Simple JOY #2 : Cake!

"To be thankful for life's simplest gifts."

Cake never fails to make me happy. I absolutely love cake.
My mother got me some cake from her workplace. Even though it's just leftover cake, this cake was part of someone's happy moment, their Birthday. I don't know whose birthday it was, but being able to celebrate their birthday from afar and experiencing the Joy they recieved by eating this cake, is really exciting!

I guess that's why I love eating cake ^^

Simple JOY #1

"To be thankful for life's simplest gifts."

How often do we take our parent's cooking for granted? Even if their cooking "sucks", be glad that food is being placed on your plate!





Today's dinner was absolutely lovely! Mother knew that I wasn't feeling well, so she cooked Udon with Seafood + Ham + Broccoli in White Sauce. It's a cross Asian-Western dish that can be found in Cha chaan tengs. (Or not... but you'll be able to find something similar to it ^^)

I was honestly so thankful for such a lovely meal, after all being sick and constantly feeling tired is not very cool. There's nothing "special" to it aside from mother's love and sweat in it, nevertheless, I'm still thankful for it :)

New "Serie(s)"? : Simple JOY

"To be thankful for life's simplest gifts."

So recently, I've been wanting to start a daily blog entry-thing about finding joy in... everything!

I guess what made me want to do this was because not long ago, I was eating "Taro cakes" and there was this overwhelming joy that I got from it! Like, "Wow, God has really blessed us with taro cakes, and even though something so small like this can make us so happy, it just reminds me of how great God is."



So why joy and not happiness? In a way, they're the same, but at the same time, they're so different. Happiness is something that you get from man, while Joy is something you get from God. And one may argue that everything I'll be posting is man-made, but in today's age, nothing pleases us. As a result, we're always trying to get the latest trend-things.

I guess, I'll be posting things that reminds me of how awesome God is, and how I should be thankful of everything. I might post things that may be pricey, most of the time I won't (Maybe) but I guess, what I'm trying to say is that we should be happy for everything? Hahahaha~

I think everyone should have this kind of mind set. It's definitely not something limited to only Christians; To be thankful for everything we have.

I'm still going to be posting my other blog entries..., but this is something that I'll be trying to post on a regular basis. I'm going to be using my twitter when I don't post an entry so, every tweet-entry regarding this blog series, Simple JOY, will be hash-tagged with : #SimpleJOY

Friend

God,

What is the definition of a "friend"?

Would a friend do the opposite of what has been asked?
Would a friend criticize you for who you are?
Would a friend soon realize that money or earthly gifts are not what I long for?
Would a friend be able to show some respect?

What is a friend?

Sincerely,

Sad face...s

What makes me frown is that there are some people in the world that claim they're something, when they clearly aren't. It just makes other people of the "same thing" have a hard time in life.

For example, Christians. There are plenty of hypocritical Christians in the world, non-loving Christians in the world, while there are Christians that live like Christians.

Okay, maybe I shouldn't have used Christians 'cause I'm a Christian myself and I could be "biased"...

But for example, in my neighborhood, a lot of people view "Black people" as dangerous people, Caucasian people as drug-addict whores, Arabic people as terrorists. While there are plenty of other people of the same race that aren't like that. And it's just so sad to see some people set up these stereotypes. Because of these people, people of the "same" race, status, age, religion, have to go through crap.

Another thing that makes me sad, school. School makes me crazy stressed, especially since they've changed the examination system; They got rid of mid-term exams and pushed it all to the end of the school year. Boo. But it's something I should be thankful for, school... Haaaaaaiiii.

Life is full of trials, but because of troubled times, we mature.

James 1:2-4 (NIV)
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

Exodus 20:17

“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
- Exodus 20:17

It's the end of the year! In Canada, at least. While on the other side of the world, it's already the new year, でしょう？I only know how to write/type in Japanese so, 明けましておめでとう！今年もよろしくお願いします～ Meaning, Happy New Year! Please look after me this year.

Hmm, so why did I start with Exodus 20:17? I guess, looking back, I'm always secretly "covet"ing without realizing it. And it's definitely something that I want to work on. At this moment, I'm somewhat conveting and like, it really sucks :/ I'm listening to one of my favourite singers. She's beautiful, she's awesome at singing, she's young (One year older than me) and she's already signed to a really nice recording label in Japan! On top of all that, she's extremely intelligent, getting 100% on a lot of Science and Math tests!　羨ましい～

I guess what I need to keep in mind is that God made me the way He wants me to. Just because I'm not as pretty as her, as smart, or my voice isn't as powerful as her, it just means that I'm different from her. Then again, two of the same person is the world would make the world a very boring place, eh? Now that I think about it, my voice is just a different "style" compared to her. So I guess it's all right. Besides, who am I pleasing? The world? Myself? Or God?

I'd like to say God.

Change

This is not my typical blog entry, but instead, I'm going to blog about what I've learned today and during the past couple of months.

This year has definitely been a year of change.

Everything that's been happening so far has been so surreal.

Perhaps I was in denial...?

I only noticed all this today, like an hour or two ago.

My cousin left for Hong Kong today. She had plans on immigrating here, but I guess she's not doing so anymore.

To be honest, she was more of my sister than my cousin. She always looked after me, I wore her hand-me-downs, she gave me everything, and of course there's so much more to her than her giving me things. She supported me during the tough times, and laughed with me during the happy times. She gave me reality checks, and she impacted me greatly.

I think I finally understand what she means by, "Life is changing, but you have to accept it."

It's not only till now that I noticed that things change. She's a huge partier, but I think that's one thing I admire about her. She works hard, but she plays hard. She lives a fun life, yet thinks realistically.

I've learned so much from her, and though, all these events still seem so surreal to me, I'm glad that they are like this because of this, I've finally realize what she means by, "Life is changing"

I'm gonna miss her, no doubt, but life changes and we just have to accept it.