2024 HIGHLIGHTS: Part 2

 I finally fulfilled my promise to my favorite son his dream vacation in Japan. It took me 20 years to save for this Anime Package Tour which cost me an arm and leg (make that 2 arms and 2 legs heheheh . . .) but no amount of money could equal the happiness on my son’s face when he eventually experienced his long-time obsession.

The 9-day Tour was a learning experience for me. Though I was not familiar with Anime, seeing my son in Cloud 9 was all worth it. We were in a group from different nations but the composition was unexpected in this age and time. There were 3 couples, 1 family, 1 mother & daughter AND surprise of all surprises—there were 4 mother & son tandems! I was quite shocked that there still exists Mama’s boys from different parts of the globe . . .

To be continued . . .

2024 HIGHLIGHTS: Part 1

 Just with the blink of an eye, January 2025 is almost over! With all the fuzz and the buzz of the Christmas Season festivities, we did not even have the time to pause and reflect what transpired in 2024. What made us jubilant, what brought us down. What were the lessons learned?

Join me as we go back in time to feel once again the happy moments, the priceless memories, the painful experiences. If your life in 2024 were to be documented in a movie, what would it be like? Would it be hopelessly Romantic? Heart-pumping thriller? Feel-good comedy? Tear-jerking drama? Or would it be close to a Multi-awarded Variety show? Hoping it won’t be a gripping Suspense/Horror movie!

Close your eyes and bask in the silence of your heart. Reminisce as far as you can.

In a nutshell, my 2024 was explosive!

Top of my List is something I still could NOT believe I did: Riding the plane 17 times last year—13X with my son Gio and 4X with my daughter Eia.

To be continued . . 

Do It Anyway

Inspirational Lines from St. Teresa of Kolkata:

People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered; FORGIVE them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives; be KIND anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and true enemies; SUCCEED anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; be HONEST anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; BUILD anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; be HAPPY anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; DO GOOD anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough; give the world the BEST you’ve got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, IT IS BETWEEN YOU AND GOD; it was never between you and them anyway.

The Wife is the Cause of her Husband’s Headache and the Husband is the Cause of His Wife’s Heartache

This is according to our guest priest in this morning’s mass, trying to put humor in his sermon. As expected, the congregation had a good laugh, forgetting for a moment the excruciating headaches and heartaches they were going through because of their respective spouses.

But me? I heaved a deep sigh of relief after painful memories kept flooding back. I silently murmured to myself—“thank God wala na akong asawa! (thank God I don’t have a husband anymore!)”

There is no perfect marriage. Somewhere along the way conflicts will come and go. There is no one-fits-all prescription when to let go and when to hold on. I strongly suggest you seek professional and/or spiritual help when you are physically or emotionally abused. You need to take care of yourself so you can take care of the precious people you dearly love.

Love yourself will you?

First Love Never Dies

 Why am I suddenly talking about First Love now, when it’s the Feast of the Epiphany?

Well, it is for the simple reason that my First Love reminded me that I have neglected writing in my blog for so long already.

Thank you, my friend. This 2025, I will try my very best to be less delinquent.

To all of you, my dear readers, hope you had a memorable Christmas celebration. If 2024 was a good year for you, then make 2025 better. If it was bad, learn from your mistakes and make 2025 a good one. There will always be things beyond your control. The perfect plan will sometimes fail. It is OK to cry when things go wrong. Let it all out. When in doubt, ask for guidance. There will always be people who will be against you even though you feel you are the kindest person on earth. And even if you’re weird and crazy at times, your true friends will always stand by you and love you for who you are. 

Let us all have an amazing 2025!

I LOVE YOGA: SOUTH WELLNESS HUB

 At 65, I conquered LUNETA TO TAGAYTAY 60km ULTRAMARATHON with the addition of YOGA in my training program. Initially, I was just there to bond with my only son, thinking that I was too old to practice yoga. But Coach Emy was patient enough to show mercy on me heheheh . . ,

In running, you get a different kind of high when you “fly” but after that, you endure the pains in your thighs, knees, legs and feet. The opposite is true with yoga. While doing the different poses, you endure the pains all over your body but after that, your whole body feels incredibly light and you sleep soundly through the night free from all cares in the world.

You wake up the following morning miraculously refreshed and rejuvenated. You notice you have become stronger and face the day’s activities with more ease. 

The day will come when I have to give up running races but I will definitely practice yoga for as long as I live. I have full trust and confidence in Coach Emy’s ability to devise a specialized FLOW SEQUENCE plan for pre-centenarians!

(Thanks for dropping by. You may chat with me via Messenger or reach me at ndelr62@gmail.com. Stay safe everyone!

Hold On To Hope

Bro Bo Sanchez described 2 extremely opposing ways of dealing with sadness. In the first scenario, a person quickly dismisses sadness as if it is a contagious disease and pretends that it never existed. Dedma lang. In the second scenario, people nurture sadness and become so comfortable with it that it now defines who they are. At times, in the attempt of evading sadness, we tend to overwork or overeat. At the other spectrum, we make sadness our home and through time, we get used to people’s sympathy over our pitiful state.

But how should sadness be confronted?

For the first time, I heard that sadness enters our lives for a certain purpose. If we just brush it off, we are not allowing it to serve its purpose. We have to feel sadness. And we have to feel it in the presence of God. Only when we feel sadness that we find the meaning behind this dreadful emotion. Thus, ignoring it will not lead us to making the right decisions in our lives. 

We seek God’s guidance to take us out from the dark. This is the time that we should hold on to hope. Hope that things will be better for us. When we don’t feel sadness in the presence of God, it is very easy to lose hope and succumb to despair and desolation. Personally, I believe that the greatest among these three— Faith, Hope and Love—is HOPE. Without hope we can lose our faith and hinder our ability to love.