The Challenge of "Going Back"

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I am currently doing a part time job being a Psychologist in a Medical laboratory.  Actually it is a consultancy thing.  The company has its own Psychometrician that runs  the Psychological testing.  Test interpretations are already built in the computer system.  My role is to check on clients that display behaviors that are not in the norm of the the test takers' population. So I get to write reports based on forwarded facts - odd behaviors displayed during testing, test results,  initial interviews, etc.  

Oh I like preparing Psychological reports.  I get to bring out what I learned in my years of formation and training. However, I find it more challenging to pursue and really finish my doctorate in Clinical / Counseling Psychology this time with a clear and humane motive of helping (that I get to delve deeply and checked myself so I may not just fall into the temptation of just getting a degree for "title"- sake).

When my friend Rodel started dropping by the house last June and the succeeding ones a week visits to share with me how he was doing with his volunteer work at a Rehabilitation Center for Drug Dependents, I saw how his own effort, sacrifice and venture had reaped series of  life-changing programs in his place.  Because of that and being a part-time Psychologist - consultant in a  medical laboratory has led me to seriously consider going back into the field.  

  

I believe there is no accident.   These exposures and encounters just came unexpectedly and I thought "why go back to it?"....  I love what I am doing right now -  assessing and preparing Psychological reports (while I prepare to become a mom soon)  Oh so beautiful...:-) 

...And looking forward to going back to school ... part time :-) 

Writer's Responsibility

http://blog.pricelesswriters.com

To whom do I owe my skill in writing?  None other than God.  I have written in my previous blogs that i never considered myself a writer at first.  Perhaps because I did not have the strength of a background and command in the the English language.  English is my most comfortable language in writing.  I tried Filipino but I seemed to drift apart from it little by little and I can't seem to sustain myself with finding the right words to say (my apologies to my country - the Philippines :-( ).

As I went into the process of knowing myself with the realization how similar my basic and innate composition as human with  others, I realize writing grew and started through a desire to share.  I went also studying and checking other writers and I found out the same basic principle... writers have the heart and the art for their crafts and I found real beauty and the uniqueness of each one.

However, as I plunged deeply into this calling of expressing the self, I could not deny the following attached with sharing the self by :

1.  Telling the Truth

2.  Saying it from the heart

3.  Going straight to the point

4.  Using the simplest of language

5.  Stating it briefly

6.  Highly considering good values that the reader get

7.  Making them see God

Why?

I just realized from my experience of writing that when i just mumble words for the sake of just having to share something in a day, it does not reach and reap the fulfillment that my heart longs for.  And then it led me to a conclusion that perhaps, I was not really doing what  I was supposed to do when I write.  And so if there is that writer's responsibility that an individual writer should keep and uphold is to stick with writing from the heart, the truth with the simplest language possible so that any reader can relate, make them see God either directly or indirectly and the rest that I stated and enumerated above? 

Everything that we do should lead us back to God...that's the ultimate responsibility....:-)

The Amazing Simplicity

http://www.flickr.com/photos/miscellaneous/534646193/

 I remember discussing about simplicity with my Spiritual director – Fr Frank.  I told him that time about my struggle with it.  He affirmed with me in that.  The more when one would literally follow Christ.  Hard as it is, but one would reap wisdom as one would trace its path.

Why am I sharing this?  I was confronted with this issue lately.  Being married and without the regular full time income with only a husband to rely on the major family expenses is a big challenge for me.  I realize I had to trim down lots of expenses such that :

1.       I no longer eat out as much as I want to

2.      I get to focus on the most basic of family expenses such food and other bills

3.      Regular monthly prenatal check up

4.      Vitamins to take in (my husband does provide us – baby and myself – on this)

5.      Stuffs for the baby ( I had such a lengthy list from clothes, feeding bottles, sterilizer, crib, stroller, etc. that I had to scrap out the unnecessary ones …good thing my sister – in – law gave us some of her babies unused clothes )

6.      Set aside for my delivery come September (had to continue my SSS and philhealth contributions as my way of contributing to  lightening up the expenses)

7.      No major trips at this time (actually I did not have any for almost a year now except for the previous company travel last December of 2011…thanks be to God I had at least that one).

Simplicity…simplicity…simplicity.  The following are the most basic and beautiful challenges that I get to learn lately…

1.       Stick with the most basic

2.      Submit with my husband

3.      Pray and submit with God’s will

4.      Never to exaggerate emotion

5.      Stick with the truth about myself

6.      Love as much as I can

7.      See my husband in the eyes with his simplicity of dealing with concerns

8.      Talk it out with and express with all honesty with my husband  ( I get dozes of this lately…I call him my best friendJ )

9.      Never to mind about opinions of others for as long as I stick with what is true and honourable in God’s eyes

10. To forgive and continue loving everyday

11. Waste a lot of time with my growing baby in my tummy (hmmm weird but I get to talk with her a lot of times in a day… this is what I call TT & T … Touch Tummy and Talk with our baby)

Simplicity really comes in the smallest and most basic of life.  It does not come with huge and expensive things.  It amazes me how God reflected Himself in the simplest of things so that it is made available with everyone…. free of charge.  I love it that way…. I love God’s way of telling us that He is most available and reachable  in the simplest of things, persons and life’s events:-)

 

Thank you God for  Your Amazing …. Simplicity:-)

Living Life Freely

“If you want to live life freely, take your time go slowly…” – Movie :  Brother Sun…Sister Moon – St. Francis of Assissi

http://www.freedomcounselingusa.com/

 

I have been told many times over about my being – OC – stands for Obsessive Compulsive.  I don’t know if those that gave me such "name"  really had the strictest definition of the words but the contextual definition says that I am sort of rigid in terms of the following:

1.       I want things in place and organized

2.      I don’t do things without planning ahead

3.      I monitor and control condition until the desired result is achieved

4.      I maintain my own planner to monitor how I am doing in a day and carry unimplemented tasks the following day…

…In short … I am really good at organizing … hmmmm in short… how about the term ….RIGID…

When I was employed, I write flows and department procedures such that daily operations including daily tasks are kept tracked and monitored.  Even when I started my pregnancy, I prepared a daily program for my growing fetus…este baby in my tummy.  And  I ended up exhausted and found myself too rigid.

I did wonder at first how I got such behavior.  I could recall when I was a kid, I would observe my own mother’s way of running our home such that, she got angry with a messy house.  She wanted things in place.  When I was seriously ill and I had to stay home to recover from the hospital, I observed my own mother fixed and produced a neat bed for me, changed my soaking wet with sweat clothes, changed the curtains in the room just to produce a neat place for me to stay and it felt good to have things around me so organized that I easily recovered from my illness because of that gesture of love and kindness.  

I saw my own older sister copied the same strategy.  And I felt that having things organized could really make things easier at home.  I brought this behavior in school until I got into the world of work.  I like so much organizing and it is so easy to trace where problems started, how they started, etc. and to find intervention and solutions.

However, along the way, I found some extremes with it.  Take for example when I and my husband moved in together after the wedding.  I stuck with my ways of doing things that it led me to be uncomfortable and worst angry when things are not the way they should be.  I became rigid with things and it affected my relationship with my own husband. 

How did I painstakingly learn from the process?  From my husband I learned the following:

1.       He has his own way of doing things – ways of organizing and the time he would do it

2.      More than procedures and rigidity, relationship is more important

3.      That we could agree on the best and comfortable ways of organizing things … not alone.. but in partnership with him

4.      Respect my husband's opinions on how things should be

5.      That I could simply allow some mess at times to give way to more important things such as waste time talking with him than fixing things  at home

6.      It is very OK to have a messy house sometimes and deal with them later

7.      I learned to go slow with my own rigid ways of doing things

8.      I set aside planners  for a while to just simply be with him in a day

…and it felt so good to just slow down…to set aside rules, flows and procedures, planners, etc… and to give way to the day’s unplanned events and its surprises…  There is more to rules and procedures…  There is life to spontaneity and it feels so good to be ….FREE:-)

Documenting Memories

I ran across the above book at the National Bookstore.  It is going to document some first events in a child's life such as the following :

1.  Before I was born...

2.  Ultrasound photo while in mommy's tummy...

3.  About the baby (arrival time, date, etc)...

4.  Origin of baby's name...

5.  Baby's first photo (what mommy and daddy think when they first saw me, etc.)

6.  Hand and Foot prints (this i find so cute hehe)

7.  Baby's birth certificate...

8.  Headlines for that day (news headlines, political figures, popular actors, movies, popular singers / songs, etc)...

9.   Family Tree (Grandparents, daddy and mommy, myself and sibling...if there are any)...

10.  First Day at Home (date, weather, first visitors, their comments)

11.  First Outing

12.  First Holiday

13.   The First Time the baby crawled

14.  The first time the Baby's finger nails were cut

15.  The First Time the Baby's hair was cut

16.  Teething

17.  Baby's favorites (playmates, toys, food,songs, activities, games, places)

18.  Medical visits

19.  "How I've grown"

20.  Baby's Baptism

21.  Baby's Baptismal Certificate

22.  Baby's Baptismal Celebration

23.  Special memories and Favorite Pictures

24.  Baby's First Birthday

25.  Baby's first Birthday Guests and gifts

26. Dedication and Wishes

The book was really a good buy.  I never expected that I would come across such kind.  I insisted from my husband to buy it since the moment, I held and browsed through the pages, it moved me from within.  I never had such documenting in my childhood years.  Hmmm I don't blame either my parents for not doing that.  They had so much to deal with 6 children ( I was the fifth one).

I know that this book would greatly help us and our child as we look back at her "history".   I realized how this one would help when my doctor asked me questions like:  What was your weight when you were born; my mother's cravings, etc and... I wanted so much to know how my mother felt when she carried me in her womb.... 

Actually my doctor was interested to know my history too, so that she can relate with my pregnancy.  She discovered from the last visit that my tummy and baby was smaller than she expected (though she knew already that I was a little trim...hmmm not really skinny prior to my pregnancy ...good thing our little girl is in within the normal range of birth weight for a fetus :-) ).  And I could not sort of answer her questions simply because I had no idea.

With my background in Psychology, I know how important memories are as to understanding present behavior.  The not so good thing was, I had no chance at interviewing my own mother about me.  She died without me knowing everything that I needed to know from her pregnancy up to my childhood years.  I could  remember full well my adolescent years expect that I wanted so much to know how she felt about my odd and crazy behaviors during that time :-).

Ahhh.... I realize, there are a lot of things that a mother or parents for that matter can do as to helping their own children craft  stories that one day would help them understand themselves and their journey.  At this time ... I could help that out in partnership with my husband so that our own - Maria Mikaela (yes that would be her name...on my 8th month of pregnancy:-)  wouldn't have a hard time tracing backwards her own path.

The Best Gift From A Father In Law

Lately, I was devouring some Christmas movies at Youtube and I ran across a film entitled A Christmas Romance.  Some kind of old though but it reminds me so much of valuing relationships with family particularly husband and wife thing. 

And I kind of looked back with my latest conversation with my husband as he shared with me how his own father (my father in law) has sort of left him some things which my husband brought with him in our own home when we got married.  He told me those are in a way my father in laws gift to both of us as they are ours now. 

But then all of a sudden I just told my husband “ No…you are papa Poy’s best gift to both of us…having you is the best gift I have in our marriage”…  The statement was just so sudden that it made me a little choked…to tears but held myself (truly God’s wisdom comes in great surprises through that moment of encounter).

Just no matter those trying times that Mike and I both had in our relationship or in our journey together, it just felt so good and  so blessed to have someone that journeyed or is journeying with me.  Now that we are both expecting our little girl in September and seeing him so dedicated and committed to fulfilling his promise to taking care of me and our family I realized how blessed I am and our baby….

I thank God everyday …for the best gift that He gave me through …the best gift that my father in law had given us ...  my dear husband…Mike:-)

The Benefits of Asserting

One day (in one of my previous jobs) I got into a meeting of a particular department.   I joined the meeting together with another member of my team (our department) named alex (not his real name).    During the session,  I presented a proposal for some changes in procedures for certain part of a program.  The proposal reaped a little outbust of reaction from their leader followed by series of questions. 

If I may allow myself to take it on a personal level considering it as attack, I would have reacted in that level, too.  Instead,  I did the following :

1.        Composed myself

2.      Focused on the content of the comments

3.      Explained the reasons and advantages that outweigh the disadvantages presented.

4.        I presented it in full force completing the information that they needed so that they would understand the rationale of the proposed changes. 

The presentation ended well with a support from the leader from where he ended his statement with “nothing personal…thank you for the help”. 

I went out from that conference room with Alex feeling  victorious not only because, we were able to get the support we needed but also I was able to hold myself in the midst of the bouts of my emotion not leveling it with the high intensity of reaction from the other side.  It was really an effort to focus, think, get the content and deliver the response in the best manner possible without stating anything that would ruin that moment of encounter.

Alex, however, commented after, that it was too close an encounter that may have ruined the entire approach.  He sensed the high tension of the exchanges of words between me and the that leader.  He thought I would burst out myself with that kind of reaction but then stated further something like this “ good thing you were able to hold yourself ma’am and  held on to completing the entire message that we needed to communicate to them.  How did you manage such emotion?”  And ended by saying “… I want to learn the same skill”.

On another occasion also, I was under “attack” by another employee.  I was busy preparing some reports when this employee approached me with his sharp words of accusations.   I was not saying anything.  I was confused at how this man was able to come up with such conclusion given the details of information he brought and delivered. 

I understood that time that he was so angry and I was battling with the same feeling.  However, I persisted with my listening and responded with the statement “ is that all that’s needed to be done?  Ok, I will do it.”  I thought he would immediately go away but still he repeated the same information he delivered and I felt that it was useless to react or give any statement given that I  have stated mine already( …nothing more or less).   Perhaps, he felt my silence at last and off he went a little embarrassed with everyone’s eyes and ears on him.  

Well, assertion can also mean being silent to stress the previous point mentioned without necessarily making yourself sound like a “sirang plaka” -  repeating the same point over and over gain.

One employee told me that if it was her in that situation she would have shouted at him to back off.  I responded by saying “do you think it was easy for me doing that?  I wanted to shout at him.   I wanted to squeeze him or throw stones at him.  I wanted to ‘powderize’ him (hahaha just joking). 

I can level off with his anger so that he would just stop doing that but then I added “   I have learned from my own family experience, how one man’s show of anger would lead to nothing.  I had one cathartic (high emotional release)moment in front of a family member that got me so drained and made me realize that I cannot get back what I said nor was I able to give the most sane solution and discussion to the issue that got me into that ‘fight’.  It ended up as useless display that got me nowhere after that.

Actually, the most painful part was being labeled a coward for not being able to fight back outright.  This is  one thing I would like to really share.  In communicating my point or in asserting myself …

1.       I need not get the laurels of appreciation from the listeners around me. 

2.     I need not get the approval of everyone in the room or be declared a “winner”.

3.     I need not be known that my strength as a person comes from the loudness of my voice and shout at someone and be known as “palaban”  (fighter) and won’t give up to any fight without using my heart and mind.

4.     I don’t need those things to prove that I am a great leader or better at confrontation or better at facing odds in the workplace.

I have been through so much with all these from my family life  up to work setting.  I was never at peace with it nor I found myself growing in that approach.  It was great to find a new strategy right?  And this one I would love to share with everyone.

To close this part,  discovering assertion was my strong resolve to the balance of communicating what is necessary and coming up with an end that would be hopefully useful to both parties no matter the tension in between and without really insisting your side so that you would  come out the “winner”.  Your expression would just provide room for further thinking, processing and perhaps consideration from the other side. 

Assertion should be regularly practiced.  Regardless of how the other party during the encounter would deliver the message, we need to establish that control center within ourselves. 

As I came close to my resignation from that previous job, Alex told me that this one approach that he witnessed with me is one of the legacies I had with him during my short-term leadership in the company.  This I would forever be grateful for the opportunity of sharing myself to him and the department I held for almost 2 years. 

Gratefulness - Space, Inner Freedom, Peace...etc.

http://www.genistra.com/blog/2008/04/08/happiness/

I spent a lot of internal  "seeing" in a day.  Being left alone  in the house most of the time (este with my dog Tobby and my little girl inside my tummy) and having that "full" time of self- check,  I realize how blessed I am being given such privilege to break away for a while from routine of work.  And I always get to utter "Thank you Lord for this space, the sense of inner freedom, the sense of peace, the sense to just be myself and the sense to keep in touch with what I love doing at this time...writing...writing...writing...(hahah obviously,  I get to do that a lot at this time...halleluiah)

Let my run the above piece by piece...:-)

1.  Space 

I have been working for more 10 years already.  Day in and out, i got to face people, "grind" with work from being a teacher, guidance counselor, human resource practitioner, with some part time works as trainer,  etc...so many things.  I missed so much that time when i stopped working 2 years back and I just had to deal with "me" and check on what has happened with my life and everything else was like a re-alignment with the person that I was and am now.

At this point, I want you to journey a little with me.  Visualize with me a space...empty...nothing in it and you are just allowed to stay at the center.  What do you think would you see?  Nothing?  Definitely the description is empty.  What would be your first feeling upon visualizing an empty space?  

At my end...perhaps at first i would be frightened.  You know why?  When i see space, i would visualize lots of things to put in it?  I would want to organize them.  To look neat.  I want them to appear pleasing.  Emptiness is kind of frightening.  

But here is the challenge...never to put anything in that space that i want you to visualize... just nothing...can you relax with me in that?  hehe great job...

Let's move forward...

2. Sense of  Inner Freedom

Now...here is a continuation to item 1 activity.  You are in that space ...empty space...can you sense ...that you are free...so that you need not put anything in that space to make you secure?  Right now I am visualizing my own bedroom such that my security can mean...putting a bed in it, closet with lots of clothes, air-conditioned, with all sorts of beautiful beddings, comforters, blankets, pillows, etc.  

Or you could imagine your own office ... yes where you are working... Can you see it empty? NO?  Perhaps you would see your table, with your name in it?  With your cabinets filled with props, books, and anything you need for the work.  What is the general feeling seeing this in your imagination?  Does it evoke certain feeling like you want to stay overtime or  a feeling that you want to  vomit (hehe sorry for the term...I did feel that a lot of times), or calmness while you stay in that environment?

But that is not my challenge here...  What i want you to do is to put it off... to flush everything that you see in this space for a while... to clean up ...your reality may be that you will go back to it...but as of now ...i want you to set them all aside and get the feeling at not having them in your... space...

Oh, it feels so good to be free.   To be free for a while from all these...Just try it...for a while...

Breaking away from my last full time employment just gave me the sense of freedom from any attachment.  I did not  mind losing the regular pay.  I just wanted that inner freedom back.  I felt some "cry" inside at not having to go back to my space and clean up the "mess" with some of my daily engagements. 

Here is another thing though...I always get to remind myself though that there is no real freedom in the strictest sense.  When I was in high school, I was not really free to go out of the house to spend time with friends or to fool around or do some crazy things that would make me express my young "wild" imaginations.  I refuted "freedom" at first.  Until it reached to a realization that true freedom is felt within in the context of following that "inner voice" that would lead us to doing the right thing.  

Inner freedom for me is following that "Inner Voice" that leads us to the ultimate good without the bother of conscience through some sleepless nights, wrecked mind, stares at blank walls, empty looks, lost and so lost decisions...etc.  Inner freedom for me is not being attached with anything that others define as "havings" of the following:

     -  houses

     -  cars

     -  titles

     -  lots of clothes

     -  traveling to prestigious places

     -  pursuing wealth for personal satisfaction

But do you think that I like to have them too ( ohhh i do heheh no denying)... but...attachment is different... such that you cannot live life without them... that is such a constricting...enslaving thing to one's soul... hahaha really if you want to be lost... go for it...

3.  Sense of Peace

There was this quote that ran like this "Peace is not the absence of chaos...etc". The quote was written on a photo showing a heavily flowing water falls from behind it is a nest of a mother bird with her nestling (baby birds that has not left the nest yet..i presume hehe).  

In my "abundant" and lavish  private moments... a lot of things not so good things are going on in the world -  even at my own place in Cagayan de Oro City but it still leaves that inner feeling of peace and contentment at the simplest things I get to knit everyday in my life - peaceful acceptance at the waiting for the delivery of my little girl come September, do chores, take care of my husband also (as he takes care of me  heheheh and argue, discuss, deliberate with him  too) experiment in cooking (not really new to me), attend with my part time job, write a lot, pray a lot and a dozes of sleep during the day (wow this...thing I missed so much when I was a full time worker).

Peace really comes with joyful acceptance.  Peace comes with letting go, embracing each moment without question and just allowing things to unfold during the day.  Peace comes with enjoying moment by moment and to care less and be anxious of the future.  Peace come with the simplest of things... not from the grandiose display of any attachments...:-)

And the next activity would be beyond my control... you know why?  However you cooperated with the first two activities from the above ...the fruit of it ...from  my experience is Peace... hey ...try it...

4.   Sense of being with myself

This is my other product from the above activities.  The sense of being myself is like being"home".  I get to feel the "no faking thing" about me.  As I experience peace...i experience being at home with everything about me...self-expression with not being afraid of  unrelenting opinion of others.  To truly focus my energies at what I am capable of doing at this time.  To keep myself in a relaxed mode without participating in the "haunt" and competition there is in the world.  Ahhhhh it is so beautiful to be just so at home with myself.  I could just ... care less...at anything related to ego...and be self - less...:-)

5.  Sense To Keep In Touch With What I love doing

Writing is what I really like or love doing at this time.  For me this was like a product of the "unskinning"  (if there is such a word) with my self from the trappings of my ego...  And I just get to write everything about my experiences... again without the cares of what others may say...  Hmmm crispy and yummy:-) 

Oh...Gratefulness...this is what this writing is all about... :-)

Again...perhaps...you could try the above by yourself...:-)  Have a wonderful weekend:-)  May God's peace reign in your hearts:-)