It's these good, spontaneous days with people I love that leave me to question at the end of the night in my room what exactly it was that I did to deserve this peace.

"No, I'm just sad and lonely right now. And no I'm not going to selfishly blame my family and friends and be like 'I have no friends' or 'no one really cares about me.' I'm just going to accept that I really need to be alone with God right now."

Boom.

Late-night-nostalgia-refelection-post:

Thinking about it now, I think one of the highlights of my early high school life was that all of my closest friends and myself were all in one group together at the time. The picture in my background is actually one of the last photos taken of most of us, although not all of us, together. That was around grade 9/10 though so obviously naive me didn't know everything would change after that summer.

Some moved away and we never talked again; others of us had high school peer pressure change and destroy our relationships; and others simply learned more of who they really were and we all ended up drifting apart.

Either way, I still see most of them now and I'm also still pretty close with almost all of them! It just sucks that we don't all hang out in one group anymore.

That's fine with me though. It's affirming to know too though that I wasn't the only one who missed our summer usuals, and it was also affirming to know that some of them thanked me for being a friend and for always trying to keep up contact.

Now my closest friends are insane, famous dancers, or inspiring and humble leaders, or studious and hard workers at school and at work doing what they can for themselves and their families.

I'd have to say "thank You" to God for all of those good times (and bad as well!). I learned so much about myself and this life we go through walking with other people. The journey is truly a blessing.

Good night. :)

PS. Life of Pi is a good movie

EDIT: If that group hadn't broken up, I would have never met and gotten close to all the many friends that are in my life now. #pG

"If they respect you, respect them. If they disrespect you, still respect them. Do not allow the actions of others to decrease your good manners, because you represent yourself, not others." -Mohammad Zeyara

Stop searching for love and friends. Be loving and be a friend.

"Entrust yourselves to God and dare to dream." -Pope Francis

My heart's filled with longings, desires and dreams. It's a beautiful feeling.

Before, it used to feel so bittersweet. At the time, all the things I ever wanted back then were things I was beginning to understand and come to acceptance with that they needed to be let go of. Of course, I knew it was letting God as well, but I couldn't help but feel like saying good bye to the past me (and past them). I knew God had something better for me (and I'm seeing that now), but again at the time, I only knew so much. Faith was something I was just starting to get back into after many wars waged on myself and others.

Coming up to speed now though, this feeling—this late night honesty—is different now; it's changed. I'm excited for the future, for the change, for the hard work and growth being put in. Things are bittersweet and at the same time almost entirely not. It's a new feeling for me to be honest, and I'm not too sure if I've ever felt this before in my life. Maybe it's the one fruit I can feel for sure that God has cultivated through me. And that gives me a lot of hope. I personally feel worthless and disgusting most of the time because of various sins, guilts and shames combined with my lack of Eucharistic and confessional intake and use. Things have honestly been broken, emptied, shaken, refilled, spilled and desecrated plenty of times through my life that you'd expect my emotional well being to be well into a loss of.. Words? Feelings? A mix of both. Which is why I describe this feeling as bittersweet, but not entirely. It's weird. I feel happy at times and at the same time I feel sad. When I look at myself, I can tell for sure I'm an incomplete work still in the making. But it's been 20 years already and I just feel so tired. And I guess that's why this feeling gives me so much hope: contrary to all that I mentioned before, it also feels hopeful, excited, persevering, empty of myself in a way, and most importantly, wholly faithful that God will pull me through this. Whatever this is.

So... I guess when I describe it like that, after all that I've been through and experienced, I have to say that maybe, just maybe, this new late night honesty, this new feeling, is one of the first fruits to be born of this new—no, better—me.

And with that, a self reminder: Truly, God is good.. All the time.

"Yes, whatever happened, happened; but what happens now is up to you. You can respond from ego, ensuring pain, or you can respond from spirit, ensuring a miracle." -Marianne Williamsom

"I looked at everyone and wondered where they came from, and who they missed, and what they were sorry for." -Jonathan Safran Foer

Dreams

Lord, I can do this, but only if You allow it. But I know that if You do.. I can do this. I've learned everything from You.

Maybe after depression and anxiety ruined a lot of things during my childhood, they're why I've developed this perseverance and determination to stop at nothing to be happy and always hold on to even the last string with undying hope and integrity.

Hate to admit it, but I gots low self-esteem looks wise a lot of the time :(

Life's still awesome doe! Hard work and perseverance, and oh btw NTS, if I want it, I have to work for it.

A hashtag seems perfect to end this:

#shallowpost

NTS: if you're going to choose to live a lifestyle of love and forgiveness, you're going to have to also trust and let people and God forgive you as well.

"These men of old must have known of God's command and of His covenant. Otherwise why would they have feared being scattered? But all they had was a promise from God. Their hopes were on abstract words, nothing concrete, and so they placed their faith in bricks and tar." -Analysis on the meaning of the story of Babel

Joys, pains and sins of life and every time I find myself praying to You.

So many mysteries. It seems You have even conquered the emptiness and numb areas of my soul.

"I do not promise to try my best, because there will be days that I will not be choosing to try my best. But I promise to never stop praying to You, because I know You are always giving Your best. Truly, I am unworthy, Lord."

Pistachio, genius.

Had such an awesome, productive, eventful and adventurous day with the YFC family and a couple of those true few.

CFC conference, creative, chilling downtown, meat and bread, picnic dt, whiterock, McDonald's.. Dang so much fun!

Thank You for this day, it's days like these that keep me going.

That's the thing about this world: 'righteous people' judge 'sinners' while 'sinners' judge 'righteous people'.

It's like no one realizes that we're all in the same boat. 'Shady' or 'sheltered' everyone has a degree of human pride. Everyone falls short of the glory of God.

The true people, or rather the true person, I believe, is someone who in their innocence or in their lessons from past hurts, chooses to live and forgive freely. No conditions; no reciprocation expected.

That kind of person, to me, is a gem. A true friend and a treasure indeed.

Let the Cross defend you; let the Cross forgive you.

I gotta say, sometimes you need those couple of days of down time alone at home with your family and your hobbies. The world is a big place with unique people all around and I'm one of them.

God has given me my own unique set of talents, desires, hobbies and passions, and I don't want to hide or deny parts of myself just to help me feel more "accepted" and "conversational."

I don't have to change anything. God has given me all I'll ever need and want. It's up to me to discover that.

And honestly, if I stay real and be me, those true few (a lot I have already found) will show themselves and be there. I am who I am and I want to love and embrace myself for all that I am.

God, help me on this journey of discovering and embracing myself. Thank You.

"My heart lives in so many places. With so many people. But God whispers to me that I really have only one home, and that is with Him. I will never be content on this earth. I will always be a nomad. It was meant to be that way."

This first half describes how I feel now. But the last part is what I'm trying to push my heart towards:

"My heart was created with a desire for a home, a nest, a sanctuary, and that can be found only with Him in Heaven."

"Men are so quick to blame the gods: they say
that we devise their misery. But they
themselves, in their depravity, design
griefs greater than the griefs that fate assigns."

-The Odyssey, by Homer

Everyone's story is a beautiful mess.

Wooo, so tired

Hung out today with the first close friends of mine that God used to start this crazy journey of mine with Him.

And I gotta say it hasn't been like this in so long haha. The tension is gone, and it feels like old times again (except not old times cause this is now), and things really have just... moved on and grown :)

And praise God for that.

A chapter has closed in my life. I can now say 99.9% for that; still waiting for a for sure for sure sign from one more person haha, but other than that, things really have changed and some things have gone but other things have returned. And in the end, through the bad and the good, something better arose.

Praise God, life keeps moving on. Bad or good, God can make good things come to be.

"You don't think your way into a new kind of living, you live your way into a new kind of thinking." -Father Henri Nouwen

"Conquer yourself and the world lies at your feet." -St. Augustine

"This... Is my story..."