Pale Blue Dot

I found this on (where else?) Wikipedia today with the accompanying description:

"Pale Blue Dot" is the name given to this 1990 photo of Earth taken from Voyager 1 when its vantage point reached the edge of the Solar System, a distance of roughly 3.7 billion miles (6 billion kilometres). Earth can be seen as a blueish-white speck approximately halfway down the brown band to the right. The light band over Earth is an artifact of sunlight scattering in the camera's lens, resulting from the small angle between Earth and the Sun. Carl Sagan came up with the idea of turning the spacecraft around to take a composite image of the Solar System. Six years later, he reflected, "All of human history has happened on that tiny pixel, which is our only home."

So when you think about this - the fact that "all of human history has happened on that tiny pixel, which is our only home", this insignificant pixel in the whole of things - why do we still bother with wars and conflicts? I mean, natural disasters cause human suffering and death, ok, we can't avoid those, but the results of wars are man-made suffering and death of our fellow human beings.

Lest we forget.

I'm back with a prayer challenge

After a prolonged absence (mostly because I didn't really have much to say and got lazy), I'm officially back.

My daily routine now is that of a (as I call it) multi-part-timer. So everyday I wake up around 7:20 and head to the appropriate work place as needed and get home around 7ish. Then I have dinner, watch No Regrets, make cards/cross-stitch as required, tutor if necessary and study lsat (because, unfortunately, I'm retaking it in December at Everett since all the Vancouver spots are filled up).

Recently, I've been thinking about the things I pray about. Usually I start of with "Thank God today for _____________" and then I list some stuff that happened today that I'm thankful for. Then I go on into a long list of needs (recently it's been better LSAT scores (preferably 165), getting along with coworkers at new jobs, ability to save money, divine inspiration for upcoming music-related what-nots, church, motivation to read more and love people around me, etc).

But last week I some how came across the idea of trying to pray just praises to God. So I'm going to try that for a week starting today.

And already the first problem I can see is to differentiate between thanksgiving and praises.

Enneagram

Couple years ago, I did one of those online Enneagram tests (the ones that tell you what kind of person you are out of 9 pre-determined personality types). I am pretty certain that I was a hardcore Type 8 ("The Leader: The powerful, aggressive type.").

I did test again just now and somehow, I have changed into someone else: split-even between Type 1 (The Reformer: The rational, idealistic) and Type 7 (The Generalist: The enthusiastic, productive type.)

Either way, I still scored the lowest in Type 2 (The Helper: The caring, nurturing type.) and Type 9 (The Peacemaker: The easygoing, accommodating type).

Eh. guess I'm still the same.

IB Entrance Essay

When I wrote my IB entrance test in grade 8, they made us write an essay on a given quote. I've always remembered the general gist of the quote but today, as I was searching up quotes on ambition which eventually led to a search on Mark Twain quotes, I came across it again:

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear. - Mark Twain

Micah 6:6-8

How can I stand up before God and show proper respect to the high God?
Should I bring an armload of offerings topped off with the yearling calves?
Would God be impressed with thousands of rams, with buckets and barrels of olive oil?
Would He be moved if I sacrificed my firstborn child, my precious baby, to cancel my sin?

But He's already made it plain how to live, what to do, what God is looking for in men and women. It's quite simple:
Do what is fair and just to your neighbour,
be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don't take yourself too seriously -
take God seriously.

i hate waiting

two very important things that i'm waiting for:

1. Someone to finally email me and say "Miss Wong: Thank you for your interest in our firm. We are interested in meeting with you to further discuss your opportunities with us..."

2. Oct 9th so that I can finally write my LSAT and either give up on law school completely or know that I would at least be secure for the next 4 years with something to do

3. The next opportunity to travel

Exchange II

Last night I had a dream where I went to Germany (of all places) on exchange! Sometimes I think that I'm not as brave as before where I'd be willing to leave my home and go to a foreign country for 6 months like I did last time. I don't know what's gone into me...perhaps I'm getting old?

I remember when I was a kid and there was this one 包青天 episode where they were able to solve the case because they were able to "revive" the witness' memory through his sense of smell. Apparently, one's sense of smell is the one sense that can most effectively link back to old memories. Today while I was going through the cornmaze, I smelled, for a few seconds, a particular smell that immediately linked me back to my old kindergarten in Hong Kong - particularly the school's "mini farm" (where they had rabbits and chickens and stuff like that in cages). Strange eh?