The Old Lady in the Church

This happened in a local Church, I can't remember the exact date it happened, but the impact it had on me has been carved in my heart. This isn't actually something 'spiritual' or in the nature of 'faith' or 'God-related', but rather an idea, or more simply, a thought that had me off guard and well, sort of changed my outlook in life.

 So the story goes:
 My family and I were in Church, celebrating the Holy Eucharist; nothing unusual, nothing new. What caught my attention was when during the singing of the song welcoming the Gospel (I don't know what they are actually called), I noticed that the old woman in front of me was singing on the top of her lungs and after a while, was coughing and had difficulty breathing- enough that she had to sit through the Mass.


Yeah, I know, the story was a bit dull and uninteresting, and in normal viewpoint, it really is. But that is the beauty of it; you never know which events in our life would actually make a difference, and which people would actually inspire us and change us, and make us who we are now.

In a religious standing, what I have realized is that when I grow old, and all the normal physiological processes degrades my body- the same as that of the old lady's in the Church, I won't be able to praise and serve God as well and as able as I can now. In my present age and condition, I am able to do all in my powers to sing songs of praise to God, proclaiming my faith as a Christian and a Catholic; therefore I should (how redundant, but true).

Now, to deeper stuff; looking at what I have realized, I began to analyze and break down my thoughts, and apply it to life in general. I realized, like being able to sing songs of praise, the condition I am in now is the prime time that I can do the things that I want, while I am still ABLE to. I thought to myself that I really should not wait for the time when I am not capable of doing things I can do now.. which means, I should sing when I want to, be somewhere where I want to be, naturally just DO THE THINGS I WANT TO, because one day, it will be TOO LATE, to the point that I CAN'T anymore. One day, I will be like that old lady; no longer able to sing to her heart's content, and I don't know if it was already too late for her or not, but I don't want to end up REGRETTING; wanting to have done things that I wanted to do, wishing that I have made my dreams come true.


However, this is NOT easily true. Take, for example, my voice; before I had my encounter with this old lady,  I already started singing with all my voice in Church- until one fateful day that I caught my cousin laughing at my singing, and naturally I was embarrassed, and started to think not sing that loudly in Church in any longer.

The same thing with everything else; somebody will eventually laugh at the things we are passionate about, some would get irritated or mad for the things we do and the decisions that we eventually make. This is the number one hindrance to this thought, and this is the MOST IMPORTANT thing to remember about this endeavor; one day, when we do decide "the hell with it, I'm doing this" and are met with criticisms and bombarded by the negative, when we are told what we are doing is irrational or illogical and/or downright stupid, we will EVENTUALLY fold, and listen, and consider them, we'd think the same way, and begin to wonder "why am I doing this?" I do hope that your answer will be "THIS IS WHAT I WANT"; whatever you are doing.. that is "WHAT YOU WANT", no negative thoughts, nor criticisms should stop you, because if you allow anyone else but yourself to make the DECISIONS for you, REGRET will surely follow.

Passing by..

There are some things we can not easily disclose to a passerby, for one, our innermost secrets. Something about a passerby is that he/she can not fully grasp or see or understand everything he/she sees or hears, all a passerby can do is to make speculations and hypotheses with the phenomena he has just witnessed or experienced. This makes it quite difficult; as to we do not care much about what strangers think; of incoming passersby, we do not mind the intrigued looks upon their faces and whatever opinion they hold upon us. Yet, we are afraid of being seen by the same unknown strangers in the most vulnerable of our moments.

I am a passerby, I can not care less of what you think of me, nor could you care more for what I exactly think of you. However, we are all passersby of this world, of this life; and there may be a lot of things that we both see and hear, but interpret and recognize differently. There will always be a discrepancy in our opinions, on how we think. Therefore, this is the perfect playground for our thoughts; we can (I can for this matter, but hopefully you shall join me soon) have discourse about everything and anything our petty minds can think of, anything, anyone that we happen to pass by in our journey in this world and in this life. There will be no standards to meet; nobody to please, just a culmination of ideas, expression of feelings, and basically the sharing of thoughts of those passing by.