A text message from mom.

An IM message from a friend in Philadelphia. 

A quick phone call from my parents.

A sweet card from my girlfriend.

A nice wish from a DMV employee 

An email titled "best wishes" from a good friend I used to work with

A comment on my friendster page from a friend in Portland 

A big red announcement on the whiteboard by my cube.

A voice mail from my brother. 

A text and IM messages from a good friend of mine in Australia. 

A lunch treat from my collagues with cream puff as dessert. 

A plant in front my my door (a sweet thoughtful gift from my gf)

A phone call from a good friend of mine in Chincago.

A chat with my cousin in Indonesia

A friendster comment from a friend in Indonesia

An IM message from my friend in Taiwan.

An IM from my friend in Austin.

They all wish me a happy birthday. 

I'm 28 today.

Today as a day doesn't feel special.

Nothing dramatic happened.

When people asked me what I'd do today, I didn't know how to answer since I didn't have anything special planned.

But today is a special day for me.

It's a day filled with reminders of how lucky I am.

I'm loved.

Many people around the globe decided to pause their lives so they can communicate to me that they care about me. Some even did it more than once to make sure I receive the message… or it'd be better to say to make sure I receive their love.

I'm 28 today.

28 years of mistakes and shortcomings has come and gone, but inspite of that I'm still standing here surrounded by love. 

I'm a lucky man.

to shorten then distance between one's imagination and its manifestation in the physical world.

art = a creative endeavor= expression of human soul = giving a human touch to something = making the world more human one object at a time = to celebrate humanity = to awaken the humanity in others = to touch another human's soul = to inspire others to be fully human = a celebration/meditation/lamentation on life = to inspire others to live = to inspire change = a vision for a better world.

I got an interesting idea while i was praying today.

It started last night while I was reading Soul Cravings last night. In that book, Erwin McManus invites his readers to a journey inside of our own souls.  He states that the universe inside of us can be as big as the universe outside of us. That idea fascinates me.

But what if it's more than just an idea?

I certainly can't say that I've tried that and it's not true.

What if we, as human, are the portals to the spiritual realm?

What if the gateway of heaven is nowhere to be found in the material world, but it could appears inside of ourselves?

I'm not suggesting that we all have a power within or God is only a potential inside of us waiting to be awaken. None of those self-centered ideas.

I'm simply suggesting that we could be the portals that lead ourselves (and perhaps others) to a spiritual place where we could meet God.

My jaw was really tired, but I had to keep my mouth opened.

"Open wide," he said.

Music playing in the background. A random sappy song from the 80's.

I was getting some fillings done at my dentist.

I was sufferring.

…

Then I had an idea…

What if I just observe this situation without thinking that it's a negative thing?

I tried to relax.

It actually worked.

I didn't really suffer anymore for the rest of that visit. The pain was there, but the sufferring was not. My girlfriend and I had a discussion about this a while ago, but I had never experimented with it until this occassion.

That made me think that maybe… just maybe… if I can relax in any situation, then i can get the best out of every situation I'm in.

Maybe that's the key. Simple but hard.

I'm starting a new experiment in my life.

I realize that I often waste time doing nothing (i.e. browse the web aimlessly) and then regret it afterwards.

What if I ask myself "why?" as often as possible before I do anything? 

I wonder if this kind of evaluation will help me live my life more effectively. 

That was a line in the first song we sang at church today.

The idea intrigued me.

Life is beautiful. I agree.

But… how about MY life?

Is my life beautiful? 

What would make one's life beautiful? 

whether we like it or not, we can't stay still in this life simply because being human, we're living in time.

a metaphor to illustrate this is like we're on a boat in an open sea. the wave will take us somewhere whether we like it or not, with or without any effort on our side. we can steer the boat to go to a certain direction, paddle to make it move towards that direction faster, but sometimes the wave is just too strong.

I'm not a sailor, so I don't know anything about sailing, but I suspect that as a sailor, you need to know how to read nature (wind, sky, wave) and even though you can't control nature, you can adjust your action so you can use your knowledge about nature to your advantage.

With life, I think it's very important to realize that we're going somewhere and sometimes things don't go according to our plan, so it is important to learn how to read our circumstance and use that knwldge to adjust our action accordingly in order to drive our life towards the direction where we want to go.