I realized there are more people than I expect who read my blog. Students can come up to me and make fun of my url. Even students I least expect to read actually confess they read my blog. Flattered, I truly am, no matter for whatever reason you visit my blog.
If you notice, its been awhile since I mused about life. My previous few posts have been nothing short of just superficial details (oxymoron) of what's going on in my life recently. If I may attempt to dig deeper now, I believe the Lord has been ploughing the soil of my heart recently and sowing some seeds, which I hope will germinate and blossom in due time and make me more like Jesus. One of these seeds is the idea of utilizing my God-given talents, gifts, time, resources, etc wisely, lest I become the man with one talent but who did not invest even his single talent wisely. In the end, even what he had was taken away from him. [Read The Story of the Talents here] Indeed, I gleaned from the Word of God recently some words of wisdom to explain why things work in a certain way even in our fallen world - For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. (Matt 25: 29)
Being made in God's image and therefore having traces of God all over us, we too have felt the souring of our noses or aching of our hearts if we were to see someone with such potential, yet squandering it all away. Humans term this inexplicable emotion as Disappointment. And this post is inspired by a couple of my friends who got quite affected by Disappointments recently.
Sometimes, I do not feel like going home to eat the same kind of fried rice with prawns and sausages for dinner. However, because I do not want to disappoint my mum who, I believe, sees cooking for me as a way to show her love and me reciprocating means alot to her, I trod home to gobble up the rice. Otherwise, she might feel that her efforts are being despised. The Fear of Causing Disappointment compels. Or rather, the Fear of Causing Disappointment undergirded by Love compels. Because Love compels.
Yet most of the time, due to the lack of the Fear of Causing Disappointment (or Love - for those with a stronger threshold for mushy words), Disappointment on its own cuts like a sashimi knife - slowly but surely. If you choose to dabble with education, like me, Disappointment comes as frequent as the MRT during peak hours in the morning rush. For me, the greatest Disappointment (which I never fail to reiterate to my students), and therefore the deepest cut (which is not the first one, Sheryl), is seeing someone with potential squandering it away. Sounds familiar? Consider the following cases:
1. Student A dazzles many with the ability to accomplish tasks efficiently and beautifully but Student A also fazes many more others with his uncanny ability to cause trouble for any poor teacher standing in his path of behavioural destruction. I thought he could be a great leader, with the humility to listen to advice and the self-discipline to control his emotions and tongue. But he chose to ignore. I was very disappointed. I gave up caring and told Student A in his face his biggest issue is pride.
2. Student B has the potential to do very well in a certain subject. Yet Student B chooses to just wallow in mediocrity, giving the bare minimum, refusing to utilize his gifting wisely. My heart pained each time I see his talent go to waste - it is akin to holding the treasure in his hands, yet allowing it to slip through his fingers and not being able to keep it within his palms anymore. Yet sometimes, despite the disappointment, I choose to egg him on further, just to try my luck in desperation, only to receive unreciprocative, and sometimes hurtful, words and attitude. This, I call myself 自做贱.
What about hoping for something, yet missing it totally ultimately? That kind of Disappointment can sometimes kill. It kills the hope. It kills the motivation. It kills the desire. It kills the interest. To Students C & D (if you read this, that is), my sincerest apologies. I can only say sometimes, it takes time. Perhaps now is just not the right time for you yet. In due time, I believe you will be prepared and ready.
The amazing thing about Disappointment is that it can be inflicted with such ease and simplicity, yet the damage it can cause can be very major. Recently, Student E did not want to take part in a certain event. I pleaded with Student E, almost to the point of begging, just short of kneeling down and even to the extent of engaging help from Student E's good friends. However, Student E chose to stab knife after knife of Disappointment. I banked on our relationship as bargaining chips to garner Student E's participation, yet even that did not work. Then I proposed to Student E that perhaps Student E can take it as showing grace to a stranger (since apparently there was no relationship to fall back on already) - even when we see someone needy along the roadside, we might be very tempted to help. I really retreated back to where I could reverse no more. Even then, that did not help. [In the end, Student E did relent and I can only attribute it to God moving his heart, because in my desperation, all I could do was pray.] This incident really left a deep cut in my life, causing me and many others to be really Disappointed.
Finally, from the point of view of a teacher and speaking to all students out there and this is not a desperate attempt to earn any sympathy vote, I have this to conclude: Granted, you have your low points of your life and BGR problems and sticky family situations and financial problems and lousy (that's what you think) teachers and piles of irritating homework and what not. But hey, guess what? So do we teachers! I can safely say my (and some, if not many, of your teachers') life is not any less thorny than any of yours out there (For one, I too grew up with my parents apart, like many of you). Yet each day, I pray (and I'm eternally grateful to God for constantly sustaining me) and brace myself for school, only to get Disappointed, Disregarded, Disenchanted many times over (by the same people, no less) and when I reach home, I have to face my own share of Disappointments. It sucks, really. But what do we teachers do? We 自做贱; we return the next day, with softened hearts, to try to help you guys to see and unleash your potential, only to be Disappointed, Disregarded and Disenchanted all over again. Its like being slashed on the same spot over and over and over and over again.
And what do YOU do? You decide.
If you notice, its been awhile since I mused about life. My previous few posts have been nothing short of just superficial details (oxymoron) of what's going on in my life recently. If I may attempt to dig deeper now, I believe the Lord has been ploughing the soil of my heart recently and sowing some seeds, which I hope will germinate and blossom in due time and make me more like Jesus. One of these seeds is the idea of utilizing my God-given talents, gifts, time, resources, etc wisely, lest I become the man with one talent but who did not invest even his single talent wisely. In the end, even what he had was taken away from him. [Read The Story of the Talents here] Indeed, I gleaned from the Word of God recently some words of wisdom to explain why things work in a certain way even in our fallen world - For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. (Matt 25: 29)
Being made in God's image and therefore having traces of God all over us, we too have felt the souring of our noses or aching of our hearts if we were to see someone with such potential, yet squandering it all away. Humans term this inexplicable emotion as Disappointment. And this post is inspired by a couple of my friends who got quite affected by Disappointments recently.
Sometimes, I do not feel like going home to eat the same kind of fried rice with prawns and sausages for dinner. However, because I do not want to disappoint my mum who, I believe, sees cooking for me as a way to show her love and me reciprocating means alot to her, I trod home to gobble up the rice. Otherwise, she might feel that her efforts are being despised. The Fear of Causing Disappointment compels. Or rather, the Fear of Causing Disappointment undergirded by Love compels. Because Love compels.
Yet most of the time, due to the lack of the Fear of Causing Disappointment (or Love - for those with a stronger threshold for mushy words), Disappointment on its own cuts like a sashimi knife - slowly but surely. If you choose to dabble with education, like me, Disappointment comes as frequent as the MRT during peak hours in the morning rush. For me, the greatest Disappointment (which I never fail to reiterate to my students), and therefore the deepest cut (which is not the first one, Sheryl), is seeing someone with potential squandering it away. Sounds familiar? Consider the following cases:
1. Student A dazzles many with the ability to accomplish tasks efficiently and beautifully but Student A also fazes many more others with his uncanny ability to cause trouble for any poor teacher standing in his path of behavioural destruction. I thought he could be a great leader, with the humility to listen to advice and the self-discipline to control his emotions and tongue. But he chose to ignore. I was very disappointed. I gave up caring and told Student A in his face his biggest issue is pride.
2. Student B has the potential to do very well in a certain subject. Yet Student B chooses to just wallow in mediocrity, giving the bare minimum, refusing to utilize his gifting wisely. My heart pained each time I see his talent go to waste - it is akin to holding the treasure in his hands, yet allowing it to slip through his fingers and not being able to keep it within his palms anymore. Yet sometimes, despite the disappointment, I choose to egg him on further, just to try my luck in desperation, only to receive unreciprocative, and sometimes hurtful, words and attitude. This, I call myself 自做贱.
What about hoping for something, yet missing it totally ultimately? That kind of Disappointment can sometimes kill. It kills the hope. It kills the motivation. It kills the desire. It kills the interest. To Students C & D (if you read this, that is), my sincerest apologies. I can only say sometimes, it takes time. Perhaps now is just not the right time for you yet. In due time, I believe you will be prepared and ready.
The amazing thing about Disappointment is that it can be inflicted with such ease and simplicity, yet the damage it can cause can be very major. Recently, Student E did not want to take part in a certain event. I pleaded with Student E, almost to the point of begging, just short of kneeling down and even to the extent of engaging help from Student E's good friends. However, Student E chose to stab knife after knife of Disappointment. I banked on our relationship as bargaining chips to garner Student E's participation, yet even that did not work. Then I proposed to Student E that perhaps Student E can take it as showing grace to a stranger (since apparently there was no relationship to fall back on already) - even when we see someone needy along the roadside, we might be very tempted to help. I really retreated back to where I could reverse no more. Even then, that did not help. [In the end, Student E did relent and I can only attribute it to God moving his heart, because in my desperation, all I could do was pray.] This incident really left a deep cut in my life, causing me and many others to be really Disappointed.
Finally, from the point of view of a teacher and speaking to all students out there and this is not a desperate attempt to earn any sympathy vote, I have this to conclude: Granted, you have your low points of your life and BGR problems and sticky family situations and financial problems and lousy (that's what you think) teachers and piles of irritating homework and what not. But hey, guess what? So do we teachers! I can safely say my (and some, if not many, of your teachers') life is not any less thorny than any of yours out there (For one, I too grew up with my parents apart, like many of you). Yet each day, I pray (and I'm eternally grateful to God for constantly sustaining me) and brace myself for school, only to get Disappointed, Disregarded, Disenchanted many times over (by the same people, no less) and when I reach home, I have to face my own share of Disappointments. It sucks, really. But what do we teachers do? We 自做贱; we return the next day, with softened hearts, to try to help you guys to see and unleash your potential, only to be Disappointed, Disregarded and Disenchanted all over again. Its like being slashed on the same spot over and over and over and over again.
And what do YOU do? You decide.
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