Exercise your Faith!

I'm not exemplary when it comes to faith but as Jesus said in Matthew 17:20 "if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain. Nothing will be impossible for you.". So I've been exercising faith like a muscle hoping for it to grow and these little acts of faith are really doing wonders for me.

Every time I head home alone, I go to this spot where jeepneys pass full. If I walk further, around 10-15 minutes from that spot, there's a sort-of terminal where there's a higher likelihood of vacant jeepneys going my route, but for my exercise, no. Each time I wait on my spot, I pray and tell myself "God knows how much I needed to go home as early as I could. If He wants me to get home, He'll give me a ride, no matter where I wait and no matter the time. If He doesn't, it's because He knows I don't need to" and God has indulged me every time!

Recently, I always wake up at around 3am and I'd have shallow sleep from then on. Turns out my mind was worried that my alarm would wake my baby and it'd be difficult for me to leave for work. Shallow sleep would allow me to wake up with the lowest volume of alarm and on first ring. As an added routine to my faith exercise, I depended on God to wake me up without an alarm and I do wake up +/- 10 minutes of 5:30am without fail! Earlier today my sleep was deep but then the AC turned off and woke me up, at 5:35am!

If you have none to little faith like I did, please try this. Find something simple/small in your life and trust God to fulfill your prayers on it. Each time God fulfills your prayers, add another routine. Keep on adding and watch your faith grow. Soon it won't be difficult to trust God with everything big or small.

your every woman,

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The Day I Thought I'd Lose Serene

While at soccer camp yesterday, it was obvious that Ella didn't have enough energy. Apparently, she only ate cereals and milk the whole day prior to camp which ran from 4:30-6:30pm. When the class was over, I brought them to KFC, found them a table, left them there, and lined up to buy them food. When I brought the food to where they were, I was shocked because Serene was not there!

A lot of things didn't turn out the way I expected them yesterday. I've prepared all the things Ella and Sereney would need for Ella's soccer camp and was very confident about it when I left for work. A few hours before the end of my shift, I was receiving messages from Ella & Drew at home asking where things were. I was a bit irritated because I gave them instructions to bring whatever I prepared and everything else was with me. When I met up with them, I found out that they left Serene's director's chair and brought an unnecessary extra bag with unnecessary contents. If you know me, you'd know I'd get mad about it, but I didn't. I was irritated, but not mad (Thank God for that!).

Sereney announced that she pooped before we left the mall beside my workplace so I had to clean her up, causing us to be a little behind schedule that we had to rush going to The Turf. Serene's sippy cup that I filled with water before leaving work spilled all over my bag for some reason. 

Before going to KFC, Ella drank water from her bottle and wasn't able to properly close it, spilling more water in my bag.

So, you can just imagine how I felt when I found out that Serene was not where I left them and Ella had no idea where she was! 

The first place I went to was the grocery which was right across KFC. She was not there! There was nothing to the right of KFC and the grocery, so I went left where there's an EGG (Exciting Gifts & Goodies) booth and right again towards McDonald's where a lot of Kiddie Crews were but Serene was still nowhere to be found! Those were the longest 5-10 minutes of my life!

While I was frantically calling out Serene's name, I was already on the verge of crying. I found a guard and began describing her out loud. Thankfully, the saleslady from EGG heard how I described her and knew that it was her inside National Bookstore. National Bookstore! Why didn't I think of it sooner?! That was the same place she'd go straight to whenever we go to that mall because she loved tinkering at the children's books there! Maybe I was too exhausted and worried that I wasn't thinking clearly. Good thing the children's books section was just right behind the store's glass wall so it was easy for the lady to see her as their store was in front of it.

I was just so grateful for I knew that the Lord was teaching me a lesson. He allowed just enough to make me realize that I CANNOT always be in control but trust that He'd always watch over my kids, my life, my situation. I stopped being pissed about what happened that night and went on to enjoy dinner with my precious kids. 

your every woman,

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Conceited Heart

photo grabbed from Etsy

During one of my zone out moments, an idea started in me. I thought "What if in the Philippine setting, a guard at the entrance of an establishment casually asks me 'What's your name?' and once I respond with my name, he'll say 'Oh, Bianca, may I check your bag please?' How would I feel?". Being in the customer service industry working for a 1st world country for almost 10 years, I can easily say it's perfectly fine! I ran the same idea with a couple of people and most of the reactions I received were that they would be offended by a guard asking them for their names and not even calling them "mam/sir". When I asked them if there was anything wrong with it, they realized that there wasn't and I continued to explain that we only have this perspective that something is wrong with it because we think that the guard is lesser than us when in fact, he is not. I continued on with my life thinking highly of myself because I know this simple truth when most people don't. 

Recently, I realized that I am no better than anyone else. I practice the opposite of what I preach. Just because I've been blessed with work where I manage people, I felt a sense of entitlement. Just because I held myself accountable for other people's performance, I felt that I should be honored, celebrated. And as years passed by, I've held this bitterness because I never received the honor I thought I deserved... or sometimes, I measure honor based on monetary value. I have realized now that there is more to work than gaining glory for myself... that everything that I do is for the greater glory of the Lord because the work that I do is a channel of His blessing. Thankfully, the Lord blessed with a means to heal my heart and my life will never be the same.

your every woman,

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