The special face of Hong Kong

It is so easy to socialize through technology and with machines in Hong Kong. In a way, I feel this option of virtual socializing, has made it more comfortable with a lot of people, than having true communication with real people here in this amazing city.

Personally, I have been “spoken to” in the same house with family through texts and emails rather than through speaking. Most significant expressions within my family have been conducted to me through whatsapp, rather than face to face.

Is this truly what communication has come to, or rather, not come to?

Have socializing through a virtual platform made it easier for people to avoid rather than commit to true communications? Where every “uncomfortable” topic or detail they feel can be made more comfortable by expressing it through a way that does not require us to see or have eye contact with the people we wish to communicate to, and perhaps then words expressed do not bear as much responsibility?

We all have to express. Expression is everything.  Everyone knows when expression is repressed, how much stress and strain we put our physical, emotional and other bodies under. But what is true expression? And have we taken an advancement in technology to perpetuate something which has the immense potential to connect people, and abused it in a way that is actually separative rather than unifying?

Texting apps available on smart phones as well as meeting through social platforms can definitely create a more convenient type of communication, where people can be brought together even when they are miles apart and in different time zones; or even within the same time zones, when the physical limitation of not being able to be at more than one place at a time (yet), we can multitask such as holding a meeting through skype while at the same time purchasing groceries for a dinner party. More than any time, we are now in a world where boundaries are no longer solid, family, work and life have the possibility of becoming one and unifying rather than completely separate ideas.

Hong Kong has a special flair of embracing technology. Here technology is welcomed rather than shunned because of fear. Everywhere in the city, people are seen serenading their hand-held machines. No fret, when we have no real socializing going on, there is always our friend, the machine, who can comfort us with a feel-good movie or excite us in a video game. Could it be that we have already felt sufficient that an inanimate object can ease our loneliness, with the added benefit that it does not come with all the messiness of relating and intimacy with people?

It may “work”, for a time. What I mean here is, untrue and unreal relating may distract us from the emptiness and the yearning to truly relate most of us feel.  But in what expense does this distraction brings?  And, what about the long term consequences? Personally, I have experienced an almost complete reliance on technology to even “see” another human being (apart from my child) during one year of my life, and that is even not regular or reception is never reliable. Honestly, how can reception through these unreal intimacies ever be smooth, when it is exactly a true intimacy that we fear? If I was not even willing to let people in who are physically close to me, how do I expect to nurture a true relationship that is miles apart? Geographic proximity is not the key, my choice to love out as well as loving in, is.

In a city where high rises decorate the skyline, it may be sad, but necessary to acknowledge that we are not a city that is built in true love. To maximize space for the highest financial return could not be a choice that is made out of true love. Yet, we are all loving human beings in the city, every single one of us. True, it may be harder for us to realize this for ourselves, with the circumstance and environment that is conditioning and running through us (if we do not choose otherwise for ourselves) every moment, but that does not refute the fact that, we are all love.

Everyone who allows themselves to truly feel, will know the essence of every single human being in this planet is unequivocally the same, and equal.

When technology is used not with the intention of true love, very easily it can become a tool for us to perpetuate lovelessness whether we are aware of it or not. Is loveless relating better than no relating? Is relating that is not out of true love, even relating at all? Perhaps it should be called separating, instead.

In the depths of our hearts, we all know the importance of true intimacy and true relating. We all feel our emptiness from time to time, even here in this sleepless “Pearl of the Orient”. Emptiness simply cannot be filled by more lovelessness. In-truth, our own emptiness cannot even be relieved by another person, or by our numbing or avoidance tactics. True intimacy and true relating have to first begin with ourselves. Emptiness can only be truly filled when we remember and consistently connect to and live our own love. With true relating with oneself, there will be the possibility of true relating with another, and another, and eventually, with the world.

In this present day, we seem to confine “intimacy” and “relationship” to only physical and romantic ones. Every single relationship, whether romantic or not, begins with the relationship to ourselves. True intimacy between a couple, does not magically happen with closing the bedroom door, but with each and every moment, both parties choosing to connect with themselves that extend to the sharing of this connection within the bedroom. Similarly, every other relationship that is not romantic, happens in the same way (just without the bedroom part).

Hong Kong, the magic is not out there . All the love, the beauty, the connection, the joy, the glory, the harmony are all right there, inside your heart.  You are so special Hong Kong, truly, in SO much more than you realize.

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Keep coming back to you

A tragedy happens in the world.

How would we feel?

Would we feel unaffected because the event is geographically very far from where we are, where life is still safe?  Would we feel concerned because that is a place we are familiar with, and have friends or family who reside there?  Would we feel particularly worried because we are where the tragedy is, and panic is running our senses?

How would we react?

Would we be calling forth with heavy emotion to “save” the people or this place?  Would we be pointing a finger to those who are “evil”?  Would we be pouring our emotions to the innocent?

Or…

Would we even in such tragic circumstances, be able to remember that this is a lesson, not a test, for us to come back to ourselves?  And it is by coming back to ourselves, that we will not be led away by emotions, which would add more destruction to what is already tragic.  It is also by coming back to ourselves, that we realize that there is no separation between humanity, whether we reside in the same geographical place or whether we are a part of the tragedy or not, for WE ARE ALL AFFECTED.  If we can hold the stillness within ourselves, this, would also affect everyone else, by not adding more panic into what is already terrifying.

On this day, let us especially remember, to keep coming back to who we truly are.

I am a little boy with little boy feelings

From the very beginning, I had a knowingness that there was a path waiting for me to carve out that goes beyond what we recognize as our confined roles in life.  The “roles” in life appeared fluid to me rather than strictly inclusive.

You could say this was a chicken and egg story.  I became a single mom and so balancing family together with career as well as with one’s inner growth is an every single day exploration.  Being a parent as well as a friend was also a delicate endeavor.

This path of fluidity is not forged with force or the feelings of insufficiency.  Rather it has  been walked with joy and anticipation, most of the time.  It was all an exploration, but mostly, deep within I know the spherical nature of an exploration is much more natural to me than a box constructed with straight lines and impenetrable walls.  It was like seeing life with the eyes of a child, nothing is impossible, everything is an adventure.  And as I approached life with a wide-eyed wonder, life greets me back with many miracles.

As the boundaries blended within my life, such as, work is not just work, it was also work with parenting; and self growth was almost always done in tandem with my child, my child and I are always learning in each moment, how to balance our own roles.  If I am to be honest and gentle to myself, there was no way I can be a parent who always uphold an invincible shield.  There are times when I am fragile and these moments had to be honored too.

Therefore feeling my own fragility and that of my child also, recognizing them in full and accepting these are a part of life, that no matter what, will keep happening.  When I am too focused on a certain role, my boy would remind me in a myriad of ways to come back to harmony.

Yesterday, he did that by saying “Mommy, I am a little boy with little boy feelings.”  This simple statement had so much gentleness but also immense power in it, that I stopped completely, then and there.  This reflection was so poignant–that whatever I have been doing, I have not been gentle enough.  And so I was reminded to be more gentle, to the both of us.  But what touched me most, is the willingness of my little boy, who is now in the tender stage of growing up into a pre-adolescent, to express the fragility that he is feeling.  No matter how much he wants to mask this tenderness in many of the circumstances in life recently, his continued opening to acknowledging these feelings to someone he trusts, is truly beauty-full.

And it is with continued honesty to myself through the impulses in the heart, as well as the clear reflections from all around,  that renews every single day, my commitment to life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just a woman

What is a woman to do after feeling the intensity of unadulterated feelings of the cosmic heart in the physical reality? Pure feelings from the heart, untampered by emotions.

What is she to do when the physical reality shifts as hastily as which it has slowly nurtured with care?

What can a woman do when the love she has grown and given to herself, seem to disappear like quicksand sucking in anything that it has touched?

What is a woman to do when the feelings of divine love expressed, is no longer encouraged to express, yet they continue to flow through her pores, her smiles, her tears, her fingers, her whispers, softly, no longer certain?

What is she to do when these feelings are magnified immensely within her heart with the moon lulling, pushing, pulling, far and near; closest and farthest from the sun, and the expression implodes?

She is just a woman.

It is natural to feel and honor her feelings.  Her feelings run mad and become emotions.  And all she could do was to honor them too.

And then and only then, the woman discovers there is much to learn and the feeling of failure and rejection is not here to be against her.

She knows that realities can change both ways, if a possibility is opened; but she is disinterested in creating or manifesting if it is not of love anymore.

She remembers the deep love that flowed through her, on that one day, reciprocated and felt in the human existence, in full intensity of co-creation; so she knows, she has already experienced what she has come here to.  It does exist.

And she knows another experience, is in-truth, another reminder and continued livingness to discover that the only medicine for humanity is to be truly who we are, in every moment, within any reflection.

She is thankful that every step forward, has brought her closer to the truth of who she is.  Her pledge is to be true in each breath, breathing deeply in honesty, every fragility, every realization.

She is just a woman, who cannot but be love.

And even if she has to walk alone, she cannot but be she.

The heart

Any heart is like your baby.

Hearts are to be nurtured, honored, simply because they are the place where all magic is shared and lived.  A heart is sacredness magnified . We do not simply pay attention to a heart when there is desire or magnetizing attraction, any heart deserves to be respected.  Being careless with one heart, we open our hearts to be careless by another; sometimes we go through lifetime after lifetime as such, until the gift of the heart is forgotten.  We have forgotten what it is to Love.

Any baby is to be cherished.

Babies are born innocent, they are portals into purity, and so is an unadulterated heart.  There is only truth in the heart.  The language of the heart is openness, transparency and honesty, spoken in the unity of harmony and joy, that which is Love.  The heart is our remembrance into the unity that we began as, and she has to be lived for the remembrance to be activated.

When we honor fully the truth of the heart, the body will age well and grace will be in our every breath.

Those in remembrance of the heart, live solely for the remembrance of others.

Please, be true and gentle with all hearts.  They are all the babies of our future.

兩極

Celebration

I live because I am.
I smile because it is natural.
I am here for an impulse within to serve.
I walk across the mountains, carrying life’s burdens, wearing my good leather shoes or no shoes at all.
I dress up every day according to my heart, for that IS the purpose.
I paint my nails because my hands and feet express in colors.
I eat and drink not because of schedules, tastes or conditioning, but how my body feels this moment.
I sprint, I pause, I collapse, whenever it is truly called for.
I teach my eyes to see through the heart, so every moment I am with beauty.
I am the mother, the father, the friend, sometimes all at the same time to my child.
When I am lonely or sick, I humbly invite my soul to be with me again.
I say thank you when I wish to cry.
I celebrate all that I am.

The Real Me

From young I taught my child the real him is that which is, and everything else is that which is not.

The real him is when he is simply living his Essence, nothing but the open radiance that he is. He is openly loving, not in contraction in needing love. He is pure joy and no living being can argue that.

As a wee babe, he lives this state much more. With growing up, he has chosen to experience other states which are not the full truth of him. Just like everyone of us.

Consequently, there will be more time when he is lost in the emotions that run him—anger, especially, and if he continues to deny his overwhelming feelings, he will very frequently turn to numbing activities such as television and video games, in attempts to block out these feelings.

Only because of my own long and tedious journey and eventual choice to return, has allowed me the awareness to witness my child’s process. And honestly, never is this easy for a mother to face in truthfulness.

Some moments I will fall into the emotional trap too, other times in desperation I may revert to control, only because I have absorbed my son’s pain, which sometimes ignite my own and am looking desolately for a way out of it. Yet these never work in the true sense, as they do not bring either of us back to the harmony that we are.

I began testing other ways, for my boy, as well for myself. I allowed him his time and his outbreaks if necessary, but rather than taking the energy on, I worked on my own non-interference and non-absorbing skills. When I am more than not in my own inner-heart, the stillness remains even though my baby is in an outburst, and how immensely important it is for me to be that stillness, especially when he is not, for the both of us.

This morning, my child woke up after a deeply revitalizing sleep. He came to me in a strong hug and said, “I am the true me”.

I held him tight, looked straight into his eyes, and said, “This, is what I would like to honor you for, the whole and true you. Not your grades at school, not anything else, but this. Even if you only live this for a brief moment, because of my Love for you, I would like to remind you of this.”

What more do we live for in life, but for these moments of Soul-full connection, when one by one, we remember. With remembrance and honesty, then the choice becomes ours. And there is nothing more precious than meeting each other in our trueness.

I truly love you.

It is all very quiet

It is all very quiet.

Crowds everywhere, nicam languages, money clothes, unending dining, new year merchandise, friends, family, business associates…

But all is very quiet.

Within my heart.

I heard my heart song.

The body chaperoning the mind, well, almost always.

(Oh, how sweet.)

But first my face grew tender, a smile unfolding like tendrils.

I felt the fire.

Warming my blood on a 6C night.

The wind joining in the carousing of the festivities, yet

I was awed, intoxicated by the fire of my heart.

It is all very quiet.

I became the fish

That did not get wet.

And slithered into oblivion.

A little heart-full story

This morning as I walked over the hills, I saw a note and an acorn.

This is very unusual.  We almost never see another human being here. So I picked up a rock and wrote a heart in gratitude.

When I returned home, a smiley face greeted me.

Sometimes, all we need is to open our hearts and our eyes will witness the beauty around, and a simple heart-felt exchange will make Love go around.