You Know Better Than I

When I look back at my own life, the journey has not been easy. There was a time when I was really SURE I wanted to be a Jesuit for the rest of my life. Life “fell into place” at that point. And for a while, I was really happy–not in a fake, so-so way. There was real DEEP JOY there.

But life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. And the mystery of life began to unravel. Life fits. Or it doesn’t. And then we make decisions and live life based on this fit-tingness — on how things fall into place and how life reaches its “kahulugan“. There’s a gut-feel to the whole thing that we cannot fully explain. But it makes sense after a while, especially if we have the patience and the strength to not control everything.

I’ve loved and lost and loved again. In different ways and iterations and versions. And throughout all that, there was a deep joy that kept me. I felt that deep joy when I met my wife Jean. And I felt that deep joy again when my kids were born. A fit-tingness to life: like life falling into place in the same way that square pegs fit into square holes.

In the end, I trust. In the end, I allow myself to be swept by a love so great it will allow me to go on my own and look for myself. It’s a love so great that it will wait for me to come home without forcing me to do so.

I am coming home. This year, in the midst of this great pandemic, I see life is falling into place again.

But you still know better than I.