It all started with integrity and ended up with a burp!
The past few weeks seemed to have gone by so slowly. It must have been the hardest weeks of my life and truth be told ... I am not sure when this difficult season is going to be over. I have never felt so stressed, mentally drained and physically exhausted.
I taught a class on Christians@Work and how having integrity is so important for Christians. By "integrity" I mean knowing who we are in God (our identity) and living out a life that is reflective of who we say we are and what we say we will do.
And so the test began ...
I found myself suddenly overloaded with work. I blew most of my deadlines. Everyone was edgy. And to top it all, Murphy's Law was at work. Whatever that could possibly go wrong, went wrong. Everything was urgent, and things just didn't go as planned. From having your company's speaker arriving at the wrong hotel to having your company name spelt "ASS ...." on the meeting room door and many more! The most frustrating thing was, it was all completely out of my control.
Time out came this weekend. I went for a four-hour massage spa and cremebath. It was heavenly beginning with a sauna then a body scrub followed by a 90-minute body massage and ending with a cremebath for my hair. But I must say, it was one of the most noisy massages I have ever been through. The Indonesian masseuse kept burping throughout the massage from the time she started massaging my feet all the way through to my shoulders and arms when I was given the cremebath.
I was later told that I was the reason for all that noise (burp!) from the masseuse. Apparently this is a common occurance when Malay or Indonesian massuese massages her customers. If the "wind" that's accumulated in your body does not come out from the customers via burps or farts then it gets passed on to the masseuse and she would have no choice but to release the "wind" by burping. Well, I must say it was my first time experiencing a burping masseuse.
Well ... it is also the most stressful time I have ever been in!
Given all the misfortunes in my life of late, frankly, I am just thankful that it wasn't me burping or farting away. It would have been an extremely embarrassing moment considering my colleague was just next door!
Anyway, moral of the story is life sucks from time to time. Sometimes, having done all, things can still go very wrong. There's no right or wrong nor should one be pointing the finger at someone else or oneself.
I still haven't got it all figured out. It there was one thing I learnt through this time so far, it's to have a clear conscience that I have done my best and it's now time to trust God to do the rest. The burps, tears and laughter in the low seasons help release tension and provide a good night's sleep.
I highly recommend massages to get through tough times. The next time you go through one, remember "Burp!"
1 comment:
i've experienced the burping of a masseur before :) but seriously i do tend to want to fart when they massage my stomach!
on the stresses of life and murphy's law. i do remember those times...it usually happens during the days leading to the CNY break. all our clients always seem to want their case completed before the week long holiday. it was like a volcano bubbling and finally erupting - and that would be me erupting!
now i wonder how i managed to go through that period of my life. it was foot to the pedal everyday and especially when i drive...
the balancing act is always the hardest because if we want to be Christians of integrity we have to do what we say we will do but sometimes it compromises other priorities in life. i guess we have to learn to prioritize - God vs all other distractions; health vs. work; family vs. work, friends vs. work - you can see where this is going don't you? Work seem to take up such a large part of our lives!
but one thing is for sure, sometimes we just need to step back and evaluate or go for a massage! there is little wonder why so many spas and massage places have sprouted in the city. stressed out executives actually go during lunch hour!
maybe you have a massage more often...maybe not 4 hrs :) but a quick one during the day.
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