Staring out the window

Rarely does a film hit me. Rarely does religious or spiritual thought affect me. And even more rarely do I give a chance to a movie with a 23% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. And putting all those rarities together, I would never think a 23% RT rating movie with religious philosophical thought would affect me. But it did last night.

I was cooking dinner with Diwata while James and Aaron were watching Evan Almighty in the living room. I was in and out of the room checking up on the cooking when I came across this interesting quote from God (played by Morgan Freeman):

Joan: But my husband says God told him to do it. What do you do with that?

God: Sounds like an opportunity. Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, do you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If they pray for courage, does God give them courage, or does he give them opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for their family to be closer, you think God zaps them with warm, fuzzy feelings? Or does he give them opportunities to love each other? Well, I got to run. A lot of people to serve. Enjoy.

If you know me, I am nothing close to a Christian. Therefore, I don't believe God gives us opportunities. Regardless of the religious references, I can't help but say that this probably better articulates what I believe about opportunity than the way I touched upon it in my 2nd P-Grad speech (probably because I was super stressed coordinating it and I barely wrote my speech that afternoon).

I don't believe that each of us possesses a particular array of characteristics (i.e. patience, courage). Rather, we have the opportunities to become those characteristics in our own right and we are defined by which opportunities we choose to take advantage of.

I'll take a good friend of mine as an example: Idelle. All year as we planned activity after activity, Buquid and I would always hear Idelle give the excuse that she's not creative. In our opinion, we think she is damn creative and we would always remind her of that. And in the end, she would give some amazing ideas. And that is because she took the opportunity to be creative.

Reiterating much of what I said at P-Grad, I have defined myself beyond what I could have imagined through the opportunities I shot myself into. I didn't have to come out to KP. I didn't have to go out when Carlo called me to. Neither did I have to write for PCC. Or become peer counselor/vice chair-internal/chair. Neither did I need to go to Sunnyvale for find a stable job. But I did. I chose to take the opportunity to be patient. to be a leader. to be creative. to be adventurous. to inspire others. to challenge myself. to try something new. All of us have the same opportunities, but I chose these ones and that's what defines me.