Tag Archives: Peace

Cultivating New Things

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Photograph of a ginseng plan in a colorful pot with a rainbow colored kite made out of popsicle sticks and with googly eyes and a felt mouth behind it on a wall

My dear friend Ale gave me a ginseng plant for my birthday.

When she gave it to me, she laughed because she knew I would be surprised.

I don’t do well with plants.

I support the life of my family and dog, but they also advocate for themselves.

Less so with myself, and even less so with plants.

But she said to me, “It’s low maintenance and it’s symbolic. You water it like once a week, and it can make it for a little bit if you don’t water it enough, but if you over care for it, it will drown.”

Hmmm, symbolic indeed.

I do not know how long my plant will live under my care, but I know that I must move past my fear of cultivating new things.

I have never wanted to do things I’m not naturally good at.

I have more than enough to do, with things I’m fairly competent at, so why try something new that I could fail at?

Except…that this means I hold myself back from things I want (to do, to be, to try) because, “What if?”

What if?

I told my husband the other day that I am struggling with rest. I get the idea, but I am inconsistent, at best, with execution.

He said, “Well you can’t get good at it if you don’t practice.”

This, of course, is logical, but also counterintuitive for me.

I want to magically master rest, after years of hyper-productivity.

It seems silly as I look at the words on the screen. I’m laughing at myself a bit. It’s cute that I’m operating in magical thinking and it’s great that I am being honest about what I want.

But I know that old habits die hard. I know that baby steps are still steps. I know that commitment + accountability + daily progress + not giving up when I take a big step back (but treating it as a reminder & learning experience) will be the key to mastering rest, like I have mastered other things.

I know I will have to slowly let go of things I’ve held on to for so many years, that have been critical to my survival.

I am trying to cultivate something new.

It is scary.

It will take practice.

I will forget and be reminded by those who love me.

But, in the end, I am hoping for something new, something beautiful, a life that may be flawed, but is also full of peace and rest and joy.

Peace

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photograph of three lit candles with a twilight sky in the background

For most of my life, I have been searching for peace, joy, and rest.

Sometimes what we are searching for is within us all along.

I have held tight to responsibilities for my whole life. Even as a young child, I felt responsible for the happiness of my family. Through family mythology and the position that I occupied, I learned to shift so that I could fill the needs of others. I learned that my needs were always second to their needs. Though the “they” shifted throughout my life, this lens has been the way I viewed the world.

I was searching, inevitably, through this lens and wondering when I might find the elusive peace, joy and rest that I was seeking. When would I have fewer responsibilities? When might I succeed in bringing joy to those around me? How could my decisions best serve the needs of others?

It was a trap, but an inviting, insidious one. People loved me because I became an excellent chameleon. I learned to perceive people’s needs and become the person they needed me to be. I was good at so many things, and as such was awarded greater responsibilities. I brought joy to many, but at a steep cost to my own well-being. It was never enough to satisfy me, but it was always JUST enough to keep me going, to keep me feeling like eventually, everything would lead to peace and joy. Rest came sparingly and only when I could no longer maintain the frenetic pace of people-pleasing. It “worked” but it was exhausting and inauthentic and so hard.

There is freedom in letting go.

There is peace, joy, ease and rest in acknowledging my own desires and abandoning myself to the truth of those desires, in all of their potential to ruin the illusion of perfection I’ve worked so hard to create, in all of my fear that people will love me less or even abandon me outright, in all of my new unwillingness to compromise my own well-being for the sake of others.

There is peace in that my joy is no longer dependent on the action of others, over which I have no control. I am recognizing my responsibility to honor myself, that my choices are that which are most under my control, and that I really cannot control the lives or choices of others. In not being able to make those choices, I also can’t be responsible for them.

There is so much liberation in this.

I am learning to trust myself and my truth, as messy and unkempt as it may be. It is a journey. I am learning the depth of my love and beginning to turn it towards myself. Slowly, but surely. In doing so, I find myself putting less pressure on myself and others. I find myself able to accept the wholeness of who I am, and give grace to myself and others. I find myself dreaming and exploring, more willing to set boundaries (although I’m still not very good at this, to be honest, but I am learning — walking towards is not always arriving right away), but also more willing to push them.

I am grateful for this peace whether it lasts only a moment or a season or becomes my new path.

I am grateful to love fully and be loved completely, perhaps not by as many, but more authentically than I have ever experienced love, than I have ever allowed myself to experience being loved.

Because I am listening and letting that love in, and letting go, and FINALLY beginning to say yes and no with conviction and grace.

It is a gift.

I receive it.

The Other Side

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An Asian American woman standing in front of the Garonne river with the Pont de Pierre behind her

A blurry picture of me in Bordeaux at night

Last week, I went to France.

France is a strange home where I have never been a permanent resident. But it is my heart’s home. It is the place where I am able to most be myself and to be the self that I most want to be. It is the place where the rhythms of life match the rhythms of my spirit. It is the place where my voice finds clarity, and where my full self finds acceptance. It is the place where I feel most free. It is the place where I have experienced the most joy and acceptance in my life.

I had not been to France in 15 years, since my son was just an infant.

I almost did not go last week.

We are still in a pandemic and I’ve had many friends who I love deeply that have been affected by breakthrough COVID who have warned against unnecessary travel. I have all the responsibilities of all the roles that I fill and all of the things that I do, personally and professionally: mother, sister, wife, friend, mentor, professor, church leader, PTSA executive board member. I did not think I could step away from these responsibilities for such a long period of time (even though I’m on sabbatical, recorded videos for my family each day, and planned my schedules around this trip).

I did not want to be irresponsible in my choices, as if I had not considered these things. Taking 8 days to travel to France in the midst of these contexts felt incredibly selfish and impossible.

But I did it.

(Note: I hope that those who love me won’t judge me for it, because honestly, judgment is still a huge fear for me that I’ve only been able to overcome by making peace with the choices that I’ve individually made and the thoughtfulness I’ve tried to put into safety and connections throughout this trip, and by the fact that I have to understand and accept responsibility for my own choices but can’t control the judgment of others.)

The act of choosing to take this trip in and of itself was extraordinary in what it required from me.

It was also an incredible gift of time to reflect, wander, and breathe.

I spent 8 days in museums in Paris, walking for hours in the city, returning to Bordeaux, which is truly the city of my heart, seeing old friends, returning to places that I’ve loved only to find they’ve completely changed, or that they’re still the same. I spent 8 days contemplating what it means to truly be able to love with one’s whole heart, what it means to choose oneself and to choose for oneself, what equilibrium looks like, how unhealthy my life has been for so much of the last 16 years, what it means to be free of obligation and full of choice. I spent 8 days not responding to (many) e-mails, telling people no, actively choosing not to work, and not worrying about what I was running late for (except for the train I almost missed, but that was yesterday’s post). I spent 8 days eating beautiful food, with amazing people who I love with my whole heart (chosen family), being present to the gift of my life.

It was probably the most extraordinary single week of my life.

I realized at multiple points in the week that I had lost touch with some of the best parts of myself, that I had sacrificed them to the gods of overwork in order to prove my worth.

My friend, Carmen, who has been a big sister to me for nearly 25 years, said to me before I left that it’s good to have these realizations while we’re away from our lives, that sometimes we have to get away in order to see what our lives have become, but if we return to our lives as they were then perhaps this respite hasn’t served its greatest purpose.

She’s right, but this means many changes for me.

They are changes that many people who I love who are close to me have urged me to make FOR YEARS: learning to pace myself; reminding myself that just because I can doesn’t mean that I should; not always doing everything at 150%; taking time for myself; not working all the time; learning to say no; guarding my energy.

These are things that I have known for years, that people who love me have been telling me constantly, even more loudly in the last year.

My refusal to choose myself, to listen to these people in my life, has not been intentional.

At first, it was a matter of survival.

Later, it became a matter of habit.

Until, gradually, I forgot who I was, in the process of taking on so many roles that required parts of myself, but that didn’t have room for my full self.

I am beginning to come back to myself.

Because I am who I am, I want to come back to myself all at once, to bring the equilibrium and joy that I found on my trip home with me and to make all the changes tomorrow.

My life is not set up to make these changes all at once though. They are hard changes. They will require time and pacing, grace and growth. They will require the community, locally and globally, that knows my heart and holds space for the parts that are best and worst.

Already, I am changing. I am learning to listen to what I want most in my heart versus what I think I should do. I am learning to honor stability, to choose my boundaries, but not limit myself in ways that come from insecurity. I am learning that sometimes when I want to watch junk television or rest, that these things are not just okay, that they are great. I am learning that if I want to be most present for the people I love, I have to be present to my own desires and my own needs.

I’m learning to choose myself.

Grace and Peace Be With You

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A small white feather floats above an open hand

My son starts high school on Wednesday.

My daughter starts kindergarten on Thursday.

When my daughter was a newborn 5 years ago, and I was still on maternity leave, home with her in all of her infant glory, I thought about this time. I anticipated it would be hard, emotional, full of excitement and conflicted inner feelings.

But, of course, I didn’t predict that it would be happening in the middle of a global pandemic which would find us starting the school year online.

I also couldn’t know that I would still be in the midst of a transition into my first semester in a new position, with more responsibility and new course preps.

It is all so much.

I wonder how we will manage with supporting a 5 year old with 5 hours of synchronous & asynchronous instruction in a language no one in our home speaks fluently.

I wonder how I will manage leading, teaching, offering professional learning opportunities, writing, and mothering.

But, when I breathe, I remember that it can only be done through grace.

I am blessed to be in community with people who remind me who I am — my family, friends, colleagues (current and former), church family, heck, even my tweeps (many of whom have never met me IRL). They are people who are full of grace. They check in on me and remind me to claim my peace. They hold space for me when I have no space to hold for myself.

It is all so much.

It is all so much.

I know this will not be easy, and I may not get it all done. It is okay. I will be okay. I am so deeply loved by family and community who give me strength. I have faith. I have support.

I know that my children may see struggles this year — social, emotional, academic. It is okay. They will be okay. They are so deeply loved by family and community who give me strength. I have faith. I have faith in them. I have support, and so do they.

May grace and peace be with you all. A peace that surpasses all understanding. As we fight battles that no one else may know, and that we may never have predicted, I hope we do so in community, extend one another grace, and experience peace.

It is all so much.

But we are not alone.

Go with the Flow

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I am exhausted.

On the eve of my first ever Chinese language class, after a weekend of working with an amazing group of Asian American Scholar-Educator-Activists, after launching and getting incredible response for a study of Asian American educators, after running 5miles at 5:30 am and tucking in my children, before getting ready for the start of a new semester and all that it encompasses, I am feeling all the feels and it is overwhelming and exhausting.

So, I take a moment to breathe and to write this blog. I breathe to get present to this moment, right now, where it is quiet, children and dog sleeping, partner getting much needed down time after a weekend with the kids, and me, blogging.  I write to get present to this moment, to the integrity of doing what I promised myself that I would do, reflect on this journey, write this blog, pause and breathe.

In my weekly planner, I wrote to “blog re. embracing identity.” What I meant was to think about the journey I’m on to embrace my identities as a Taiwanese American, an Asian American scholar, educator and activist, a mother-scholar, and returning student.  But, what I’m realizing is that, as important as all these identities are, it is perhaps even more important to embrace my identity as evolving.  After getting tenure, I changed the title of this blog to “The Life and Times of an Evolving Academic,” and at the time, I didn’t realize how true that sense of becoming really was to me.

I am embracing that there isn’t always a right way, that sometimes I won’t get it all done, that there will be moments of tension between mothering and work, between being a student and an academic, between being Asian American and being a scholar-educator-activist.  But, I can acknowledge this tension and move through it to become stronger.  And I can do so with the support and love of multiple communities, including my family who reminded me tonight at dinner that change is good, that I can do this, and that they are behind me 100%.

Acknowledging all of this is a gift, a perspective that I need most as I go back into a classroom as a learner, as I juggle an “already too full” life, as I embrace abundance and learn to go with the flow, as I learn to say no, as I apologize when a spinning plate crashes to the ground, apologize and move on without letting it define me.

It is the present of being present even in moments when I don’t think I have it in me. It is self-compassion and self-care and lifelong learning, and I am lucky to be living it.