thought in a supermarket

"Mommy, you hurt my feelings! Are you going to say sorry, or are you going to say nothing?"

This is what I overheard a (maybe) 8-year-old girl say to her mother at a Chinese supermarket the other day.  I am assuming they were Chinese but the girl was talking to her mother in English.

Following where her eyes were looking, I saw the woman she called mommy.  The apathy I saw on her face greatly disturbed and saddened me.  

I don't know if she believed in "children should be seen but not heard" and therefore didn't hear her child's protest?  I wondered if when the girl was in infancy that her cries did not draw her mother's attention?  Maybe she didn't believe a child's feelings can be hurt too? Or maybe she believed a child's feelings are to be discounted and dismissed because they are just children's feelings and they must be minuscule too?  Maybe she  attends to her child's physical needs by providing shelter from cold, and hunger, and fatigue more readily than meeting her child's emotional needs for love, to be understood, security and respect and the like, because physical needs are seemingly more tangible and gratification of meeting those needs is more immediate and thus more rewarding?  And before you can meet an emotional need, you need to be aware of, and respect its existence and significance.  Maybe this mother is lacking that antenna which is responsible for picking up the nonverbal clues?

Or the idea of a mother saying sorry to her child is foreign to the mother's culture? Or is the mother lacking the tool to communicate her apology to her child so she chose to stay silent? Or was she simply ignoring her child and believing that was the best way to rid of the annoyance?  Or did she fail to see the fact the her child's feeling was hurt and to value that feeling and make amends?

Or did she not understand English to know what her child was saying? But I could hear the protest in the child's tone of voice, and I could see the sadness and slight anger on her young face.  

I guess I just didn't understand, and therefore troubled by what I saw.

I am imagining for this kind of communication to continue and the girl grows to be a young woman.  Will she want to talk to her mother more as she grows up? Will the mother then complain that her daughter doesn't seem to want to talk to her?  

What can be done to bring the mother to the awareness of her daughter's desire to communicate with her and to respond in such a way that will promote deeper communication as they have a future to share together?

Or am I simply thinking too much and worrying too much?

About brushing teeth...

Have you ever noticed how you always towel dry yourself the same way after shower? Have you ever noticed how you always brush your teeth the say way? Do you start from right? Left? Or the middle? Do you always finish the same way? When you put socks on, which foot goes first? How about when you put on your shirt? 

Don't laugh! These little things matter! You have been doing these thing, (hopefully) regularly for a long time now and a habit of how you do it has been built in.  Try change just one little thing about, say, brush your teeth.  Don't do it your normal way.  Deliberately brush shorter/longer/in different order and see how you feel.

These little things we do without thinking provide the basic structure for our security.  Like we know the sun would come up tomorrow morning, we don't think about this kind of things.  Day in and day out, we repeat the routine.  I imagine if one day I am too old and need to go to the old folk's home.  How uncomfortable I must feel,  for people to brush my teeth for me and change me and feed me.  They don't have my rhythm; they simply won't get it because they are not me.

We are not free people.  Not totally free free.  People would like to think they are free and they want to be free from all structure, rules, authority and power higher than themselves.  They want to be their own masters.  But you see how we all submit to these little "rules" that we need, in order to live comfortably.  Change one aspect of it, and your stress level goes up right away.  When we follow these daily routines and how we always do them the same way, we don't mind at all and we don't consider ourselves outdated and politically incorrect. In fact, we want them done a particular way.

Psychologically, and spiritually, we also will feel more "comfortable" if we submit to certain rules.  Like training a child to form good habits, in the beginning, there will be resistance and doubt -- "Do I have to do this? Why do I have to do this every day?" but soon we will just do them without thinking and appreciate the structure and security these routines have given us. 

If you don't believe me, just try towel dry yourself after shower, starting from a different place on your body and pay attention to how you might feel.  You will see what I mean and smile. :-)   

Throne of Grace and Empathy

"for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are -- yet was without sin.  Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." (Hebrew 4:14-16 )

When we sin, do we go to our loved ones with confidence? Are we afraid that the person who is supposed to love us will be so angry with us that he or she will reject us?  Or do we trust that we will receive nothing but mercy and grace because this other person understands/empathizes/sympathizes with us? 

The L. A. Times a few weeks had an article on dogs yawn when people around them yawn and the article talks about the ability to empathize and how a solid sense of self is the prerequisite for empathy.  So I like how in verse 14 named our high priest "Jesus, the Son of God"  Solid sense of self!! He doesn't change like shifting shadows. (James 1:17)  Empathy is not a modern idea, invented by people who study psychology.  Our God is the author of empathy.  His solid sense of himself, his being one essence, makes it possible for him to empathize with us.  As we become more solid and have a clear sense of who we are, our ability to empathize will only then increase.  Hollow people can't empathize.

May his mercy and grace make me solid and strong, so my presence may be a mini throne of grace for those in need of help.

 

From Target to freedom

I needed to buy new phone and an iron.  I have been putting the shopping trip off without really knowing why.  Today as I was walking out of the store, with my new phone and iron in bags, I understood myself.

My heart literally felt pinched by the number on the receipt.  It's not a big number, but if you know you need to be careful with spending, a trip to the store could feel forced and therefore, somewhat painful.  More expenses!! I wish I didn't have to spend this money... but I need the phone(line) to save my cell phone minute and I need the iron to save money and time to the cleaners.

How not to indulge oneself but also not to overkill by becoming stingy; how to use money wisely and not become a slave of it was something I was thinking about as I was walking in the parking lot on a normal September day like today.

People who don't need to be watchful to make ends meet most likely will not have struggles like this.  They know they have more than they need to spend, or even want to spend.  (Or do such people exist? I am thinking about the Hollywood celebrities.)  For ordinary people like me, this is like many other to-be-or-not-to-be-questions in life.  How much is enough? What is more important? Do I really need this? Is it wrong to sometimes let yourself go and just enjoy yourself? What qualifies for "sometimes"？

Confucius talked about 從心所欲不逾矩, or loosely translated to refer to the freedom to follow your heart's desires without violating (moral) norms. I admire that kind of freedom.  And that kind of being "right" all the time.  But I think Jesus gives us a better kind of freedom.  He talked about there is no condemnation in him.   He knows only when there is no fear of being caught making mistakes, are we free to live our lives with the resources He has given us.  

He has given us plenty of opportunities to learn to make right decisions.  Going to Target to buy what I think and rethink to be "necessities" is just a blessed example of that learning experience.  It would be scary, to say the least, if there WAS condemnation, because many times only when we look back, could we conclude if the decision was right.

About the upkeep of self and others...

I was cooking breakfast this morning and while I was waiting for my coffee to brew, I cleaned up the sink and put away what were in the dish rack from yesterday when this thought hit me : I, like all things in life, deteriorate despite my daily efforts to upkeep them.

I wash my face for it to get dirty and I wash it again.

I take out trash only to have trash again.

I eat and I get hungry and I eat again.

Everyday I need to take care of myself and even so I get old and I die eventually.

Everyday I take care of my plants and they give flowers but they get old and they die too.

I spend a big amount of time and energy in the care of my physical body.  Eight hours I sleep and I prepare meals and I have daily grooming routine to follow and I exercise and I make sure my living environment is healthy too.  And there is the emotional me that needs attention and regular pruning too.  I need time to feel, to heal and to be ready to give, to embrace, and even to be hurt again.  

The routine of eat and drink and get hungry and thirsty again is to me, a constant reminder that I am indeed made of earth and to earth shall I return.  I have limitations.  The routine of cleaning the cat litter box knowing I will need to do it again the following morning, like other routines in our lives, gives me a sense of security.  We all need routines to help anchor us.  The need for routine, for structure, however, also points to the fact that the world can't sustain itself.  We, without proper care, or even with proper care, deteriorate.

I pray, that my soul eats and drinks from the well of Him, that I may not be hungry and thirsty again.

pj's and privacy

While driving to work this morning, I saw an Asian man walking down the sidewalk in his pj's.  I was appalled. And realized no so soon after that this is what the process of assimilation has done in me.

When I was a child, I remember going to the open-market with my grandmother, and I saw people wearing their loungewear and pajamas , apparently just out of bed, bustling between grocery stands, trying to get the most fresh produce and meat and maybe bringing home breakfast too.  The sight of pajamas in public places didn't bother me at all.

28 years ago I came to the United States and started learning the concept of privacy and living in and around the respect, even demand, of it.  It feels good.   You feel safe, important and there starts to be a sense of ownership of your life.  You learn what to reveal and what not to.  And it's okay because you are the owner, and you decide.

Pajamas are not for public places!!  Pajamas is something you wear when you are in your home; it's meant for the bedroom.  Okay, kitchen sometimes too.  Not the sidewalk!

I used to hear my Japanese neighbor scolding her daughter because she didn't change into work clothes while vacuuming.  This morning when I saw that man, I think I felt the same way.  I used to think my neighbor was too rigid and harsh on her daughter.  She was just vacuuming.  As long as she gets the job done well.  I thought that should be all it mattered.

When a social norm is violated, we have an emotional reaction to it.  With my bi-cultural background, finding what is "norm" for me has been... at times, shocking, to myself.