When Grief Is the Great Gain: Finding Contentment and Rest in the Valleys of 2021

The Sands of Time, 2021

As 2021 ends in three days, I could only think about how swift the year has been as if they were sands that brushed off our palms quickly. But similarly as sands that passed off our hands, each miniscule particle of sand holds a certain value, without which the year would not be complete to end with. This is how I picture 2021, and as it ends, I could not be anymore grateful that it has chosen to end this way, in this fashion. 

2021, despite its swiftness, changed me into a different person that the pre-pandemic version of myself would never have imagined. It is true that the pandemic changes each and every one of us, but a better question to ask perhaps is how? How can something as tragic and traumatic as a worldwide crisis change us? 

This 2021, I have found that the answer to that question lies in the core of what tragedy and trauma bring us -- GRIEF. Yes, it is grief that has changed me this year. And no, you do not need to lose a loved one physically to experience grief. Crisis, tragedy, and trauma have altogether shown that grief does come in different shapes and forms. I have realized that any form of "loss" is grief in itself, and indeed, 2021 has been a year of losses for me...but it is in these losses, in these moments of grief, where I have truly gained something far better. 

This year is a year of loss, and whatever I have lost this year is far beyond what my pre-pandemic self could ever handle. Just when I thought that the losses I once had last 2015, 2016, or 2020 were grave enough, the losses of 2021 were just brutal and cruel. Still, it is worth noting that these losses happened at the expense of something life-changing.

Losing Circles, Gaining Intimacy and Authenticity

I have grieved over lost people over the course of my 20s, but this year is so much different. This time around, I have lost people simply because they have moved towards a different stage in their lives--a stage I could no longer identify myself with. I think that has become a fact, a reality of entering late 20s that I have learned to live with. Having friends who enter marriage and family life while I grapple with finishing my master's and finding a stable job with career progression are almost entirely two different directions. I realized that while they have something I do not have as of the moment, I have something that they might never ever have. When conversations and discourse go towards their direction, it is almost always an indirect and a subtle reference to my current state, pressuring me to follow in their footsteps instead. This year, I have learned to choose the energy I would like to receive and eventually reciprocate. While marriage and a family life are definitely in my late 20s - early 30s prayer list (as you would see in a while), they are definitely not the discourse I currently need, neither are they the energies that feed me right now. With that, I have been left with the best choice of grief--losing them--as a result of choosing not to receive and reciprocate their energy. 

While that sounded more like a defense mechanism, but I think it is high time to drop unnecessary pressures and opinions around us. It is high time to affirm ourselves of our own timeline, of our own seasons, of our own journeys as we walk further away from other's expectations or desires on us. While at first, I had to adjust big time living alone, with empty and outdated group chats, re-filtered "close friends" list and so on, it was not too long until the Lord time again reassured me of His perfect track record of "never leaving me empty-handed," a reference from 2015. I might have lost a number of "friends" from 2016-2021, but here we are, 2021 redirected me to intimacy and authenticity within and beyond. 

I have found that true intimacy and authenticity begin with myself. If I cannot be genuinely joyous alone, I cannot be genuinely joyous with somebody else--even as far as marriage and family life are concerned. 2021 has made me realize that the Lord has created and gifted us with the ability to be intimately connected with Him and with ourselves. As David greatly strengthened and encouraged himself in the Lord, so could we. While we have been created as social beings, we are also created with the capacity of being contented and sufficient with our very own company. I remember Job, Elijah, Jeremiah and the other prophets, and even Christ Himself as they have had their own journeys without any other company, it is evident that God's providence is not found in the presence of another person, but in the very Person of God Himself. 

Only until I learned that reality was I able to gladly and thankfully walk away from people who are no longer able to serve growth for my current season and walk towards those who are able to. 

In losing circles of friends, I gained contentment in intimacy and authenticity with my own person.

Losing Passion, Gaining the Present Moment

Well, losing friends are not new to me. While there were some brief periods of adjustment, they were not brand new, and I was able to easily accustom myself to such a life. But this second great loss came to me as a surprise, and it is certainly something my pre-pandemic self would never have imagined facing. 

I have grieved over losing my very passion and zeal for living--the will to hustle and be productive at work. 

Indeed, this sounds new to you as well if you have read all the articles here, and especially if you have known me personally. Losing the momentum to accomplish anything is so foreign that you might even have a hard time believing if this has truly happened to me this year.

But it did, and this is the grief that I lamented the most this year. God knows how difficult this was for an achiever like me. I believe this has started during August when I constantly confronted myself with the questions, "how long will I be in this kind of remote setup?" "How many more months would it take before I finally get to finish my thesis?" "When will I move forward from this kind of line of work?"

Should I say that I got really tired of all the hustle of 2016-2020? I grew weary of doing one thing that I so loved to do before--studying in graduate school, writing and publishing researches, attending and facilitating numerous conferences, while teaching in the classroom at the same time. For many moments, I felt like I have reached the peak (sumagad na) and there was no going further anymore. In those months, despite being presented with a promotion/leadership opportunity at work, it was clear to me that it was not for me. However, whenever I was asked of my plans in terms of my career, I could not give a clear answer. The road ahead of me was filled with smoke and fog. Truly, the last quarter of 2021 were soul-searching moments for me. I could now imagine myself as a swimmer who wallowed deeper into the abyss searching for some lost treasure underneath the sea. Until something started to emerge from the dust: I have lost my pre-pandemic passion. 

I have lost my passion for my life way back in the old normal. All of these I have realized when I started focusing and channeling my energies on the "present moment," here in the new normal. I came to the point where I stopped saying "I hope things can go back to how they used to be" and I entertained the possibility of not ever returning to how things used to be. As the pandemic ravaged our lives this year with two more big surges, taking away the lives of many--a number of them whom we personally know--and affecting us all on a very personal level, I was brought face-to-face with the reality that all that I got is the "now," the "present," this very moment. Using the present time to lament on the past was a waste of time to me. I believe the Lord has used this season to teach me to embrace the skills of adaptability and flexibility--the skills that are greatly needed in "learning to be content and grateful." Remembering Paul's learning experience of both "abounding" and "abasing," him writing Philippians 4 implicitly shows how the Lord has allowed him to master the skill of being flexible and adaptable to whatever form or shape of "normalcy" was presented unto him. And I think, the pandemic on its second year has taught me to ride on any wave of normalcy. If normalcy involves changing passions, learn to ride with it.

In losing my "old normal" passion, I gained contentment and even gratitude for the present moment."

Losing Childhood Dreams, Gaining a New Vision

Grieving over lost passions have led me to this last loss, a very recent one I must say, but this is something my pre-pandemic self would never have imagined experiencing either. Just this early-mid December, as I taught myself contentment in accepting that things that will never return to how they used to be, the anticipation, the hope in looking forward to "how things will take their new shape and form" started thumping within me. Later did I only realize that as I gladly let go of my old passions, I made room for new passions to take space within me. 

I have grieved over losing my childhood dream, my younger self's ambition to make way for a new dream, a clearer vision.

Being a teacher is my childhood dream. Ever since I was in kindergarten, my teachers spotted my ability to facilitate learning. When I was 9 (and you can also see this timeline in my older blog posts), I started dreaming of being a teacher, teaching in a classroom, checking and grading papers, and doing other supplemental duties of a teacher as well. When I was 16 I realized that this was the profession God was leading me to pursue, and I was able to actualize this childhood dream way back 2015-2016, when I was 20-21. In 2017, I answered the call to Christian education and to have myself armed with Bible education, a willingness to surrender to the ministry, to missions, whenever He calls, and to be armed as well with a graduate degree in education sciences as well. However as the pandemic began, and as my exposure in the academe grew for the past 5 years, I have seen and realized that there is more to life than just being a teacher. It is in these past 5 years as well where my desire for eventually having a Godly family and raising Godly children started. As adulthood quickly caught up with me, I also started desiring for stability through stewardship, especially in terms of professional and financial stability--two key assets that I believe would greatly help in fulfilling the desire for having a Godly family. Together with that, I also realized that education in the new normal is borderless--there are no limits as the new normal has been eliminating the barriers, the walls of the classroom. I imagine my younger self standing in a room with many walls, with the road ahead filled with fog and smoke, and as time passes by, my younger self evolves, the walls of the room crumble, the fog and the smoke slowly subside, and I am starting to clearly see, that there is so much in the road that He has prepared ahead of me.

A new vision has been formalized, and that is to see myself grow professionally by exploring the different avenues of the academe-industry linkages and to contribute my knowledge, skills, and insights therein. If the academe is my current mission field, then there is more to saturate beyond the walls of classroom teaching. 

In losing my childhood dreams, I gain contentment in cultivating a new vision, not just for me, but for the "family" that He would eventually give me, and to the "professional community" that I would eventually reach out to.

Sovereignty, God's Perfect Track Record in 2021

Everything that shall happen will happen in God's own time. Everything depends on the compass of His hands and the working of His fingers. But this 2021, His sovereignty has also taught me that it is He who changes our hearts, and shapeshifts our dreams and visions as we seek His discernment for our future. It is time to put an end to those days where we hold on so tightly to our passions and to our dreams. If there is one more lesson that I would want to add, that is to hold on lightly to people, passions, and dreams, because ultimately, they are not under our control, but under His. As the saying goes, we are not called to bear the weight of having it all figured out, but we are called to trust the only One who does. People come and go, let them arrive your way, but also open the door for them to leave. Passions are not permanent and rigid, let God move and change them for your future. Do not settle for less when it comes to your dreams, let God give you a reality that is far better than your dreams. 

As 2021 comes to a close, surrender to God's sovereignty. His sovereignty is our cause for hope, contentment, and gratitude. Moreover, His sovereignty is a mirror of His faithfulness--of which both have a perfect track record of unfailing. 

There is a grief that is good, and this is good grief--losing our grip over the things of this life and holding on instead to His sovereignty. And this grief is but gain, we gain nothing but the best that He has in store for us. 

While 2021 seemed to be a year of rest, reflection, and realization in the valleys that taught me contentment, I believe these are all preparatory work for 2022, a year of ascension and ascendance. 

“Guidance, like all God's acts of blessing under the covenant of grace, is a sovereign act. Not merely does God will to guide us in the sense of showing us his way, that we may tread it; he wills also to guide us in the more fundamental sense of ensuring that, whatever happens, whatever mistakes we may make, we shall come safely home. Slippings and strayings there will be, no doubt, but the everlasting arms are beneath us; we shall be caught, rescued, restored. This is God's promise; this is how good he is.” -J.J. Packer