Rules of Engagement

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Pic from google

Hello. I don’t have a blog schedule, I just write when I feel like it.

I realize that most of us don’t grow up being taught how to make friends or what is normal, healthy in a relationship. I’ve learned some things over the years that have helped me to have healthy boundaries. First, I read the book Boundaries by John Townsend. That changed my dynamic with my mom because I realized that I could say no to my mom. Also I grew up going to a baptist church where they taught you that loving people meant listening to them, or serving them. What a recipe for a fucking place mat, or door mat. I meant.

I don’t think Jesus listened to everyone when he was walking this earth, I think he wouldn’t have accomplished everything he needed to do.

Here’s a few things I came up with : 

  1. Close friends are your inner circle that you share your problems with, confide in, pray with. It’s a mutual relationship where you better each other.
  2. There are different types of close friends, some friends you talk to more often than others. Some you talk to about certain problems.
  3. It is okay to separate from friends that are going different directions. I have broken up with a few friends that due to beliefs and differences, it was healthier for both parties to basically stop talking or fade off. You don’t necessarily have to “break up”, you can just distance yourself.
  4. As a wise sage, many people have requested to “hang out with me”. Hey WE HAVEN’T talked forever, we should hang out! 

I found out the hard way that it meant I was their therapist and they would dump a shit load of problems into my ears and psyche and mess with the positive flow I was in. 

Which is why I have started asking people “what do you want?”.

Here’s a way to filter out people:

  1. What are you hitting on me?
  2. What’s up?
  3. What’s going on?
  4. What’s wrong?
  5. What’s right?

Which sounds kind of awful, but it has helped me clarify so that I am not getting fooled.

You might be thinking, “well maybe you are the answer to their problems!” Well, most people who use manipulative ways to “spend time with you” actually won’t listen to any of your advice. They will continue to brood, complain to anyone who will listen. 

5. The key is to say no. Say no when your heart says no.

6. If you ARE on the other end, you see someone that is maybe wise, as an acquaintance, approach them by asking “hey, can I get some advice from you?” Come out right in the beginning and say what it is that you want. “Hey I need help, I’m in a pit right now and was wondering if you had any advice for me”. Don’t manipulate others by pretending you are wanting to be their “friend”. Friends are people who actually want to contribute to another person, not just TAKE from them.

7. What does that mean? Your circle will decrease in size. As you get older, you will learn to discern who has your best interest in mind. You will maybe have a best friend, and a few close friends….

8. What is a true friend? Someone who you can be yourself with. Not just a therapist all the time.

9. If you do want to do something, do it. 

If you don’t, don’t. There is nothing worse than a obligated life. 

 

Daily Surrender

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The beauty of life actually lies in the act of daily surrender.

As crazy as people say I am, the more I live a life of surrender, the more I realize how limited my thinking is. I cannot begin to comprehend how God works and that is just the beauty of it. I’m dumb as fuck compared to God. 

Life becomes enjoyable when we admit that our wisdom is beyond limited and God’s unimaginably creative and mind blowing.

By letting go of control, we get to partner with God in creating art out of our lives, to feel deeply each emotion, to play, to have fun, to create a rich life of love.

I am lost for words, sometimes unable to even express the plethora of emotions that is in my heart. I will go days feeling the tensions and not knowing how to face my truth.

It is in admitting “I don’t know why that happened, why nothing happened according to my preconceived notion of what should have happened, and why I even had that notion in the first place’ and maybe that I’m disappointed, scared that life is unpredictable, uncontrollable….

That my heart can finally release it’s grip.

It is okay that I don’t know.

It is okay that I may have been disappointed, but I want to continue learning how to surrender to God’s infinite ways of life.

Nowadays, grace is not so popular. Not knowing is so unpopular, there is an answer for everything. But I don’t always know what is going on and I’m okay with it. God’s got it, God has it figured out, He knew me before I was born.

I might not know where I’m going geographically even in the next month, and it upsets people. They want to make plans with me, but I can’t. My loyalty isn’t to them. My loyalty is to God. Make plans with me in the next week, but after that, I don’t know where I’m going. If I feel RIGHT about something, I will commit to doing it, but if I don’t feel RIGHT in my heart about it, I won’t. I have an inner compass. Being loyal to your vision makes you uncontrollable, free. 

So don’t feel bad that life didn’t go the way you predicted, perhaps your get married by 30 plan, career plan, etc. Life is better in a daily act of surrender. Surrender never felt so sweet.

(pic above is in SF, my mom and I went on a last minute trip).

God-employed

My conversations with God are often in moments of frustration, probably because I have been practicing patience all my life. I am like a jack in the box that has been kept in the box for too long.

But even then I know God is strengthening me for the path ahead. A lot of people have asked me about my “self employed lifestyle”. Honestly I am not self employed, I am God employed.

I CANNOT EVEN IMAGINE HOW I COULD HAVE SURVIVED WITH MY Sanity attached all these years without God.

Because entrepreneurship was more about just learning to converse with God and to build this trust relationship with Him.

Entrepreneurship divorced from God is like unimaginable to me.

Only last year did I basically let go of full control and let God take over, up until then I was still asking God to bless my plans. I thought that in order to do good in the world, I had to first be like Tony Robbins. Little did I realize that things spark fire in brokenness. In our inability, God does what humans cant.

I call this grace.

So yes I managed to survive and sometimes thrive, but it was when God told me to sell everything and follow Him that I totally let go of my fear of not having enough, not being enough, not trusting him basically to take care of me.

I let go of my apartment, I let go of my new car that was leased, I let go of my credit (it plummetted), I let go of the lifestyle I was trying to sustain, when in actuality it was a huge facade of the shit that was inside my heart.

I was so tired.

I had lost friends. Family had spewed accusations at me, I had just gotten out of a codependent, unhealthy relationship where I felt like I completely lost myself.

When I lost everything I actually found myself.

I found my sweet authentic self at the core of my tears and brokenness.

So began my rebuilding of my dreams, my heart.

It was at that moment that I felt I would do anything for what I really wanted out of life, even if I had no food or shelter. I SAID God anywhere, anything, I am willing.

That is when grace filled in the gap. GOD CAME.

I got opportunities to be on 3 tv shows within a year. I stayed with my friend for a few months, ended up booking a one way ticket to Thailand.

I traveled with the spirit, not knowing where I would go next. How?

Everyone asks how. But few actually believe. You cannot do great things without first stepping out in faith. God just showed up in so many ways, sometimes through strangers, sometimes through divine encounters.

What has this year been about for me?

1. Learning to stay in faith when hardships come

2. Restoring and reconciling my relationship with my mother. When I was living alone, I had a huge motivation to prove her wrong. My family basically thought I had gone rogue and was screwing up my life by following my dreams. I remember going to Europe for 2 months and actually blocking her number because I needed space.

As an asian dsughter, I had to really speak up for myself. OUR RELATIONSHIP HAS IMPROVED DRAMATICALLY. I think it was at that moment when I was crying my eyes out because she wasnt happy for me when I told her I got this huge opporunity…..that I realize, yes she loves me, but when will I stop living for her approval??

Many of us are waiting for someone to be proud of us, to tell us, you are enough……but God showed me, I am enough for Him.

3. Breaking out of the world’s system of success

4. Living in freedom

Xoxo Rebekka

How To Protect Your Heart When You Have An Asian Mom

You are responsible for the well-being of your heart. Yes, you are.

You are the landlord of your heart and you get to decide who and what resides there (landlord analogy by Christa Black). When I was younger, I’m 28 now, I opened my heart to lots of people because I thought, “well I’m taught to love people right?” but that’s when I realize that THERE IS EVIL out there. Real evil. And then I got frightened and closed my heart up after too many evil encounters. Thank God I’ve been healing from those manipulative encounters and learned to guard my heart.

I learned that it is important to have boundaries in your life. And you have to SPEAK UP for your heart, it’s your responsibility YO.

Which leads me to the whole controlling Asian parent thing again. 

Recently I’ve been blessed with good food and have eaten well. It’s just this season of rest and getting fed. Well, my mom mentions a couple of times that “watch your weight”, your legs are getting fat or your stomach is getting fat.

And as you can see, I’m not an obese person, I’m a pretty skinny Asian woman that happens to have curves. (This just goes to show the impossible culture Asians live in).

I was totally fine the whole day, had no neck aches and for me when I have neck aches it is usually because I am fearing something. 

SO at night I start getting these crazy painful neck aches and I start to do my inner healing, meditation, prayer time with God. I ask Spirit what the hell is going on. I look back on the day. I mean I had really great food, got this amazing dress from Nordstrom, felt so alive and free all day. I felt abundant.

Then it struck me, that moment when my mom….instead of saying “wow I had a great day with my daughter”, she said “your stomach is looking fat, watch yourself”.

Gosh, how encouraging.

So in that moment, subconsciously my self worth was struck down and subconsciously I heard and felt in my spirit “You’re not enough, you’re not good enough”. 

Wow. I love healing sessions with God.

So then I start planning a speech about what I’ll tell my mom, how I’ll speak up for my heart so that I can protect it in the future. Then I have this crazy dream about a childhood friend who I am no longer friends with due to parental conditions (aka controlling Asian parents who basically took control of our friendship and ended it with, well their controlling spirit). 3 times I ask her what’s wrong, no answer.

Finally she tells me “my mom died”, I hug her and we cry and cry. Then my mom comes in and questions what I’m doing. And the light bulb went on. When do Asian kids ever grow up? Some of us, without knowing it, are still being controlled by our parents. We feel out of control, we view God like our parents…unrelenting, angry, controlling.

In Asian culture, there is no such thing as GRIEVING, we are taught to get over it, cover it up, Asian moms don’t really have much capacity to comfort or tend to your emotions (I’m talking about the older generation, now not all moms are like that but I have seen a lot).

So in the grieving, pain process, we are often commanded to ANSWER TO and name WHAT IT IS we are going through. And as you know, grieving is messy, you can’t always name it. People want to KNOW shit because they feel like they are in control if they know what it is you are going through. 

Some Asian adults still feel that they are seriously unable to make their own decisions. They feel powerless in their own lives and a victim of circumstances.

Well, after my dream….I knew I had to just speak up.

“mom, can you not say anything negative about my body? It hurts my heart and honestly if I want to exercise or lose weight I will, but that’s my own decision. This is my body, not yours”. 

And with that, she said okay, as long as you yourself know.

And even if I sometimes feel insecure, I know that this season is actually a blessing.

Why? Because most of the time when I’m traveling I’m losing hella a LOT of weight and I barely have an appetite sometimes, like in Cebu, Philippines, I was shitting out water, or food that turned to water, okay I know Too Much Info.

Which leads me to my point.

I once heard a relative of mine say after I chose DISTANCE from certain people in my life that “people have a right to their opinions about you”. Well I have a right to “who I want in my life and what opinions I want to hear” because most peoples’ opinions ARE NOT truth about who you are in LOVE.

Because LOVE feels good, love FIRST tells you your true identity, then in the encouragement, propels you TO DO GOOD….not the other way…like when people yell at you and tells you “you suck” and think that ‘s going to encourage you to change. LOL.

So guard your heart because out of the heart comes all the goodness and junk of life. You have a right to say NO and TO create healthy boundaries, use your speech, speak up like I did.

PS- I love Asian moms, don’t get me wrong. Not all Asian moms are this way. There are many reasons people become controlling or negative, most of the time they are speaking out of their own insecurities. AKA my mom just bought this weird massage tool that is supposed to massage the fat out of her body. I love my mom- she is REALLY amazing. Sometimes I have to write about her because well, it’s my experience and I believe it can free others.

This article doesn’t just apply to Asians or moms, or women, this applies to ALL HUMANKIND. Maybe even animals. I pray this article may help free you to LIVE IN FREEDOM!

How To Protect Your Heart When You Have An Asian Mom

My New Goals Don’t Involve Achieving Anything

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A few months ago I filmed two tv shows, one day I was the star and then I descended to earth and was just like anyone else, alien turned human roaming Paris for a bite. No one recognized me, I was normal again.

I was also on a competition show and only one person would win. Many and most went home slighly or largely disappointed. But then some maybe found that winning was not so much about achieving the goal, but loving the process and the people surrounding the journey. 

Some cried, somewanted to use the prize money to save a whole country, save the poor, send their mother to Japan, some wanted to start a fashion line, still, it made me realize how much we uphold expectations that we think are the answers to our happiness.

And we ask “what’s next?”

We rarely savor being, we rarely savor the moment.

Because we have these milestones we uphold, career advancement, getting the dream guy, getting married, having kids….we register for gift registries waiting for others to congratulate us, you made it!

We often get there and ask now what?

Which is why I want to start a revolution…its called….being.

So if you ask me what my goal is, for this year, for the rest of my life is?

I would answer “to be”.

Sounds vague. Well, I just want to breathe in every moment, to be present, and out of that space of being enough, accepted, loved, live. Whatever living looks like.

And I will create, not achieve, Ill express, like I am doing now, not achieving, because achieving is objective, it is based on peoples’ opinion.

I would also say “to live fully out of my heart”.

TO BE FULLY AUTHENTIC AND TO LIVE IN FREEDOM.

That to me is worth it all.

So no more lists of making a certain amount of income, no more lists of what i want to achieve, where I want to go, how many new friends I want….no more figuring out what I want because when you live out of being, you naturally attract the right things. 

1. Our egos always seek to prove our worth thus we achieve, looking for approval, hoping someone will say I love you.

2. The way of being is love. If you are pure love, then you lack nothing.

Love Was Not A Safe Word

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Palm springs

Okay peeps, shit is going to get real in this post. Read this if you need to clarify some relationships with family, friends, non-friends, frenemies, boyfriend, girlfriend, wives, husbands, etc. I’m not a psychologist but I have lived an intense life and have also coached people about their lives.

Growing up in a single mother Asian household, I realized something….love was not a safe word. I never felt safe because love was basically obeying your parent, doing what they say, and trusting they are right. And as you know many parents, or most or all are not perfect, so when they give you sound wisdom about how you should eat your chicken, you either obey or your question their way of eating chicken. 

Because her life seemed stressful enough, I bore the burdens of a parent, of being one. I put my own emotional needs aside to handle the stress of being home and to listen to the needs of my parent.

Consequences– I became a people pleaser and believed that I needed to help others before myself. The training of the institutional church did not help either. So I suffocated my own problems. NOW I also LOVED being alone because I found that most people wanted to control my life so I found it much easier to be alone with my own thoughts. I also felt that everyone was a smaller version of my mom so I often escaped to find my personal freedom. I was able to finally find people who would allow me to be myself, however because most people are not aware enough to dig up the reasons behind their behavior, I often have to draw a line between those relationships.

I’m glad that I did enough soul searching and reading to actually realize all this and CHANGE! Because I can’t imagine what a shitty life I’d have if I had continue being a people pleaser.

Going on vacation with my mom kind of clarified why I was the way I was…

Here are some things people use in relationships.

  1. Manipulation- “If you do this, I’ll pay more attention to you, I’ll give you more love”

“I’m providing for you, you better be grateful”

“Ten years ago, you fucked up my car…so you will pay for it by my punishing you in various ways”

Truth is if it was really unconditional love….you give love without expecting anything back, you give according to your perimeters, you don’t use it to manipulate that person’s love for you.

Consequences of long term manipulation- 

Manipulator- has no idea what BOUNDARIES mean and expect others to live their lives for him or her. He or she is a tyrant in life and is often disappointed, probably will end up with no friends because their rules are impossible to live by.

Manipulated one- has no idea what FREEDOM looks like in their personal and public life, does not know how to make choices on their own, always thinks others know better. He or she is always a victim who does not take personal responsibility for their lives….because the choice to submit to a manipulator is a choice. 

2. Control- Control is probably the creepiest one, because a lot of times we don’t see it until we get physically sick from it. 

“Go wash the dishes now, go fix my car now, call me now, where are you? Who are you with? You have to do this and this and this, if you don’t it shows you have no love for me”

“Because you didn’t DO THIS ONE THING for me, you hate me, you don’t love me”. By threatening with control, that person is able to control what you do for them.

Truth is if it was really unconditional love…..you’d give people freedom to be whoever THE FUCK they want to be and to do whatever they want to. Now if you want to suggest how you feel loved (5 love languages), then tell them, do not threaten them with by “withdrawing love”. How I experienced that in my life? My parent never ever said sorry and when we fought, this is what happened….silence for 3-4 days, yep, and not looking at me, like I was some non-person.

Consequences of control- 

  1. Controller- Needs to know what is going on all the time. If someone does not respond to their text when they want, often freaks out and then accuses the person of negligence. Often does not enjoy life, cannot enjoy life, probably doesn’t drink (joking), has fear that they are out of control.
  1. Controlled- Fear of doing wrong in private and public life. Often needs to ask for permission to do something, creatively suppressed, cannot find the courage to draw outside the lines.

Now, finding freedom from these issues can be difficult but know that God’s love is powerful enough for you to break free. Consciousness is worth having to live a free life.

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Thousand Palms

If you need a meter for which you know your personal boundaries are being crossed….

  1. If you have physical aches, usually that is a sign of discomfort, boundaries being crossed.
  2. Discomfort emotionally, from 1-10 how uncomfortable do you feel
  3. If you feel emotions of fear or intimidation

What to do when these things happen: 

  1. Take time away from the person to access the relationship, to give your heart space to breathe and feel
  2. Say “no” or create verbal boundaries such as “I do not feel that way”, “no thank you”
  3. Find a way to create physical boundaries

And if it gets unhealthy, please find a way to stay away from the person. You must put yourself first.

The Myth of Not Being Enough

You are enough, for God. But usually not for humans. If you were purely living in grace, you are enough. Now, when you’re a kid, you get to play, and you’re allowed to be goofy. As you grow up, you gradually notice that you are rewarded for “being good” to your parents. You know, being obedient. Then, you are applauded for accomplishing things like getting A’s, being president of some volunteer organization or club at school, writing a good essay for your college, getting into a good college, dating the right kind of person that your friends approve of, looking nice, losing weight, the list seems to go on.

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That’s me just playing, because I wanted to, because I was curious, because I was interested, not because I was being forced to.

As you get older, you are applauded for getting the right kind of job with the right salary, you are congratulated for having a kid, getting married, maybe staying at a few luxury resorts….you get applauded for trying, but not really for failing. Or for living at home with your parents when you are 30…definitely not applauded for still being single and doing odd jobs and freelancing….you definitely are not applauded for “being” because “being” seems lazy, seems well, lazy times two.

Your whole life after 3 years old, or whatever age you stopped playing because your parents wanted you to “succeed”, is a whole list of doing, trying, accomplishing, checking off lists. It’s a tiring rat race.

After I became self-employed, I had to release the idea of trying. I hustled really hard. And even that wasn’t freedom, it was slavery to the whole system of striving. When I finally gave into what I call grace, allowing God to open the right doors, I still struggle with it at times…but now I’m more sensitive to it.

The spirit of striving is like this spirit that sits on your shoulder and tells you “YOU’RE NOT ENOUGH = DO MORE!” 

Do you ever notice that when you want attention and love from people, you rarely get it? You seem desperate and people can smell it? But when you’re content and filled with love, people love to bother you. It’s because that is BEING. The God void in your heart isn’t supposed to come from people, they can’t fill your every need. It’s supposed to come from within, a divine Godly love.

And when you are filled with DIVINE LOVE, people are attracted to real unconditional, spirit filled love. A desperate need for love comes from fear, fear of not being enough. Fear that you need peoples’ approval. 

Yesterday my mom was like “if only you had studied something else”. I’m like, “you want a happy daughter or a miserable one?” And Helen Fisher had really helped me discover my personality, I got 97% explorer, which just means I don’t like being controlled and I love excitement and variety…….paired with builder is a no no because they tend to be too structured and have a need for stability. Which makes a lot of sense because in my past relationships the guy didn’t even have a passport. And here I am literally itching to go to 100 more countries.

SO rest into what I call divine grace.

And if you don’t understand what that means, ask. And you shall receive the answer as I am slowly learning. It’s a lifestyle, it’s a divine now.

You are enough. Stop doing and start soaking in the love that fills you to the overflow. 

“And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.”- Romans 11:6

Don’t Act Like A Slave

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Why do we act like slaves when we have been given freedom?

I used to be her.

Uppity, full of worldly ambition, striving, smiling to be nice and to please ther world….running in the same rat race. But i got to so many places and saw that everyone has an imaginery cage.

You know, the person with a business who has become a slave to her own business, unable and unwilling to take a break, feeding her ego : look everyone I must be important because I am busy!!!! Busy doing who knows what, busy serving other people. Ego.

Or the person who will not stop to enjoy himself just because everyone else is enslaved. To buts, can’ts, will not, one day.

When will we become conscious?

I used to be her. And so as i sat there, felt an uneasy gratitude, I have evolved so much yet it was such a difficult journey to awaken to freedom.

We all have freedom to do what we want, why do we wait until someone gives us permission?

Fear is irrational. It only becomes real when we believe it.

Heaven Is For Real

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Photo by http://www.see.place and google (does not belong to me).

I’m a dreamer, I dream almost every night. They are long dreams, like a movie. Sometimes I dream about heaven, actually my spirit is there, it’s too real. When I dream about heaven, I always have a feeling of wonder, like when I’m watching a movie by myself in the theater. Maybe that’s why I love film so much, because what is real is not what we see, but what we see with our hearts.

This night I have a dream that I am in an apartment, I’m sleeping, I wake up and clean, I look out the window and see a sign that says Hawaii. However, it is really strange. There are boats and people walking on water. Except they are actually walking on land, which is under water. There are boats like the ones I’ve seen in Thailand. It is a little gloomy. I try to walk out of the apartment, but there are so many rooms I can’t seem to get out.

Finally, I see two girls, they are twins and roommates of the girl I’m staying with.

We are talking, suddenly I feel dizzy because the apartment starts moving. Maybe the island around me is moving? I’m confused, as the room starts moving, I see the land. We are actually floating, but there is land and ocean.

It looks like the blue city in Morocco, but it is all situated in and over water so imagine the blue city surrounded by water. It is magical, beautiful, stunning, my heart can’t take the beauty anymore. When we arrive somewhere, we get off. I’m shocked, okay, the whole time I had gone into a room that was actually a vehicle, I was then transported.

I’m shocked and tell them I’m not going wherever they are going. And for some odd reason, they say they are going to Denver, on a roadtrip, for 9 days. 9 days adds up to July 4 which is the day God told me something would happen in my life.

I tell the bus load of people, I can’t go, no I didn’t even bring water! I have nothing on me, I left my wallet in the “real apartment”. I see out on the sideline and see my friend, but he has something stuck in his eye and I freak out.

I know it’s addressing some feelings of not knowing where I’m going or doing next, or what July 4 will bring, readiness, preparedness in my heart, but before I know it I wake up.

 

The Spiritual Implication of Change

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(photo taken at a cafe in London 2014)

SUMMER IS HERE. That means change.

This year is the year of jubilee, for those that follow spiritual seasons. A lot of shifts and changes are happening in the air. First off, UK pulling out of EU. 

Now, when I heard about that, I knew immediately the pound was going to drop in value. However, after my dream, God clarified a few things.

When a country goes through change, and when people are voting for change from traditions, that means they want a NEW THING. They want to break away from what has been so they can see change and new things in their lives. The UK is becoming independent because the majority, more than half of the people are looking for change.

What does it mean? There is a thirst for something more. Discontentment for what is already.

Most of the world will see it as a weakness, however, spirituality, I believe it is one of the greatest thing that is happening. Now countries and world powers are either being removed or realigned. Old traditions are being dismantled. 

Spiritual implications is that even though on the outside, people see economic weakness, people will come into their own power in leadership- in their personal lives, leadership will be replaced in politics, government, education, arts, people will awaken to the dreams that have been hidden in tradition. New things will happen in the country.

This is a great reminder that even though you may have gone through a desert in your career, love life, dreams, a great shift is coming where you will be catapulted to your wildest dreams, and where you are has no reflection of where God is bringing you.