A Celebration of Blessings

There is just so much to celebrate and praise this amazing god for! I have been going through an amazing experience of unending blessings. The only way I can actually describe the kind of emotions that fill me in my heart is that 'I feel in each moment that the Blessings of God in my life continue to outweigh each struggle in my life'. In the entire time in my life, I have never been able to say this because maybe it a very great extent, I felt it is not true in my life. Blessings seem to be a rare sharing topic among people today. I guess its only natural that we look at our struggles first. But ever since my trip to aussie for the SSS community retreat in july'11, I would say that the scales on the eyes of my heart have fallen and I'm able to see life in a very new way. When I look at life now as well as where I am, the first thing I see are the multitude of blessings in my life. I come to an emotion of deep gratitude unto God! Isn't God just so amazing!

It has been awhile since I last posted anything. Most of the time, this would happen in a time of great struggle for me. But this time, its been the total opposite. I would be lying to say that there was no struggle for me in the past few months, but like I said, the blessings of God just outweigh each struggle. Now I first celebrate life before looking at the many struggles in my day. The festive season of Christmas & the New year has been one of simplicity and great joy & peace. It was a festive season that I have been really looking forward to. For me, I wanted to just use this festive season to give thanks unto God and celebrate life! The Christmas & New year gatherings helped me appreciate the gift of people's presence! And I am ever so thankful for an amazing time of celebration of Christ's Birth. And I am sure that Christ Jesus was definitely reborn in the lives of many. For me, I did give myself a good treat after an amazing year. I spent about $400 on shopping for new clothes for myself. It was a deep pinch in the pocket, I felt that this splurge was an important one for me as I needed to tell that little person inside my heart that he was important! This has been the crux of my healing in the year of 2011, a true and much deeper love & appreciation for the person that I am! But on the another plus point, I just love my new wardrobe! I believe that I step into as new phase of my life as I embark on the year 2012!

As the new year of 2012 began, there were 2 things that were constantly exciting me in my heart. First, it was the amazing 24th birthday of mine. For me, birthdays are always a special time as on that day many years ago, God breathed life into me and made me! That surely must call for a celebration. This year, my birthday was simple but so amazing. It seems these days that simplicity is what I desire the most. On the eve of my birthday, I had a very good dinner with 3 of my community members (Stephen, Sarah & Shaun). I had a great time being in the presence of people that love me. On the actual day of my birthday, I had taken leave from work. I had spent the day with Freeman. It was just great to be spending my special day with a brother in Christ I have come to appreciate & love so much more! In the evening, I attended mass and there was this great peace in my heart! In that moment, I just saw all the blessings in my life and rejoiced at all that I am. At night, I had dinner yet again with people that love me so much. This time, it was with Fr. Brian, Cheryl, Julia, Tim & Freeman. And finally, the day of celebrations ended with my own family. It was a day of joy, peace & love. It was a day to celebrate! The celebrations made me happy!

Second, it is an event that has been in my heart for exactly an entire year! I believe that this event of the Serangoon District Youth Conference is not only my dream but its also a dream of my youth leaders of the past & present. It our event! This only seemed like a very far & unrealistic dream but the event starts tomorrow! In my heart, I am near speechless. I really find it so hard to believe that the Conference starts tomorrow. The process of planning for this event has been a long, tiring but extremely enjoyable & joyful experience! There have been many joys in this process, from seeing how much the music team has grown technically & spiritually as one to the excitement of seeing everyone come to together to the amazing design of this poster to being part of the core team for such an amazing event. But the greatest joy is to experience the unity of the Catholic Church. It has been amazing to see how everyone has come together to be part of this event! The only one to praise & thank at the end of the day is none other than God! He is the reason for this conference and he is the source of all strength! There will definitely be a blog post soon!

Finally, as my discernment nears closer to the end, I come to decision! As it stands, after discerning for 5 months, I will be staying in Singapore and continuing my studies here! It has been 5 months of alot of self-discovery! I am very excited to start studying psychology! I am truely amazed at how far God has brought me and continues to bring me! It is really such a joy to be a child of God!

There is just so much to praise god for & celebrate! What makes it most amazing is how humbled I feel by the many blessings from God! There is really none like you, O God! Praise you, O Jesus!