So what do you do when you find yourself confronted with one million plus things that are different and require you to think differently? You do it. You adapt, adjust, change, or go crazy. I’ve seen expatriates who try to change the Philippines instead of letting the Philippines change them. They are angry, frustrated, and sometimes outraged. Ever heard the term “kicking against the goads”? A goad is a stick used to direct cattle, to prod them and get them where they are supposed to go. So kicking against that would hurt, and that’s all these angry, unchanging people are doing; hurting themselves. And for the first year we lived here that’s what I did. I suffered from the heat because I wanted it to suddenly stop. I suffered at doctors visits because they do things completely different here. I suffered in housework because different things were required.
But thank God I changed. When I was younger I memorized the Serenity Prayer, and without realizing it I began to live it. Now I have peace where I had stress and anxiety. Nothing changed here except me. And my husband has admitted that he noticed the change, and that serene me made life at home better.
"Serenity Prayer" written by Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971)
GOD, grant me the serenity
to accept the things
I cannot change,
Courage to change the
things I can, and the
wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardship as the
pathway to peace.
Taking, as He did, this
sinful world as it is,
not as I would have it.
Trusting that He will make
all things right if I
surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy
in this life, and supremely
happy with Him forever in
the next.
Amen