Life – Deborah Mary S.

Mistakes I could have avoided and lessons that could have learned sooner (from a 27-year-old)

Featured by Deborah Mary S., posted in Adult life, Blogger, Career, Education, Life, Life lessons, Life Question, marriage, Personal Story, Social Media, Study, Teenager

Trusting the wrong people

I guess you never know when your friendship is real and your friend loyal and honest with you until she or he disappoints you and hurts your feelings. I know disappointments and hurt can go away one day (or not), you can talk this through, forgive and move on and be friends again. But not if she or he does not show any kind of remorse or just for a second until you take them back into your heart and then she or he continues to be the same dig again. I trusted someone who was very close to me for many years until one day she misused my trust and lied to me. We did talk and of course she apologised and I did not want to loose her in my life so I forgave her. Only to get hurt again. This was the moment when I realised it had been this way the entire time I only had not known or to be honest did not want this to be true and accept the fact that she was never a loyal and honest friend to me in the first place. This realisation is not play the blame game here but rather a tipping point for me when I realised: the people you do life with can make or break you. You give them this power. And you have the power to decide whom you want to give this power to in your life. A lesson I wished I learned sooner.

Loosing time in your career/ education

Time is valuable. You learn this in kindergarden. If you are late you do not get the seat, you do not get in, you miss out. Something that can be so minor in kindergarden can sometimes cost you your interview, your promotion or your dream house later. I lost time in my life. I did not set my priorities straight, I found excuses not work and do the things I needed to do. Few years later I found myself in the same place and making accusations to myself why I did not follow up with what I had to do. Being at the same place few years later sucks! Trust me. While everyone else moves on in their life, gets their promotion, pays their first mortgage for their dream house, you feel kinda isolated from the rest of the world. You feel stuck in your own little world. The excuses you make will not buy your more time or set the time back. Comparing will not change anything. You have to be your own cheerleader. You need to take things into your own hands. You only are responsible for your decision. Blaming will not solve how you feel years later. Stop looking around, stick to your plan, stick to your goals, stick to whatever you desire to be, to accomplish and do it! Do not waste your time. Time is valuable, it will not come back for you. You will thank me later.

Being indecisive

This is another bad trait of mine. I do not know whom to thank for. My mum is not like that, neither is my dad. But it found me. I am indecisive all the time. When I go to the restaurant, everyone had ordered and I am still reading the menu. If I get to choose between two things, I am dependant on other peoples opinion and mostly I am not content which the decision taken afterwards. This has let to many wrong decisions in my life! I know that not all the decisions you make will turn out to be the right one. But let me tell you, if you do not make your own decision, others will make them for you and it will not be always pretty! In my case, I then realise what I really want but it is not for me to decide anymore and I lose out. I do not want you to lose out in your life! Nobody wants, right? Take your chances, if you do not know now, do not wait too long. This will cost you something. Most of the time you cannot get it back and this will follow up with you and make you to be more unsure next time. Do not let this happen in your life. You want to live your life to the fullest and enjoy every bit of it along your journey. Make your own decision. You will have more freedom in your life, more space about the things you decided to do. You only will own it and eventually that will make you happier.

How much skin is too much skin?

May 13, 2018May 13, 2018 by Deborah Mary S., posted in Life Question

This question bothers me just as much as the question: ’Mum, what do we have for dinner today?‘. Before I continue, I have to tell you some things about me because simply one characteristic can change the whole layout of this question. So I am a girl, well woman whatever you wanna have it, 23 years old, unmarried, born in Germany to Tamil parents who immigrated from Sri Lanka in the 80s and 90s respectively. You will need this information to understand the following.

“Suppose you meet Chancellor Angela Merkel today, would you wear this? Will you go out with this clothes? No. But to church you dress up like this, huh? You want to worship the most holy God, the Lord of all lords with this ‘disgraceful’ outfit?” – mum, aunty, uncle… I hear this a lot – even today my mum is super strict when it comes to clothing. One of the few things I sometimes really hate about being born to “culturally-orientated” Tamil parents in post-modern Germany. Because we do not have the choice to choose our parents or our birth place there is not much left what we can do about the ongoing dilemma which becomes more severe as we get older. We learn from school how other children dress up, we come in touch with other ‘white’ Christians but most importantly with age we mature and start to question what is being preached or dictated to us by family, society and the world. So, here comes the inevitable question: How much skin, is too much skin then?

I personally do not think, there is a straightforward answer to this question which can be applied universally to each single situation in similiar outset. One has to decide for him- or herself what she thinks is appropriate for that given occasion. This difficult question is and will be as controversial as the debate about whether climate change is for real or not as long as human beings will be living on this planet. It is determined by some factors such as age, type of event, purpose of the function, type of guest/ audience, location, time and other variables.

I do want to make clear and point out, that as children we have to respect our parents and most of the time what they say is good for us or with well-meant intention. However, there are some exceptions especially when it comes to dressing up after a certain age when you feel mature enough to differentiate between what is “culturally derived intention” or what is “not culturally-influenced intention”. Sometimes both strays of intention collide and its hard to decide what is right or wrong in that particular moment – except for traditionally clothing, e.g. sarees. They tend to be more liberal when it comes to their familiar way of dressing up but even on this topic we have all sorts of critics. Double-standard, guys. 😉 Surprisingly, (I feel that) Tamil parents in Canada, England and some parts of India are more open-minded than in other parts of Europe. #lol. Nevertheless, most of the time I find that in regard to clothing our parents disapprove because of “culturally-orientated intention”. So this means, we have to critically decide for ourselves what is appropriate having in mind where we are going and who will be there.

There is no defined set of standards for women how to dress regardless of color, ethnicity or faith. I think there is no yes, you can wear that or no, you cannot wear that. I would suggest parents to raise their concern about something in a reasonable manner and then let their grown-up children decide for themselves what to do. In our culture, parents are fixed too much on what others say about you but they do not notice how this puts a strain in the relationship to their children and how this affects them negatively. They have to make peace with themselves and accept, that the way they were raised is not present time anymore. It is past time. We have 40 or 50 years of development, change and advancement since they were born. Sri Lanka today is not what it was tw decades ago when they left their country . People there have also moved on and adopted their way of living according to recent industrial progress.

So, this brings us back to the question what is then appropriate for today’s time? I pinned myself some basic rules:

when I am around other Tamil people, especially when men are present I tend to were ‘more’ modest clothes,
when I go out with friends or when I mingle with ‘white’ people, I feel more comfortable now to wear ‘less’ modest clothes,
and when someone is mean enough to stalk me on social media and share my pictures (because their own life is too boring), I do not care anymore.

This has simple reasons: I figured out that Tamil people and most men from the east in general – even if they are ‘Christian’ (who said Christians do not have feelings?!) – often give you a second look which makes me feel uncomfortable. They are not used to see girls or women in tight leggings or sleeveless tops. So they like to look again (You cannot change the world – can you?!). For me, I can say I do not need this extra attention and because of that I have decided to cover myself a bit more when I am around people from different culturally upbringing and understanding and let loose when I know I will not be subject of wrong temptation.

Conclusion: Everyone has to decide for themselves what they think is too much skin. There is no defined set of standards of right or wrong dressing but sometimes listening to our parents will not harm us but on the other hand it does not imply that everything they say is correct.

I am excited to hear your opinion on this highly anticipated topic. Feel free to leave a comment below. Thanks. 🙂 I look forward to hear from you, guys.

Gott ist (k)eine Wundertüte

May 6, 2018May 6, 2018 by Deborah Mary S., posted in glaube

Kennt ihr das? Man hat sich fest etwas (z.B. Studium, Beruf, Fitness, usw.) vorgenommen und dies zum baldigen Ziel gesetzt und alles deutet auf ein positives Schaffen hin und boooooom der ganze Plan ist jetzt nur noch Bestandteil des Papierkorbs. Wieder einmal hat man knapp etwas nicht bestanden oder die begehrte Stelle nicht bekommen oder das gewünschte Gewicht nicht erreicht. Wieder einmal eine ganze Portion: Frust, Enttäuschung, Wut und Demotivation ungefragt serviert bekommen – richtig unnötig, zeitlich unpassend und sowieso ist das alles unbrauchbar, wie das meiste, was kostenlos als Beilage mitkommt. Dabei hat man doch so strebsam daraufhin gearbeitet, so viel Zeit, Fleiß und Selbstdisziplin aufgebracht und man war kurz vor der Ziellinie. Wem geht es auch so oder hat so eine Situation schon ein- oder vielleicht zweimal durchgemacht?

Ich kann nur für mich sagen, dass ich im Laufe meines Lebens immer wieder solche ‚beinah-geschafft- Momente‘ erlebt habe und jahrelang jedes Mal nicht schlauer war mit dieser Situation umzugehen. Ich war so sauer – Frust und Enttäuschung hatten sich schnell in Wut umgeschlagen – dass ich mich als nächstes damit beschäftigt habe den Grund bzw. den Schuldigen für den unerwarteten Misserfolg zu finden. Und in meinem Fall war das jedes Mal Gott – so habe ich das zumindest bis jetzt immer gesehen. Gott war schuldig für den entstandenen Chaos in meinem Leben. Einzig und allein Gott. Die Erklärung war einfach: Gott wusste doch, dass ich das unbedingt wollte und ohne dem vorerst nicht großartig weiter komme. Ich habe doch gebetet und Gott klar gemacht, wie sehr ich diese Stelle wollte. Er ist doch ein allwissender Gott und sowieso der allmächtigste. Er hätte doch ahnen können, dass mir das sehr am Herzen lag und dass ich sehr viel dafür getan, um dieses Ziel zu erreichen. Wie konnte er das zulassen?! Das Klagelied könnte ich auf Moll so weiter singen…

Jeder, der jemals auf ein ‚Wunder‘ gewartet hat, weiß, dass Wunder wie eben Duden das definiert: “außergewöhnliches, den Naturgesetzen oder aller Erfahrung widersprechendes und deshalb der unmittelbaren Einwirkung einer göttlichen Macht oder übernatürlichen Kräften zugeschriebenes Geschehen, Ereignis, das Staunen erregt” nicht passieren, wenn man sicher von einem Ergebnis ausgehen kann. Denn dann wäre es ja kein “Wunder” mehr. Meist spricht man von einem ‚Wunder‘, wenn etwas entgegen den Erwartungen oder Wahrscheinlichkeiten positiv stattfindet oder geschehen ist.

Im alltäglichen Leben als Christ sollte man wissen, dass Gott nicht der Verantwortliche ist für Entscheidungen, die wir als Individuum treffen. Klar, er ist ein allwissender und allmächtiger Gott, aber er hat uns nicht als seine Marionetten erschaffen, sondern als Menschen mit eigenem Willen. Natürlich weiß er, dass wir uns ärgern, wenn unsere Wünsche nicht erfüllt werden. Aber was wäre er für ein Gott, wenn er jeden unserer Wünsche in Erfüllung gehen lässt, nur weil wir meinen, wir hätten dafür lang genug gebetet und es endlich verdient. Dann wären wir vermutlich als Kinder alle nur mit Zahnproblemen unterwegs bei den ganzen kindlichen ‚Schokoladen-Wünschen‘.

Gott ist wohl ein Wundermacher, aber sicherlich keiner, bei dem man sich eine personalisierte Wundertüte bestellen und abholen kann. Wie auch Jesus Christus dazu berufen und auserwählt war, als Mensch auf dieser Welt zu leben mit allen menschlichen Herausforderungen, so gibt es auch für uns auch kein VIP Ticket für ein ‚pain-free living‘.

Gott hört unsere Gebete. Das tut er. Aber er kennt auch schon das ganze Bild von unserem Leben, während wir mit jeder Erfahrung und mit jeder Entscheidung ein neues Puzzlestück von uns finden und es langsam nach und nach zu einem ganzen zusammenbauen. Klar, für den Moment denken wir, dass allein wäre das einzig Richtige für unser Leben gerade hier und jetzt und meinen, Gott müsste das doch auch wissen, wenn nicht sogar besser. Und genau, das ist es. Er weiß es besser. So bleibt uns nichts übrig als mit solchen ‚beinahe-Momente‘ umzugehen und das bester aus der Situation zu machen. Denn Gott ist nicht Schuld, wenn es dir schlecht geht. Er weiß es und es tut ihm auch weh, aber er weiß auch, dass Du aufstehen und weiterkämpfen wirst. #warrior

Das bedeutet nicht, dass wir nicht mehr beten brauchen, aber Gebet bedeutet ebensowenig, dass das, was wir im Gebet Gott fragen, auf unserer Menükarte unbedingt steht. Manchmal müssen wir halt ein anderes Gericht aussuchen und merken vielleicht später, das war gar nicht mal so schlecht. Gott ist eben (k)eine Wundertüte.

First blog post – a letter from a big sister

July 30, 2017May 6, 2018 by Deborah Mary S., posted in Personal Story

Hi guys, today I want to introduce you to my little sister. She lost her dad at the tender age of nine. Its like she never knew her dad at all. Today she graduated from school.

Life wasn’t easy for her though. As a black girl growing up without a father, daily opposed to classmates whose parents where mostly high earning doctors, engineers and whatever, having only a mum who makes her living by cleaning these peoples houses was never something she would have chosen if she ever had the opportunity to do so. Having to live in these deprived circumstances she however never let her hair down or took life as an excuse for something less. She rather chose the uneasy path.

: Lydia with our daddy ♥

She proved that whatever circumstances or what burden life has put you in you can make the best out of it if you are willing to fight for your own happiness. That’s why she stands here today and can call herself a hero – I would admit. As her big and only sister when I look back, I cannot say of myself that I was nice to her all the time, neither can I say I supported her in every thing and or that I was always there for her when she needed me most. We never had the relationship sisters are suppose to have (But what is that?!). We really got to know each other the past two years and became good friends since.

: Lydia & Me ♥

From my own experience as well as seeing my sister succeeding in her studies so gracefully, all I can say today is: boys and girls out there, please let nothing or anyone keep you away from your studies. Education is the key for your life. This key opens doors you never knew existed in the first place. This key determines one day who you are, what you are capable of and what you stand for. Its a fortune beyond a value. I know myself studying isn’t easy especially when you study hard and it doesn’t turn out the way you expected it to be or issues are bothering you or you are living in circumstances worse than this (But that is a topic for another time!). Whatever it is, never let go of education.

Lydia, I wasn’t a good sister to you. I am very sorry for not being the sister you may have wished to have. Nonetheless, I want you to know that I am very proud of you. The young independent strong woman you have become amazes me!!! I wish you happiness, health and all the blessings of this world. I love youuuuuuuu <33333