BoringYetGraceful

Learned to play guitars accidentally in the 2nd year of my high school. The guitar at home was there before I was born. My old man is a country dude, and my big bro plays the instruments too.

It's a sudden enthusiasm for me to play a song from that Xtian song magazine that my big bro brought along with a CD that contains it minus-one tunes. I still remember struggling to play “As The Deer,” “In Your Hands,” and “I Offer My Life”.

Chord Chart was my best friend. Thanks to that magazine, and a few words of wisdom from my old man. I must study first the basic 3 finger chords and make them sound whole, not tunog kabag. My strumming is a different story. This took weeks before entering to learn a song.

My first song I learned was In Your Hands by Hillsong and Numb by Linkin Park. Please see the chords for those songs why I chose those. It took me some weeks again to play and sing along, man, that was difficult.

The learning journey was satisfying, which made my parents angry because after school, I just played guitars for hours (learning the chords and song and strummed my heart out while singing lol)

Yup, those are the days, I'm so freaking happy learning a piece either from church or secular and figuring them out, that made me buy song hits. Kahit 1 kanta lang naman habol mo, bibilhin mo yung isang issue.

Timing and playing by feel is a different story (will talk differently on that). If your enthusiasm is high in learning the song and the background of how to learn things in and out, that would build you up to advanced stuff in guitar.

Kung yung basic di mo magawa, tapos gusto mag ala-Malmsteen. Mangosteen bagsak mo sir. Wala akong interest sa totoo lang to play lead guitars, eh sana shred shred na din ako agad noong simula? I prefer na poste lang ako (which mahirap din).

Note to the reader: Everything written here is an opinion, and I'm not an expert. Consult professionals for better information. Thank you.

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. — James 1:19-20

Anger or getting angry is okay. It's a normal emotion of a normal human being but sometimes humans tends to be abnormal and it's not okay. Specially when you want your anger to be validated even it is not. Human emotions are complicated, and we like to choose that way because we have reasons.

Positively its fine, as it release you from pain. Negatively anger results in bad stuff like murder. Can't imagine someone getting released from their pain if they ended someone life. That's insanity.

Take It Slow

Our heart beats fast when we are angry. Our inner being wanted something to control to, like losing in an argument or you get cut in a line where you stay for hours, well you're really get angry on that.

Controlling anger leads us to have options. When you take the fast lane, that will end in war but when you take it slow, to understand things and yourself. You're promoting peace to others and to yourself also.

This process is hard at first but its rewarding of you don't want to have a highblood pressure and have a sudden heart attack. Our heart aren't good in fast pace especially if it's emotionally driven in a negative way.

Process

As you choose not to get angry. Process is the next thing. Why did you get a get angry? What is the best reaction instead of getting angry? This leads us to have more options. See, getting angry is easy but the opposite is difficult but the path to easy life is hard, take note on that and that includes on that getting quickly angry.

Anger is a quick fix thing, the opposite takes a lot of process like cooking a food that have a number of ingredients and dozen of process. Will you choose a fast food over a healthy food?

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, — Ephesians 4:26

Let It Go ASAP

As stated above, anger wants something to release, e.g. ending someones life. To be not angry, you must release the anger itself ASAP. Some people can process but they'll not let go. In the end, it will return and will go in cycle. That's why the best solution is let it go ASAP.

For me, I follow the Bible verse above. There is no peace if I kept this negativity in me, given that I'm a Christian, and it was stated in the Bible. Anger must be let go before the sun goes down, I take that literally. God forgives us, why we can't forgive if we are already forgiven by Him. For a Christian reading this, are you able to live those verses mentioned above?

“I have made a covenant with my eyes; How then could I gaze at a virgin? — Job 31:1

How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping it according to Your word. — Psalm 119:9

Your word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against You. — Psalm 119:11

I don't know, maybe in most Christian weddings, the ceremonial “you may kiss the bride” wasn't their first kiss at all. If you're a Christian guy and also for the gals reading this thing, look at those verses above and take some time to embrace the book of Romans. I know the struggle is real, but God's mercy is new every morning.

Now you're thinking, why does the title don't have a relation to the opening part, well that's life. Gusto ko ng click bait!

Leveling up in life (Christian life) takes a lot of courage and time , and your spiritual life is tested too, always naman. I'm not an expert on these things, but I'll just throw some quick words. Parang car crash videos lang, sa isang iglap...life changing sya “ano tong pinanood ko?”

Be Founded In Christ

The sweet and landian moments are given, but if you're a Christian couple who love God the most. Take time to be rooted in Him individually & together. I won't elaborate pero dapat given na din yung: pray together, read the Bible together, do a devotion together, and it's the men who must lead these things.

I know, guys love physical stuff (mga kamay na hindi alam saan patungo) pero kamusta naman kung hatakin ka ni Satanas sa kadiliman at wala kang panlaban? Maski yung babad sa Bible nadadale boi, matindi ang laban sa part na ito, eh paano yung hindi?

Stand Beautifully

Once founded, then you can stand together beautifully. Easier said than done. Relationships takes time to build parang mga projects ng SMC, SMDC, at DMCI etc. Our relationships can stand on our own, but those founded in God are beautiful and sweet and maybe sour? Syempre if magtagal masasabi mo pa din may asim pa kayo, lol.

For His Glory

You stand together beautiful for His glory alone. The chief end of man is to enjoy God forever. Well for a couple who devoted their relationship to the Author, the goal is not just having kids, a house, a car, travel the universe, etc. It is to glorify the Author of life and the love that they have and proclaim who He is in their life.

We love, because He first loved us. — 1 John 4:19

Proverbs 18:21 NASB1995 Death and life are in the power of the tongue, And those who love it will eat its fruit.

The tongue is a double edge sword. It can fabricate anything, from peace to war and everything in between. It's been tested ages ago and this proverbs prove it, that's Solomon for you.

As someone who is hot headed and “maikli ang pisi”, ay talagang masusubukan yung pasenya ng dila. The fruit can be sweet or bitter. You will know it once you experience it. That's why some says “tame the tongue”, and I can say its a good remedy. Christ is the cure.

Developing a habit is difficult, but you can start small like what I did recently. 5 knee pushups, or an elevated one, and that will do it. Writing or reflecting in your journal for a minute or 5. Small adjustments are worth it.

Note: This is originally posted in a blog I created and deleted, named: Pinoy Habits, last 2018.

1. Know Your Why – Stop blaming and find why your always got late. One way to find this is ask yourself why for 5 times. It's a method to find key problems in businesses and factories when there's something got wrong. If you use the why for 5 times and still didn't found the real reason, don't stop until you make it. The 5 whys is your guide for it. Use it to beat your tardiness.

2. Create Time Blocks or Schedule – Write down your tasks of the day, starting from the end to the start. Time blocks assures you that you must do specific tasks in specific time and writing it backwards ascertain the amount of time you need for all the actions you must perform: 6:00 Leave Office, 9:00-6:00 Work, 8:30 Leave House, 7:00 Breakfast/Get Ready, 6:00 Exercise/Jogging, 5:00 Wake up.

3. Get Organized – Maybe your always late because your room is like Divisoria, instead of leaving home early. You spend an hour looking for that door key. Organize your things in such a way, you can get them in ease. You can use the Japanese way of sorting things: a. Tie (Where to put) – Decide the location where to put something b. Tie Hin (What to put) – Decide what item needs to put c. Tie Rio (How much to put)

4. Get Excited – If you don't want to be late, get excited on the event or task that you will do. Just think those children who are excited for their field trips and those who will watch new release movies in cinemas. They are early in the waiting line so they can have a good seat.

5. Make Gradual Changes – You're always 1 hour late, try some tips in this list to improve on time. From 1 hour, then 45 minutes, then 30 then 15 minutes until you reach the goal of not being late. In the process you will be aware of the things that affect your tardiness and in your self why your late.

6. Know Your Limitation – If beating Filipino Time (tardiness) wasn't easy and everyone know your always in that mode. You can make an excuse and inform your friends or your boss that you'll be late. Make a consideration but don't end everything here. Your goals is to beat this bad habit.

7. Create Accountability – Ask a friend and create challenges and add stakes (below) this will make you and your friend accountable to each other. Accountability makes a good habit stronger because you compete to each other and you don't want to be late forever and pay for his lunch.

8. Add Stakes – Money is big issue for Filipinos and we hate losing it. I experienced this from my last job. 5 pesos for every 30 minutes and will pay in the end of month. The higher the stake (1000 pesos)much better or donate that money to any organizations that you don't want to support. I know you'll beat tardiness or loss money

9. Commit – Write in a paper and post in your Facebook wall that you will never be late again and being on Filipino Time is not in your blood. If everyone see this from your family to your workplace, they will look forward to you no to be late. This will get you excited and thrilled.

So now that you have 9 ways to beat Filipino Time (tardiness) kababayan. How about add a 10th one that you know that can help to beat this bad habit?

You are not a prisoner to know the feeling of being corrected for what you have done wrong. School examinations and your parents' teaching surely give something worthwhile about how to be corrected when you fail and miss the mark of what needs to be done. Life is not about being like Stephen Curry throwing some 3s forever, you'll have some Rodman and O'Neal in your life to push you out of the court and feel the hardcourt like MMA.

This will be fast...

Regret and Hurt

Sabi nga ni kaibagang Emman nasan man siya ngayon, safety first kaya nasa huli ang pagsisisi. We are reminded, warned, and foretold ahead of what is good and bad yet we test the lines between life and death and taste how it feels beyond the tree of life and knowledge. Then once the quickie satisfaction ends, the thorns and thistles appear backstabbing us into an eternity of bewildering misery of dark clouds and thunderstorms. Flooding you with an unlimited supply of hurt yet...

Acceptance, and Forgiveness

Acceptance is the key, the sunshine will come but you need to see the sunset of your past as it farewells its sweet and sour goodbye, letting go, breathing away all those wrongs you have done. You can ask God to take away all the pain. His overflowing supply of forgiveness like an ocean to be fill in your teaspoon of pain will ease everything in the blink of an eye. Nothing compares to His loving arms, full of hope, and you will see a new day dawning for you given by Him. Nothing is sweeter than Jesus, your lips will surely tell.

Gratefulness

The sun now shines brightly more than diamonds in the sky. The salty sea breeze in your nostrils, feel the air of new hope, new horizons, a future that is yours from God. You are fully known by Him. The battered and bittered heart that came from a stone is now a grateful heart, softened with more than a fabric conditioner, but by Jesus alone. Now the life you have is not yours but for Him, who crosses the shittiest line for you during your selfish days, and took all the pain for you and me, so we can have a life fully.

Be grateful, forever grateful.

Goal setting is important in life, but I don't know when that idea started. Just Google it. And as we set goals. We must go there, and yes, getting there is the most hardest part of all. Losing weight, getting back in shape (from trapezoid to square), getting all those numbers back again to normal like blood pressure at sugar, whatever normal to you. You can just declare this is the new normal. Like you're 50kg before and now you're 150kg then declare it as your normal. Hindi naman natin maibabalik yung nakaraan, adding body weight is easy, trimming is a different story, like those memories from the past kung ano mang past meron ka.

Getting there, we measure the progress, parang papunta ka ng Manila di ba, if galing kang Basilan, at katatapos lang ng terror training mo, at ready na sa another photo bombing session sa MRT line 3, you measure the progress by the distance. Pero minsan mahirap sukatin yung layo mo sa kanya kung wala ka talagang pagasa. As you move closer to Manila, you know you are getting there until you set foot, katabi si Rizal sa luneta. Maynila na ako! Goal achieve yet, but what's next?

That's our next point, so what's the point in all of this ika nga ng isang awitin na hindi ka mapapasayaw kung hindi ikaw ay mapapaluha, sa dami ng eyeliner na ginamit mo, pati iris mo nalagyan, kanta din yun ah? Our point here is that goals are like family parang problema, magkakamag-anak yarn pero different clans sila except they have effect sa katawan natin, bakit na ako napunta dito? Like envy and jealousy, masakit sa tyan yan, kahit mag take ka anti-acid at omeprazole, hindi mawawala, baka mawala pati fatty liver mo. Unless isuko mo kay Lord na magsusupply ng pag-ibig na higit pa sa lahat.

Goals are family, once you achieve something like arriving on Luneta, eating balot and adobo ice cream, while a snatcher takes your wallet too kesa naman puso mo. You need another goal to accomplish. Given yarn, maybe kiss the guards that stand by with Rizal, buti sya may guard, eh puso mo, pakabit ka na lang ng CCTV, mahirap na maakyat bahay tangay puso mo.

So goals are like dominoes, masarap ba pizza nila? It doesn't end lang sa isa, kapag sinagot ka naman diba? Hindi lang doon natatapos unless tapusin nyo talaga, napaka short-term naman noon at least walang critical damage sa Pilipinas. Kung gusto mo tawagin natin si Taguro, minahal mo ba siya ng 100 porsyento, tapos na spirit ray gun ka lang. Katapusan mo na!

Nawala na sa hulog itong binabasa mo.

As we progress in certain goals, there are mini goals along with it, ano na ba tawag doon? Nag Google pa ako pambihira, Milestone.

The main goal is photo bomb sa MRT Line 3, yet at the moment, gusto mo na iuwi si Rizal pabalik ng Basilan which wala sa mini goals. Marupok ka kasi at malapit ka sa LRT Line 1 but our milestone here is you already survived sa airport (wala akong alam jan) nag Grab pa Luneta, salip pa Ortigas. Mas pinili mo sa Rizal kesa kay mother mary (let it be, let it be)

Milestone in relationships, este in goal setting, it is important para makita mo ang iyong progress kung nasaan ka na (sa puso nya), parang measuring the distance nun sumakay ka ng airplane (sori hindi pa nakasakay, baka maulit 9-11) from Basilan to Manila.

Goal setting, progress, milestones. Project manager na lang kulang, pray na hindi ka papasukin ng Sabado. As the common goal setting idea, apply SMART.

• Specific – Photo bomb MRT Line 3 Ortigas Station
• Measurable – 32 shot SLR Nikkon Kodak Film
• Achievable – Madaling lang pumunta doon
• Realistic – its a real place not just in our hearts and mind
• Time Bound – paktay na tayo, deadline, papasok ka ng Sunday?

I hope as January ends, you already have some goals in mind, like my goal last year is to write 100 chapters yet 51 pa lang ito, kasi walang nagpapadala sa Gcash ko (PM for more info), hahaha. I want to subscribe sa premium ng blog para naman makita nyo yung archive ng past ko este past chapters which is magagawa lang if premium ito, though the free one is enough naman na, the support will push me to write more, though someone already pushed me to write, that person already have the privilege to read the writer first hand. 😉

Thank you for reading. —nml

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

It's never too late to greet, and it's still January na naman. This chapter will be written in Tagalog-English, so please bear with me as we dive on the two verses below:

And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. — Deuteronomy 8:2

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. — Philippians 3:12-14

Everything is written impromptu as I think of the topic on hand. It's literally a draft. As far as I know, this topic came from a sermon, but I already forgot who the speaker is but it's one of the thousands sermon that stuck in my head and as well in my heart. There'll be addition as we go.

It talks about remembering and looking ahead in the life of faith. As they say the Christian life is impossible, and yes, this topic just shows it's hard, yet by the grace of God, the Christian can do it because Jesus already did it.

Deuteronomy 8 talks about remembering the Lord for all what He has done to Israel since day 1, leaving Egypt up until they ready to enter the land of milk and honey. The speaker, Moses didn't get a VIP pass for it, though, Joshua and Caleb did have.

The 2nd verse came from the New Testament, and it's Paul who is talking to the Philippians, and it talks about pressing forward and not looking behind. Here, you're like an athlete pressing on toward what lies ahead.

So what will you do?

And add this verse which now say don't think too much:

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. — Matthew 6:33-34

So what's the best thing to do? To remember, to look ahead, or just don't think too much and enjoy the present moment?

It's all of the above.

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. — Hebrews 13:8

All those verses above points toward a name that exist in all time phases.

In Jesus, remembering makes us grateful, the present moment makes us content, and trusting in Him builds confidence for us to face what the future can give.

So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom. — Psalm 90:12

As we face this new year, the best decision is to cling to God and His Word, and from all the things He has done for us, as we put our faith in Him alone.

To God be the glory.

Looks like I won't achieve my goal of 100 chapters this year, but I'll continue to write.

Whenever I teach how to play the guitars, I always ask the learner what he or she wants to learn. Most of the people I taught are beginners. As someone said, “begin in the end of mind,” something like that.

It took me 2 months to learn to play cleanly the open chords and the basic bar chords. There is no song yet, and the interest in playing lead guitars is out of my head. I just want to strum and play clean. As my old man says back then, “mag gujangjang ka na naman?”. I was addicted to the process of learning to play the guitars.

After a decade, it became fruitful... somehow, but I'm happy with it.

So, what is your end in mind? Things and stuff you want to be dedicated to. Maybe, world peace? Greenier earth? Less carbon emissions? Stop poverty? Never again? Patalsikin si Erap? Have a heart check, but don't follow it.

As someone said, but he is not a Ghost Fighter Character, aka Yuyu Hakushu in Nippon:

“The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it? — Jeremiah 17:9

The majority tells follow your heart, does your heart really know where ever you will go? (So lately.. )

For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the LORD, And He watches all his paths. — Proverbs 5:21

I don't know about you, but someone is looking above, who knows better than you. It's also a good thing to ask Him because, in the end, everyone will face Him.

Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. — Revelation 20:11-15