A Blessing for the Brokenhearted

Let us agree
for now
that we will not say
the breaking
makes us stronger
or that it is better
to have this pain
than to have done without this love.

Let us promise
we will not
tell ourselves
time will heal
the wound
when every day
our waking
opens it anew.

Perhaps for now
it can be enough
to simply marvel
at the mystery
of how a heart
so broken
can go on beating,
as if it were made
for precisely this -

as if it knows
the only cure for love
is more of it

as if it sees
the heart's sole remedy
for breaking
is to love still

as if it trusts
that its own stubborn
and persistent pulse
is the rhythm
of a blessing
we cannot
begin to fathom
but will save us
nonetheless.

- Jan Richardson

Strong

“You have been told that, even like a chain, you are as weak as your weakest link.
This is but half the truth.
You are also as strong as your strongest link.
To measure you by your smallest deed is to reckon the power of the ocean
by the frailty of its foam.
To judge you by your failures is to cast blame upon the seasons for their inconstancy.”

― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

4th August 2019: Heart Strings x Botanics' Puppies

Woke up bright and early to volunteer for the Heartstrings Walk. 

So many people turned up! 

Met a little cutie who provided many kisses. 

My cute station partner! My entire back was aching by the end of the morning, lol #old. 

Rushed home to wash up, and get this puppy ready. 

Because we were off for a picnic! 

Went to meet these two cuties to carpool to the gardens. 

Excited to goooooo. 

Meeting friends already! 

This silly derpz didn't want to leave the garbage bin and we had no idea why. 

No amount of lifting would move him lolol. 

My sweet baby. 

Bumped into his aunty Zhen and uncle Willy. 

So happy to be out playing! 

More frans. 

My jessicakes <3 

Girl gang puppy gang life. 

Cola is tooooo cute. 

Met another friend that Tofu got on super well with. 

Knocked out from his day out! 

Be Whole in Everything

“To be great, be whole;
Exclude nothing, exaggerate nothing that is not you.
Be whole in everything. Put all you are
Into the smallest thing you do.
So, in each lake, the moon shines with splendor
Because it blooms up above.”

― Fernando Pessoa

Extend your hand

“How should we be able to forget those ancient myths that are at the beginning of all peoples, the myths about dragons that at the last moment turn into princesses; perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us.

So you must not be frightened if a sadness rises up before you larger than any you have ever seen; if a restiveness, like light and cloudshadows, passes over your hands and over all you do. You must think that something is happening with you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand; it will not let you fall. Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any miseries, or any depressions? For after all, you do not know what work these conditions are doing inside you.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke

1st - 2nd August 2019: Work Girls x Litgirls

Rare after work dinner with work pals :3 

We were craving for some burgers and friessss.

Home to my baby. 

I don't think anyone is ever as happy as he is to see me.

Hahah doing silly things at work. 

Was a good day :3 

Dinner time with my lit girls! 

My bb, I miss the days we were housemates :') 

This was wayyy too much for me. 

Gossiping over korean drinks.

Silly face.

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.”

― Naomi Shihab Nye, Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

29th - 31st July 2020: Zumba x Friends

Lili and I signed up for a trial zumba class. It was intense and we were... flailing hahaha. 

Rewarded ourselves with sushi later. The quality was not great but good enough. 

Pupper <3 

Met a friend on our nightly walks. 

Catch up time with my cutie Jem (: 

Friday nights in bed with this baby.