though chinese ppl we
encountered seemed not in the least phased). in
hangzhou, we found out that the war had begun when a
cab driver started gesturing with his fists and
repeated "Meiguo" and "Iraq."

at the end of the two weeks of packed sightseeing,
good company and good food, the rush of comfort (the
kind that you get upon seeing an old friend) when we
landed at Incheon and spotted the welcome signs in
korean struck and stayed with me a bit. we'd
withstood the frustrations of getting around on three
words of chinese, being harassed by sketchy cab
drivers, and staying at depressing hostels, but the
vulnerability invoked by a world rocked by a war...it
gets to you like none other. needless to say, it's
such a relief to be 'home', to be in the midst of our
loved ones, wherever that may be for each of us.

miss you all much.

love,
~sus

2010-06-25T13:39:00.001-07:00

Our God's tender love for His servants makes Him concerned for the state of their inward feelings. He desires them to be of good courage. Some esteem it a small thing for a believer to be vexed with doubts and fears, but God thinks not so. From this text it is plain that [He] would not have us entangled with fears. He would have us without... doubt, without cowardice.

[He] does not think so lightly of our unbelief as we do. When we are desponding we are subject to a grievous malady, not to be trifled with, but to be carried at once to the beloved Physician. Our Lord loveth not to see our countenance sad... He would have us put off the spirit of heaviness, and put on the garment of praise, for there is much reason to rejoice.

[We] ought to be of a courageous spirit, in order that [we] may glorify the Lord by enduring trials in a heroic manner... Let your spirit by joyful in God your Saviour, the joy of the Lord shall be your strength, and no fiend of hell shall make headway against you, but cowardice throws down the banner.

Moreover, labour is light to a man of cheerful spirit; and success waits upon cheerfulness. The man who toils, rejoicing in his God, believing with all his heart, has success guaranteed. He who sows in hope shall reap in joy; therefore, dear reader, "be thou strong, and very courageous."
-CH Spurgeon, Daily Readings

2010-06-21T13:51:00.001-07:00

The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing.
~Zephaniah 3:17

Things I've done/experienced in NYC thus far!

2010-06-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

- Playing basketball in a beautiful park in the Upperwest Side over President's Weekend
- Swing dancing at Swing 24 near Times Square
- Dancing and more dancing :)
- Watched Billy Elliot
- Experienced "snow days" off from work
- Visiting Redeemer small groups
- Karaoking and getting Korean food in K-town
- visiting the Guggenheim Museum on a "pay as you wish" night
- volunteering with Hope for New York (including with the NYC Relief Bus on a freezing Saturday morning in the Bronx)
- visiting the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA)
- living in and navigating Flushing..enough said :)
- watching a Eugene Park concert at the Village Underground
- going to a Lifehouse Concert at the Hard Rock Cafe
- walking the NYU area on foot
- trying the best halal place on 53rd & 6th where there is a ubiquitous line
- Steak Shack
- going to the Cloisters
- experiencing long lines akin to airport security check lines at Whole Foods
- Seeing the Highline and exploring the Meatpacking District (including a covered market there)
- going to see a Mets Game
- salsa dancing at the LQ at the Radisson Lexington Hotel
- bike-riding along the Hudson River
- going hiking about an hour and a half away from NYC
- going to the REAH NK meetings
- running in and exploring Central Park
- visiting Times Square Church and the Brooklyn Tabernacle (the best gospel choirs ever in my humble opinion :)
- the YWCA Queens and KAFSC's 21st Annual Gala
- reconnecting with old friends and meeting new ones :)

On Love

2010-05-31T07:20:00.000-07:00

“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.”

~Neil Gaiman

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”

~C.S. Lewis

Let Go and Change

2010-05-11T06:16:00.001-07:00

"When we let go of hatred, prejudices, arrogance and entitlement from the heart, our actions change. We love, forgive and hope from the heart, and from there our world changes. So I offer this prayer for us: 'Holy One, we give you permission to carve away all that is not pure in our hearts. We invite you to create space in our crowded hearts for you to dwell. Create in us a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within us. We ask you to align our priorities with yours, and awaken our hearts from their sleep."

Source: Esther Elizabeth, Journey Into Freedom

2010-04-28T07:58:00.000-07:00

영광의 상처

나는 그에게,
손이 베일 정도의 제품을 만들어보자고 말했다.
너무나도 아름답고, 너무나도 완벽하기에, 손이 닿았을 때
베일 것 같은, 완전무결한 것을 만들자는 뜻을 전했다.
돌이켜보면 '손이 베일 정도'라는 표현은, 어렸을 때
아버지께서 자주 하셨던 말씀이었다.
"무슨 일이든 손이 베일 만큼 해라.
그렇지 않으면 제대로 했다고 할 수 없다.
공부도, 네가 하고 싶은 일도
손이 베일 만큼 해라."

- 이나모리 가즈오의《왜 일하는가》중에서 -

Let Evening Come

2010-04-21T06:37:00.001-07:00

Let the light of late afternoon
shine through chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the cricket take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don't
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.

Source: Jane Kenyon, Collected Poems

Inhabiting Our Moments

2010-03-18T21:46:00.000-07:00

Everyone is too busy all the time. We have become a nation of multi-taskers. By definition, multi-tasking means the mind is divided and not fully focused on any one event. A very simple definition of mindfulness is doing one thing at a time. If we are planting some turnips, we are doing it properly. If we are reading to a child, that is all we are doing.

I have a long history of doing two or three or seventeen things at once. I am cooking, but planning my next road trip. I am talking on the phone, but wondering if I have a can of tuna handy for lunch. I am bird-watching, but worrying if I have offended someone. I am walking, but even as I smell the French lilacs in the air and notice the heron on the lake, I am thinking of presidential politics. Yet slowly I am discovering that life is best when I am one place at a time; that is to say that when I am cooking, I am cooking. Well, okay, maybe stirring and listening to the radio, but I am not planning a Father's Day party for the extended family.Sometimes inhabiting the moment is simple indeed. We hear Louis Armstrong or Chopin on the radio. We taste our lover's kisses, the pomegranate juice or the salt air. We smell the sage or the jasmine blossom.

Animals can pull us into the moment. One of the reasons pets are so popular is that when we are with them, we share their pleasure in being here now. Pets do not live in clock time, and they allow us to rest from chronological time. We join them in older, animal rhythms.

On winter nights, Jim and I sit in our recliners and look out onto the snow and the lake. We wait for our local fox to appear. When he comes, he runs along our south fence toward the lake. He is the color of a shadow and his fur fluffs out like feathers. He trots onto the dam, runs in tight circles, then pounces on whatever prey is available. Within a few seconds he is gone. Afterward, having seen the fox, we are as giddy as children.

Most people respond to wild animals the way we do. I think it is because, deep within us, we carry something far more ancient than human thoughts. Animal spottings, whether of eagles, grizzlies or dolphins, remind us of our ancient selves. Primordial appreciates primordial. We have a moment to connect to something older than our culture, our history and our short lives.

Because children live in the present, we can join them in fresh experiences. Until they are educated away from living in the moment, that is their natural place. Just recently, I drove my grandchildren to the Ozarks for a family reunion. Eating a chocolate doughnut at our Days Inn and thinking about swimming with her newfound cousins, three-year-old Claire said, "My heart is snuggling inside me." Then she realized this didn't quite express what she was experiencing in her chest. She said, "My heart feels very big right now." Her life was not so complicated that she couldn't recognize the physical sensations of joy....

To create moments in our daily lives, we must have a new set of skills for making magic out of the ordinary. The more moments we find, the more we learn to find them.

Source: Seeking Peace
by Mary Pipher

Snow Days

2010-02-16T18:25:00.000-08:00

I have been in New York for about 1.5 month now. The breathtaking landscape of the city still doesn't cease to amaze me and embues an aura of romance and cosmopolitanism (is this a word?) even to the mundane things (like eating at a diner, for example).

Work is going well..it's getting busier by the day. A snowstorm fell on the city last week and it snowed a bit today. But I find it amusing/humorous to see people trekking about (especially the ever-ubiquitous crowd in downtown Flushing), unfazed by the inclement weather and simply going about their business. Welcome to New York City.

"Paralyzed or Free"

2010-02-08T19:16:00.000-08:00

Most of the people on earth today are paralyzed by what are said to be the consequences of their sins. The destitute of the world have it hammered into their consciousness--by those who, like the scribes, have the power in our day to define sins--that they are poor because they are lazy; or that they are poor because they have mismanaged their resources; or because they have squandered opportunities; or because, in the most blatantly evil definitions of guilt, they are black or female or homosexual or members of whatever part of humanity the powerful choose to define as subhuman and sinful. Paralysis, hunger, homelessness and early death are, according to the rich and powerful, the direct consequences of the poor and powerless having sinned in one way or another.... [But] the paralytic walks away because he has become a new human being. Transformed within and without, he is freed from paralysis. ~James Douglass

In NYC

2010-01-03T15:50:00.000-08:00

It's been about a week since I've been in NYC. Arrived last Monday after Christmas and searched for housing in Flushing all week - I think I looked at about 11 or 12 places. Finding *quality* housing in Flushing is no easy feat, I've come to realize, but I've found a place to stay for now!

But I really do love New York - seeing the diverse faces on the subway, the skyscrapers and the breathtaking architecture, the nooks & crannies of each neighborhood, even the grimy streets.

Spent a fun New Year's Eve at a benefit bash sponsored by Restore, a Christian organization which seeks to assist and rehabilitate victims of trafficking. I cannot believe that it's 2010 - time really seems to go by in a blur (especially the last several years). I start a new work tomorrow - keep your fingers crossed for me!

NK At a Glance

2009-11-24T14:29:00.000-08:00

Some compelling statistics on North Korea:

24,000,000
North Koreans

1,000,000 – 3,000,000
Starved in the mid-1990s

300,000
Refugees in hiding in China

250,000
Imprisoned in concentration camps.

70%-90%
Women refugees in China trafficked in the sex trade

40%
Of North Korean people urgently in need of food assistance

15-30%
North Korea’s GDP used to support the military even during famine

15,000
NK refugees resettled in South Korea

93
NK refugees resettled in the U.S.

13/93
Refugees resettled through LiNK in the U.S.

A really good post...

2009-10-29T21:05:00.000-07:00

Turning Toward Intimacy
October 24th, 2009
By Kayla McClurg

Over 1 million children under 18 will experience divorce this year. Even when it’s handled with love and care for the children involved, the divorce of their parents is a traumatic and life-altering event. Perhaps less stressful than living with two parents who can’t get along, but stressful nonetheless. Throughout our lives we are faced with situations that are painful and in which we feel overwhelmed and powerless. Sometimes we are left by someone we love. Sometimes we are the one who leaves. Sometimes we are neglected or abused, and sometimes we are the one who neglects or abuses another. We live out our childhood losses again and again. Jesus had his own “issues,” you know he did. Small towns talk, and the story is, maybe he’s not even Joseph’s son. I mean, it doesn’t take much detective work to count up the months between marriage and birth … I’m just sayin’….

Jesus understands what we’re going through; he loves us regardless; AND he is no fool. He sees how we use each other and blame each other and hide out from each other, using our starting stories as an excuse. And he keeps calling us to another way. Not a way based on legal systems or social customs, not a way based on denial or casting blame; but a way based on the lofty ideals of down-to-earth love. So whether he was talking to adults about divorce or blessing the children of parents who might be together but were probably struggling as much as any others, he kept reminding whoever would listen to stop going the direction they were going and to turn toward what matters most.

To repent is to turn—and so is to bless, to turn toward instead of away. In Hindu tradition, when meeting or departing, one turns toward the other, bows, hands together at the heart chakra, and says, “Namaste,” which means “I bow to you.” Bowing isn’t the same as, “I give in to you.” Or, “I give up; you can have things your way.” Rather, it is a recognition of the spark of the divine in you. It is bowing to that part of you that, regardless of how we might be at odds, regardless of how differently we see the same thing, regardless of how much you annoy me, reminds me that we are connected. [“The Spirit in me greets the Spirit in you.”]

“To bless” means that when the relationship is breaking down, we choose to believe in the possibility that, actually, deeper connection might be “breaking through.” And so we make a commitment to turn toward one another at the most difficult junctures, not away. When you hurt your spouse or your close friend, or have been deeply hurt by them, when you have been failed by the community of people who have promised to journey, together with you, as members of something bigger than all of you, and in your hurt you turn away—and that might be the right response initially—at some point, turn back. See the ones who have hurt you for the struggling humans they are. Turn toward each other, instead of away.

When you’re not the one hurting, but others are, turn toward that hurt. Go to the Festival Center when Jubilee Jobs has its next orientation—or wherever hurting people gather in your part of the world—and look into people’s eyes and see what hopelessness & hope look like up against each other. Don’t be afraid or angry or resistant to the person begging on the street. Turn toward her instead of away. When children are frightened by the fighting in their home, or other things that are out of their control, turn toward those children, not away. Powerlessness comes because we turn away from each other; empowerment comes when we turn toward each other and toward the God in each other.

This sounds like a lovely exercise until you try it on a daily basis. As humans we yearn for closeness, but don’t know how and are scared to confess even that little bit of self-revealing information. Isn’t it interesting that we are capable of doing all kinds of daring things—visit someone in prison or join a protest where we might get arrested ourselves or swim out into a lake to help get someone to shore or simply face the daily grind of being a responsible person in the world—but we can’t imagine looking someone in the eyes and saying, “I would like to know you and to be known by you, but I’m afraid because I don’t know how.” Our yearning for intimacy is matched by our fear of it … and our fear of admitting our fear.

For many of us the fear goes back to childhood where we never received the blessing we needed from family and the wider community. Did we have a circle of love where we were blessed as Jesus blessed the children, or did we feel more often in the way, scolded for taking up too much space and time? When we went to school, we weren’t taught intimacy like we were taught to read or do math or even like we were taught to share and be polite. Intimacy is caught more than taught. It’s a way of being that is nurtured in simple gestures. I remember a moment when my kindergarten teacher created space for intimacy simply by looking me in the eyes one cold day as she tied my hat on my head. She said, “I think I’ll tie the bow over to the side today because that’s how my little girl likes to wear her bow.” That’s all it took for me to feel the closeness of being as dear to her as her own daughter.

This is what we were created for—small tender gestures, gentle moments of being seen and known and, as they say, loved anyway. And yet we are as clumsy as toddlers who are just learning to walk. We stumble all over each other trying to figure out how to do it. It’s been called the “dance of intimacy” but should dancing cause this many bruises, this many hurt feelings? Rarely are we able to be honest and say we don’t know how but we want to try to learn how to be open and honest and loving … and so we just lumber along, smashing into each other’s feelings and opinions until, exhausted, we conclude that indeed we ARE NOT able to do it, this dance called healthy relationship. We decide the best thing for this turtle to do is to pull in and live inside the shell. Make a cozy little nest there. Permanently.

And maybe that will work out for you; maybe you’re one of the few who can do life alone, but I for one am not. I might not know how to let you get close to me, but I know it’s what I’m made for. And I choose to believe in One who says it’s never too late to be on this path … because it’s really the only path. Not to constantly relive the past and cast blame on those who have hurt us and didn’t teach us well how to open our hearts, but to live NOW as beginners, each moment like children just starting out.

On Not Being the Center of the Universe

2009-09-26T16:06:00.000-07:00

I remember an old, old Peanuts cartoon. Charlie Brown is watching Lucy and another girl from afar. He approaches them: “You girls were talking about me, weren’t you!” he says accusingly. “No we weren’t,” the girls say with a smug expression. Charlie Brown reverts to his earlier distant position, and waits a bit, only to return once again and ask: “How come you girls never talk about me?”

A basic human presumption seems to be that we are, each of us, the Center of the Universe…. The Chinese call their land The Middle Kingdom. World maps in the U.S. have, guess which country, at the center? Not the same country as maps sold in, say, France.

Years ago I read a study of students and professors. The study asked students how much time they spent thinking about the professors (not much), and how much time they thought the professors spent thinking about them (a lot, the students figured). The professors, asked the same questions, said they didn’t in fact spend much time thinking about the students, but they were sure that the students, of course, spent lots of time thinking about them. Wrong again. Center of the Universe all over the place.

On a more cosmic scale, it was only recently in history that we could as a species countenance the idea that the universe might not revolve around planet Earth…. Some of us—some a bit more than others—escape from the tyranny of self, but only just a little bit. We get angry, resentful and afraid—basically because people don’t behave the way we would like them to. After all, aren’t we the center of the universe?

Of course, we most assuredly are not. All those would-be subjects of ours aren’t paying us homage—basically they’re just not that into us…. But there are two great causes for optimism in this observation. First, since most of humanity doesn’t really concern itself with us, we are quite free of the bondage of others’ opinions. Our slavery is of our own creation. We hold our own keys to freedom.

Second, once we see that others have the same uni-centric disease that we do, we can lighten up a bit and reach out over the 50-50 line for a touch of human contact. Yul Bryner once said, “We come into this world alone, and we leave it alone; and if someone offers you kindness along the way, you don’t spit on it.” Bryner’s is the minimalist version. The maximalist version is that if you touch someone, you help to free them from their own self-obsessed bondage. By reaching outside yourself, you initially delight them; but quickly that turns to teaching by example. You show that it can be done, and you role-model the benefits of doing so.

If you live in the space that says you’re the center of the universe, people’s orbits tend to fly away from you. But if you reject that belief, then people are attracted to you; oddly, you become (directionally) the center of much more. They trust you….

You are not the center of the universe. What a blessing. Go pay attention to someone else.

~Charles H. Green
Charles H. Green is founder and CEO of Trusted Advisor Associates. This piece is excerpted from the Trust Matters blog found here.

changes

2009-07-18T18:28:00.000-07:00

it's been about two months since graduation. i literally went into some kind of a hibernation mode where i slept for three weeks straight. that was definitely a first for me (not something i would like to do again), but i think my body was screaming for some kind of a rest.

thoughts post-graduation

2009-06-01T22:08:00.000-07:00

now that I have graduated, there are endeavors, hobbies and "projects" that i've been indefinitely putting off (e.g. reading good books, journalling, creative writing, enjoying the outdoors and spending time or hanging out with friends) which i now have time for. but there are also things like paying bills and going through the stack of mail on my desk, getting a haircut, finding a sublet for the summer, applying for jobs and writing thank you notes that scream for my attention. only if there were three or four of me!

2009-05-29T22:29:00.001-07:00

"Tonight I Can Write"
By Pablo Neruda

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, "The night is starry
and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance."

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

When I heard the Learn’d Astronomer

2009-05-20T23:28:00.000-07:00

WHEN I heard the learn’d astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,

How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick; 5
Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.

~ Walt Whitman

2009-01-05T03:54:00.000-08:00

an interesting article - would be interested in hearing the readers' thoughts!

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google

Tis 2009...

2009-01-01T21:13:00.000-08:00

Gustav Klimt

"The Kiss (c. 1907)"

"Silhouette II"

"Musique"

"The Mother and Child Detail from the Three Ages of Woman (c. 1905)"

"The Tree of Life Frieze (c. 1909)"

i thought these questions were fun - perhaps a good way to screen potential dates? =)

2008-12-08T13:33:00.000-08:00

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/12/08/odd.oxford.questions/index.html#cnnSTCOther1

Make a Mess, Discover Your Life

2008-12-06T22:48:00.001-08:00

A much-needed kick in the butt!

By Anne Lamott

Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life. I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won’t have to die. The truth is that you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren’t even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they’re doing it.

Besides, perfectionism will block inventiveness and playfulness and life force (these are words we are allowed to use in California). Perfectionism means that you try desperately not to leave so much mess to clean up. But clutter and mess show us that life is being lived. Clutter is wonderfully fertile ground—you can still discover new treasures under all those piles, clean things up, fix things, get a grip. Tidiness suggests that something is as good as it’s going to get. Tidiness makes me think of held breath, of suspended animation.

When I was 21, I had my tonsils removed. I was one of those people who got strep throat every few minutes, and my doctor finally decided that I needed to have my tonsils taken out. For the entire week afterward, swallowing hurt so much that I could barely open my mouth for a straw. I had a prescription for painkillers, though, and when they ran out but the pain hadn’t, I called the nurse and said she would need to send another prescription over, and maybe a little mixed grill of drugs because I was also feeling somewhat anxious. But she wouldn’t.

I asked to speak to her supervisor. She told me her supervisor was at lunch and that I needed to buy some gum, of all things, and to chew it vigorously—the thought of which made me clutch at my throat. She explained that when we have a wound in our body, the nearby muscles cramp around it to protect it from any more violation and from infection, and that I would need to use these muscles if I wanted them to relax again. So finally my best friend Pammy went out and bought me some gum, and I began to chew it, with great hostility and skepticism. The first bites caused a ripping sensation in the back of my throat, but within minutes all the pain was gone, permanently.

I think that something similar happens with our psychic muscles. They cramp around our wounds—the pain from our childhood, the losses and disappointments of adulthood, the humiliations suffered in both—to keep us from getting hurt in the same place again, to keep foreign substances out. So those wounds never have a chance to heal. Perfectionism is one way our muscles cramp. In some cases we don’t even know that the wounds and the cramping are there, but both limit us. They keep us moving in tight, worried ways. They keep us standing back or backing away from life, keep us from experiencing life in a naked and immediate way.

So go ahead and make big scrawls and mistakes. Perfectionism is a mean, frozen form of idealism, while messes are the artist’s true friend. What people somehow (inadvertently, I’m sure) forgot to mention when we were children was that we need to make messes in order to find out who we are and why we are here.

Anne Lamott is a writer of books and essays. This piece is an excerpt from her book, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life.

Interesting!

2008-12-05T16:18:00.000-08:00

I filled out a job application and here is the assessment it gave me:

CareerView Summary:

Your Career Beliefs
(When you believe you should be doing)

Your Career Motivations
(Patterns that would best fit your motivations)

Primary Theme:
Expert

long term specialization in a particular type of work, with emphasis on expertise, and stability Learning

periodic movement into new types of work, with emphasis on broadening of skills and knowledge, and creativity

Secondary
Theme Competitive

rapid upward advancement, with emphasis on achievement and gaining influence Entrepreneurial

many different kinds of work, with emphasis on variety and independence

Analysis:
The key themes in your Career Beliefs profile are very different from the key themes in your Career Motivations profile.
We place much more importance on Career Motivations than on Career Beliefs in career decision-making. Career Beliefs are too easily influenced by other people in our lives. A person's Career Motivations are more likely to reflect that person's own true preferences. Consequently, in your case, we recommend that you take care to place most importance on Learning themes and Entrepreneurial themes when searching for and evaluating career opportunities. Be sure not to give too much weight to Expert and Competitive themes. They could lead you in the wrong direction in your career.

-------------

StyleView
The StyleView Assessment provides a profile of the image you want to project versus your natural operating style - and examines how people's first and second impressions of you may differ.

StyleView Summary
Comparing your leadership style profile and your thinking style profile

Your leadership and thinking styles influence how people see you when they first meet you, or when they only see you in relatively formal circumstances, (leadership style) vs. how people see you when they get to know you well (thinking style).

As you know, first impressions may not be accurate impressions. That is, people often seem quite different after you get to know them from how you viewed them when you first met them.

Based on our analysis of your profile, we expect that other people's first impression of you will be somewhat different from their impression of you after they come to know you well.

Our reasoning is as follows:

Your Primary Leadership Style is
Task Focused

Your Primary Thinking Style is
Complex

First Impression of You When people first meet you they likely see you as action-oriented, firm and practical - steady, reliable and committed to getting things done efficiently.

After People Get to Know You People who really get to know you well will come to see that actually you are very analytic, thorough, and logical in your thinking, and as quite inclined to stick with a particular course of action once you make up your mind.

Main Difference The main difference that people likely notice as they become increasingly familiar with you is that you are more analytic and inclined to think things through thoroughly before deciding than you first appeared.

Desire to be Embraced

2008-11-22T12:14:00.000-08:00

it's a crisp day outside, a kind of a day which beckons you to take a walk or do something meaningful for another. here i am at the library for the umpteenth (sp?) time and wish that i were back in Alexandria (my humble abode) visiting shops or on the road to somewhere.

sometimes, i think we make decisions on the spur of the moment or based on such a trivial factor only to realize later the full implications of what we have done. in retrospect, i very much regret having come to DC. i wish i was enveloped by words and people who beckon and hold me with their warmth and comfort. i wish i were in a place where i could identify with the language spoken there - language of inclusion, openness and truth. i wish i were in a grad program which inspires me on a daily basis to be a better person and to love and to serve another - a place where i can be free to be myself. i wish i were in a place that loves back and pours blessings in gentle waves and rhythms unbeknownst to the recipient.

Morality and the Economic Crisis

2008-10-08T08:52:00.001-07:00

i had the chance to visit the church where pastor Gordon Cosby presides here in D.C. i thought this was an interesting post...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I have a friend who is an attorney with a deep knowledge of the national economic crisis. He made two interesting comments:

He first said that "liquidity" is not the real problem in the market right now---it is that no one knows what anything is worth. So much stuff of questionable value is hidden on balance sheets that buyers no longer know if something is worth what it is trading for, less, or more. So no one really knows how bad things are and cannot put an efficient, valid price on things. In other words, blindness about value. That destroys the logic of the "free market" because efficiency is based on "transparency" of value.

Second, he said that as a result of the first problem of blindness about value, it is difficult to know if persons you are selling to can meet their commitments to you. In other words---blindness about the solvency of parties in the market. That also kills an "efficient" market because it destroys the needed trust that makes the market work.

In spiritual traditions of all kinds, blindness is an old theme----people who corruptly set out to blind others end up blind themselves. We ignore that wisdom at our peril. Morality, once again, is proven to be fundamental to an efficient marketplace.

Source: Conversation with a friend, September 28, 2008

The Ambition of the Short Story

2008-10-04T15:48:00.000-07:00

By STEVEN MILLHAUSER
Published: October 3, 2008

The short story — how modest in bearing! How unassuming in manner! It sits there quietly, eyes lowered, almost as if trying not to be noticed. And if it should somehow attract your attention, it says quickly, in a brave little self-deprecating voice alive to all the possibilities of disappointment: “I’m not a novel, you know. Not even a short one. If that’s what you’re looking for, you don’t want me.” Rarely has one form so dominated another. And we understand, we nod our heads knowingly: here in America, size is power. The novel is the Wal-Mart, the Incredible Hulk, the jumbo jet of literature. The novel is insatiable — it wants to devour the world. What’s left for the poor short story to do? It can cultivate its garden, practice meditation, water the geraniums in the window box. It can take a course in creative nonfiction. It can do whatever it likes, so long as it doesn’t forget its place — so long as it keeps quiet and stays out of the way. “Hoo ha!” cries the novel. “Here ah come!” The short story is always ducking for cover. The novel buys up the land, cuts down the trees, puts up the condos. The short story scampers across a lawn, squeezes under a fence.

Of course there are virtues associated with smallness. Even the novel will grant as much. Large things tend to be unwieldy, clumsy, crude; smallness is the realm of elegance and grace. It’s also the realm of perfection. The novel is exhaustive by nature; but the world is inexhaustible; therefore the novel, that Faustian striver, can never attain its desire. The short story by contrast is inherently selective. By excluding almost everything, it can give perfect shape to what remains. And the short story can even lay claim to a kind of completeness that eludes the novel — after the initial act of radical exclusion, it can include all of the little that’s left. The novel, when it remembers the short story at all, is pleased to be generous. “I admire you,” it says, placing its big rough hand over its heart. “No kidding. You’re so — you’re so —” So pretty! So svelte! So high class! And smart, too. The novel can hardly contain itself. After all, what difference does it make? It’s nothing but talk. What the novel cares about is vastness, is power. Deep in its heart, it disdains the short story, which makes do with so little. It has no use for the short story’s austerity, its suppression of appetite, its refusals and renunciations. The novel wants things. It wants territory. It wants the whole world. Perfection is the consolation of those who have nothing else.

So much for the short story. Modest in its pretensions, shyly proud of its petite virtues, a trifle anxious in relation to its brash rival, it contents itself with sitting back and letting the novel take on the big world. And yet, and yet. That modest pose — am I mistaken, or is it a little overdone? Those glancing-away looks — do they contain a touch of slyness? Can it be that the little short story dares to have ambitions of its own? If so, it will never admit them openly, because of a sharp instinct for self-protection, a long habit of secrecy bred by oppression. In a world ruled by swaggering novels, smallness has learned to make its way cautiously. We will have to intuit its secret. I imagine the short story harboring a wish. I imagine the short story saying to the novel: You can have everything — everything — all I ask is a single grain of sand. The novel, with a careless shrug, a shrug both cheerful and contemptuous, grants the wish.

But that grain of sand is the story’s way out. That grain of sand is the story’s salvation. I take my cue from William Blake: “All the world in a grain of sand.” Think of it: the world in a grain of sand; which is to say, every part of the world, however small, contains the world entirely. Or to put it another way: if you concentrate your attention on some apparently insignificant portion of the world, you will find, deep within it, nothing less than the world itself. In that single grain of sand lies the beach that contains the grain of sand. In that single grain of sand lies the ocean that dashes against the beach, the ship that sails the ocean, the sun that shines down on the ship, the interstellar winds, a teaspoon in Kansas, the structure of the universe. And there you have the ambition of the short story, the terrible ambition that lies behind its fraudulent modesty: to body forth the whole world. The short story believes in transformation. It believes in hidden powers. The novel prefers things in plain view. It has no patience with individual grains of sand, which glitter but are difficult to see. The novel wants to sweep everything into its mighty embrace — shores, mountains, continents. But it can never succeed, because the world is vaster than a novel, the world rushes away at every point. The novel leaps restlessly from place to place, always hungry, always dissatisfied, always fearful of coming to an end — because when it stops, exhausted but never at peace, the world will have escaped it. The short story concentrates on its grain of sand, in the fierce belief that there — right there, in the palm of its hand — lies the universe. It seeks to know that grain of sand the way a lover seeks to know the face of the beloved. It looks for the moment when the grain of sand reveals its true nature. In that moment of mystic expansion, when the macrocosmic flower bursts from the microcosmic seed, the short story feels its power. It becomes bigger than itself. It becomes bigger than the novel. It becomes as big as the universe. Therein lies the immodesty of the short story, its secret aggression. Its method is revelation. Its littleness is the agency of its power. The ponderous mass of the novel strikes it as the laughable image of weakness. The short story apologizes for nothing. It exults in its shortness. It wants to be shorter still. It wants to be a single word. If it could find that word, if it could utter that syllable, the entire universe would blaze up out of it with a roar. That is the outrageous ambition of the short story, that is its deepest faith, that is the greatness of its smallness.

Steven Millhauser’s most recent book is “Dangerous Laughter: Thirteen Stories.”

Old Town, Alexandria

2008-09-19T20:12:00.001-07:00

I just moved to a new place in Alexandria, Virginia -- one of my many 'homes' since college. Besides the number of shops on 'King Street,' the main street replete with a wide range of restaurants and ice cream and coffee shops, I'm very excited about the Gap Outlet store nearby!

I stayed in tonight thinking I would do a lot of work, but to no avail. Probably should hit up a coffee shop or just enjoy Friday night next time :) On a related note, I hope that I can find a good bible study/community group in the area soon!

Aigoo...

In The Washington Post today...

2008-09-09T21:39:00.000-07:00

Joe Eszterhas

"My Base Instincts and God's Love"

Seven years ago, I sat down on a curb near my home, sobbing, and asked God to help me.

I had just had surgery for throat cancer. I still had a trache in my throat. I had been told that if I didn't stop smoking and drinking immediately, I'd die. I desperately didn't want to die. I adored my wife and children.

But I knew I couldn't stop. I'd started smoking when I was twelve and drinking when I was 14. I was now 57 years old.

I cried and begged God to help me . . . and He did. I hadn't prayed since I was a boy. I had made fun of God and those who loved God in my writings. And now, through my sobs, I heard myself asking God to help me . . . and from the moment I asked, He did.

I didn't at first understand why He did. I didn't deserve His help, I thought. I was unworthy. I ignore Him for forty years and then suddenly I ask Him to help me and He does? It took me some time to understand that God helped me because He loves me. Because even though we don't deserve God's love, God loves us - all of us.

Not only did He give me the strength to be able to defeat my addictions, He saved my life. My throat surgeon, Dr. Marshall Strome, told me seven years after the surgery that I am "cured." Not that I am in remission, but that I am cured. That my throat tissue has regenerated so remarkably that even a doctor examining my throat wouldn't be able to tell that there was ever cancer there. Dr. Strome, who had removed about eighty percent of my larynx, called this "a miracle."

I call it that, too. Why did God save the life of a man who had trashed, lampooned, and marginalized Him most of his life? Why did He take the time and the trouble to save me? It certainly wasn't because I had written Basic Instinct and Showgirls, right? Was it because my wife and I had four little boys we were trying to raise? Possibly.

Or was it God's divinely impish sense of humor? "Who, you? You're praying? After
everything you've done to break my commandments and after every nasty, unfunny thing you've written about Me and those who follow Me - now you're sobbing? Praying? Asking Me to help you? Hah! Okay, fine, I'll help you. But if I do, know this: My help will obliterate the old, infamous you. You'll wind up turning your life inside-out. You'll wind up stopping all of your excesses. You know what will happen to you? You'll wind up telling the world what I did for you. You'll wind up carrying my cross in church. Yes, I make all things new - and you will be new, too."

Well, I thought I heard God saying all those things to me . . . and then all of the things God said would happen . . . did. My life has turned inside-out. I have stopped my excesses and replaced them with prayer and long walks. I am carrying the cross as often as they'll let me at Holy Angels Church in Bainbridge Township, Ohio. And I have written a book as a thank-you to God. Not just for saving my life, but for saving me.

I am witness to and the beneficiary of God's love for all of us. Am I am witness, too, to the fact that His love is so strong that it was even able to open my rusty old closed heart.

I will thank Him forever because He gave me new life and a heart which is truly able to love for the first time in my life. His love is mine.

Joe Eszterhas is the author of a new memoir called "Crossbearer." He has written the screenplays for sixteen films, totaling over $1 billion in box office revenue. His blockbusters include Basic Instinct, Jagged Edge, Flashdance and Showgirls. A former senior editor at Rolling Stone, he is the author of five previous books - the second, "Charlie Simpson's Apocalypse," was nominated for the National Book Award.

Poems

2008-08-29T14:42:00.000-07:00

Ask Me

by William Stafford

Some time when the river is ice ask me
mistakes I have made. Ask me whether
what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into
my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know
the current is there, hidden; and there
are comings and goings from miles away
that hold the stillness exactly before us.
What the river says, that is what I say.

Source: The Way It Is, New & Selected Poems

~~~~~~~~~

Thirst

Mary Oliver

Another morning and I wake with thirst for the goodness I do not have. I walk out to the pond and all the way God has given us such beautiful lessons. Oh Lord, I was never a quick scholar but sulked and hunched over my books past the hour and the bell; grant me, in your mercy, a little more time. Love for the earth and love for you are having such a long conversation in my heart. Who knows what will finally happen or where I will be sent, yet already I have given a great many things away, expecting to be told to pack nothing, except the prayers which, with this thirst, I am slowly learning.

Source: Thirst

Lecture by an old professor

2008-07-31T20:12:00.000-07:00

Today, I had a chance to hear one of my former professors speak on the current state of Korean affairs. In many ways, hearing him speak brought many issues concerning Korea and international relations to a full circle...

2008-07-31T20:07:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my revamped blog! I was getting a bit tired of the woe-is-me entries, so here is the new and improved version..hopefully with lots of pictures, images, and thoughts. I hope you visit often! :)