Moving forward
This must have been one of the busiest years of our lives! I just realized I couldn’t even answer a simple text from a friend of mine who asked about what was most memorable for me for the year 2010 and another text inquiring about the most important lesson I have learned. My daughter Hannah asked me what was most fun about our Christmas celebration and I gave her a blank look. Everything was so awesome! How could I sum up my 365 days in one memorable occasion or how could it be defined by just one learning? How could one very special moment have one important fun event?
When we talk about numbers, I am reminded about many things: The Pangilinan side alone consists of 47 individuals. Nine siblings from two strong, very influential parents married to nine more individuals, who make up the in-laws, producing 27 offspring plus one on the way come July 2011. My side is not as prolific but quite interesting. We are only three children from my mom’s side and only my brother Melvin and I are married. He has two children and I have four with one on the way. Our youngest brother Mikhail is 18 years younger than I, which makes him only 22.
This year alone, my husband must have traveled to more than a hundred destinations for work and his advocacies, and must have at least spoken to close to a hundred thousand people in his seminars. Aside from my showbiz engagements, I have immersed myself in our sporting activities and while browsing through our 2010 calendar, I realized that our Triathlon Team Pangilinan, where I act as team manager, had quite a hyperactive year. Our team joined a total of 18 races. If you multiply that by six individuals (Anthony, myself, and our four children), that would amount to a total of 108 races! That does not even include the races our honorary members have joined. My mom and my 87-year-old grandmother have joined a total of six races. All in all, because of hard work and countless hours put into training, our team has gone to the podium to receive various sporting awards at least 22 times! Now, I could go on and on with numbers and this could either make me want to retire from any form of work or involvement, but it actually wanted me to go forward so much more. Perhaps to conquer more, but more importantly to be of bigger and of more positive impact on the lives of others.
Regardless of how many people we touch daily or even yearly, if we don’t create even a slight dent — and I mean a positive dent in their lives — we have gained nothing. My mother always told me as a child that success is not defined by money or acquisitions, but how one’s work has helped improved the lives of others around that person as he goes up the ladder of success. If everything was measured in monetary figures or material value, I would liken this to what Solomon describes in Ecclesiastes as a life void of meaning and work that involves simply chasing after the wind. Some of us are responsible for more than a thousand people in our organization. There are those who survive by the skin of their teeth and then there are those who have everything they can hope for or imagine, but the only thing I know that will make all our toil worthwhile is the result of such labor. Who gains from all this? Where does the glory go in all our successful ventures? How have we achieved our stature in life and when can we say, indeed, that we have been to our Maker a delight — someone He can be well pleased with? These are wonderful things we can think of before we actually dive into having a list of New Year’s resolutions that most of the time is bound to be forgotten and broken.
As I now carry my fifth child in my womb, I am awed at the manner in which this child has maneuvered its way to existence despite having been careful with my intimate encounters with my husband. So many questions popped in my mind about my capacity to care for a child now that I’m in my 40s, when I’ve been just so gung-ho about being fit and fab and dreaming of being in my bikini on the beach! So many things will have to be put on hold, focus that has to be shifted, and priorities that have to be reassessed. Seems too much to think about, but my eldest daughter put it plainly for me when she said, “Mom, we’ll make things better for this baby.” Yes, indeed, I have been a mother four times over, and I can hack this and I know I’ve got all my children to back me up.
With another year just over, I thank God for all that He has allowed us to do, to be, and all that He has provided for our comfortable existence which has also allowed us to help provide for other people’s needs. As we look forward to another year, may we allow ourselves to be defined by the value our Savior has given us, as we’re reminded by His birth on Christmas, and may you put the same value and more to the lives you will touch for the next 365 days of the year 2011!
