I’m just telling you we barely have countable days before the noche buena. But will you be home this Christmas?

It’s sickeningly sweet remembering the festive media noche we had. There is nothing special this year. It’s maybe not yours but mine. My Yuletide isn’t that much exciting and that’s for two years now in a row.

Christmas Lanterns (Credit to the rightful owner of the photo)

But for many, as we approach the Yuletide Season, it is becoming a different atmosphere. It is somewhat bringing us the feeling of more inches higher of being elated from shopping to dining 'til whooping up getting the best Christmas gift.

Back in the Philippines I always had Christmases being away from home but it‘s just a boat-ride away and there was not much emptiness you would feel for you were just around with friends and just within the same border celebrating the same spirit. Now, it’s different for it takes crossing many borders before your mind reaches home to celebrate Christmas. And, it’s very different in every aspect of it.

December, as always, is a nostalgic month for most people who are away from home whether an OFW or whether a student traversing to a more independent zone. This nostalgic feeling has been largely aggravating anyone’s emotion especially those who have been separated from home the first time.

Now here’s to that nostalgic emphasis. In The British Psychological Society’s archived article placed on its web, The Psychologist, the term ‘nostalgia’ derives from the Greek words nostos (return) and algos (pain). The literal meaning of nostalgia, then, is the suffering evoked by the desire to return to one’s place of origin. Suggesting the adverse symptoms displayed by Swiss mercenaries in the service of European monarchs in the olden times, the term came to be coined by the Swiss physician Johannes Hofer (1688/1934). He thought of it as a cerebral disease and believed that it was caused by the quite continuous vibration of animal spirits through those fibers of the middle brain in which impressed traces of ideas of the Fatherland still cling. However, J.J. Scheuchzer, a physician, opposed Hofer’s idea and proposed that Swiss mercenaries’ nostalgia was due to the variations in atmospheric pressure they experienced as they descended from their Alpine homes to fight on the plains of Europe. Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries the view of nostalgia as a medical disease persisted. The 20th century saw nostalgia as a psychiatric disorder.

However, psychologists recently have focused on the positive and therapeutic aspects of nostalgia. Though surmising, but many studies revealed how such feeling of aloneness juxtaposes a healing self. A report from University of Southampton psychologist Constantine Sedikides and his colleagues in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, affirmed to this position. In the culled researches of Marina Krakovsky which she collaborated in her article, Nostalgia: Sweet Remembrance, through the online Psychology Today, she said that “occasional detour down memory lane can give [one’s] spirit[s] a significant lift.”

Remarkably, studies offer these silver linings, that is, while we posit a positive attitude towards being nostalgic:
1. Thinking of good memories for just 20 minutes a day can make people more cheerful than they were the week before and happier than if they think of their current lives, researchers from Loyola University concluded. University psychologist Fred Bryant furthered that reminiscing can give you a sense of being rooted, a sense of meaning and purpose – instead of being blown around by the whims of everyday life.
2. Nostalgia is a potent mood booster. Psychologist Tim Wildschut and colleagues at the University of Southampton in the U.K. disclosed that since memories often star important people in our lives, they may give us a comforting sense of belonging.
3. Nostalgic people have high self-esteem and are less prone to depression.
4. Nostalgia counteracts effects of loneliness, by increasing perceptions of social support.
5. Nostalgia gives us a greater sense of continuity and meaning to our lives for it provides a link between our past and present selves – providing us with a positive view of the past.

Just like any other humans, I have always been visited by this nostalgic fever. Thanks to cellphone, I can flip the memories left behind at the precious captures with my family. Thanks to the internet, the good old days are still fresh with every album my classmates and friends personalized on their social networking pages where I am free to join them in every wishful browsing they make looking at their newborns, left-behind loved ones, and the wackiest experiences we had in schools and everywhere.

For Marina Krakovsky, you don't have to wait for nostalgia to strike. These steps can help make it a regular part of your life:
1. Make a list of cherished memories, but for best result, Sonja Lyubomirsky, a psychologist at the University of California at Riverside, suggests to reminisce in your head rather than on paper.
2. To jog your memory, find some photos or other mementos from good times past.
3. Close your eyes to block distractions. Then think about what's outside the "picture frame" to bring back subtle details. Mental imagery produces greater happiness gains than does simply looking at old photographs.
4. If possible, reminisce with people from your past. It strengthens close relationships.
5. As you go about your life, sock away good moments and mementos for later reminiscence. Take a mental snapshot and hold on to that feeling.

Beyond being nostalgic, there are still many ways we celebrate the yuletide with just a couple or three to gather around the little table. Yes, Filipinos always thrive, in any way and in any part of our world, or away from our comfort zone.

Filipinos always survive! A merry Christmas to everyone!

Thanks to my good professor, Madam Fe Reyes. It was kind of her to teach us the value of learning literature in a scholarly manner. My years in the master’s program at the national university were solidly hashed out. From her, I learned that understanding a literary piece is not the simple skin-deep text recognition but a burrowing into the cryptic design of each word.

The Man with the Hoe (Credit to the rightful owner of the photo)

Then, here's Monsieur Abe. He is my boss. He is a guy next door but he doesn't show off. He is even enigmatic about his life as a Yale University graduate in a bachelor and a master’s degree in business, and in engineering on the other. Whew! He is an heir, too, to a family business. He remains to be low profiled. He's teaching everybody the walk to simplicity behind life's grandeur and dexterity.

Both of them belong to different times – one is in her 60s while the other in his 20s. They are two people who hail from different horizons - one is a Filipino while the other a Saudi. Yes, they are two different individuals who have every difference, but there is one thing which time has afforded them to be the same; both of them have been learning and unlearning the wisdom behind the mystery of the hoe.

June 15, 2008 (Father's Day) - I was twelve years old when my parents put me to work at their small soap factory in Ada, Michigan. For thirty-five cents an hour I was responsible for watering the lawns and weeding the flower beds. At that time my father, Rich DeVos, and his partner, Jay Van Andel, were busy building their company. Yet no matter how busy Dad seemed to be, he was always there for me with an encouraging smile and the kind of attention that made me feel special, even though I was one of four children. His praise for a job well done filled me with pride. I didn’t realize it at that time, but through those simple tasks I was being taught the values… That was how New York Times bestselling author Dick DeVos accounted his one beautiful life with his father in his book Rediscovering American Values.

It can’t be denied that we envy the kind of life Dick had. Just last week I got that quick sampling of students and workmates with the question, “Between your father and mother, who’s closer to you?” Their votes were indeed sufficient to say that 96% was for mothers.

My father is the opposite of Dick’s. He grew up to be work-oriented toiling hard for his family even before he got his own. Growing without a father to look up to, he was inclined to huddle for every cent just to feed my lola and his other siblings. That was one thing that contributed to his being strong and being strict to us his children. As a grown-up I used to asking about the why’s in the family. I used to ask why papa always scolded aside from punishing us capitally when mama just would love to punish us verbally. There were always differences in their rearing. I used to ask why papa always had to punish us only when he was in the influence of alcohol and mama had to anytime of the day. I used to ask why papa had to do this worst thing to mama in front of us when they could have done it away from us. My papa could have been elusive.

While we see the good side in our fathers, we do more seeing the other side of them. We look at them as less expressive, less caring, drunkard, strict, remote, and much more. Many young Filipinos believe that fathers do not have the feeling which mothers possess. Always, fathers are machismo. They are not emo individuals. They do not show that feeling of being open to all talks than mothers do.

But, fathers understand our needs of being understood. It is just that they are much akin to sponges which absorb everything they see and hear in the family and only when enough courage and cautious times permit then they talk.

It could have been a great effect to the Filipino family’s way of life when colonialism had caused upon us. Our foreparents lived very tragic lives. From the Spanish to the American occupations, our forefathers were forced to leave home to work for the colonizers leaving the family. At one point, our other forefathers had to flee from mountain to mountains just to be part of the guerillas to fight back the colonizers. While most women had to work at home for the children, others served as comfort women for the colonizers too. Unlike mothers, the role of fathering was gone because of the inadequacy to respond to due to their absence. There was that never ending trauma within the Filipino family. The value of togetherness that should have been imparted by both parents in the family was lost for 400 years. If it would be difficult for parents to mold close relationship within family with the children for 20 years and with fathers to be open to their children, how much more for that 400 years. That Filipino heritage should have been passed on from one generation to the next, but it was put in vain. It was never imbibed in us. The anxiety that was once felt still reverberated in today’s generation. That’s why Veterans still look forward to the happy days they had that were lost during wartimes. Comfort women too tried to share their stories that today’s youth may mirror the tragedies they had. Fathers cannot still find the true orientation they should possess because of the role gap which got lost in transition.

Since time immemorial, fathers have been the head of the family. Kingdoms were always ruled by kings, empires by emperors, and tribes by datus. The society is even controlled by the male populace. That is how man openly asserts his status. He is seen as strict, domineering, and hard. Children tend to move aback from them because that is how we see them.

Regaining back Filipino moments bound by olden-day heritage which were eminent then before the Spanish occupation is hard to do. Mothers are lucky for always being remembered by their children. Fathers are forgotten. If psychology’s complexities – Oedipus and Electra – were just brandishing that inequality and differences among children then the family members created unfair rule among themselves.

At 11:46 am I texted my mama to great my father a “HAPPY FATHER’S DAY!” It has only been two years when I found that close attachment with my father, only then when I went home escaping from work which almost ended me AWOL and surprised him with a very first birthday party in his life. That day of 2005 was my first to see him teary-eyed. The second I know was this morning when my mama replied of how papa reacted on the message I sent him. It is wonderful to know that the silence in him was finally broken.

Day after day, he is the father who looks forward to have us by his side being told all fairy tales that only mama knows. He is wanting to keep us within reach that he can turn back the failing and ailing times where we were yet looking for that fatherly moment. Only the past two years that I finally knew the answers to my why’s on him. Yet, he is my legendary father.

To the FATHERS and to your FATHERS out there, say, HAPPY FATHER'S DAY! to them. #

May 11, 2008 (Mother's Day) - A highest possible score of 100. A classmate who got 98. And, a galling score of 78. After a long reporting stint in my EDL 261 I should have to bog down but bobbed up my mind before I went to rest. Voila! Everything went out dizzily from my mind that all I can remember before I fell to bed after arriving from a whole day class is that I was musing in the jeepney going to SM Cebu of my discomfort after getting 78. I wasn’t relieved of the fact that I did poorly in my Mid-Term I took last week. Enough! I told myself after scrambling all the receipts I had in my side pocket which only then I remembered that I went to the doctor yesterday morning for a checkup. It was then I remembered that I went out from my Mid-Term exam in Socio 220 to rush to a clinic on a high day due to scattering red spots. I was fourteen minutes late from 11:30’s docking of my Socio 220 but I needed to take my Mid-Term back. Thankful, my dear professor gave me an extension. I was in total crisis of everything yesterday, that I ended up answering only one question of two. I couldn’t put any critique on education. More, I was totally lost for the Filipino family question. I had overly been reading PCIJ's Robbed and Michael Tan’s A Reconfigured Filipino Family but I still hadn’t written something on my paper. Tabularaza visited me that day. What the heck! By next week, I’ll expect another overkilling of my grade, should I further, at stake is my GPA this trimester.

My bedtime rest was awakened, headset still attached to my ears, by an overtime evening news feed. Exactly, it was 8:43. My stomach began to grumble, forgotten that I had not eaten my supper, I hurried to have it but on my way to Lapu-Lapu City I happened to pass a group of people at the vicinity of Mc Donald. More and more were flocking, overheard that there was an ongoing hostage drama. Another? But this time there’s that sociologist George Ritzer’s coined word McDonaldization of hostage dramas. It’s something a new strategy or theme to consider after that (still) standoff hostage drama in Manila. Wonderment of the passing scene wasn’t that much for me but wandering was all over my head. But, I never forgot my menu that evening which included the usual 2 cups of rice (which still confuses my workmates why I am still that thin when I gobble more than the usual carbo) and steak. Water filled up the entire meal.

So many things occupied my mind. Alongside, I never forgot my side dish which was one in my birthday to-do list. It had been set sometimes the first quarter of this year that I should call my Mama at exactly 12am to be the first to greet Happy Mothers’ Day. Verily, I did call my Mama and greeted her another wishful motherly morning beyond her oblivious sleep affair. Her voice seemed concealed. I noticed that she was disturbed by the ring I gave her but she was happy, after all!

Past 12am. I was earbashing myself of not being able to sleep earlier. Monologue came in. I was struggling myself of the why and why-nots to bedtime. Suddenly, came another thought of the conversation I had with my Mama. I asked myself, “What’s beyond Mama’s voice?” To me, there was dryness in her voice. That dryness is symbolically a gutted moment of aging for women.

Patrice Fagnant-MacArthur, editor of Spiritual Woman, discreetly pointed out the reality of new motherhood crisis. As early as giving birth, a woman already experiences crisis in life. She said, a woman asks, “Who exactly am I now that I am a mother?” In her book, The Gift of Change, Marianne Williamson writes, “When a woman gives birth, two are born: a baby is born from the womb of its mother, and a woman is born from the womb of her former existence.” For a woman that’s quite interesting to know more.

We, children, are just too quiet to understand our mother’s feelings. Often, we don’t understand how they feel about things they see day by day as these change. I admit that this idea just happens to perk up in my interest after I gave my Mama a call. The ultimate anxiety a mother experiences in life is not instantly laid down. It’s not commonly seen. It may be relative. It may be conditioned by human circumstances. Along with the mother’s thrust of raising a child and family is that considerable lookout of the odds that might affect and threat family’s foundation. She has to protect everybody. As she begins to act maturely, she also understands the variety of a woman’s anxiety. That’s even more aggravating for an aging mother. I should say if there’s crisis for new mothers, there are also a lot more of this for aging mothers. That’s how I see crisis in my Mama which she can’t explain and express to us frontally. The new mother has crisis on how she will be able to respond and experiment home with a new life while an aging mother has crisis on how she could keep closely with her all the lives she gave birth. There is joy after a temporal crisis in a new mother because she can still see that joy in the eyes of her growing child. But for an aging mother, there is sadness after seeing her children becoming grown-ups, growing as men and women, who will eventually be leaving her for them to build a family of their own. You can’t tell her how she’d be able to look in your eyes as you were back when you were young because your presence is obstructed by your separation. She can’t see your eyes in that mileage distance. You can’t tell her that you’ll see her in December. Not on her birthday. Not until something happens to her badly. That’s reality. This is her crisis, again. This is where I always remember the times my Mama had to give me that selfless care. She’d always recall how worst cases made her stronger just like battling sleepless nights and attending my hysteria. Her crisis is always keeping her abreast much that her strength has been used up and her agony has been prolonged as care has been extended to us, her six children.

My day-to-day works often place me to forget my Mama. That’s my crisis, too. We both have crises but hers is, though not apparent, heartbreaking while mine is still manageable with every coping mechanism. In a given day, I could not live up to what I should do completely. For me, a day is not enough to end the scheduled daily tasks. I notice that for the past days I happened to text her only a few times, only when circumstances push me to do so. She’s been deprived of my simple hi and hello. I remember when I was inside the taxi going to a doctor for my check-up the other day, I found myself on the verge of losing for I was very sickly as if I could not move my body and I felt that high fever. With that condition I had, it was very rare that I got my cellphone and browsed through my phonebook to edit the name of my Mama and added ICE before her name. The moment gave me a recollection of the article I read just the past week that one common thing people often forget about upon leaving the house is knowing and identifying anybody in the family to contact with in case of emergency (ICE), and that's needed to be tucked in. That, I, too, decided to add the acronym. But why my Mama when all of us seven in the nuclear family have handy phones? It’s all because there’s something in mothers which is beyond doubting. It’s all because there are two welcoming arms which always embrace us, there are two ears which always hear us, two eyes which see us, and one heart which always feels the very least of what we feel for them.

When Mama is in crisis, too, I cannot help but only think of her as somebody I prepare for a future visit in an almost empty household. But just like you I never know when. She’s making the most of her time doing household chores just to forget the emptiness in a place which was once called home. She’d make herself busy attending small business just to let time pass to put pressure on to another barren days of her life. Though, we are not accountable for what we should do to them as they grow old but for them it’s a great joy in their hearts seeing you back and looking you straightly in your eyes. It pays off for a mother to hear the laughter back in a once childish year we had. Amidst crisis, they are still hopeful to bring good times back. Beyond all those skimpy lifestyle shift they have, in their hearts and minds they are longing the slimmest shadow of our presence, eager and just waiting for us all to say, “Welcome home, anak!”

My Mama knows she’s very special to me. She knows her children appreciate every little thing she does in the family and that's more than love. She knows that beyond the sickening letting-go we have to award her that coming back, in space and time. From her children and Papa, we wish her that lasting strength and vision to see us all one passing day.

To the MOMS and to your MOMS out there, say, HAPPY MOTHERS’ DAY! to them. #

Now is Summer 2009.

Bikini Open (Credit to the rightful owner of the photo)

Have heard of bandini (a bikini using a bandeau-style top), tankini (a long tank-style top paired with bikini bottoms), camikini (quite similar to the tankini in its design, however, it generally pairs a more structured, camisole-type top with bikini bottoms to provide more support for women with large breasts), and Rudi Gernreich’s monokini (topless swimsuit)? They’re just offshoots of the bikini of 1946.

Who’s never danced into the groove of Brian Hyland’s Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini? This song of the 60’s spoke of the mildly indecent way bikini was perceived by people in those years and inspired them to a bikini-buying spree. But, you never know that the song was immortalized only after 14 years of bikini’s breakthrough. Summer of 1946, it was a year after the end of WWII when simultaneously America had conducted nuclear tests on July 1 off Bikini Atoll, one of the 29 atolls and five islands that compose the Marshall Islands located north of the equator in the Pacific Ocean, and at stake were two French designers contesting as to who could introduce to the public a revolutionary 2-piece swimsuit. On July 5, fashion designer Jacques Heim's creation, which he called the Atome (after the particle), dubbed as “the world's smallest bathing suit,” was first shown to beachgoers in Cannes and in a fashion show at Piscine Molitor in Paris. Two months later, Louis Réard, a mechanical engineer-turned-fashion designer, worked with a mere 27½ inches from a bolt of cloth, took his design a step further — dropping the bottom half of his two-piece suit below the navel. It was barely a couple of hankies stitched together with string. Delighted with his provocative invention, he introduced his masterpiece as “The bikini — smaller than the smallest bathing suit in the world.”

The term bikini was never having an etymology to refer to its physical structure and origin of existence or language. Many etymologists assumed that the term was originated on Réard’s belief that his creation would create the same jaw dropping and shockingness equal in its reverberation to that of the atomic bomb’s detonations.

For men’s bikini, speedoes go likely to mean the same.

However, the world’s acceptance of bikini was taken aback due to its scandalous makeup. The United States even had 15 years of sublimation. Media’s influence through films made bikini a pop-culture symbol. Its wide acceptance was levered through the introduction of a bikini icon in 1962’s Dr. No, first James Bond series, Ursula Andress in here filmed white bikini. The rest followed.

There was the making. There was the sophistication. There was the scandalous apprehension.

Today, there’s the rub. It’s not the rub of the past struggles of the designers but rather the rub of a maligning use of this thing to cultural inflection. There’s something working ineffectively in today’s culture with what Heim and Réard had awfully pieced into craft. The wonder of bikinis had even got a rude interest even in the 1950’s Miss World Pageant. Exactly, it was because of the conservatives who wanted to outdo sensuous and exposed life.

Here in the Philippines, bikinis have never spurred much in acceptance as Westerners do. Bikinis do not form part as a beach apparel prototype for every Pinoy and Pinay doing summer clothing list. There is a very good deal on the matter such that there’s still the presence of conservatism among Filipinos in today’s age. But, the explosion of bikinis as one clothing line is not the major concern; it’s all about its existence of use as adhered by Pinoys and Pinays in an immodest way – the bikini contest.

The Philippines has its simple history of bikini contest. It all started in 1990 with a body building contest whose objective is to display men and women’s physique. Today, it has definitely shifted its course from a wholesome image and body projection to a daring glamorous sexual activity.

In the Philippines’ social status quo, celebrities define the use of bikinis through presenting it publicly in the modest fashion showcase. There’s the lineage of presenting bikinis only for advertisement or promotion. For these celebrities, dressing up, going up on stage, romping, and strutting are just designs of their work on the limelight as star-studded and privileged individuals. They’re not into money but they’re into that prestige of being one of those body-beautiful Filipinos which are to be adored and be idolized by the mass. On the other hand, there are those individuals who are seeking the limelight courageously and painstakingly. These individuals are ordinary fortune seekers who make headway to join contested limelight to earn money for daily financial stability and to help support the family. It is undeniably a condition, set in every Filipino’s mind, of seeking easy money using the body rather than risking oneself to jobs which need higher qualifications.

Summer time is always bikini time. It’s always a time to spend a lot more watching bikini contests rather than wearing bikinis. Bikini contests can take place in bars, nightclubs, at beaches, beauty pageants, and even in the internet. These are the avenues of those ordinary fortune seekers. There are those who love watching these shows conditioned upon the idea of belongingness, socializing, orienting with pleasure, and going with the in thing. But, in a more indiscreet reason, individuals love to watch the sexiness upfront to what’s always expected – men and women in few pieces. With the kind of viewing measure, the bottom line is that these individuals engaged on stage as contestants who are just being used by viewers for self gratification are prostituting themselves, showing off their bodies for an exchange of remuneration. That does not end in there, the worlds of lesbians and gays, and the worlds of dirty handlers who form themselves as event organizers and/or sponsors are greatly involved in each contestant’s plight before and after the show. After all, they are the table turners of these ignorant contestants. In an impoverished world such as ours, many people are still interested in playing games of easy money. From an ordinary bartender to the night’s winners in this provocative industry, nobody gets the fair share.
The 1946’s explosion in Bikini Atoll that released a fraction of its energy to the two French designers is still reverberating in today’s time. Today, the explosion is sending a bad energy to Filipinos making use of the piece as an avenue for pimping and another culture of prostituting. #

That was nine years back... a series of exeunts.

Somehow, it's been nine years now since I graduated from college. But, every year I always had been a witness to the many events which make people all along laugh, cry, and forge lasting welcoming back. Yes, different faces in different places, from simple to the most intricate and ambitious graduations, I saw them all. There were simple family-caught videos and photographs and a nationwide broadcast, a festive party, and unforgettable graduation balls. There were shots of goodbyes and say-cheezing to backdrop the living rooms after some years. There were sudden reconciliations and unexpected confessions.

I was about to have another height of graduating after a master's degree in the national university, but it waned for I decided to leave the country.

As I write this, I remember more than a hundred faces but countable places. It's worth the time I had been tied to some academic institutions with uncountable experiences and hopeful ambitions like professionally growing up but be dwarfed due to limited financial resources and impracticable workshifts. As they say, with different folks, you'll get different strokes. Yes, persons are shaped differently and they can be those whom you can believe, whom you can confide with, and whom you can treasure memories with them for a lifetime.

Two weeks ago, I was writing another lyrics of a graduation song for the school I had been with for sometimes. Along with, I was trying to hum different sounds to add up to the making of its melody. Though I'm not a pro to this thing, but I'm blessed to have such talent that is worth locally, and this has always been my tribute to the people I left behind with that aching sentiment of the not-to's, my students and my colleagues. Whenever I write songs of goodbyes, I'm always agog to what will be the byproduct of such song. I am not mesmerized by the gentleness of my talent, but by every word I sew to create a masterpiece that makes people remember and sing it while they are still alive and free from Alzhimer's. Every goodbye song is always renting in me a nostalgic feeling that drops my weight down and be teary-eyed.

Nine years in a row, I had been writing and editing Valedictory address. It's a good thing in the past knowing how your students learn the basic of growing up academically. More than what you think they are, after years of teaching them, they are now great orators, on their own advantage, to their speeches with selfless desire to impart the nerve-racking whining of their hearts. You'll hear each of them while on stage differently; one always cracks jokes while speaking, the other does it with high spirit, while others are deeply drowned by their tears, and none ever has done it monotonically.

A relief I see now as I turn another chapter of my life with people who successfully march on stage with pride. Though I miss this year's grand ceremony, but the memories I had for nine years are grand enough to celebrate giving me a comporting replica of great stories from ordinary people who choose to learn and unlearn the value of everyday naiveness.

To all the graduates, CONGRATULATIONS! #

To my dear friends, Che-Che Enjambre, Thata Gaquing, Beckay Edpalina, and Jeff Lindio, HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Just like the passing of your days, it's a march to weighing in things for good and be a learned individual. Take care!

It's another New Year. Once in every year, especially the first week of January, we spend time reconciling the past and the present. Within such conditioning, we then start to count the many divisive thoughts we had, the losses, the negatives and a lot more.

It's never inevitable to mask up what we had been messing up. Then, we sour-grape that it's human nature, and sweet-lemon by saying that, “I just need to have a new new year’s resolution.”

Verily, it's true.

Once in a while we need to do simple alignment in our life. It's great even if we have it for we realize things deeply and in tune with our personal or spiritual needs. As Christmas is always Christmas and we made up the most in our Christmas list to wish for, it's now time to face a New Year list to be resolved.

However, British mental health charity Mind cautioned that “making self-improvement New Year's resolutions often leaves people feeling worse.” Mind chief executive, Paul Farmer, further said that "New Year's resolutions can sometimes focus on our problems or insecurities such as being overweight, feeling unhappy in our jobs or feeling guilty about not devoting enough time to friends and family throughout the year… We chastise ourselves for our perceived shortcomings and set unrealistic goals to change our behavior, so it's not surprising that when we fail to keep resolutions, we end up feeling worse than when we started.” (inq7.net)

So, here is my simple ABC to a new year:

A – ccept the differences in you from one you know. Everybody is born unique, thus, learn to appreciate yourself.

B – uckle up for things that may come unexpectedly. They may get you off-handed and dumb enough to notice that you fall into your own trap without being warned.

C – heer up for every little deed you accomplish; it is a small thing that will soon be a great reward.

D – efine your goals by polishing every purpose God has designed for you. Set your goal locally not globally.

E – mpathize with anybody whom you are deeply concerned with. People you know are people who’ll turn to you for consolation; the reverse will just come along.

F – reshen up yourself for a positive outlook and perspective. Such notion may give you a brighter side of acknowledging your self-esteem.

G – o green through celebrating life with nature. A simple walk with it and a balanced munching of veggies around you are treats to caring your world.

H – elp reach out to people. Donating charity works and relief services are things we know about every day. Try reaching out to your neighbors for a humble start.

I – ndulge yourself to a great night sleep and not much of the night-outs. Conditioning yourself for the next day is always a healthy deed.

J – oin network of friends to liven up the youthfulness in you. Having that sense of belongingness adds up to your emotional stability.

K – eep every penny you get for future use. A peso a day makes you richer along the way when not spent away.

L – earn to laugh out loud. Laughing with a cause at the right time is exhaling the rotten soul in you. Be happy!

M – ake miracles every day to people around you. A simple “hi” and “hello” which you never did to any ordinary persons is a life-awakening experience.

N – otice the changes in your life. A year ago is never the same two years ago. Every year is promising you a new start and a new purpose.

O – ffer advice on things which you personally know and experienced. Don’t comment on things which give an impartial view to others for you are naive at it.

P – ray unconditionally. It just needs a little faith from you to move a mountain. Our God is never deafened to hear your worries and praises.

Q – uantify the blessings that you have received. From year one and onward, know whom to be thankful for. This is humility; you had nothing when you were borne.

R – eward yourself with the most soothing and soul-gratifying holiday. Spending time with yourself is refreshing to jubilate what you have been doing for the years that gone by.

S – peak up for words which bring positive outbursts. Attempt to empty yourself with words which condemn people and evoke evilness from them.

T – ake some time to celebrate the promises you fulfilled. Don’t ever stop fulfilling stalled promises; people are counting on them.

U – nderstand people when they boil over you. When things heat up, back off so you won’t get hurt and you won’t stumble into a more complicated argument.

V – alue every moment spent with your family. The family that stays [sometimes] together misses each other.

W – ake up with a heart full of gladness and a mind that sets a positive attitude to induce that conditioned feeling to get ready for the day load.

X things out in your to-do list which you consider unimportant and do not require immediacy. Purchasing electronic gadgets in these trying times is often impractical.

Y – earn for an “every day” that gives you relief and an eventual resolution of unstitched threads in your life. The human being is a work in progress which needs cross-stitching to fashionably develop him into a masterpiece.

Z – ero in on a life that will enrich your soul. Such action needs focusing of your attention on simple plans that will easily wrap up your whole year.

This is it! Heeling your sole is repairing the worn-out part of your shoes. Healing the soul is mending the broken pieces of your life. If something is missing, there should be enough time for reparation. Heeling the sole is healing the soul.

Have a grand New Year!