Maybe

I feel this pain in my chest since that day slowly easing. This is a good thing, but does it mean it's slowly fading? Perhaps that's what needs to happen. God knows who I am and I'm sure He knows I deserve the equivalent of...me. He gave me a chance to take back the dignity that was taken from me and I'm proud of myself for being able to speak up.

Forgiveness is not about letting the other person get away with something. It's about allowing the love of God to overshadow the hurt and betrayal.

My heart no longer feels heavy.

Interview

So, today I had an interview for CSUF's grad program in Counseling. I feel pretty confident about my acceptance. The faculty seemed pretty down to earth so it made the process a lot more comfortable. I was in a group interview with about 11 other interviewees. The letter is expected to be sent out some time at the beginning of May. I'm excited and have decided that I will most likely stick to CSUF-mostly because of financial reasons. Mount St. Mary's sounds good and I would love to go there for their beautiful campus, but it's insanely pricey and I'd have to rent an apartment. I know that wherever I end up, it's part of God's plan.

I want to go off topic and share about a little experience I had with my kids at work. Upon greeting some of my early-bird kids one day, one little girl said "Miss Tracy, we saw a bag hung on a tree and it had eyes balls and a knife in there!" So I asked, "which tree did you see it hung on? How did it make you feel?"

The girl replied," we're scared."

So then I said, "oh, there's nothing to be scared of. Do you know why?"

Then, the girl said, "I know. Because Jesus is always with us. He's everywhere. He's probably sitting next to you right now."

That little comment really warmed my heart.

I see so much improvement they've made as students and I made as a program leader. In the next few weeks, we don't know when, but someone from the program is going to come and evaluate us. We had a mock evaluation today by one of the staff in the program office. He said he was impressed by mine and another PL's class because we really utilized what he taught us in training. YAY! Last time, we got a pretty bad score. I think the main reason was because our former site coordinator wasn't full time, so she didn't have enough time to organize the program and do everything that needs to be done in order for our program to improve. We got a 4.5 on a 10-point scale. that's pretty close to horrible. But during the mock evaluation, we got a 7! 7 is considered very good. Of course we want it to be a 10, but from a 4.5 to a 7...I think we're doing pretty darn good!

I'm so proud of my students!

Sunday's Homily

On the 3rd Sunday of Easter, I attended and sang for 10am and noon Masses. I just want to reflect on some of the things Fr. Francis talked about.

"God never imposes on our free will."
God gives us free will to make our own decisions, but through prayers for guidance, we may be able to make the right decisions. We must pray for the wisdom to be able to distinguish between the decisions we make for our own sake, and for the sake of following God's plans. How do we know which decisions are right? We look deep into our hearts. If these decisions transform our hearts, I would imagine it to be guided by God.

"Transformation of the soul...taking all risks."
Taking risks means going the distance. It means not being safe. It means doing something that we are afraid of. It's through taking risks that we may be able to transform our soul. When we fear loss, loneliness, pain, we hang on and we convince ourselves that this is better. We become prisoners to our own false hopes. It's in letting go of all these that we may be able to allow God to transform our heart and soul.

"When you're young, you think you can control your life..."
Fr. Francis said something after this that was really awesome but I couldn't catch it because I got distracted by a friend of mine. I guess when we're young, we think that somehow we wear this cloak of invincibility; we avoid situations that we feel might hurt us. When we grow older, we begin to gain a better understanding of who we are and what we want and need. We start to think back to the times when we thought we were in control of our lives only to find that we'd missed so many opportunities to be transformed by these experiences we were so afraid of.

Fr. Francis ended his homily with three words.

Courage. Love. Transformation.

Redirecting My Focus

Lately, I've been feeling so energized. It's this feeling of getting to know myself better that's been making me smile a lot. I went to the gym today and caught myself just smiling while running on the treadmill. I'm still not quite sure what made me feel so good, but I guess sometimes you don't have to have a reason to smile.

Yesterday I woke up thinking, "hmm, I sent in my application to Fullerton a couple of weeks ago. I should be getting a letter in the mail soon, shouldn't I?" So then I checked my fullerton email because I got a letter saying that after I create an account, all future communications will be through that email. So I typed in my user name and password. Wrong password. OH NO! I don't remember my id or password. What do I do? What If I got an email about my acceptance or decline?

So I called the prospective student advisor at Fullerton to ask about my application status. She didn't answer but her voicemail gave me the answer I needed. She said that 100 students will be chosen for an interview out of about 500 or something. The interviews will begin at the end of April and 50 something students will be chosen for the program.

So, I calmed down for a bit. When I went outside to get the mail, I got a letter! I went through all that trouble for nothing. I had gotten a letter in the mail inviting me to an interview. Phew! I would have been surprised if I didn't get an invitation but things are falling into place. I have an interview with Fullerton's Counseling Program staff on April 27...also known as my mom's birthday.

I actually want to go to Mount St. Mary's College but we'll see what happens as soon as I send in my personal statement. Who would have thought writing just 1000 words would be so tough? I wrote 3000 words for Fullerton and it was easy peasy. I will send it in by this weekend. I WILL. No ifs ands or buts!

Right now, I'm just indulging myself in strawberries and whipped cream, and a glass of wine. yum!

After that, it's good ole' sleep!

Spring Break's over

I had a great day today. After two long nights of standing in heels, trying to improvise and pretend that I can be an MC, and singing songs I barely knew in front of hundreds of people, I've gotta say today was THE way to end my Spring break. I went to Mass at noon, because I really needed extra sleep. So sorry to Interfaith choir! I really needed a break from using my voice. After that a couple of good friends and I went to Dromo 1. Wondering what that is?? It's a race track! It's sort of like go-cart racing, except, it's better. We had to have our gears on and the jumpsuit. It was intense. I had such an adrenaline rush, even though I was one of the slower racers. It was my first time and I needed to get used to the sharp turns and stuff. Next time I will be better. hahaha I had a great time. I was 6th place....but hey, at least I wasn't last. =]

Anyway, after that we all went to Johnny Rockets to get our grub on before our 9:05 showing of....Clash of the Titans! I liked the movie. I mean, it wasn't AMAZING..but it was good. And now it's raining, which is perfect!..because I know I'm gonna have a good night sleep.

Tomorrow, it's back to work. I'm not really worried about work. I'm pretty excited about Spirit Rally. I'd really like to be a part of it this year. Hopefully I'll have a chance to do that and hang out with friends from Interfaith again. I feel pretty disconnected, but it's mainly my fault. I just gotta make the time.

Kk, I'm off to bed. Thank You! Alleluia!

Catching a Break

So I have a little break/rest right now so I thought I'd use it to give a little update on what's going on in my life. I've been on-the-go for my whole Spring Break. I thought I would have some time to just relax and "do nothing" but life's unpredictable. I've had countless rehearsals and preparation for events that I've bravely committed myself to. There's a fundraising dinner tonight that I am singing/MCing for. I'm trying my best to not stress out but being that I have a wedding reception to sing for tomorrow night, with about 15 songs under my belt I have to sort of perfect, I'm pretty much on edge right now.

With that said, life has been sort of amazing! Even though the busy-ness can become stressful and exhausting at times, I'm grateful everyday for a chance to be busy. It's boring when you have nothing to do or not much to look forward to. I've been waking up to the thought of going for a run to start my day, laying on my bed to reflect for a couple of minutes, then actually going for a run, and then the adventure of my day would begin.

Of course none of this would be possible if I didn't have Him. Thanks be to God, indeed.

Cheers!

Good Friday

After work today I rushed over to Interfaith for Good Friday's service. I hadn't been that emotional in a while. The homily today was about forgiveness and not speaking about things that are evil. There was a lady who was sold into slavery when she was just 9 years old. She faced torture from multiple masters until she was sold off to an Italian man. This man took her to a convent and asked the nuns there to teach her how to behave like a lady because ever since she was 9, she was treated like an animal. She had heard about the greatest master of all times and wanted to see him. When she asked the nuns, they told her that it was Jesus. When she died, they discovered that her body was filled with scars from past masters who had branded her. She never spoke of these scars.

Another story was about Bishop Nguyen Van Thuan. When he was put in prison, the guards would give him really salty food to each, but wouldn't give him water to drink. When he had to use the bathroom, there was no place to go, so he had no choice. When the woman who was in charge of cleaning up the cells came to clean, she ridiculed him for being so messy even though he is a bishop. He thought about yelling at the woman and telling her that he had no choice, but instead, the next time he saw her, he apologized for causing her so much trouble.

These are such great stories about people who were able to humble themselves enough to face so much humiliation. I believe that we are all capable of having this quality. What I'm praying for is to be able to have dignity and be humble in this way at the same time.

Holy Thursday

Aside from the gospel's message and the washing of the feet at Mass today, Fr. John Francis' homily was amazing. It was amazing mostly because I felt like he was speaking to me. That was no coincidence.

His homily was about dignity and loving yourself genuinely before you can love others. I've struggled to understand this for some time now, and maybe I still don't quite understand it. But, I do know that I need to safeguard the bit of dignity I have left.

I really wish I could've stayed for Adoration. I really needed it and I missed doing that with everyone at UCI. One of my best friends' dad is really ill and we thought he wasn't going to make it, so I was spending some time with her to keep her company. We were dropped off for Mass and our ride was waiting for us so I couldn't stay. It was so tough for me to choose between Adoration and the people I've missed hanging out with and my best friend who I hadn't seen for a while and who's in need of support.

I can't be in two places at once, but my spirit can. I really do need Adoration though, Liwanag style.

Oh, I had a good time with my co-workers today. Technically we were supposed to have the day off today because of teacher conferences at the school where I work, but there were things that needed to be prepped for our Spring break program so our site coordinator was told to ask her top 3 program leaders to come in for extra hours. I was so happy to hear that that was why she chose us to come in for work. We had to make a lot of phone calls, but that was no biggy. The rest of the time, we just reorganized the office and chit chatted. It was fun to just joke and laugh with each other. It's rare to have a relationship with your boss where you're that comfortable to joke around and laugh. It's awesome!

After that we went out to lunch together. It's funny how we talk about the kids even though we're not working, but that's probably the best part. We don't get to see the funny things that kids do in each other's classes so it's just fun to tell stories about them. I'm glad the environment at work has become so comfortable. We get our work done, but we have fun doing it. That's the best part!

Anyway, I should get to bed. My goal is to sleep before 12 am every night. good luck to me.