This has been a year of learning to deal with difficult things. My long-overdue thesis. My father's stroke. My grandfather's cancer. My grandmother's foot injury. The whole family's been under a lot of strain.
With so many things happening at the same time, it's hard to just sit down and make sense of everything. And I have a feeling it'll take a couple more months before I can do that completely. In the meantime, here are fragments of what I've learned so far:
From the Thesis:
1. Sometimes you just have to keep doing something even though you can't see the point. Because if you're paying attention, you'll see the point eventually.
2. Learning starts when you've reached the point where you feel like you don't know anything anymore, and you learn to accept that. Ignorance isn't a stumbling block, it's a space for something new to grow.
3. When your intelligence fails you, sometimes sheer stubbornness does the trick.
4. Fight, even if it seems like a lost cause. Because if you fail anyway, at least you have the satisfaction of saying you went down fighting. (I owe this one to Gani.)
From Tatay:
1. No matter what happens, God's grace is always more than sufficient to pull you through.
2. Stress doesn't happen because of the amount of pressure around you. Stress happens because you let the pressure get to you.
3. We have to go through life like rubber bands. We have to learn to stretch ourselves taut when the pressure's on, and then relax afterwards. If we're perpetually stretched, we snap. If we're perpetually relaxed, we're useless.
From Lolo and Lola:
1. Dependence is not a bad thing. Sometimes you just have to let other people do things for you.
2. Love is not squeamish. 
We have to go through life like rubber bands. We have to learn to stretch ourselves taut when the pressure's on, and then relax afterwards. If we're perpetually stretched, we snap. If we're perpetually relaxed, we're useless. 
