Smothering enmeshment

So glad that I have the agency to move away from the smothering enmeshment.
In the past, I would feel guilty and bad for not having agreed or given in,
But at the expense of feeling like I can barely breathe or of feeling bad about myself,
like I have done something morally wrong or made a really stupid and unwise decision.
at the expense of seeing myself and my life through your eyes.
This is one of the downsides of living in an Asian society.

Now the smothering enmeshment makes me want to distance myself away further,
It doesn't promote true harmony as it has sought to accomplish as its goal in the first place.
How hypocritical it can be sometimes.
Yet we all have to learn to deal with it and work with it.
It is no easy task to negotiate because those who live and breathe it do not have insight that this is happening.

I have since realized that I am my own person,
and that I do not have to take responsibility for someone else's pain and unhappiness as if it were my own to bear,
when it is a matter of preference.

It is a sad situation that there can be no agreement,
And that we can only strategize our way to survive this.

I wish you could just let me go, and let me be.
and you would discover that perhaps,
contrary to what you had thought would happen,
perhaps,
we would finally be connected.

Difficult decisions

It usually is a mix of emotions and thoughts whenever a referral to child protection services has to be made. Sometimes it brings some relief that the authorities may be stepping in to ensure that children are safe, yet sometimes even more anxiety and uncertainty about what will happen to the family when this decision rocks the boat of the homeostasis and equilibrium.

Sometimes I feel good and glad that I am doing the right thing, but at times my heart just sinks at the fact that I have to make a referral - it means that things have not been good and people have already been harmed for a period of time.

Conflicting feelings in the midst of a very busy and intense 2 days. Sometimes I don't even have time to process and think. Don't even get me started on the systemic issues impacting the social service field - lack of manpower, resources, senior staff to meet the increasing complex needs of our cases.

Okay, time to send the referral.

God dwells with us where we are

A colleague shared and prayed that God dwells with us where we are. 

Even though it is such a simple truth, it's something that I tend to take for granted. Sometimes I'm just too worried about the future, about thinking of what I should do to improve my present circumstances and wishing that I could get better or be better that I forget that even in my present state or situation, God is still with me. 

Am I too anxious for things to be moving and "improving" that I forget the present?

Am I too prideful to think that the present circumstances and the present me are not meant to be, because in my eyes, things are not good enough?

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This week has been tough (not surprisingly, it is a rarity that a week is not tough). I've been discontented with many things. The idealist in me can't take it when things aren't what they should be, especially when things can be quite ridiculously illogical, political, rigid and hence, sometimes I don't really see the meaning in doing many things - and when there is little meaning it really drains a lot of my energy. 

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My reflection in view of all these things happening around me, to me and within me is - with whose eyes am I seeing these things and seeing me? And how are these eyes seeing things and seeing me?

What is good and what is bad, and how do we really know? 

Such difficult questions. No easy answers.