 So what’s new at InspiredCopywriting? My Feature Story is out! Yay, and Kristin Lavitola will surely inspire you to follow your dream and take the plunge. One Saturday morning, I chanced upon Kristin lounging in her booth at the Irving Farmer’s Market. Displayed on the tables were her ceramic artworks in different sizes and vivid colors. Click on the Feature Story to read more about Kristin... ↵ #DisneyPrincess Half-Marathon is still in the far horizon but I’m getting nearer my goal of being a half-marathoner. It’s Week 8 on my 10 Weeks to 10K Program. I missed quite a few running days due to vacation and the effect was significant. Catching up required more discipline than usual. And my daughter’s wisdom teeth (all 4) extraction gave me the wisdom on how to deal with missed runs. See, she had to be on round-the-clock antibiotic and pain reliever and the first few days were the most challenging. Blame it on her erratic sleeping schedule. Blame it on the summer break. Blame it on the TV. Blame it on whatever, but she still had to make up for doses she missed taking on time. The sooner she remembered the better because it enabled us to adjust and keep doses back on track. And that’s what I did where my half-marathon training is concerned—got caught up and back on track. I’m now running 8K for 1 hour. Who would have thought, after a back injury in 2010, and now diagnosed with Sjogren syndrome, an autoimmune disease associated with early onset arthritis, I would be back on my feet: a half-marathoner wannabie? Thanks to www.djsteveboy.com. This was the program I used about 10 years ago that enabled me to run 10K and converted me from a hater of running to a lover. The memoir is in my book, Running the Millionaire Lane, available as an ebook at Amazon.com. Now, I’m training again and somehow running helps control my stiffness and myalgia. Follow my journey as a wannabie on my facebook page Running the Millionaire Lane. As for my writing, I suffered the same setbacks. My daily devotionals are missing some dates. My web novel got caught in the web. I’m really in a panic mode not because I’ve been missing on stuff, but because the complacency is starting to get too comfortable. Guess what? My web novel, How I Met Dr. Anthony Sparker spoke to my heart. Stop. Look. And Listen. God is trying to tell you something. Decode the message. Lost your path? Recalculate. Yes, He’s definitely leading me to a different path and I must listen otherwise, I’ll only get more frustrated. God is a God of peace. When restlessness and chaos ensue, I know I have gone out of my orbit. Recalculating. It’s time to get back on track and listen to the voice within.  If ever there’s such a thing as an editor’s block, I’m definitely suffering from this chronic condition. Then today, God told me a parable. The Parable of the Faucet and the Shower Head My kitchen faucet has been suffering low pressure, and when the plumber checked it, he recommended replacement of the entire faucet to bring back the pressure. The shower head on the other hand could not be replaced because doing so might break the pipes. Our only reason is aesthetic, and not worth the hassle. If it ain’t broken, don’t break it. I realized it’s the same with my works in progress. If it didn’t need fixing, I should not worry too much about the form and aesthetic details. The water, i.e. the message of God will be transmitted as it is. No matter how ugly the conduit. But if there is something that needed to be replaced to make the water flow faster, i.e. make the sentences flow better so the message is understood, then that’s where I should focus my energy and not on something that already works in terms of readability and clarity. So long story short, I got myself a fancy Delta faucet and the old shower stays. I’ll do the same with my novels. Make the web novel fancy and fun and keep the manuscript simple. It’s gonna be tough, but I’ll do my best, and allow the Holy Spirit to do the rest. That’s it for today! 
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 It’s been a crazy week for me. Pardon my tardiness for not sending out my weekly newsletter as scheduled.
After visiting family and friends in Cincinnati, OH, I flew to San Jose, CA with my husband and two daughters to attend college orientation. The one thing I find hard to do is to let go of the mother’s string that flies this little kite that is my oldest daughter. It’s been a game of tug and let loose these past years. When I give too much slack to this little kite, she dives down. I have to pull the string fast to get her up and ride the wind again. But pulling too hard keeps her from flying high, and she spins round and round, so I have to loosen the string, so she rides the wind and flies high again. I realize that I cannot let go of this little kite completely because based on past experiences of flying kites, letting loose of the string altogether would send the kite high up in the air to fly everywhere, but when the wind dies down, it hits the ground hard and breaks. I may still be able to fix it, only if I find it. I’m not taking my chances on her. Because she is the oldest, she gets the brunt of parenting blunders. Despite the nursing courses I took on child-rearing practices and units in pediatric medicine, nothing could ever prepare me to become the perfect mother. The techniques that apply to other kids do not always apply to her. And what applies to her does not apply to her younger sister. But one thing was certain, when I mother them too much, they didn’t get much of me. Instead, they got a mother with an “s,” but not the plural form of mother, but smother. Seated among first-time college parents, I felt relieved to see that it was not just me who seemed nervous to let go of their kid, uncertain whether we’ve prepared them enough to be on their own and make the right choices. In the past, when my husband and I give her permission to attend some social activity, I’d often say, “Enjoy and have fun but don’t make a fool of yourself.” Hearing one college student say, “the one advice my Mom gave me that kept me from losing myself was ‘Don’t bring shame to the family,’” made me heave out a breath. It’s not just me. This is all normal parenting blues and jitters. But after the two-day orientation of listening to all the talks from the school staff, administrators, professors, directors, mentors, spiritual directors, co-parents, and students, I am assured. My daughter made the perfect choice. We made the right decision. We found her home away from home, a Jesuit school, where she will thrive and not just survive. I relearned cultures and traditions that had been with my husband and me when we met as Jesuit volunteers. Magis, to be more and do more, to be men and women for others, and one can only succeed in being and doing through constant reflection and introspection— the Examen, another practical Jesuit tradition, because an unexamined life is not worth living. So I sat not so much as to be enculturated but to be reminded of what I already had, it felt like getting a refresher’s course on life and my life’s purpose. The message addressed to the Class of 2022 became the message addressed to me. What is my purpose, my mission, my call? A very practical guideline resurfaced to me during the opening program. My purpose is the meeting point of what I love doing, what I’m good at, and what the world needs. These serve as clues to why God created me. I’m in my late 40s, and people might think it’s quite late in the game for me to be asking these questions. My daughter is blessed to be put in a learning environment where she could find the answers and pursue her call. But I’d rather find my answer now while I still have half of my life to pursue that answer. I don’t want to become that someone in her deathbed still asking these questions and hoping that the life beyond would give her the opportunity to pursue her mission. Although I’ve never been educated in a Jesuit school, through strong bonds and affiliations, as a Jesuit volunteer married to someone educated in the Jesuit tradition from kindergarten to college, I have embraced the Jesuit spirituality among other spiritualities in the Catholic tradition. I walked out of that place wearing another Jesuit hat, one that says, “I’m a Broncos Mom.” |
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Images and blographics created using Typorama. Scriptural passages are lifted from iMissal app.