‘Tis the season for remembering and for reflection, but as we allow our memories of the past to enrich and deepen our soul, let us not forget that in this process of being created, we are equally capable of  creating – new relationships, new memories, new loves.

May the dawn of each day continue to inspire you.

Blessings,

Huey

Christmas 2011

***********************

it all begins as
a sprinkle from the sky
falling on the thirsty land

then a tiny brook is born
so tiny a child could skip across
with a little help of course

as it tumbles along
tripping over stones
uncertainty mixes with curiosity -
is it going where it needs to go?

the clear water clouds
as it courses through barren landscapes
creating, as it is being created

when did it become a river?
who knows?
perhaps it was that time
when it collected
that teardrop
that fell from the cheeks
of the brokenhearted lover.

along the way,
there were many love affairs
afterall, it’s hard to travel so far for so long

what’s a little fling
with the fish and the frogs
the birds serenading from the shores
with trees, especially trees

who can resist
their easy charm
and the wisdom they carry
of knowing that they need only to stand
wherever they are
to be blessed.

and how could the river forget
that one girl with deep, soulful eyes
who sat alone by the banks
for a long, long time
now and again, dipping her toes into the icy waters
sending visible shivers
across its liquid skin.

through the seasons,
the sun remained faithful
such love for the earth
shining, shining, shining,
as if willing everything to hurry up and grow

still, the river keeps on meandering
for that’s what rivers do
but it’s getting closer
to the place where it should be

beloved,
the next time someone asks
“if all rivers are sweet, where does the sea get its salt?”
remember this story
and speak of it like one who has known rivers

That reading good poetry may cause one’s mood to alter.

Or that one needs to be prudent with one’s diet so as not to overdose on maudlin sentimentality.

I feel a little hungover today from drinking in a cocktail of sadness, grief and regret.

Anybody got a remedy?

*************************

Heavy

That time

I thought I could not

go any closer to grief

without dying

I went closer,

and I did not die.

Surely God

had his hand in this,

as well as friends.

Still, I was bent,

and my laughter,

as the poet said,

was nowhere to be found.

Then said my friend Daniel,

(brave even among lions),

“It’s not the weight you carry

but how you carry it -

books, bricks, grief -

it’s all in the way

you embrace it, balance it, carry it

when you cannot, and would not,

put it down.”

So I went practicing.

Have you noticed?

Have you heard

the laughter

that comes, now and again,

out of my startled mouth?

How I linger

to admire, admire, admire

the things of this world

that are kind, and maybe

also troubled -

roses in the wind,

the sea geese on the steep waves,

a love

to which there is no reply?

- Mary Oliver

Text by Mary Oliver

Image by Huey Ko (copyrighted)

Forgiveness and gratitude. If you have these in your life, I assure you, you will plug all the emotional leaks that are draining you of an abundant life that you so richly deserve right now.

Here’s a wonderful message about the dance of love by the inimitable Pastor Ngiam Su-Lin.

And here’s my response.

i am a river.
i begin gloriously, with monotonous sweetness.
along the way, collecting all sorts of things – sand, stones … the occasional tear of a stranger,
the clear blood clouds as it courses through barren landscapes.
creating, as i am being created.
until finally, i empty out into the sea,
joined by other rivers in universal anonymity.
then will i sing.
with the placable sweet sounds
of one who has known rivers.
~ Ko Siew Huey

*******************
Inspired by Pablo Neruda’s question “If all rivers are sweet, where does the sea get its salt

I revisit this essay every year during Easter, just to remind myself of the significance of this season and to remember the reason for my belief.

During my morning meditation on Good Friday, the word “surrender” popped into my head. I looked up the etymology of the word and realized that the original meaning is “to give back”. Huh. How very interesting. I always thought it meant “to give up” which gives the word a totally different flavour altogether.

In surrendering, I am called to return what is due to the rightful owner. So if nothing is mine, everything is a gift. I must say, it’s a wonderful perspective to have in life – to live life with a sense of gratitude rather than entitlement.

What a perfect antidote to the problem of pride.

Yeh. Ok. Now go do.

**************************

April 2007

“Why get baptized now?”

That’s a question I’ve been getting a lot lately. The short answer is that I feel it’s time.But I also feel it’s important to put sentiment into sentences, and perhaps in the process of articulation, achieve new clarity.

So this short essay is my attempt to do just that.

16 years ago, on a Good Friday evening, I said a prayer. Someone led with the words and I simply repeated after him, mumbling words of contrition and understanding the gist of it to mean that I recognized myself as a sinner and that I acknowledged Jesus as my savior.

That choice point pretty much altered the trajectory of my life.

Thereafter, I took on many personas: from being a self righteous zealot, to a pariah in my traditionalist ancestral worshipping family, to a well intentioned but misguided standard bearer of social justice.

Each time, I knew just what was the just and right thing to do and nobody could get in my way… not even God.

But where was I headed? I had no clue. I never was contented with the status quo and felt it was my mission in life to make things better. That drive brought me to places as diverse as Northwest China, Uganda, and most recently, New Orleans. I’ve always felt inspired by my interactions with people stripped of pretences, and I have been incredibly privileged to have been a witness to the heroism of ordinary folks trying to live each day with dignity despite their daunting circumstances. But my messianic aspirations have gotten me into a lot of trouble as I am often unaware that I am transmitting what Thomas Merton describes as the contagion of my own “obsessions, aggressiveness, ego-centered ambitions, delusions about ends and means, doctrinaire prejudices and ideas.”

Ok. So I can hear some of you saying “you’re too hard on yourself”. Different variations on this theme include “you’ve got your panties on too tight” or “you seem to walk around with a dark cloud circling over you”.

I know that. And I know my salvation lies in learning to shed the burden of greatness.

I’ve seen that it’s not enough to have passion. The greater lesson is to learn compassion. I take to heart what my teacher once told me – that I need to sink my roots on solid ground but learn to grow a branch to my neighbor’s yard. That’s a great principle to live by and is really another interpretation of the commandment to love God with all of our heart and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

It has been said that the Christian faith is about learning to die, so that we may better live. Baptism is that public declaration of this abdication of self – it is my testimony to everyone that I am taking the step to bury my old life of self-centeredness and to be resurrected as a new creation, a part of the community of believers.

But this is after all still a step of faith and is by no means a testament of my absolute, unwavering certainty in all spiritual matters. I would like to think that I am more comfortable with ambiguity now than in the past. I still have unanswered questions and will continue to have them. I will still struggle with feelings of anger, impatience and despair. When that happens, (and I’m sure many of you will be at the receiving end of that…) I humbly ask for your understanding and indulgence. Nevertheless, I am confident that growth happens and is supported by buoyant doubt. In the process of wrestling with God, the scars that are left behind will not only serve as permanent reminders of our human flaws, but also sobering knowledge that we can do nothing but cling on to His blessings.

Micah 6:8

He has showed you, O man, what is good.

And what does the LORD require of you?

To act justly and to love mercy

and to walk humbly with your God.

For some weeks now, I’ve been meeting regularly with a couple of friends to discuss a book titled “Everything must change – When the world’s biggest problems and Jesus’ good news collide”.

Despite the glib title, the book does introduce an interesting idea that the leverage point to effect change is to create a better framing story – a story that gives people direction, values, vision and inspiration.

Too many times, we accept the conventional wisdom, (fitered through the media, our education, our experiences, our political and religious leaders etc.) forgetting that every narrative that has been created is the result of a particular worldview, serving a particular agenda, at a particular time. These narratives become doctrinal beliefs over time, which then have a power to orchestrate behaviour, focusing our attention within the frame that has been constructed. These structures then perpetuate the status quo, keeping the incumbents in power.

Since no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it, change work begins when people come together to reinterpret the dominant view and collectively reframe an alternative story.

But I believe the attitude one adopts in this process is also important. If one begins by taking on an adversarial stance, one can never proceed beyond the narrow pool of ideas that characterize all that is anti-establishment. There is no true freedom of thought when one merely swims in the arena of “counter-isms”.

The capacity for Independent thought is a necessary sanctuary for seemingly heretical ideas to evolve into legitimate innovative breakthroughs that enable a society to not only survive but thrive. To shift from a state of counter-dependence to true independence requires one to be self-reflexive, being aware of deep seated assumptions, consciously evaluating new information in the light of those and finally making a deliberate choice to move forward with a course of action.

To attain that level of openness requires one to possess the wisdom of a child. Yes, to look upon something as a child would, as if looking at something unfamiliar for the very first time. Probe it, play with it, take it apart, question it – but do it with an attitude that seeks to discover rather than to scorn.

But the dynamic that has the potential to produce the greatest impact, is when members of society are interdependent. This is the kind of relationship where people are individually self-reliant yet at the same time, responsible for each other. Where people respond with compassion rather than react with haste.  Where respect is reciprocal. Where each side recognizes the truth in the other’s position and weaves them together into what Martin Luther King Jr calls “the inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny”.

I know how incredibly naïve all of this sounds. Yet I continue to hope. General elections in my country will be called soon. Already, we hear the familiar babel and bluster, with politicians pitching to us their version of events since the last election and foretelling the future with aplomb. So I wonder – where do I feature in this Great Singapore Novel? Am I really a co-author or have I been content reaping the royalties generated by ghost writers? If we were all given a pen to write one sentence, what would it be? What would my line look like? What would yours say?

When I am among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness.

I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,

in which I have goodness, and discernment,

and never hurry through the world

but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves

and call out, “Stay awhile.”

The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,

“and you too have come

into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled

with light, and to shine. “

- Mary Oliver

Without going into details, suffice it to say that I have been stubbornly resisting God’s call for me to submit to his will, both in my professional and personal life. As a result, he has left me to my own devices, which has meant a season of fruitless wandering in the desert.

The beginning of this year has been a difficult one for me for various reasons, but all that has brought me to a point where I am ready to say “not my will but Yours be done”.

Now, I know this is the kind of prayer that one doesn’t muck around with coz it has the potential to make things very very inconvenient. Ok, so maybe that was the wine talking. But hey, there’s something to be said for liquid courage… it has a lubricating effect that allows ones deepest desires to surface.

And so, here I am. He is doing so much internal renovation in my life right now, it’s not even funny. I am drained. But it is during times like this, when one goes back to the basics.  Prayers become simple. Childlike even. “God help me through this day. That is all I ask. Amen.” Only then does one learn what it means to depend on a grace that is sufficient.

I guess as with all exercise, when the pain is most acute, that’s when you know that your muscles are being worked on. In this process of going through the refiner’s fire, I know that at the end of this, he will make me a much more useful vessel not only to receive his grace, but to be able to pour it out as a blessing towards others, as we imitate the example of our wounded healer.

That has been my perennial thorn in the flesh. But I realized last night that even in this, as with all areas of my life, I am still depending on my strength. I strive to DO humility, as if it is something that can be accomplished. Last night’s insight was that I can’t try to be humble, I can only allow myself to be humbled by God.

Read this prayer a few days ago during devotion. I wish I knew how to write music, coz this would be my personal anthem and  I’d sing it to Him every day.

Lord, I have given up my pride

and turned away from my arrogance.

I am not concerned with great matters

or with subjects too difficult for me.

Instead, I am content and at peace.

As a child lies quietly in its mother’s arms,

so my heart is quiet within me.

Psalm 131:1-2