Time to pick up the pen and start writing

Recently have decided to start writing..
It's time to pick up the pen once again, put on my thinking cap, pray and ask God for directions in my life. I need to know the path ahead that God has installed for me.

It is time to start penning down my thoughts, one by one. Whenever something comes into my mind, i should write it down.

Time to set long term and the short term goals that will lead me to my long term goal in the time to come. I really can't wait to see what God has installed for me and the journey that He will bring me through in order for me to achieve my ultimate call of my life.

In the mean time..
Wait for me.. I'll be back!!

A HTHT Moment with Raymond

Raymond came to join us after CG meeting for fellowship.

After sending Esther home, I had a heart to heart talk moment with Raymond, one of my closest bro in the cell group. We were sitting on the benches downstairs his block and we began talking.

We started addressing the issues that I am facing currently. Apparently, from my understanding, Joeann who has been concerned about me brought up about my recent easy flare ups whenever I am with the cell group. I shared with him my side of the story and he started telling me about what the others were letting him know.

To conclude, these were the takeaways I had through my HTHT moment with him.

Firstly, he mentioned that I had to learn how to love myself more. Love myself by appreciating myself more and respecting myself more. He told me that over the past almost 2 years of my life since I had came back from Australia, I had been myself all along. I still share about my goals, dreams and visions, I still do what I had to do, I am still the same. But however, I had been really upset with myself, I hated myself and I felt extremely useless. At the end of the day, because of my own guilt and bitterness I had inside of me, I ended up being really hot-tempered. I became someone who got angry so easily with other people, just because I was angry with myself for not being able to do anything with my current situation.

He shared with me about learning to love myself more. I have to learn how to appreciate myself. I have to learn how to respect myself. Only if I had learn how to love, appreciate and respect myself, then I can learn to love, appreciate and respect others and at the end, gained back their love and respect for me. He encouraged me to talk positive things to myself everyday. I got to learn to rely on myself and be more independent even more, especially in the area of my over-reliance to people around me. I have to learn to trust myself more. I have to learn how to be more secure and my security can only be found in God. God is the only person in the world who will never ever let me down. I have to learn to find something to thank God for in my life every single day. After that, only then I will be able to be appreciative of the people around me and only then people will be appreciative towards me and I myself from there, will be able to see the positive side of a myself as a person.

Secondly, he taught me about setting goals in life. 2 kinds of them. Long term and short term. Set weekly goals followed by a longer term and finally, goals that you will want to see yourself achieving in the many years ahead. Sooner or later, before you know it, each weekly goals you set will eventually lead you to your ultimate goal which you had set for yourself maybe even decades in advance. I admit, since 2012 started, I have gave a thought to many things I would like to achieve, however, it is the month of May now and I have yet to really pen down my goals as well as putting in an effort even, to try to make things happen. I suppose, it really is time now to start penning those goals down and making things happen!!

Lastly, he reminded me of myself and who I really am. He reminded me that I used to be someone who's really self-motivated, someone who's kind, someone who's always there for everyone, someone who has goals, dreams and visions in life. He told me that I am someone who's really focus and knows what I really want in life. I do agree that I really used to be like this. As for my current situation, I personally have given up on myself and because of that, I assume that everyone has given up on me. Because afterall, at the end of the day, everyone and anyone can tell you anything, but the ultimate decision lies totally in you. As for me now, I personally have totally given up on myself and therefore, whatever people say to me, will just end up being words that I turn a deaf ear to. Time to forgive myself, and be back to the Benjamin that everyone who used to know. One who is self-motivated, one who is kind, one who is always there and extremely strong for others around him and of course, one who is fully secure in God. I can't let these 2 dumb years overwrite my past 19 years of excellence and success. I suppose Raymond is right. Whatever success I have seen and experienced back then is history and is just minimal of what God has for me. God indeed has so much greater plans for me!! AMEN TO THAT =)

Time to sit down, start penning down my action plans. It time to start to penning down my thoughts and time
to get some action plan started. I can't wait to be the same old me or hopefully a better me once again =) Time to love myself more and show appreciation to everyone around me. God, I can't do this on my own, I need you, please help me and remind me k? =)

To end, thank God for such an awesome bro in my life. I love you bro =)

This time......

This time,
I am going to prove it with my actions
I am going to rely fully on God
I am going to live day to day by His strength
I am going to learn how to let go and let God
I am going to change my thinking
I am going to confess more positive words
I am going to learn how to love myself more

I AM GOING TO CHANGE FOR THE BETTER!!!

Ben

Living for a better tomorrow..

A common problem in society today - Suicide.
Suicide is defined as "the action of killing oneself intentionally".

As the years go by, the increment of the number people committing suicide has become one of the most disturbing facts that is happening in our world today.

Looking over the past 5 days itself has been nothing but shocking discoveries to me.
1) The suicide incident which took place during ICT where someone slit his own neck 3 times with a pen knife.
2) The NS Regular who hung himself in Changi Airbase
3) The girlfriend of my Primary school friend who took her own life.

To me, I have never encountered death in my life, if not I wouldn't be here typing this post. However, I have been at that stage really recently, a near suicide incident. I personally have attempted suicide before.

About a year ago as I was in the midst of my medical course, due to stress from my environment, I have decided to take a really easy way out. I threatened to take my own life in my bunk in front of my bunk mates. I climbed out of the window and wanted to jump just to end my misery.

Until today, with much remorse and regret for my silly actions, I am suffering the consequences of my action. But thank God for Him in my life. With time and constant prayers and support from people around, I have overcome my suicide tendencies and emerged a lot stronger today.

Thought a part of me still wish to head back to the past and erase everything else, I still thank God for it to happen, because through this incident, I was able to learn more about myself, be more positive and learn to lean more towards God in my desperate times of needs and as my source of comfort.

After knowing of all those 3 incidents that took place, the first thought that came to my mind was through my own personal experience, I realised that every problem in this world has a solution to them. The reason why we all are down and negative is because of the past. Many of us live with guilt from the past. We are constantly allowing the guilt within us to choke us from seeing our present situation and even more so, our future.

I tweeted this yesterday "Let yesterday's happenings remain a history, let's live our present moment to our best for a better future". Have you ever wonder why do we struggle and fight so hard everyday, pushing ourselves to our very limit, giving our all in whatever we do? It's really simple, it's just for a better tomorrow.

As I type this post and look back, I feel that death is never a solution. If your past is painful and you are still in pain in your present situation and you feel it's just going to be same again tomorrow, how would you know that tomorrow's going to be same as well? Have you tried living tomorrow yet?

Was BBM-ing with Germaine yesterday on my way home. Was telling her how much I wish I at least before that had the chance to meet them, talk to them, hopefully, they'll be able to give themselves and even God a chance into their lives and have their miracle breakthrough as well, just like how I had mine. She then said something to me that was really wise. She told me not to be down, it was probably someone else's responsibility, mine has others placed in my life, so instead of thinking "why didn't I", it should be "who are those I'm supposed to reach out to.."

After reading what Ger replied me, it somehow encouraged me a lot. It made me treasure people around me even more than ever. I want to be somebody who people can open up to, to share with me their problems. I want to be the one who is there for them, to cry together with them and ultimately, lead them to God. Showing them how great God's love in their life is.

To conclude, life is really precious. It is really saddening for someone to go through really a lot of pain, having so much of unexpressed negative thoughts and feelings inside, but no one to share the load to. It is really painful for people around as well, especially family members and friends to lose a loved one out of a sudden to suicide, where all solutions can be solved ultimately. I am also able to see the extreme need of people who are able to share the love, especially the love of God to people around, especially to people who are down.

A Slap

Dear God

If You can hear me my Father,

Please give me a HUGE SLAP ON MY FACE

Like N-O-W!!!

I need a wake up call..

Music's from the heart

No matter how tuned a guitar is
As long as your heart is out of tune
The music you play will never be as good as how it was meant to be..

28 April's Encounter with God during Service

During past week's service, Pastor shared with the church about Sun's crossover into the entertainment industry. I remember those days when it first started as I was there to witness and experience those moments myself.

During those times, I saw how the Pastor, Sun and other members of the church was attacked by people, especially the media, posting untrue things about Sun and the church. However, she continued, stayed strong and carry on doing God's call onto her life. Pastor Kong and Sun held onto God's vision really strongly. Time and again they were attacked and each time, they overcome the temptations and attacks and emerge a victory every time.

As I watched through the different videos, saw the different pictures, they all showcased and brought back memories to me. Seeing them also has shown to me how awesome of an impact that through Sun, God has blessed so many lives and many has been saved. Really thank God for using Sun, making use of her God-given gift to bless and inspire many.


I also saw my life as a video as well. I saw my whole journey of my life in Australia. I'm really thankful for God in my life during those days where day to day living was based on nothing but purely by the grace of God.

Just when I thought to myself how great God was to me during those days as those days reminded me how much I needed God's grace to be in my life. During last week's service. God spoke to me during service last Saturday. 

During Service as Pastor Kong speaks, I began to feel a strong spiritual excitement in me. I began to have visions of myself Bartending. I saw myself mixing drinks in the bar. I saw myself in 399 Bar working together with the team, serving customers and we were all happily smiling =)



I saw myself travelling to different parts of the world, every continent, making drinks, bringing glory to God's name. By the grace of God, I did way beyond I imagined myself to be doing.


He told me that everything that has happened the past few years even until today, is a preparation phase for me. He is trying to mould me and prepare me for a higher purpose in my life. As he spoke, flashbacks came to me of myself in the past.


It was of me sharing my F&B dream to everyone when I first entered the industry at a young age of 16. I was young but at that time, I had really big dreams. I wanted to open training establishments in Singapore. I wanted to raise a new generation of people and send them out into the industry in Singapore as well as around the world to tell the world that there is still hope for genuine service and hope for the industry. Hospitality industry is one that is extremely messy. It has one of the highest suicide rates as depression rate is high, it is really common to smoke, reliance on alcohol or even doing drugs. It is extremely normal to have casual sex within the workplace just because there is a need to have sex at that time. I feel that such a beautiful industry like this truly needs God.  I believe that God is going to use me as a vessel to reach out to these people and bless them.

God wants everyone to have a future in Him. So do how much I want people to have a future in God as well. I want to give a "future" to people who feels that there is no more hope in this world. I want to impart them a skill as well as knowledge. I am a human and I will die one day. I want my skills and knowledge to be passed down to the next generation and I am extremely determined to train up a new generation of F&B personnel that is going to change Hospitality Industry in Singapore. It will no longer be a pinoy or cheena affair, but a Singaporean affair.

I can see myself going into boys and girls home, meeting the homeless, the broken, gangsters, people who are suicidal and even the rich or people who are born with a silver soon, working with me. To some, I was their mentor, while to some, I was like a family, their father, brother or even their friend. I will make them work for me and when the time is right, I will set them out to the fields, send them overseas, sponsor them with education.

I will open bars and restaurants at different areas, reaching out and target different age groups, social status and even culture. I will provide the best possible service for them and let them enjoy products that they have never seen before.

But before that, God showed me a really dark and narrow pathway. It was the path that is ahead of me, one that I will have to walk before all these happens. I saw myself back in 399 Bar after I ORD. I was trained as a bartender there. I saw myself at another part of the world, doing the same thing. The road was really tough and lonely, but God was always there with me. But ultimately, I saw myself back in Singapore, i stood out of the gate after I took my luggage. Everyone was there and there was a huge banner saying "WELCOME HOME BEN". It was a really heart warming feeling that I know that the best is actually yet to be.

I'm really looking forward to the future. I can't wait to see what's ahead for me. Although it's going to be really tough, where day to day living will be on nothing but purely under the grace of God, I will trust and obey.

I suppose, it's about time?

Not my time but God's

Learnt this awesome truth today..

"God is never too early, never too late.. He's always RIGHT ON TIME!!"

Many a times we tend to rush through many things in our life that we forgotten the most simplest things around us.. Time to step on the brakes once in a while, relax and wait for God's call =)))

I love you Daddy God!! =))))