lettersandme

Friendly

“It’s not enough to be friendly, you have to be a friend.”

It’s a line from the movie “Wonder”. Nakakatuwa yung movie kasi tungkol ito sa batang may cranial deformity na naging sanhi para matakot siyang makihalubilo sa iba. But because of the love Auggie ( the main character) receives from his family, he overcome that fear. I am touched by how his mom told him that he’s not ugly and that his mother’s opinion matters the most because Mothers knew their children best. That particular scene made me appreciate my parents more. ( I think I’ll have to write another post for that)

Okay, let’s go back to the title. For the past months, I’ve been trying my very best to befriend everyone. For what reason? I want o know them better and understand different types of different people. Yes, I can say that it’s overwhelming and yet very humbling. I feel blessed to really got to know them. Pero hindi naging madali. Sometimes, people see me as “masungit” o kaya mahirap i-approach, because of that, I had to change that impression. What I did was I studied the topics that they feel comfortable to talk with, then, as they say…the rest is history. I’m happy to know that I have a lot of friends that I could have imagined. But, the real secret is, I also became their friend. They could talk to me about anything and everything under the sun!! And I am so grateful and so blessed for that. I think, my struggle right now is to choose a favourite. 😊😊😊

I hope that anyone who’ll read this will find a blessed way on how to have more friends.

Salamat. 😚

Maricel😁😇

30-Day Challenges (My Journey to Minimalism)

My almost 2-month journey to minimalism already taught me to live peacefully. I was released from all worries – What clothes to wear? What food to eat? What movie to watch? – these are some of the questions I asked myself then, but now that I re-evaluate my possessions and found value in everything that remained, I feel so good and at peace😊

I embraced the idea of becoming a minimalist because I want to de-clutter my life, I want to appreciate the things that really adds value to my character rather than chase the things that I think would add value to my personality. Yes, it’s hard at first, because people around me thought that I’m depriving myself of the “good” things, but minimalism is not deprivation; it’s finding value and true purpose in everything.

I know that I’m still new to this kind of lifestyle so I decided to make it more fun! I’m making a 30-Day Challenge. I will challenge myself to practice for 30 days a certain change in the way I live then hopefully make it a habit.

So, for my first challenge, I will not spend money on clothes, shoes and cosmetics (lotion make up and the likes😀) for 30 days. I made this as the first challenge because I observed that I sometimes shop compulsively when it comes to this type of items so I want that bad habit to stop.

Let’s see how far I’ll go with this one.

Thanks for reading. Please, feel free to comment. 😊

Salamat. 😀

Taming Technology (My Journey to Minimalism)

Everyone knows that technology has its positive and negative effects on each person. We have cellphones, computers, laptops, and any gadgets that can quicken our means of communication and socializing. Our amusement of these types of technology may become a ferocious animal that can eventually harm us (that’s a bit exaggerated.. Haha😆). Seriously speaking, we should tame some of them.

My journey to minimalism made me evaluate how I’m using my “technology “. Ok, I have an android phone and a laptop. That’s not a lot of “technology” to begin with, but here’s the thing, my phone has applications, which after my evaluation, are apps I don’t really need, the same goes with my laptop. When I realized that my technologies are cluttered with unimportant stuff, I decided to tame it.
And how did I do that?

I uninstalled! 😀 I freed myself from my social media apps such as Facebook and Twitter, mainly because I realized that my unending scrolling down of newsfeeds from the two sites, limits me from talking to the real people and it occupies a great amount of my time. I have not yet deactivated both accounts, but uninstalling the applications helped me to “really” control the temptation of just clicking at the app and staring at the newsfeeds completely.

I uninstalled all of my gaming applications. Oh Yes I did! 😩 again, for the reason that it occupies a great amount of time. On-Line games also made me feel like I am always chasing for something, and that violates my idea of minimalism.

I de-cluttered my e-mail.

I am not the kind of person who reads her e-mail and deletes it immediately after reading so when I told myself that I needed to tame my e-mail, I deleted 5,000+ of messages in it. After that I unsubscribed to newsletters that I think unhelpful, because some of them are just advertisement about this and that.

Lastly, I deactivated my on-line Shopping accounts, because I realized that those accounts tempted me to spend money impulsively.

That’s it! That is how I tamed my technology. Here’s a reminder; going minimalist should not leave you a feeling of deprivation. The feeling shoud be “ease and peace” as I put it. The above steps worked for me but I am not saying that it could also easily work for everyone.

Thanks for reading. Please, feel free to comment.

Salamat😊😘

My Journey to Minimalism – Why Minimalism?

I have been so obssessed of watching videos and reading articles about minimalism for a month and a half now and I realized that I want to live that kind of lifestyle. Simplicity, contentment, freedom and clutter-free are only few words to define minimalism. But if I were to define the word minimalism it will be “the ease and peace of living more by having less” and that will be my life’s ultimate goal.

Why live less when you can have more?

Consumerism has swallowed us whole! You can see advertisement anytime and anywhere. You can see your favorite icon wearing or doing something that you wish you could have and do someday. You talk with your friends and family about the latest trend in clothes, car shoes etc. etc.. Honestly the list could go on and on. And what does that leave you with? The feeling of always chasing something. Yes, you will find fulfillment when you get it, but for how long? A month? A year? Or just for today? What if a new one comes along? Will you chase for it again?. This question has been my guideline in finding values and purposes within my possession or wanting to possess, and I believe that this will also help me find value in who I am and what will I become as I continue with my Minimalism journey.

My goal is to;

1. Find more time for writing. – Writing gives me peace and calmness.

2. Create new hobby. – My hobby is reading, but I want to be more creative. I want to learn play a musical instrument.

3. Be healthy. – I believe that finding value in the food that we eat and the activities that we do will lead us to decide what is good for our body.

4. Active in Church. – I am a Seventh Day Adventist and I want to find time in doing productive things for the children in church and for others as well.

5. Early retirement. – I am 28 years old now, and I want to enjoy and live in nature when I turn 35 years old.

Those are my goals and I believe that becoming minimalist will help me achieve them without having the feeling of “Chasing something “. As suggested by Lio Babauta of Zenhabits, we should have mini missions, and I will try to make my minimalism journey a mini missions for each month.

I hope that this will inspire and help someone to become a minimalist. Feel free to comment 😊

I want to be a Minimalist

For the past week, I have been watching YouTube videos about being a minimalist. My curiosity started when I decided to eat healthy and to learn how to become a vegan someday. (but this topic is another story 😁) All those “Why become vegan? ” videos somehow linked me to minimalism videos and it intrigued me to understand the kind of lifestyle that a minimalist have. So, how do I understand the word minimalism?
When I encountered the word Minimalism my initial idea was that it’s a way of living a simpler life, and I believe that I got it right somehow. Basically, minimalism is living a life with things that a person actually needs and find happiness in it.

Most of us, and I include myself, has the idea that happiness and success may be measured by material things. That these “things” will define our status in the society that we live in. There’s nothing wrong with that, but if you find yourself getting frustrated and tired while trying to get those things, then that’s the start of getting it all wrong. Minimalism will help you fathom the idea that what you have right now is more than what you really need, and you must get rid of everything in excess.

This kind of lifestyle will give meaning to the famous phrase of “Less is More”. That’s the main reason why I want to become one. At first, I thought that it would be easy, but it’s not! You’ll need to deeply ponder over the things that you need to let go and the things that you need the most. It may sound that I’m exaggerating but it’s the trick that will help us practice minimalism. It’s like de-cluttering your life then sorting things out and finally living with it.

It’s not an overnight magic! You have to take small steps, especially if the things that you need to let go holds special memories. It’s a battle that you have to win. 😀 and I am currently fighting that battle now.

So, as of the moment, I already made the effort to sort my closet and took away the excess (I am planning to give all the excess clothes to my cousins) and I found out that there’s whole lot of space in there! And I found happiness in it because I know that I have enough Sabbath dresses, uniforms, sleep wears, underwears and casual wears inside my closet. I found contentment and peace to see that I don’t have to mix and match my clothes in order for me to wear everything in it. Yes, it’s lesser than before yet it made me happy and at peace. 😊

So, that would be my step #1. I hope to write my progress as soon as I can. I do believe that living a minimalist lifestyle will help me become happier.

Happy Reading 😘

letters and me

Hello! 😊

“letters and me” will be all about my thoughts on the books that I have read or currently reading or about people that I met, or about places that I’ve been or it could be about anything. 😁

I love to read. It always amazes me to see letters combined to form words and eventually ends up into one great story.

So, I guess I’ll just have to start writing a good one.. Right? Am I making sense? Haha! 😁