Stay Focus to Love

Yesterday, I had a very enjoyable tea time with my friend, Michelle. She told me she had hugged her brother on his birthday. At first, she was worried about taking this action, cos this wasn't the "normal" practice in her family. But she told herself, she shouldn't wait for other people to show their love before she starts showing hers. She wouldn't care how her brother would react, she just wanted to let her brother know that she loves him. So she took the brave act. She felt really good after that. I was fascinated and inspired.

I had stretched myself by telling my mum a few times I love her. I am sure she got my message by now. So last night, to take a step further, I planned to kiss her good night. It really wasn't easy to take this action, as I find it very awkward. But I had made this declaration to my friend earlier, so I told myself I must do it.

I used a very cunning method, in fact. Before Aron went to bed, I told him to go and say goodnight to Po Po and give her a kiss. I said, "Mummy will also do the same." Aron went straight in to Po Po's room and did everything I told him to do. then he turned to me and said: "Mummy's turn". With lots of excitement, I went up to kiss my mum. Aron smiled. My mum? She was laughing so happily.

Thanks to my friends out there, who give me the support that I need to take this action. I felt really good.

Ever since my mum moved in to stay with me, we had conflicts so often, that I started to talk lesser to her and even avoided her. We could never see eye to eye on the maid's issue. The maid had become a wall between us. Even with no maid, it didn't help much. I always question myself why is my mum so controlling, so stubborn, so unreasonable, so insensitive, so unsympathetic and so selfish. She had never put herself in my position and understood my difficulties. I thought I would only get the peace only when she is no longer around. Or maybe, I should work a way out to let her stay somewhere else and come back occasionally. Her bitterness had not only affected me, but also to my entire family, as well as my relationship with my husband sometimes.

But now, I truly understand this - I had allowed these conflicts and issues to affect my emotions and block my focus of loving her. I realize these will never go away between us, so why should I let it ruin my relationship with her. By holding on to the considerations so tightly, I will lose my focus. This will not work for me and our relationship.

So, for now, whenever mum complains to me about the maid again, I am no longer affected, cos it is not important to me. I continue to show up my love. If there is a need, I will change the maid every 6 months, without getting myself frustrated anymore.

Beautiful Mum

I used to be the one who initiated kissing my boys. Then they would just reciprocate back in the same manner. Asher, being the shy boy, hardly kiss me back, unless I asked for it.

But these 2 days I felt something different. Asher started to initiate the kissing. Aron, who had been quite generous in giving kisses, continues to be as loving as ever when he kisses me.

I heard of a story recently, which touched me. It was about a mother's beauty that showed up out of love. This mother is a beautician, who looks simple and pleasant. It all just happened when she was talking to a customer about beauty. While its obvious that this mother's boss looks much glamorous, the customer told her that she just felt that the beautician is more beautiful. Feeling touched, the beautician started to share her story and her view about beauty.

The beautician told the customer that she has 2 daughters, of which, the elder one has become nun to serve the Lord, while the younger daughter is currently studying in a overseas university, majoring in mass communication and psychology. The young daughter has chosen to write on a thesis about "How to Deal With Difficult Child". Out of curiosity, the customer asked if the young daughter has any children or has been a teacher. The answers were nos. Then how would she know the best way of dealing with difficult children when she has no experience? The beautician answered "That's because she felt that she was a difficult child herself".

When the younger daughter was a little girl. She gave her mum lots of hard time, as she was really a stubborn little girl. Once, she would not tell her mum that she didn't want to take her meal. She said she would eat in her bedroom. So she took her plate of rice and dishes, walked straight into the bedroom, and locked the door. After a while, she took the empty plate out. Few days later, while her mum was cleaning her room, to her shock, she saw a pile of rotten food in the daughter's cabinet. She didn't scold her and she cleaned up the mess. She told the daughter softly, next time if she didn't want to eat, let her know.

This young daughter loved oranges, but she coughed very often. In order to keep the oranges away from the daughter, the mum kept them in the higher compartment in the fridge. One day, when the mum walked in to the kitchen, she saw her daughter standing on an inverted pail in front of the fridge. She was holding an orange in one hand and a knife in the other, and was trying to figure out how to cut it. Fear that the daughter might hurt herself by getting a fright from her loud voice, the mum called out the daughter's name gently, walked up to her and hugged her from behind. She told her gently that this was not the right way to cut the orange, as she might cut her own hand. She then carried the daughter down to the floor, took away the knife and orange, and showed her the way to cut the orange on the table with a cloth under it.

The daughter grew up and went overseas for study. She made new friends. Many of her friends went wild, once they were away from their families. They were, like prisoners, being set free from control from their parents. They went clubbing, taking pills & drugs, smoking, and even sleeping around. For herself, she didn't have the interest to do all these. Her mum had given her all the freedom to do anything she wanted to do since she was born and having the faith that the daughter would grow up to be a great woman. She felt she had received so much love from her mum that she wanted to love herself more.

As for the elder sister, who had chosen to serve the Lord, she had also received her mum's blessing. As long as that is what the daughter really wants and she will be truely happy doing it, the mum will fully support her and be happy for her. The mum just want the daughters to see the true beauty that comes from love.

In the past, my focus was to make sure my boys grow up with the right behaviour and manners. I would be very firm with them if they are not behaving well. I would shout at the top of my voice when they threw tantrums. I just want them to get my point. I had so much fear that they will go into the wrong path or directions. That would be the end of their future and my hope.

But now, I get to learn that I should have faith in them, believe that they will grow up to be great men, from the love I have for them. Whatever they have done wrong, it doesn't matter to me anymore. Cos if I take on these experiences with me, it will become an obstacle for me to show my love for them. My focus on loving them would be blocked out by my fear of loosing them as perfect children. Though they are not the perfect children and they do have flaw, but I would love them for who they are. My focus on them will be just love.

To all mothers, please continue to love your children and have faith in them. No matter how difficult they are, stay focus on what you want to give them. Anger, disappointment, frustration, etc, will only blocked out your love. Trust that everything else will work well. That is the greatest beauty of a mother.

Suddenly, there is a song that comes to my mind now - The Greatest Love of All.

To The Person Who Is Upset With Me

To the person who is upset with me now,

For things that I said these few days that hurt you badly, I am sorry.

I may have used the wrong words, or wrong approach when I am trying to show my care and concern for you. But in my heart, I just want to be honest and open with you.

I may have misunderstood you. I may have not tried enough to understand what you have been through. But I know for sure, life has been hard for you lately. You have been miserable, drained, stressed, lost and tired. I believe you have tried everything you can. You probably have so much anger that why despite after you putting in so much effort, things still don't work out. You probably have cried so many times. You needed support, you needed the power to live on. If consoling and comforting words could get the results that you want to see, I would do it a hundred times, a thousand times. But things will not change even if I can make you feel better. What I believe is to achieve results that you want.

I am not a preacher, a counselor or a psychiatrist. I just care enough that I want to give you the power to move on. I believe with my honesty and openness, you can feel that I really care and I really want to see miracle happen to you. I know you can achieve this, cos in my eyes, you are a powerful and loving person. You have so much power in you that you don't even know you have it. I want to bring this hidden power out from you, so that you can create miracle to your family and achieve the results you want to have. You win, I win. You loose, I loose. These are not consoling words. These are just the things I believe I can make it happen and you can too.

For whatever I have done, its my love, care and concern for you. I may not be the person that can give you much consolations and comfort. But I will be the person to give you the power that you need to achieve what you want. This will only be possible when you are committed to doing it yourself.

I Set Myself Free

I had just finished my Asiaworks Advanced Course. For the past 5 days, it was really a roller coaster journey for me. However, it was also very revealing of who I really was in the past. I had not noticed them myself, neither could my loved ones who I faced everyday. It was really amazing that in this training, even those who had not spoken to me could see through me. If words were not communicated between us, it must be the energy that I radiate out. You can't hide that energy. If you are real, the energy is real, if you are fake, the energy is fake, if you are in silence, you still have the energy.

Till now I could not exactly tell what is the course about. There is also no right solutions about how to handle specific problems. But I do know what are the things that are possible for me, and whether I have really gone 100% doing it.

In the past, I had hold on certain things badly, which I myself wasn't even aware of it. To put in the right frame, I probably chose to ignore it. But even with me ignoring those things, it had subconciously been put on my shoulders. I thought everything was going smoothly for me, and I could handle it very well, just that sometimes I have my ups and downs. But now I realise, no matter how well I handle the problems, I wasn't in the right set of mind.

After I went through this training, I feel that I could really set myself free. I may not be able to solve certain problems still, I may not have any right solutions, but I know I have the right set of mind to face them and to handle them. Not that I am giving myself with good excuses of not being able to get things done. But I know what results I want to create, what are the obstacles that I set for myself which I have to overcome and whether I have put in 100% effort in my actions. I have been pushing lots of responsibilities and blame away to some other people, like most people do, in order to make myself feel better. But by doing this, I was also being irresponsible.

In the training, I see many types of people, the powerful ones, the weak ones, the vulnerable ones, the resisting ones, the righteous ones, the bitter ones, the lost ones and the violent ones. But we do have a common problem - dealing with own feelings and dealing with relationships, especially with the people who are important to them. All these naturally shows up in the training, no matter how hard they tried to hide. I also see lots of transformations in them after the training. Not that they have changed, but they finally bring out the power that is inside them, be it love, passion, confidence, authenticity, etc, from the support of other people around them. I was very touched to see each and everyone of them, including myself, grow.

These are what we have just brought it to the surface of our lives. Whether we are able to continue to hold these inner power, its really up to individual. Some of them had used it to create many successes in their lives - in relationships, careers, in their own passion, etc. But some just return back to their own original position.

What is going to happen next, I don't know. But for now, I am committed to living my life with love, passion and confidence. I want to bring these across my family and those who are close to me, as well as to the well being of others. Sound sacred? But at least, I believe I can do it.

I Quit

Finally, I quit the part-time job.

Before I started on this part-time job, I couldn't fully convince myself of being a full time stay-at-home tai tai, especially when my house doesn't need me to do cleaning, when my family doesn't need me to prepare their meals, so I thought I should must well contribute to the family financially. Taking up this part-time job was a trial for myself and for my family.

Now, I am fully convinced that I should stay at home... still don't have to do cleaning & prepare all the meals. I have found my true purpose of staying at home.

Recently I saw a documentary on the TV, about the right brain training programme. I have heard about this term long ago, but have never really been interested to find out more about the details. But from the programme, I came to realise how this type of training could benefit the children's learning ability. Its is a brain stimulation programme which helps the children to absorb things faster, increase their memory power and focus, develops their IQ & EQ, widen their creativity, imagination and increase confidence, through a series of activities and regular mental exercise. This form of training could in fact start as early as from birth, up to the age of 6. My sons are aready reaching 3 & 4. But still its better to start now than not doing it at all.

I have always been very lost about how to create an interesting learning envioronment for my children. I couldn't come out with good ideas on creating fun games and acitivites for them. I ended up buying lots of activity books for them, which Asher will choose to do on the pages he likes and Aron just interested in pasting stickers, and scribbling on the books. I was so worried about pulling down their potential of development. Yes, I had been thinking about sending them to art classes, music classes, drama classes & phonics classes, but at the same time, I am concern about overloading them and the financial burden, when I am not even sure what is their true interest.

When I came across this programme, I realise that the most important thing now is to increase their learning interest and ability, create an opportunity for them to be eager to learn (in just anything). Only when this is developed, then they will be able to find out what is their real interest (be it music, art, sports, etc), and they will be automatically asked to go for these courses. They will also pick things up faster.

After doing some research with a few schools, I decided to put Asher into the course right away, no more delay (so I gave up on the school which wants me to wait for another half a year for the next intake). Asher has very strong memory power, and good focus. He also enjoys problem solving. I am so eager to make sure his potential is being developed from this very moment. Not that I am expecting him to become genius, but I don't want to waste anymore time, before the best time to start is over.

However, to see effective results, I also learn that we cannot just count on the school. Lots of training needs to be done at home as well. While I see that Asher is enjoying the lessons, I am also keen to learn the training technics & methods from the teacher.

While I was working in the office, half the time I couldn't concentrate on my work. I kept thinking about the activities I could conduct with the kids, and secretly did some research on the internet, as and when nobody was watching. After a while, my guilt conscious sank in, cos I knew my heart was not on the job. Well, in the first place, the job nature was already not my cup of tea - telemarketing. I felt as if I was working like an insurance agent. So, now that I found out my true purpose of staying at home, I must well don't waste anymore time.

From now on, I primary focus will be attending the trainings with my kids, pick up the skills from the teachers, do research, source and make my own materials and have fun with them every evening. They shall have fun and learn at the same time. This is my ideal way of educating them, as well as creating a positive bonding with them.

My secondary focus is to make use of my new mini oven - start with some REAL simple recipes. Yes, MUST be idiot proof recipes.