Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. -Col 3:2; for our lives are just temporary. Every decision and action should be based on that eternal mindset that ultimately we have to answer to Him. And that following him should not just come out of an attitude of obligation but out of love and reverence for Him. And naturally the joy and peace will be fruits of that. 
The Bible tells us in Ecclestiastes 5:10 that “the one who loves money is never satisfied with money, and whoever loves wealth [is] never [satisfied] with income. This too is futile.” if money is the only reward of your job you will begin to deteriorate in your life physically, emotionally, spiritually and relationally. – Dan Miller
May I honor You in everything I do.Jobs come and go but it should never derail you from your calling. – Dan Miller
“Jesus said, you must be born again in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” By this, he meant that you had to be born once to the world, and once again to the knowledge of God through Him. I have come to believe that we must be born three times — once to the world, once to God, and once to ourselves. Because only when we can see who we are and what we stand for — what we want to be about in the world — does every action we take suddenly seem significant. That is the point at which we have realized a vision for ourselves and our path through this world — a path that defines success. – Laurie Beth Jones
This quote clearly defines where I am now.
It’s been a while since I have been having a question in my mind of why I feel happy and content despite the more pressures at work, difficulties of doing my field work with my expanding belly, swelling feet, and sleepless nights. I thought of many things like the blessing of having our baby at the perfect timing, my supportive bosses now after a series of.. shall I say.. crappy politics and emotional stress from my previous job, lots of opportunities coming my way, supportive team at work. All these I’m thankful for. But really, when I thought about it really hard, I wouldn’t be this happy if I didn’t knew my purpose in life. I was truly born again when God showed himself to me and even became more intune with myself when my creator revealed to me what my life is for. Now truly, as laurie says it, everything I do becomes much more significant and thus, I am content.
Content that doesn’t sit lazily but content thinking that I am where God wants me to be. When everything that’s happening makes sense. :)
We have closed recently a project that is close to my heart: The DSWD‘s NHTS project. It’s a multimillion project that will impact how our government provides to the 9 Million poor households in the Philippines where 5 Million are considered poorest of the poor and will become beneficiaries of the government’s 4Ps project. Take note that’s 5 Million HOUSEHOLDS! Multiply it to an average of 5 people per family, that is 25Million people! I am happy that through my job I am helping impact the lives of these people. There are so many projects in line still which I am very excited about like the project we have with PAG-ASA and DENR about climate change, and the potential solutions we can provide Department of Education and Department of Energy. They say handling the government in the Philippines is very hard and most sales people will shy away from it. But as for me, I am excited to cover it because the solutions are exciting and I know I’ll be making a difference in the lives of my fellowmen especially the poor and my country’s environmental state. I know it will not be easy but I am more hopeful now with the new government. :) and I’m much more purposeful because not only am I following God’s leading in my life but I am creating a better future for my baby Solara. I’m excited to tell her all the things we can do to help the poor and the environment. With her name connoting the Sun, I am excited to see how God will use her to brighten people lives. Can’t wait to see you my little darling.
For almost 9 years I have been in the IT sales industry. I’ll be honest I have episodes where I ask myself the purpose of what I’m doing more than earning for myself or my family. During those times I look at people in the medical industry and instantly I see how they are able to help and make a difference even while earning for themselves. They make an impact to the people they are treating. Then I also see people who go out and choose to work for non-profit agencies, for foundations.. trading the comfortable life and potential higher earnings just to help people they don’t know. I yearn for that. When I took a break of 5 months from work, I was able to reflect much on why am I here and for the purpose of my life. I knew I am to make a difference by helping the poor and at the same time helping the environment for my children and the future generations. And then I was offered a job in a company I wanted to join in 5 months ago. It was a dillema because I feared I may not have the time to fulfill my calling if I accept the offer. But I prayed about it and resolved that I can do this at the same time and this will help me and my husband in the much needed capital we need to pursue our dream. And so I accepted it. 2 and half months in the job, I can say I am happy with my work because I have a great boss who supports me and doesn’t micromanage, colleagues who are helpful and fun to be with and most especially a partner (a dedicated Inside Sales Rep who closely works with me) who is patient enough to bear with my sometimes bossy personality. But as I have anticipated, I have become too busy to pursue my calling on building that social enterprise for the poor and the environment. And I have again started asking myself what’s the purpose of selling all these computers, servers, storage, and systems in general. People can live without it and besides there are far more pressing issues like poverty, hunger and global warming. There was a time I again struggled going to work. And then I prayed to God to show me why am I here, why did He place me here? And then deals started to come in. Deals that would help the poor and uneducated children. One deal was for a National Household Targeting System (NHTS) for the Poor which is designed to help qualify the poorest of the poor to become one of the beneficiaries of the money grant program from the government. Our solution will be the infrastructure that will help run that system. :) Then, next is an educational institution which provides schools, systems that will help rural areas gain access from quality education from the city. We didn’t win the first phase but the potential of us being able to win the next phase and be part of improving the educational system of the rural people are good enough reasons for me to find purpose in what I do. And then everything started to make sense, the fact that I’m working for a company who takes saving energy and environment seriously, the opportunity to work on several government agencies to prove that we can win accounts in a clean way.. without bribe or any dirty tactics are all good reasons for me why I was placed here. I am happy that I’m working for a company that share the same principles that I have and values the same visions. These all are an affirmation that I am in the right place and I can do more being here. As they say, in this company, we have “THE POWER TO DO MORE” 
Please refer if anybody knows a “green architect” for this project:
An environmental NGO working in Lipa City, is set to renovate a building in Tagbakin, Halang, Lipa City, by the shore of Taal Lake to serve as a community training center, with an eventual goal of being a research and monitoring station with interactive displays of Taal Lake information. We are seeking an architect for this project with the following qualifications:
1. Environmental Planner
2. Background in social/community development and work with LGUS
3. Design philosophy/projects that retain, enhance natural landscapes and habitats, with a familiarity with what is wildlife-friendly (both animals and plants)
The biggest problem is getting beyond the “you can’t” syndrome. The moment you figure that out, you’re on your way to flying. Anyone who cannot see problems around him or herself is utterly blind. All the problems sitting there are an invitation for you to be creative, make use of your skills and resources and find a solution. Of course you can do it. It doesn’t require brilliance. It’s just giving yourself permission and then being persistent. Persistent in seeing the problem or opportunity and persistent in thinking about it until you have come up with some interesting ideas that might change the pattern. It’s really a mindset, not anything in the objective world — that is the problem.
– Bill Drayton of Ashoka.org
I totally agree with Mr. Neric Acosta’s article below, that the climate is truly crazy and damaging. Fatalities are increasing in millions around the world. 
And, it’s a direct consequence of a long time neglect. Mr. Acosta couldn’t have said it better that ”our work is patently cut out for us citizens of the earth. We delay and dilly-dally at our own peril.” Nobody can solve it alone, it should be a concerted effort of EVERYONE. From citizens to business owners to government leaders. We should all be good stewards. May it be as simple as conserving energy, or recycling, or implementing policies, or creating greener innovations. It should be acted upon NOW, else, fatalities will increase. I just hope and pray we are not next.
Pakistan 2010
Philippines 2009
=================
ASTUDENT IN a recent climate change forum remarked, “The earth has gone berserk!” Another asked rather perplexedly, “Are we being punished by God?” Such are common and plaintive musings of those who wonder with a strange sense of foreboding and helplessness what all the catastrophic events of the last several weeks mean.
Floods of unprecedented magnitude leave swathes of Australian territory, including its third largest city Brisbane, vastly inundated for weeks. Months earlier, floods in Pakistan destroy villages and regions larger than Western Europe. The same scenes come out of calamities in China, Sri Lanka-and strangely, even in the flooding of the desert city of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia!
2010 was declared the hottest year on record and forest fires raged from Moscow to Athens to California. Meteorology explains that the warming of the poles causes cold air to rise, setting off more precipitation and greater rainfall, severe winter storms and freak blizzards earlier or later than usual.
The earth has perhaps gone berserk, indeed, even considering that nature has had perpetual cycles of hot and cold, wet and dry weather changes throughout human history. And while some circles insist climate change is a hoax and that the science surrounding it is inconclusive, there is no denying that more and more places on this planet are increasingly vulnerable to calamitous climactic occurrences.
The country itself, of archipelagic make-up, is battered by over 20 typhoons a year, several of which, like Ondoy and Pepeng in 2009, are characterized by growing ferocity and destructive power. The eroded hillsides and barren mountains, long stripped of vital forest cover, become frightening geo-hazard zones, prone to deadly landslides and fatal flashfloods. The tableaus of displaced communities and inundated cities in the Caraga region, known as the country’s “timber capital,” and in Eastern Visayas and the Bicol region speak of woe and despair-and deepening poverty. The stark irony is that the regions most endowed with natural and mineral resources are those with the highest poverty indicators in the country. And these regions, because of having relied almost exclusively, if perilously, on extractive industries like logging and mining for their local economies, exacerbate their vulnerability to the impacts of natural disasters.
Something ostensibly does not make sense when a patch of God’ good earth, a land so rich in biodiversity, finds itself facing an unsustainable future because the very ecosystems that should abundantly give us life and livelihood are gravely threatened or depleted. Why, pray tell, should there be poisoned rivers in Mindanao, or why should hunger stalk its towns and hinterland? This is, after all, the long-heralded food basket of the Philippines, that could well feed its millions and far more.
Instead, we have intermittent corn and rice shortages-and an ever-expanding pool of undernourished children in Mindanao and the rest of the country. And when their parents’ marginal or traditional farming ways are imperiled by periods of El NiÒo drought or small-scale fishing affected by dwindling fisheries brought about by coral bleaching and warming ocean temperatures, we know what is said of a new phenomenon of “climate refugees.” Not simply refugees displaced by war or conflict, but hordes of poor farmers and fisherfolk dislocated by the ravages of climate.
Beyond the arguments for adaptation, which was a breakthrough in itself in the recently-concluded climate change conference of parties in Cancun, Mexico, a new, serious global rethink is imperative. What is at stake is survival and life itself, but solutions towards sustainable development can only be hinged on a consciousness that sees the emergent trends in the ecology and economy of the planet and acts from those reference points.
As to the bewildered student’s question itself, “Are we being punished?,” we can possibly say that images of divine wrath and cosmic retribution ought not be the way to cause this ecological rethink, as it were. If anything, the climatic imbalances should engender a reawakening of our intrinsic connectedness to the elements and rhythms of nature.
In physics we learn that for every action there is a reaction, a dynamic of clear cause and corresponding effect. We do something to upset a delicate balance, a universe of energies seeks to reorder and restore it. We tear down ecosystems and foul up the atmosphere, we pay a high environmental price with nature striking back. We put a higher premium on economic value at the expense of vital life-support systems like clean water and clean air, we reap the non-linear and exponential repercussions of ecological damage.
Our work is patently cut out for us citizens of the earth. We delay and dilly-dally at our own peril. Across sectors-infrastructure, investments, insurance (risk management) and institutions-there must be a defined, common thread of climate resilient policy thinking and action. This is needed not only for more effective adaptation to a “planet going berserk”-but also for the imperative of seeking a way to a greener, truly sustainable future.
http://www.manilatimes.net/index.php/opinion/39250-climate-crazy
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360° Wife,
Aspiring Social Entrepreneur,
World Changer
And a Hands-on Mom! :)
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