Because of that, I have emotional needs, and capabilities.
Emotional capabilities are a positive, but the needs are a negative. Capabilities make me sensitive to others, but needs make me sensitive to myself. I try and try harder every single day to trust in God and put others before myself, but popular media and the general modern culture has told me to stand up for myself even if it means stepping on others’ feet. I say feet because that’s the start. Others may step on people’s legs, their arms, hands, and even their heads. In today’s normal day life, that’s normal, taking advantage of others to reach the top. I guess that’s why it’s so refreshing and unique to see a person who makes it based on hard work and perseverance and not just on pure luck or snarky tricks.
I want dearly to be the kind of person who is honest and hard-working and who may fall from time to time (as I’m definitely not perfect) but gets up and works harder every time. But I’m also lazy, which is a character flaw that I need to work on, through discipline and self-control.
I’ve realized that as a person, I’m a people-pleaser. I try hard to make people laugh, smile, feel welcomed, and happy. I want others to know that in a world where every single person has a perspective of each individual as a friend, foe, or mutually neutral acquaintance, I’m a friend. However, not everyone wants to be like that. In fact, as I grow older, I’m realizing that the fraction becomes more like a fraction rather than the majority. And although I can’t really stop that, since awareness and responsibility seem to foster seriousness and nonchalance to most people in the background of day-to-day life, I can stop the change that my heart and mind has been tempted to stray to. This change is that same uncaring and bitter melancholy towards the world that so many people have nowadays. As of now, my heart is still premature, in the sense that I try to please, and feel sad when others are not pleased with me. If even one person is unhappy or seems unhappy with something I said or did, I try my best to make it right, even if that means saying sorry for something I didn’t do. So what’s the happy balance? Moreover, what does God want me to do? He didn’t call us to please others, He called us to worship Him and give Him the glory.
What I have found is that I definitely can’t please everyone. I have my own ideas, my own beliefs, likes and dislikes, and ambitions. There have been cases before where I have judged others for not having these same things as I have, or those who don’t do or think the way I do. But everyone, absolutely everyone, has, is, and will be different from me. And as much as I’d like to be, I can’t be on good terms with everyone in the world. And I need to wholeheartedly understand that, not just relunctantly accept it.
Even more, I am compelled by the blood of Christ to love them, regardless of differences, to see the similarities between us and the humanity in them. I need to suck up the pride that I have in myself to see the stories that lie behind their positions on certain subjects. Because everyone has a story.
I’m right now, in 2015, only 18 years old, and I already have so many stories to tell, so many years of laughter, pain, and even confusion that have made me who I am, and continue to shape me. I’m not even 1/5th (I hope) through my time here on earth, and yet God has blessed me so much with a life that is rich with lessons and truth. And this is another truth that He has taught me, and I must learn from it instead of spitefully swallow it like bitter medicine, or worse, bitter Chinese medicinal herbal tea. It’s good for you and works well, but the taste is like death served with just a sprinkle of dirt and a dash of sadness. (If you’re into that, I guess give it a try???)
My goal for this year and beyond: to love without expectation, but still understand limits and not live to please others; to be joyful and loving even if others aren’t towards me, because God loves them as well as me.
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