Brules

Readers,

Guess what is the most severe, problematic, contagious, and deadly disease that infects humanity.

Nope, you're wrong.

It's called the I'm-not-enough disease. It's when you feel inadequate, you feel that you are not enough, and therefore you do things and behave in certain ways to satisfy all the "shoulds". You hope that by doing that you feel adequate, you feel enough. But nope - after reaching that certain goal, after complying to certain standards, after following certain conventions, you still feel that you're not enough. In fact, it's like yanking the movie rolls to change a movie's outcome - all physical actions taken in the world will never make you feel enough.

The proposed solution is, therefore, to scribble a lot of "I AM ENOUGH"s. Keep on reminding and affirming yourself that you are enough.

As I was reading and reflecting on this, though, I discover that as a sufferer of the I'm-not-enough disease, I can turn this affliction into a powerful decision-making tool. When faced with a situation where a decision needs to be made, I can simply ask myself: "What would I do if I am enough? What would I do if I have nothing to prove?" I shall experiment with this, but my hunch is that this eliminates a lot of fears. When you think, and you realize, that you are actually enough, that you've actually nothing to prove, it frees you from the fear that you have to make certain decisions or act in certain ways. And then you can be free to choose whatever maximizes your happiness! Even if you chose the difficult choices - you can be certain that it was your own agency that landed to that choice, not some bullshit rule (brule) of you not being enough.

So, what would I do if I am enough? What would I do if I have nothing to prove?

You're welcome,

MA 3HY 865

Today I clicked the 'cancel registration' button in the MassRMV website.

It's finally over - my beautiful black Honda Civic was totaled a few weeks ago, and Geico had paid out the market value "worth" of her.

Her name was Anastasia - named after the very first girl I was head over heels for. Your firsts are always special. They set the standards and expectations for the seconds, thirds, and so on so forth. And there's this hard-to-grasp quality, magic, that will always be there, unforgettable. Mind you, it's not like I've never ridden or driven other cars before her. And although I will opt out of owning a car in the near future, she won't be my last car ever. Not by a far stretch.

And yet, I already know that it won't be the same.

I first got her in the summer before junior year in college, and I have been longing for a car for the longest time in the world. I still remember vividly my first ever trek to a car dealership (it was a Volkswagen dealer), the sickeningly sweet mixture of intimidation and persuasion of the car salesman, and the sigh of relief as I walked away from that deal. After what felt like hundreds of phone calls, millions of Google search, and numerous drives to a plethora of car dealers miles away from Amherst, I decided on a black Honda Civic.

I chose the SE version, which stood for "Special Edition", because guess what, your firsts are special. ;)

We've been together in numerous drives ever since. On one day I would drive her just to move between dorms, and on another she would ride me on a trek to DC. Various people have been on her passenger seats, she's seen many of the dates that I drove. She's driven me on my happiest, proudest moments, but also on my darkest. She's hid my tears while I drove to Wong's Garden as I sought to escape my stress, and she's comforted me as I drove back from New York toward Amherst in the nightfall. She has truly made my last two years of Amherst wonderful. And oh, the multiple drives to Quabbin Reservoir? Williams to take a certain someone? Connecticut to be parked at Chou's place?

Thank you, and goodbye, Anastasia. I am truly grateful for the amazing two years with you. And while I know, in the future, that I shall drive a more expensive, fancier, and perhaps more beautiful car, you'll always occupy that first-ever spot in the corner of my heart.

Hope you end up in the car heaven.. Farewell.

Skydiving

This weekend is the first weekend where I've fully implemented my strategy of responding instead of initiating - last weekend didn't count because I have already planned vacation to San Diego with my cousins and sisters!

There is probably a deep-seated fear hidden within me, which states that if I don't plan or don't initiate my weekends and reach out to people, I'll be forgotten and left to the dust. I guess we'll see if this fear is true or not. Funny because don't your deepest, truest fears are the ones that end up manifesting?

Either way, when Friday evening came around I was fully convinced that I probably won't be having any human interaction over the weekend - nobody was going to plan anything with me.

Nope, I wasn't about to be left alone, it seems. Saturday came and I was invited to visit MoMA with Steph, Corry, and Yvonne. We explored the museum and had a nice lunch at Xi'an Famous Foods. Good stuff. When Sunday came, a similar invitation came to visit the Brooklyn Museum. I voluntarily decided to be by myself today - I turned it down, and proceeded to do a lot of stuff. Perhaps.. I am beginning to enjoy this solitude.

Biologically speaking, we are hardwired to fear rejection, to fear isolation, because the caveman who didn't have a tribe didn't end up surviving against the wolves and mammoths.

Spiritually speaking, during the fall from grace, we deliberately broke off our connection with the divine and felt isolated. This pushes us to form connections with other beings, before reuniting (finding our way back) to the divine himself. 

Personally speaking, I know that this challenge is two-folds. First is to be able to stay happy, peaceful, and productive in solitude. To enjoy one's own company, march along happily, and to sustain the internal dialogue in the midst of the crowd. But secondly this is also an exercise in manifestation and a test of faith. 

For a person who is used to being controlled by his own ego, who trusts nothing but his own "logic and reason", who is used to having to reach out and initiate everything, surrendering and waiting to respond is not really different than skydiving with a tandem instructor in your back. You scream, and scream, but you realize that you have no control of your faith. It's scary to hurtle down the earth at dizzying speeds, but even scarier that you have no control over when your parachute pops open. What if the dude behind you falls asleep, or faints? What if the parachute malfunctions? What if the straps that links you to him breaks?

Well, I know, because I have been there.

I remembered screaming and screaming, until my lungs felt about to burst open. But then I realized that I couldn't even hear my own voice, because the air was so thin so high up. I thought that either I could a) continue screaming and struggling or b) enjoy the seemingly infinite vista from 14,000 feet. I reasoned that I would choose to enjoy the view, the feeling of hurtling down, and the force of air and gravity against me, because if I do end up dead splat on the ground, I'd rather not have a parched throat with that.

Not different than the skydiving experience, I also chose this. I chose to experiment with this strategy. I chose to be far, here in New York. I chose to live this life, in this body, to take this journey. Sure, perhaps the next few weeks or so might seem that I am hurtling down to the ground, or it may seem so quiet and lonely like when it happens when the air is thin. But I shall resolve to stop screaming nor worrying. I shall resolve, instead, to enjoy this majestic view, this wonderful panorama, of the world and the life that I have chosen to thread.

The parachute shall open in no time, as always, and I'll be in the ground again, thanking myself that I have chosen this path.

I am enough :)

Rituals

A person is but a sum of his or her rituals.

As follows are the rituals that I have implemented:

• Daily morning meditation + prayers - spiritual.
• Daily gratitude + daily random magic - happiness.
• Daily gym, either resistance or cardio - physical.

I have been successfully implementing these rituals for more than thirty days - I think the key here is that they are implemented first thing in the morning, and absolutely nothing gets in the way of them getting implemented. Therefore it sticks. It feels weird that, for example, if I haven't said my gratitude yet or gone to the gym.

I am implementing a few more:

• Love audio (sync with meditation)
• Radical forgiveness (sync with love audio)
• I am enough - making this more ubiquitous in my life overall
• Responding, not initiating - this is an ongoing experiment that will stick around until Mid-March

After these six core pillars are implemented, I'd love a few more to stick: 1) restricting phone/internet usage in general 2) more stories written on these blogs 3) radical mindfulness (being in the present now) 4) Hermetic energy management and reality creation 5) more reflection and journaling on my purpose and direction 6) correct eating pattern, respecting the food and ingredients 7) reading biographies and/or watching inspirational lectures.

These rituals are practiced under the foundation of "blisscipline" i.e. the notion that in order to achieve true freedom, certain amount of discipline is required.

The core of these rituals center around maintaining high energy levels throughout the day, enhancing productivity, and improving reality creation outcomes. Everything in life is energy. Scientists have discovered that physical, solid matter are but vibrations. I strive to better utilize the resource that we are given, that we only truly have: Energy and Time.

What's the relationship between the two? Who knows. But for now, I'm experimenting with these rituals to see where they can take me. And so far so good - Albeit I am a bit skeptical about the fourth strategy (responding, not initiating), the others have been doing wonders for me. And I have grown a bit lax on my gratitude and loving kindness, getting back to it would be amazing.

Yours truly,

R

Magic Check

Since the new year started, I have been using Rhonda Byrne's book "The Magic" to practice increasing my gratitude levels. The book is divided into 28 days, with a different gratitude practice each day. In particular, there is an exercise called the Magic Check, in which one writes down his/her desired amount of money for a particular need, expresses gratitude for it, and keeps it in a familiar place - until one day money magically appears in your life!

Back then, I wrote a magic check for three thousand dollars, wanting to use the money to spend on my vacation. I went to their website, downloaded the check, printed it, filled it in, affixed my gratitude upon it, and placed it in my wallet. This was about a month ago - I actually never really thought about my magic check again, nor did I remember how much money I asked for...

Until today.

After finishing 28 days' worth of the Magic, I have been randomly assigning myself daily gratitude assignments, and today, it fell on the Magic Check again. I thought to myself, "Wow, I probably need to be more grateful for money in my life."

Until when I fished for the check inside my wallet and re-read it again.

Sometime in the past week, the stock markets crumbled and crumbled, and my dad reached out, asking me to buy certain stocks. I happily obliged, and after putting in a sizeable amount, I told him that I would need liquidity. He said, yes, and without me specifying the amount of money needed, he wired over three grand. Exactly a three followed by three zeroes. Of course I was immediately grateful for it, but I did not make the connection to the magic check I wrote in January.

This is it. Scary. I got exactly what I asked for. Not a cent more, not a cent less. I am really grateful, because this is a sign, an answer to my question earlier this weekend regarding manifestation. Yes, I am a generator, but we have our own ways to manifest. The magic, the secret, the law of attraction, the wonders of appreciation, detachment, and gratitude can work for us, in our own ways. I didn't initiate physically (i.e. I didn't go around asking for money nor actively seeking to obtain $3,000), but it involved a physical affirmation (writing a check), and I guess this is one component of the power. The other component of the power is the obedience to the law of detachment - I forgot about it after doing the physical affirmation. I was really grateful for it, really happy, but I didn't give it much thought or resistance. I was able to divorce my intent from my attachment to the outcome (sure, $3,000 is a lot of money for me, and it's nice to have that extra cash, but somehow I wasn't desperate chasing for it, nor did I anxiously try to speed up the process of obtaining it).

This is just another reminder for myself in the future in case I end up questioning my (our) power and/or ability to create, to manifest. It's the law, there's no way around it. I want to treat every single desire in my life like a game, so that it's fun manifesting them! Hehe. Happy creating, my fellow creators.

R

A Generator

So..

What's up, guys and gals.

I've been reading up about bodygraph and human designs recently. Essentially, you input your birth date, hour, and location, and it will use a formulaic method to lay out a groundwork about you and your life.

Being a selfish person, obviously I'm just going to think and reflect about myself first. Hehehe.

Apparently, I am a generator. So - allegedly - I have boundless energy, but I need to channel them properly. The only way to channel my energy properly is to wait to respond, instead of taking the initiative to act. Apparently, if I wait and respond properly (by trusting my guttural instincts), I shall be rewarded with a life of abundance, ease, and spontaneous manifestation of my desires. However, if I play along with my social conditioning, and take the initiative instead of playing the waiting game, I will get rewarded with frustration instead (e.g. won't have the energy to finish what I started).

So this is interesting. These days, I have been obsessed with reaching out and planning and filling up my time slots in the weekdays and the weekends to meet with people. I shall try and give that up. And play the waiting/responding instead of the initiating game instead. I guess instead of reaching out to people and giving them suggestions or offering help, I shall assume a passive but benevolent and helpful role - if my sacral permits. This is early February, so let me give this a shot until early March, and I'll keep you posted if I end up being frustrated or happier. Honestly, it scares the hell out of my mind (classic mind) that if I don't reach out to people first then I'll be left alone to dusts. Then I'll never find the one. Then I'll never find the right opportunities.

But hey, I have some faith. And all I have is faith. I will keep on creating and living the reality I want in my head, while keeping a grateful attitude in my heart. All the difference lies in my mindset and my attitude/action.

Funny because when I've asked advice from the sages, they said things that sound pretty similar.. "Semua usahamu akan sia-sia" "Mas, santai aja, kamu dikelilingi oleh bidadari yang jatuh cinta pada kamu. Tapi mereka pura-pura cuek. Kamu tinggal diem aja, nanti juga dikerubutin" "Suatu hari nanti kamu akan bangun tidur dan sadar kalau apa-apa gausah di plan. tinggal ikutin kehendak soul mu saja, dijalani, nanti akan terjadi yang terbaik untukmu." "Semua tinggal terima jadi aja, dan dinikmati. sebab semuanya sudah diselenggarakan".

Funny how. Well, I guess then I understand what the first sage was saying - it's not that all my efforts shall be in vain. It's those efforts where I ignore my central authority, my sacral, my soul, tend to be wasted. Looking back in my life, I have had wonderful achievements and tremendous happiness, and it's not that I have been passively waiting and lazing around. I worked my ass off to be here in the States, and to live the life I live right now. However, at the same time, the process seemed so serendipitous. Right people and right events and right decisions just came about during the right time, and here I am today, very blessed. All I needed to do was just to respond - to that calling.

Very cool. Let me wrap up by presenting an example that turned out so well, that wasn't me responding. Well - I was originally going to be roommates with Chris in New York, but it suddenly fell through. While I was deep in sadness and gloominess, I surrendered everything and prayed to my soul. From deep within, there came a voice, a thought, perhaps, saying: "Paul". I knew what to do - I immediately reached out to him and asked if he was still looking for people to room with. Now, I am living with him and Hao in a comfortable apartment in Midtown East, right about five minutes from the office. I am blessed for the short commute, for the amazing roommates, for the cheap rent, and for the amazing living condition. Well, I guess this was an instance of taking the initiative to reach out, but that's after deep contemplation and it's in response of the depths of my soul (obviously being sanctioned by the Soul, then).

Anyways, I'll keep you posted! Hehe. Or ask me, because I'm not supposed to take the initiative. Hehehe.