wife and mum extraordinary: July 2013

Monday, July 15, 2013

Wife and MUM 05/2013 – She is Unique

Monday 15 July 2013

Friend: Who is your wife?

Me: You have known her for at least ten years and you asked me who is my wife.

Friend: Yes, I know her but do you know her?

Me: Off course I know her. I eat, talk and sleep with her every day.

Friend: OK. Noted. Now tell me what are her strengths?

Me: What do you mean by strengths?

Friend: Describe your wife to me in terms of who she is in terms of her behavior, her values, and her approach towards everyday happenings. From your description, I should be able to recognize her.

WOW! that is quiet a challenge.

Me: OK, give me a day and I will get back to you.

As a trainer, a coach and a person who studies human behavior, I cheated a little. I got my wife to do a character profile analysis.

Me: Friend, let me tell you about my wife.

My wife is a unique lady. She has a very humble beginning, the third child of a very poor family. Her father died when she was very young and as a result she had to work from the age of twelve while others goes to school. Nevertheless through the grace of God, her life improves with time. Therefore she is grateful to God for the good things that had happened to her. She is well aware of the fact that whatever she has now, “health, friends, relatives, etc.” can be gone tomorrow. As such she takes pleasure to call and visit friends who are sick, and friends she had not seen for sometime. A biblical verse that can relate to her is “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.”

Friend: What else?

Me: She is also modest and conservative as she does not project herself as the expert even in things she is well versed in, preferring to let others lead. This can be attributed to her mindset of not seeing herself as special.

Friend: What else?

Me: In my opinion, her strengths of gratitude and humility as described above is complemented, influenced and aligned with her spirituality. What it means is that she believes in a higher purpose and she grounds her faith in the Lord Jesus as her savior and God. She believes that this world is temporal in nature that will ultimately end when she is reconciled with her God. Her beliefs shape her actions that is translated into behavior and seen as her personality by her friends and those who knows her.

Treating those she come in contact with respect and dignity is one value she holds dear to. Having being a hair stylist for many years she had seen the good, the bad and the ugly displayed in the behaviors of her clients. There are many stories of arrogance and humility, kindness and cruelty, pettiness and generosity plus many more shades of traits and character.

On top of this she is a forgiving person. She believe in kindness and not revenge. Despite being treated unfairly in her youth by a relative, she had reciprocated with kindness and not hate. I have personally witness her speaking to this particular relative with kind words and in a demeanor befitting of a younger person. Love and not hate is the operating word. She had loan to friends and relatives knowing that the loan will never be repaid.

Yes, one other attribute that I would add is her loyalty to the team. She plans her schedule to be in line with her team. Occasionally she will bring food for her choir members. This is not done out of obligation but of love. Irene is loyal and dedicated teammate who does her share, working for the success of the team.

In short, six words that sum up Irene’s character are Gratitude; Humility; Spirituality; Fairness; Forgiveness; and Teamwork.

"Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

- Abraham Lincoln

"I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end, when I come to lay down the reins of power, I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside me."

- Abraham Lincoln

Questions for reflection:
1. If you were to describe your spouse’s character, would your spouse recognize them-self?

Cheers.
Hope to see you soon.

Papa Coaching

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Thursday, July 4, 2013

Wife and MUM 04/2013 – Love and Rotten Eggs

Thursday 4 July 2013

On the last week of each month Irene travels to Singapore to support her daughter. Her daughter would be busy in the office and usually manages to get back home late in the night. Mother and daughter has a close bond and with a grandson who laughs enthusiastically and kisses his grandma unconditionally, Irene looks forward to the trip lovingly.

Each trip is planned out carefully. She is part of church choir who practices every Wednesday night and Sunday afternoon. In addition for every first and third Sunday the choir renders a hymn of praise. Therefore Irene plans her trip to avoid not attending practice on Wednesday and rendition of hymn on Sunday. She scrutinize the calender and bus-coach schedule to ensure she will not miss practice or rendition if possible. She generally purchase her ticket for a Thursday trip on the fourth week and get back on Tuesday of the first week. In this way she achieves her objective of not missing practice and rendition. I asked her why she goes to all this trouble. Her answer is “We must be committed to the team. What if everyone of us do as we like. Also when we serve in the singing ministry, we must serve diligently and faithfully.”

For the three weeks when she is in Malaysia, she would be looking at cloths for her grandson, utensils for her daughter and food for her son-in-law. Therefore shopping for her is a joy, because she builds love into her shopping.

Today, Irene went to the market to get a fresh chicken to cook and bring to Singapore. Her son-in-law likes “Kaya - Coconut Jam" for spreading over the bread. To prepare home cooked Kaya, it takes fresh eggs, pandan leaves, coconut milk, sugar and flour plus probably four hours of constantly stirring the ingredients and watching the fire. She enjoys her labor of love so it is not a chore.

Last night she bought the eggs, sugar and flour from the supermarket. This morning at the fresh market, she bought the coconut to make coconut milk. The first step in making the Kaya is to prepare the eggs. She broke five eggs into a bowl. On breaking the sixth egg, there is this pungent, smelly odour. She has broken a rotten egg into the bowl. So there goes the Kaya. No Kaya for her son-in-law this month.

Kaya can be bought from the supermarket, the coffee shops and lots of others places. Therefore this is not an issue. The interesting aspect is what is next after breaking the rotten egg into the bowl? The essence of a person character comes across after a negative unexpected event. An unexpected event that cause discomfort to us. How do we cope?

Irene called me to show me the rotten egg in the bowl. I suggested we wrapped the eggs up in a plastic bag and throw it into the garbage can. Irene says if we do that the whole neighbour hood will smell of rotten eggs, and within a few hours worms will be seen wriggling out of the uncooked eggs.

What Irene did was to scoop up the rotten egg and washed it down the drain with plenty of water. Then cooked the remaining eggs after which they were disposed of in the garbage can. In this way, there would be no rotten smell and no worms to worry over.

“It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”

- C.S.Lewis

Questions for reflection:
1. What positive actions can I take when faced with negative unexpected events that does not work in my favor?