BOBOT

I must say, I did not have a happy childhood like most of the normal kids do. I grew up from a "big" family, with many siblings from different paternal sides... distant.... cold....torn apart. We were individual people, brought together by fate but each minding his own, each to himself. Well, it was a family, but not until I came to realize the real meaning of it. As years went by, weI never really felt that I belonged. I never really cared if I did exist. I never really knew if I was loved.

This, needless to say, brought out the feeling of bitterness in me. In a way, as I gradually learned the real essence of the word, Bobot  had the yearning of "wish-I-were" and "wish-I-had". But this was his life, this was his family. In a way, Bobot began to be cynical and pessimistic. In a way, Bobot was hopeless.

But Bobot was a child.

Years might have clouded his normal senses but as he learned to live the world around him, he began to see that "there's more to life than only bitterness and lies." That, bitterness would be turned sweet memories for they had made him a stronger person now. Amidst life's imperfections is the soul that has seen beauty in disparity, light in darkness, joy in sorrow, silence amidst  noise. 

"We're on the road... we move from place to place... and oftentimes when I'm about to call it home, we have to move along... LIFE IS A CONSTANT CHANGE..."

Jose Mari couldn't have put it better. But why do they say "rolling stones gather no moss"?

Life's moss is vicious. We never really get what we wanted. As we "roll" from one place to another, as we "roll" from one want to another, we eventually find out that what we have gotten is not what we really need... we search for more... we crave for more... but at the end of it all, we are still empty. Life's vanities are alluring. We toil, we struggle from sun up to sun down. We burn our energy. We give our soul but at the end of the day we find ourselves at the corners of our mind still yearning for more, still wanting for things that we don't really know or grasp. Deep inside us is the unsatiated desire that every humankind has been longing to fill. Then we surrender...

But life's not about having all the things you want. It's also NOT having what you want because somebody might have needed it more than you do. So we move on to find more open doors in the circle of life. We take the rollercoaster ride in every step we make. Along the way are steep hills and  narrow vales. At times, we fall down but we pick ourselves and ride again. And as a door closes, more welcoming doors are opened. Entering the door is risky... but we never really know what is in store for us unless we cross it. Life is taking opportunities, life is taking risks. Life is  CHANGE.

Change is painful at times because it means saying goodbye to people, to a home or to a family,  who have become a part of you. But it also means hello to new relationships and new environment that would eventually will become a family, a home. And we start all over again, we leave all of yesterday's behind but at the same time, cherishing valuable lessons in the past and all the sweet memories. We are made whole again. And life goes on...

In the end, life is not gathering moss after all. It is leaving your footprints along the way. And when others will tread the same path you had, they will know it was you who were along the way. It's not what you gathered, it's what you have left.

1. "We change the world not by what we say or do, but as a consequence of what we have become."
Dr. David Hawkins

2. "The state of your life is nothing more than a reflection of your state of mind."
Wayne Dyer

3. "Emptiness is a symptom that you are not living creatively. You either have no goal that is important enough to you, or you are not using your talents and efforts in a striving toward an important goal."
Maxwell Maltz

4. "Determination gives you the resolve to keep going in spite of the roadblocks that lay before you."
Denis Waitley

5. "What we love we shall grow to resemble."
Bernard of Clairvaux

6. "As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
Nelson Mandela

7. "Every really new idea looks crazy at first."
Abraham H. Maslow

8. "Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creative."
Charles Mingus

9. "Often the difference between a successful man and a failure is not one's better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on his ideas, to take a calculated risk, and to act."
Maxwell Maltz

10. "All who have accomplished great things have had a great aim, have fixed their gaze on a goal which was high, one which sometimes seemed impossible."
Orison Swett Marden

11. "All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea."
Napoleon Hill

12. "A real decision is measured by the fact that you've taken a new action. If there's no action, you haven't truly decided."
Tony Robbins

13. "All of us need to grow continuously in our lives."
Les Brown

14. "Most of us have far more courage than we ever dreamed we possessed."
Dale Carnegie

15. "Chase your passion, not your pension."
Denis Waitley

16. "Expect the best. Prepare for the worst. Capitalize on what comes."
Zig Ziglar

17. "The ability to discipline yourself to delay gratification in the short term in order to enjoy greater rewards in the long term is the indispensable prerequisite for success."
Maxwell Maltz

18. "A goal is a dream with a deadline."
Napoleon Hill

19. "Honor your commitments with integrity."
Les Brown

20. "Do the hard jobs first. The easy jobs will take care of themselves."
Dale Carnegie

21. "Courage means to keep working a relationship, to continue seeking solutions to difficult problems, and to stay focused during stressful periods."
Denis Waitley

22. "We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellowmen; and along those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects."
Herman Melville

23. "Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies."
Mother Teresa

24. "I live in the present. I only remember the past, and anticipate the future."
Henry David Thoreau

25. "Our self image, strongly held, essentially determines what we become."
Maxwell Maltz

26. ғhoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars."
Les Brown

27. "If you want to conquer fear, don't sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy."
Dale Carnegie

28. җe donմ see things as they are, we see them as we are."
Anais Nin

29. "There are two ways of exerting one's strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up."
Booker T. Washington

30. "Nobody grows old merely by living a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals."
Samuel Ullman

31. "There are no extra pieces in the universe. Everyone is here because he or she has a place to fill, and every piece must fit itself into the big jigsaw puzzle."
Deepak Chopra

32. "Entrepreneurship is a state of mind, a cando attitude, a capacity to focus on a vision and work toward it."
Barry Rogstad

33. "Man maintains his balance, poise, and sense of security only as he is moving forward."
Maxwell Maltz

34. "If you take responsibility for yourself you will develop a hunger to accomplish your dreams."
Les Brown

35. "The person who seeks all their applause from outside has their happiness in another's keeping."
Dale Carnegie

36. What I think about, I bring about. The thought of success will foster success. The thought of love will foster love. The thought of security will foster security. What am I thinking about today?
Rita Davenport

37. "Our life's journey of self discovery is not a straight line rise from one level of consciousness to another. Instead, it is a series of steep climbs and flat plateaus, then further climbs. Even though we all approach the journey from different directions, certain of the journey's characteristics are common to all of us."
Stuart Wilde

38. "We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny, but what we put into it is ours."
Dag Hammarskiold

39. "Freedom is actually a bigger game than power. Power is about what you can control. Freedom is about what you can unleash."
Harriet Rubin

40. "The easiest success measurement tool is a simple question. What did you do today to move forward? The easiest project plan on earth is also a simple question. What will you do tomorrow to move forward? At the end of each day, document your success and design your next move."
Rich DiGirolamo

41. "For imagination sets the goal picture which our automatic mechanism works on. We act, or fail to act, not because of will, as is so commonly believed, but because of imagination."
Maxwell Maltz

42. "You cannot tailor make the situations in life but you can tailor make the attitudes to fit those situations."
Zig Ziglar

43. "Confidence on the outside begins by living with integrity on the inside."
Brian Tracy

44. "Generosity is another quality which, like patience, letting go, non-judging, and trust, provides a solid foundation for mindfulness practice. You might experiment with using the cultivation of generosity as a vehicle for deep self-observation and inquiry as well as an exercise in giving. A good place to start is with yourself. See if you can give yourself gifts that may be true blessings, such as self-acceptance, or some time each day with no purpose. Practice feeling deserving enough to accept these gifts without obligation to simply receive from your-self, and from the universe."
Jon KabatZinn

45. ҍost true happiness comes from one's inner life, from the disposition of the mind and soul. Admittedly, a good inner life is hard to achieve, especially in these trying times. It takes reflection and contemplation and self-discipline."
W. L. Shirer

46. "Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant."
Robert Louis Stevenson

47. "Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will."
Zig Ziglar

48. Ҕhe true voyage of discovery consists not of seeking new landscapes, but having new eyes."
Proust

49. "Close scrutiny will show that most "crisis situations" are opportunities to either advance, or stay where you are."
Maxwell Maltz

50. "Face your deficiencies and acknowledge them; but do not let them master you. Let them teach you patience, sweetness, insight."
Helen Keller

51. "Long range planning works best in the short term."
Doug Evelyn

52. "Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all."
Dale Carnegie

53. ҅nter every activity without giving mental recognition to the possibility of defeat. Concentrate on your strengths, instead of your weaknesses... on your powers, instead of your problems."
Paul J. Meyer

54. "Genuine security arises from actual, firsthand knowledge that one is both capable and worthy of achieving happiness (through conscious, responsible action) and, once having attained it, that he deserves it."
Michael J. Hurd

55. "We are not held back by the love we didn't receive in the past, but by the love we're not extending in the present."
Marianne Williamson

56. "If you look to others for fulfillment, you will never be fulfilled. If your happiness depends on money, you will never be happy with yourself. Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the world belongs to you."
Lao Tzu

57. "Maintaining a complicated life is a great way to avoid changing it."
Elaine St. James

58. "Accept yourself as you are. Otherwise you will never see opportunity. You will not feel free to move toward it; you will feel you are not deserving."
Maxwell Maltz

59. "A man needs self-acceptance or he can't live with himself; he needs self-criticism or others can't live with him."
James A. Pike

60. A man is as great as the dreams he dreams, As great as the love he bears; As great as the values he redeems, And the happiness he shares. A man is as great as the thoughts he thinks, As the worth he has attained; As the fountains at which his spirit drinks And the insight he has gained. A man is as great as the truth he speaks, As great as the help he gives, As great as the destiny he seeks, As great as the life he lives.
C.E. Flynn

61. "It isn't what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about."
Dale Carnegie

62. "And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom."
Anais Nin

63. "Once you have a clear picture of your priorities that is values, goals, and high leverage activities organize around them."
Stephen Covey

64. "Strange is our situation here upon earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know that man is here for the sake of other men."
Albert Einstein

65. "If you make friends with yourself you will never be alone."
Maxwell Maltz

66. "Nothing carries more potential for change than individual acts of human kindness."
Jamie Winship

67. "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always gotten."
Anthony Robbins

68. "Life is no `brief candle' to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I've got to hold up for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations."
George Bernard Shaw

69. "Success is the maximum utilization of the ability that you have."
Zig Ziglar

70. "Desire is the starting point of all achievement, not a hope, not a wish, but a keen pulsating desire which transcends everything."
Napoleon Hill

71. "What we notice is what resonates with our inner perspective. We tend to overlook what does not connect with our current attitude or sense of awareness. When it comes to a tragic occurrence, do we focus on the horror stories or on the stories of courage and support? Both are available to us."
Gail Pursell Elliott

72. "With love and patience, nothing is impossible."
Daisaku Ideda

73. "Optimism is essential to achievement and it is also the foundation of courage and true progress."
Nicholas Murray Butler

74. "The strongest oak of the forest is not the one that is protected from the storm and hidden from the sun. It's the one that stands in the open where it is compelled to struggle for its existence against the winds and rains and the scorching sun."
Napoleon Hill

75. "The poor, the unsuccessful, the unhappy, the unhealthy are the ones who use the word tomorrow the most"
Robert Kiyosaki

76. "The first virtue of all really great men is that they are sincere. They eradicate hypocrisy from their hearts."
Anotole France

77. "There are powers inside of you which, if you could discover and use, would make of you everything you ever dreamed or imagined you could become."
Orison Swett Marden

78. "The practice of forgiveness is our most important contribution to the healing of the world."
Marianne Williamson

79. "Everyone who has ever taken a shower has had an idea. It's the person who gets out of the shower, dries off, and does something about it that makes a difference."
Nolan Bushnell

80. "Be curious always! For knowledge will not acquire you: you must acquire it."
Sudie Back

81. "The only time you ever have in which to learn anything or see anything or feel anything, or express any feeling or emotion, or respond to an event, or grow, or heal, is this moment, because this is the only moment any of us ever gets. You're only here now; you're only alive in this moment."
Marianne Williamson

82. "Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success."
Napoleon Hill

83. "Generosity is another quality which, like patience, letting go, non-judging, and trust, provides a solid foundation for mindfulness practice."
Jon Kabat Zinn

84. Failure is only postponed success as long as courage "coaches" ambition. The habit of persistence is the habit of victory."
Herbert Kaufman

85. "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor."
Henry David Thoreau

86. "When you engage in systematic, purposeful action, using and stretching your abilities to the maximum, you cannot help but feel positive and confident about yourself."
Brian Tracy

87. "In every person who comes near you look for what is good and strong."
John Ruskin

88. "I believe with all my heart that civilization has produced nothing finer than a man or woman who thinks and practices true tolerance."
Frank Knox

89. "There is one quality that one must possess to win, and that is definiteness of purpose, the knowledge of what one wants, and a burning desire to possess it."
Napoleon Hill

90. "Always remember that problems contain values that have improvement potential."
Norman Vincent Peale

91. "Our principles are the springs of our actions. Our actions, the springs of our happiness or misery. Too much care, therefore, cannot be taken in forming our principles."
Red Skeleton

92. "There's always a way if you're committed."
Anthony Robbins

93. "The abundant life does not come to those who have had a lot of obstacles removed from their path by others. It develops from within and is rooted in strong mental and moral fiber."
William Mather Lewis

94. "Forget the resolutions. Forget control and discipline, too much work. Instead try experimenting. Go in search of something to fall in love with...something about yourself, your career, your spouse."
Dale Dauten

95. "Just as your car runs more smoothly and requires less energy to go faster and farther when the wheels are in perfect alignment, you perform better when your thoughts, feelings, emotions, goals, and values are in balance."
Brian Tracy

96. "Enjoyment is not a goal, it is a feeling that accompanies important ongoing activity."
Paul Goodman

97. "Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude."
Zig Ziglar

98. ҉ come to the office each morning and stay for long hours doing what has to be done to the best of my ability. And when you've done the best you can you can't do any better."
Harry S. Truman

99. "In our daily lives, we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but the gratefulness that makes us happy."
Albert Clarke

100. "Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy."
Dale Carnegie

Being with her most of my time made me realize that life could be cruel at times... but "everything work together for good"  eventually unfolded to its rightful place. Sometimes we have to pass through a great ordeal before we learn... we have to learn to crawl, before we learn to walk.

We shared sentiments... but with no feeling of regrets or bitterness for what had happened to us in the past. The past... For we were once enslaved by our own blindness and obedience. We were once trapped in the doors of disbelief, of dissentments. People have pressed us from all sides, but still we took the "less calculated risks", the "roads less travelled", hoping hopelessly to show the depressed and weary the LIGHT at the end of the tunnel. But in the end, even the weary and depressed souls began to crucify us in the cross we did not fashion. Suddenly, words became more like a poison than a cure. The roads are closed and we must flee...

But what is rather agonizing is the fact that you were never heard before they shut the door. Treated more likely a slave, you were not even given the chance to behold the presence of the king and defend (at least, for the last time) yourself. Just GO. Leave. TERMINATED for insubordination. I would have hated law for this...

But when a door was shut, more doors were opened. Thank God I did not confined myself in the narrow world of one "kingdom". For after leaving another door, I found more welcoming doors, ready to embrace my worth and value as a person.

Nostalgic. Bringing back this memory with a friend who encountered the same fate makes us shudder. No pain. All we have is a treasure of wonderful lessons that we have learned... of people we met along the way who have made our journey more meaningful and whom we owe a lot of lessons in life, good or bad.

I posted this blog 8 years ago in my Livejournal.com. Sadly, my blogsite doesn't work anymore. I always loved the sincerity of it. One of my best students write this for me and I still have the fondness reading it. This is how she knew me. This how she sees me.

I am a very sentimental person with deep, DARK secrets.

I am not a fan of mediocrity. AT ALL.

I live and die in the name of art and creativity. And intellect. And truth. And beauty. What will the world be without a hint of beauty?

I am, by all means, not inclined to things that lack luster and are dull. I go for shimmer. I want things that shine. I WANT TO SHINE.

If dancing is a way of life, then you could say I have a very interesting lifestyle.

Francis Bacon couldn't have put it better: reading is for ornament. Kowtowing, I am well-accesorized.

I am often the subject of ridicule and criticism. It should weigh me down, but it does not, for it only shows one thing: I MATTER. Enough to be talked about and criticized.

I am not into people who backstab. But I am an expert in doing the side stab and the front stab.

My only strength also happens to be my only kryptonite: and that is love. Yes, while it has the power to make me really happy, it also has the power to crush me. Being the wise person that I am, I use it sparingly. Exceptions, however, are made when you are worthy.

If I were to live a nomadic existence, I think I'd survive just fine. Because I have the skills and the charisma to actually do so - something people who only rely on books and mathematical prowess and scientific knowledge simply can't, for the love of God, pull off.

I was - and I would like to believe I still am - a teacher for a time. I teach my students about grammar and speech; about how to construct the perfect essays; how to dissect the absurdities of a poem. I usher them into the world of Shakespeare and Chaucer and Venerable Bede and Edgar Allan Poe and Oscar Wilde....However, the one teaching I would have wanted to teach them is something I am currently just learning to realize and cherish and to apply:

LIFE IS SHORT. LIVE IT.