learning to embrace yourself

I like being able to embrace things.


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Dear everybody,

Please pardon me, if you decide to read this whole chunk, and find me a bit incoherent. Or if you find that I am repeating myself, or that I am getting out-of-point, or anything. It tends to happen. And anyway, this is an excerpt of what I wrote in my diary earlier today (or well, tonight) that I thought I'd like to share. God bless you :)


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There is something wonderful about sitting outside school at the long bus-stop when it's dark and it's quiet and the cars pass by and you're just waiting peacefully with the cool night air.

Okay actually, I think it's just the night air and feeling peaceful part.


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I like being able to embrace things :)

I think I've come to a point where I've pretty much learnt to embrace myself for who I am, past those angsty wish-I-were-someone-else teenager days. Okay well at almost 19 I still am a teen. But anyway. There were those days when I wished I were as smart as the someone else who got straight A's without studying, or that fast runner or athletic person who excelled at every sport, or that very pretty girl, or that talented musician, or that person who seemed to be all of the above. I don't ever dive into "intelligent conversation" neither will I be much good in joining in talk about what goes on on TV. I seem to almost always be either here or there– we have the sporty Chin Siew (that's my sister) and the artsy Chin Ee (that's my sister too) and I'm halfway between both (Chin Siew won't go visit the museum with Chin Ee, Chin Ee won't go climb the mountain with Chin Siew. Chin Mei (that's my sister, too) might do both, I most probably will do both). I'm okay at design, but not great. I’m okay with this and that, but not great at any, I feel. Here's and there's, in-betweens, neither this nor that...


But well, like I said, I've come to embrace myself for who I am :) I don't have to be like you because you're better in something else I want to be good at (well, who doesn't want to be good at everything?) I've pretty much learnt to be happy as I am. I guess it also comes from knowing who I am in Christ :) I won't say I've completely "found" myself yet. I think I'll have to find out what I'm truly happy doing (as in like, as a job). Bur well, life is also a continual self-discovery process. You constantly find out new things about yourself. You may think you know yourself well. But really, you don’t. Being with people helps you with that process. After all, it’s people and things that rub us and change us, moulding us into who we are. And of course, God, because God sends the people and things.


I think I like myself for who I am now.

I don’t mean that I am perfect. I don’t perfect people are very completely likeable anyway, in a way, because they’d be too unreal :/ I have my flaws : ) And there are times when I feel so completely not confident and sure of myself, the things I do, the decisions I make. Like when I taught my small group this Sunday, and felt horrible because I thought it was a messy lesson, though I prepared hard for it, or when I mess up a presentation, or when I make a wrong decision and someone (unintentionally) gets hurt because of that. But. Still. Ohwell. It’s all part of being human. And we have God’s grace to get us through. : ) Yeps.


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So. Um. Back to… embracing myself.

Yeps. So now, I pretty much embrace myself. And I like that. It makes me happy. Haha. And I think you should learn to embrace yourself as well, if you haven’t learnt to do so. Like Judy Garland said, “always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.” Besides, doesn’t it feel better to do what you do and say what you say because it’s purely, authentically, so originally YOU? Why try to be someone else you’re not? And anyway, God made only one of you, and you are You, because you are YOU! And you’re special because you are you, and not because…you’re someone else or whatever. So embrace yourself for who you are, for who God made you to be :)

You are you because you laugh in that way, because you’re not good at maths and science but are musically talented, because you can’t tell jokes well but you’re good at making people feel comfortable in another way, because though you can’t hit the super high note when you sing but still you’re able to worship God because you even have a voice, which sounds to Him sweet because of your hearts love for Him. You are you because though you might not be an ambitious person, a person without long-term goals, and you think that isn’t good because everybody has goals, the good is that you’re able to trust God to take you step by step and to always provide. You are you because God created you most wonderfully, and He loves to see you laugh the way you do, and smile the way you smile, with or without teeth (haha) and because you are His loved one, safe in His secure arms which you know will protect you and cherish you forever.

Know who you are in Christ, know who God is to you– it helps, a lot. Comforter, friend, joy-giver? Provider, faithful One, God above all? :)


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Embrace this God-given life. Like Rick Warren puts in his Purpose Driven Life book, why would God give you another day if you chose to waste this one? So yeps, embrace this life you’ve been blessed with. And take time to appreciate. Slow down once in a while, and sit down at that quiet bench with the night air and look around, and feel Him all around you as you be grateful for all wonder around you. Learn to just soak, and…just bask in His amazing love, His agape, generous, selfless love.