Gratitude

During last three days, I have once again discovered that in life, the only people who can love you unconditionally are your family. They are the ones who will always be there for you, caring for you when you are down, giving u a push or a shove anytime you need one, gently rebuking you when you stray and hugging you so tight, that you wish you would never need to leave them. I love them from the bottom of my heart, so much so that I believe that words can no longer be adequate to express how much their presence meant to me especially throughout this period of my life. What hurt me most is not the fact that things happened. What hurt me most is seeing how my Grandma is in pain knowing that I am in pain. I need to be stronger for their sake.

Friends and colleagues, thank you so much for your continuous support throughout the past 3 weeks. I fully realize that my attitude has been crappy and my work performance was so bad that I had to burden you guys for your time and sympathy. All the advice, encouragement and gestures of not leaving me alone when I needed people around are forever etched in my heart. I hope I can be the person you guys think I am and I promise that I will be there for you guys whenever and wherever you guys need me, just as you guys did not abandoned me in the time of my greatest need.

Father in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. Truly You are the great Friend, Savior and Provider of my life. I am sorry to have only come back to You in my time of need. Please help me to be faithful because I realize that the emptiness in my heart can and should only be filled by You. I rest assured in Your guidance and I know that You have heard my cries. I know you were testing my faith and I realized that all these were necessary to bring me back to You, to depend on You and You alone, and not to put any other above You. I am sorry for my foolish ways and believing that my life can ever be complete without You. I re-commit myself to You and pray that You will watch over us, Father. I will have faith that You will protect us.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the Lord, "and bring you back from captivity."~Jeremiah 29:11-14a

Faith

Two days ago, I went out to have dinner with my colleagues. During the dinner, I remember a scene from a movie that I once watched and it played a major role in defining who I am today.

In the movie, the lead character was going to be married and went home to his parents' place where the wedding was going to be held on the following day. In the scene, he was flipping through the photographs of his parents over their long years of marriage. He asked his dad how did he knew that mom was the one for him. He himself was going to be married tomorrow but there is a nagging doubt in his mind whether his fiancee is the one for him.

His dad answered, "Son, when you look through these pictures of your mom and I, you can only see the parts where we were happy together. In between these pictures, we had thousands of problems and differences. There were times when both of us can't even stand each other. It takes a lot of hard work and sacrifice."

So I believe that in life, nothing is perfect. Work hard, play hard, try your best in everything. Always look forward to the next picture in life. I believe that is what having faith is all about.

Perspective

Sometimes, when you go in a meeting with CEO, CIO, Director, Millionaires, Lawyers and Senior Council, and you see how them putting their great minds and time together to work on one single problem, you can't help but realize that everything else in life seems so small and irrelevant.

I suddenly woke up and remember who I am. For the last two weeks, I had lost all confidence in myself. I forgot that David was always David and there was nothing wrong with me. There is nothing for me to be ashamed of. All of us are destined for great things. God has made it so and we just need to listen to Him.

I did not suddenly become a better person. I did not become stronger. It was just that my perspective changed and I realized that my world did not end. I love her the same. I miss her the same. My heart still hurts when I think about her. But the real question is this. Did I try my best? I did and I will have no regrets.

So instead of beating myself up for what could have been, I will now strive for what can be. It's not an overnight thing but I know I am on the right track. I thank God for putting back perspective in my life.