Sunday, June 13, 2010

Wisdom is Empathy

I almost can't believe it's been about a month since my last post. But then again, since I'm no longer in school, I don’t really have the same things to procrastinate about……just real life….sigh. Whatever, this almost doesn’t make sense.

IRRELEVANT INTRODUCTORY PARAGRAPH

I guess some big news to share is that my sister is now married and “removed” from the family. She’s no longer in her room and her last name is all different. In Chinese “thinking,” when a daughter gets married, they’re “lost” to the family she weds into, which in one way sounds ridiculous, but in a sense is true. I don’t miss her (yet), but it is quieter around the house.

Fun fact related to the wedding, or rather, embarrassing fact. I bought a suit three years ago (off the rack, yeah!) and it fit great. But when I tried it on last month (for the first time since then), it was very evident that my butt, hips, and thighs (good grief, I sound like a woman) had gotten bigger… much bigger. My mom, God bless her seamstress-ing skills, let out the pants a bit, but even then it was a tight fit. So the two weeks before the wedding, I started cutting out almost all salty snacks (and some sweets… only some) and a few days before my sister’s big day, I started running, er… fine, fine, WALKING on a treadmill (because I don’t have stamina to run) to cut down on my water weight. And the good news is that it worked! My suit pants fit better…but they were still a bit on the tight side…haha.

Why I am explaining all of this? Because last night, I gorged on some lovely salty snacks before going to bed; a nice 240g bag of crunchy Cheetos, which I had only planned to eat half of. Ugh, I felt horrible right after, and while trying to fall asleep too, as I lay in bed (thank you God for my bed!) with a parched mouth and that horrible thirsty-but-not-thirsty-at-the-same-time feeling. I don’t know how to describe the feeling on my tongue, but just know and understand that I had ingested too much monosodium glutamate (and about 2485mg of sodium according to the nutritional facts on the bag). I think I was still feeling the effects of it today as well. But all in all, I love Cheetos and I love you too, Joyce and Phil (so please buy me some Cheetos). Haha, it’s a joke! Seriously though, Cheetos are the best. Haha, another joke! I could do this all day!

Sooooo…. it was two week that our pastor at church was talking about Solomon and wisdom, and I sat there pretty convicted, because I think in my heart there have been times where I’ve been asking God for much lesser things. In 1 Kings 3, God asked Solomon in a dream what he wanted, and instead of asking for wealth and power, Solomon asked God for an understanding heart to judge the people and discernment between good and evil. I think I realized at an early age that it is actually quite foolish to ask for wealth from God, despite desiring it very much, and I used to pray to God to give me wisdom, just like Solomon asked God for wisdom. In summer 2006, I started to memorize Proverbs 2:1-6 and I used to pray it too, because not only does it sound noble, but its quite godly. However, I know there are many times where I prayed and asked meaninglessly. I asked God for wisdom without even caring or thinking about what I was asking for.

But God in His great love and mercy, I believe has started to answer my prayers. In the past few years, I’ve started to learn how to have empathy, so much to the fact that its felt like my heart actually hurts, and I may have even shed tears for strangers. I believe that wisdom is empathy, understanding and caring for what another person goes through. I still have much to learn though, because I know there are times when I choose to be ignorant and cold-hearted, but I think empathy, and wisdom altogether, sometimes feels like rare qualities to find on someone in the street. Sometimes it feels like it doesn’t even exist at all.

I found this fantastic video through Lon Wong’s blog. It is potentially intellectually heavy, so only watch it if you have enough time to think and digest it. Think of it as a challenge, especially if you’re only used to watching stupid, funny videos like me, but you will be rewarded in the end, because the doodles are cute and funny, but the message is strong:



And finally, I found this Venn diagram yesterday (via Gizmodo) and I literally laughed out loud, because it is AWESOME!



ITS SO CUUUUTE!!!!


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Been seeing gas between 113 -115¢/litre.

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