Monday, August 22, 2011

A Total 180

I opened the front door this morning and felt cool air hit my face. I now realize that summer here in New Jersey is slowly coming to an end. My life at this point is truly a completely different reality than it was last year. Last summer was probably the most difficult period of my life. However, this summer has managed to be the exact opposite. It's safe to say that this summer has probably the best summer of my life.

Last summer, I saw several doors in my life close in front of my face. One door that closed was particularly difficult for me at that time. I can't remember a time in my life in which I was more depressed, scared, alone, and miserable than last summer. As the summer of 2010 ended, I was uncertain and unsure of where my life was heading. I was eager to start a new path in my life and leave the old one behind, yet I didn't know how I was going to do so.

Fortunately, God brought me through several moments through the Fall, Winter, and Spring that led me to where I am today. Some moments were fun, others were frustrating, and some were downright annoying. But, God truly opens the right doors and closes the wrong ones.

This summer has been a series of open doors. In May, Bayani Warrior opened at Jersey Fight Club in Cranford, NJ, becoming our new home and blessing us with new students and new friends who support our mision and what we do. In June, I got to speak at a summit in New York City for the UNIPRO organization in front of some of the top names in the Filipino community. I saw the Bayani Warrior Gathering take place on that same day and saw our numbers literally triple in the span of that one session. In the first weekend of July, I was given the honor of attending, demonstrating, and teaching at Sayoc Kali Sama Sama...it's been my lifelong dream to have the honor of demonstrating at Sama Sama, let alone teach there. At the end of July, I attended the SFL Conference in Dallas, Texas where I got stronger in my faith, made so many new friends, and best of all, I met someone very special to me who has all the same core values as I do. In August, I have also been able to train under some of the greatest warriors on the planet this month, learning skills I never thought I'd be able to learn.

This summer, I've learned that our past only dictates our future if we allow it. We have the ability to move forward, and once we do, God opens up doors that we never thought we'd see opened. However, it is up to us to MOVE. God won't move unless we do. He's waiting for us to move forward away from the negative aspects of our past...to move towards a Higher Path. Once that happens, and once we shed the chains of the past, only then will we see true opportunity and growth in our lives.

I am stronger, more self-aware, and happier than I have ever been. I know there will be battles to face in the future, but I now have the right faith, the right training, and the right people to stand by my side.

So to conclude, I will say this: Life isn't perfect. But, it is good. :)

Monday, August 8, 2011

Ready to Play

Growing up, I never really played sports. While I was heavy into martial arts growing up throughout my youth, I never really had the interest to play basketball, football (sorry to all the Texans out there...I know it is akin to committing an act of blasphemy), baseball, or tennis. Looking back on it, I think the desire to play was always there. The desire to play has not only been a part of my athletic life but also part of my spiritual life as well.

I always had a desire to go out and do athletic things. When I was a kid, the truth was that I was very naive, sheltered, and physically, I was fat, uncoordinated, and slow. When it came to gym class, or recess after lunch, I would always try to play sports with the other kids, but time after time, I was always the one picked last. It didn't matter what sport was being played: basketball, football, or even dodgeball or tag--I was always picked last due to my size and lack of knowledge regarding the game being played. I remember trying out for my junior varsity basketball team in middle school and failing rather miserably.

After being taunted and eventually kneed in the groin by a school bully, my parents decided to take my chubby, wimpy self to a Karate class in town where all the other kids seemed to be training. Martial Arts provided a solution to a lot of the problems I was facing. Not only did it teach me how to protect myself from bullies, but unlike other sports, it didn't require any prior knowledge of the sport to participate, nor did it require team tryouts or physical fitness tests to begin playing. I started as a white belt and eventually stuck around at the school for a few years. In time, I became physically more fit and more confident. The desire to play and to be athletic seemed to be what kept me there for a while, even when my friends from the school eventually quit. I went on to study different forms of martial arts, eventually finding the Filipino martial arts, which is the art God put in my heart to passionately pursue, study, and teach. To this day, the desire to play is still in me. I train 5 to 6 days a week, oftentimes twice a day. I eat right. I sleep at least 7 hours a night. I like fighting. I like being an athlete. I like to push myself and see where my body can take me.

Likewise, in my spiritual life, I can easily say that I've been ready to play for a long time. For as long as I can remember, I recall praying and talking to God about possibly using me to do something important on this planet while I'm still here. I feel that for the last few years, God has "benched" me in a way. No matter how hard I seemed to work or try, I could never get ahead in my spiritual life, nor was I able to find the purpose God had for me.

God is the greatest coach in the universe. He will train you. He will break you. He will push you to your limits. When He feels it's right, He'll put you out on the playing field. Above all things, He wants you to remember that you are not an individual. You play for HIS team, and He won't let you onto the playing field until He feels you are ready.

In the past month, I had the opportunity to be part of two amazing conferences, each of them representing the two pillars of my life. After attending Sayoc Kali Sama Sama in Pennsylvania, the world's greatest Filipino martial arts gathering, and after attending SFL Conference in Dallas, a truly fulfilling and amazing Christian conference, I feel like He's letting me know that I'm ready to accept my purpose, or at the very least, I will be able to step onto the field pretty soon. However, I just want to go by His playbook. He knows the game of life better than anyone else, after all.











Tuesday, August 2, 2011

The Message

I just got back to my home state of New Jersey from my recent trip to Texas. After a 2 hour flight delay and a three and a half hour plane ride back home, I had a lot of time to think about these past several days and what I experienced.

For those who may not know, I was in Dallas, Texas to attend a Christian conference for Singles for Family and Life (SFL). For those who know me, I am a person of faith, having been raised in a Christian household my whole life. My parents are very active in Couples for Christ (CFC), which acts as the overall head of SFL. I honestly have not been involved in the CFC/SFL community since my youth days. However, God really brought me through some pretty rough battles within the past year, and I feel that in that time, I got closer to God in my distress. I decided to make a committed effort to be more devoted to my faith and I eventually got involved in SFL these past few months. This past conference was enlightening and strengthening. I was also fortunate to meet and get to know young adults from all over the nation. One of my friends from the New Jersey SFL, Reggie Balbin, asked me during the last night of the conference, "What message do you think God told you through this weekend?" When he asked that, I honestly told him that the answer didn't arrive to me yet. However, finally back home, I think I understand what God was telling me through my experiences this weekend with the conference as well as the social outings with the people I met.

The message is, "You are NOT alone."

This past week, I've met other young people like myself who share the same core beliefs that I do. While we are all from different places and different backgrounds, I feel that I have found an organization of young people that truly desires to make a positive change in this world through their beliefs and values. The people I met at this conference all seem to possess the mentality that they are not here on Earth to settle for mediocrity--that they are here for a purpose. They emphasize the importance of family and life, which forms a huge basis for who I am as a person and allows me to put my faith in the proper perspective. They teach the importance of purity and integrity in thought, intention, and action.

This week, I've walked away with many things learned. I learned that while I am a strong person, true Strength comes from God the Creator, whose power is Infinite and through whom all things are possible. I've learned that one must step outside their comfort zone. I've learned that there are other young people like me who like to socialize without resorting to belligerence, drunkeness, or negative behavior. I've also gotten a better understanding of what I want my future relationship with my future wife to be like.

As an added bonus, I got the chance to eat some awesome Mexican and Texas BBQ (among other animals I never thought I'd eat), ride a mechanical bull (which I lasted over a minute and a half on, to my surprise), stepped into an actual rodeo stadium, saw where JFK got shot, and I even got to help a random stranger fix a flat tire.

I want to thank all of you who made this SFL Conference possible. Thanks to my household for their support. Thank you to all of the awesome speakers who inspired me to be a better leader. I want to say hello and thanks to all of the great people I met this weekend from Texas, Las Vegas, Seattle, and Chicago, whether in the conference or in fellowship socially. All I can say is I wish you all lived closer to me! But, don't worry...I'll see you guys here in New Jersey next year. :) I want to say fist pumping will not be in the agenda...but my brother Matt makes no promises.