Berkat & Kutukan Terbesar Parenting

Di sebuah kantin sekolah dasar yang cukup ternama itu tampak berbagai macam aktifitas terjadi di dalam kantin tersebut. Hiruk pikuk suara anak-anak yang habis berolahraga berteriak dengan sekuat tenaga mereka, untuk berjuang membeli nasi gorengan ayam kesukaan mereka yang selalu habis dibeli anak-anak yang beruntung sebelum jam makan siang. Tetapi yang menarik dari pemandangan itu bukanlah keluwesan anak-anak untuk saling berebut membeli nasi ayam itu. Tepat di samping kiri dari jendela kantin yang diperuntukkan untuk menjual makanan itu, tampak 4 orang ibu-ibu sedang duduk berbincang dengan peluh berkeringat dan sambil masing-masing menikmati es teh tawar di gelas plastiknya. 4 orang ibu-ibu ini ternyata sedang "mendiskusikan" mengenai anak-anak mereka. Pembicaraan mereka kurang lebih berlangsung seperti ini. Ibu 1: "Eh tahu nga. Saya kagum banget loh sama anak saya. Bayangin aja. Anton dari semenjak kecil sudah di les kan piano oleh kami, dan pas ultah ke 9 nya, Anton berhasil menjadi salah satu murid termuda yayasan musik itu. Saya dan suami , walaupun tidak bisa bermain musik, dari dulu memang berpendapat bahwa anak harus dipastikan belajar piano dari kecil agar otaknya lebih bisa berkembang dan menjadi lebih kreatif." Ibu 2: "Wah hebat kali anakmu Anton. Anak saya Ika juga tidak kalah hebat loh. Dia mulai ikutin jejak saya sebagai seorang pesenam dari umur 5 tahun. Hampir setiap hari semenjak dia berumur 4 tahun, dia ikut terus dengan saya ke tempat senam dan melihat kami semua berlatih. Ika pada awalnya menolak mati-matian untuk belajar dan selalu mencoba untuk berontak lari. Tetapi dengan jalannya waktu, akhirnya dia mau mencoba dan kemarin baru pertama kali mengikuti lomba senam dan akhirnya menjadi juara 2 se DKI Jakarta. " Ibu 3:" Sebenarnya buat saya sendiri yang terpenting adalah anak saya jadi multi-talent. Punya banyak keahlian dimana nantinya apapun yang dia putuskan untuk kerjakan, sudah ada modal dasar keahliannya. Makanya si Bonar dari umur 2 tahun sudah kami masukkan dalam berbagai macam kursus dan kegiatan ekstra kurikuler. Ibu 4: "Wah hebat-hebat ya anak sekarang. Kalau buat saya malah simple. Saya ingin anak saya bisa menghargai kehidupan sungguh-sungguh dengan belajar dan bermain dengan maksimal. Saya ingin mereka punya karakter yang kuat dan bisa mandiri dan mengambil inisiatif sendiri untuk melakukan eksplorasi terhadap pilihan-pilihan kehidupannya. Sehingga apapun keputusan yang dia ambil dalam hidupnya, dia punya drive dan ambisi yang kuat untuk menjadi sukses. Percakapan dari 4 ibu ini merupakan representasi dari kebanyakan pemikiran orang tua jaman sekarang. Ini merupakan perwakilan dari ambisi dan kebanggaan orang tua terhadap anak-anak mereka. Dimana perlu diingat betul bahwa kebanggaan dan ambisi kita sebagai orang tua adalah pedang bermata dua yang bisa menjadi berkat atau pendorong semangat terbesar untuk anak kita, atau malah menjadi kutuk yang menjerumuskan anak kita sendiri. Ibu 1 merupakan gambaran dari orang tua yang menjadikan anaknya sebagai perpanjangan tangan untuk mimpinya yang tidak tercapai dalam kehidupannya dulu. Orang tua yang seperti ini sangat sulit untuk melihat anaknya sebagai individu yang terpisah dari kepribadiannya sendiri. Perlu diingat sebagai orang tua bahwa setiap anak dilahirkan berbeda dan spesial dengan bakal, minat, dan kepribadiannya masing-masing, yang tentunya bisa sama sekali berbeda dengan orang tuanya. Biasanya yang terjadi adalah semakin besar mimpi atau hasrat orang tuanya yang tidak tercapai, semakin kuat dorongan dari orangtua agar anaknya bisa menghidupi mimpi orangtuanya yang tidak kesampaian itu. Padahal, sangat penting untuk di pahami bahwa anak itu adalah sebuah titipan bukan alat. Sedangkan Ibu 2 adalah gambaran orang tua yang terlalu percaya akan yang namanya legacy atau prinsip warisan. Orang tua yang seperti ini mempunyai pemahaman bahwa bakat, minat, dan kepribadian dari mereka sebagai orang tua bisa diturunkan kepada anak-anak mereka untuk melanjutkan kerajaan yang sudah dibangun. Seringkali ekspektasi seperti ini ditemukan pada keluarga dimana orangtuanya telah membangun sebuah reputasi yang mengagumkan berdasarkan kemampuan, bakat, ataupun kepribadian mereka. Mereka mampu membangun sebuah image atau kerajaan bisnis yang sedemikian rupa yg sangat melekat dengan keahlian mereka dan siapa mereka dimata masyarakat umum. Orang tua yang seperti ini terperangkap dengan anggapan bahwa,"kalau papa mama bisa, kamu pasti bisa nak!" Padahal setiap anak dikaruniakan bakat, minat, dan kepribadian yang berbeda-beda. Dan tidak tertutup kemungkinan bahwa perbedaaan ini sangatlah nyata dengan orang tua mereka masing-masing. Semua orang tua mempunyai harapan terbaik tentunya untuk anak-anak mereka. Tetapi kita harus bisa belajar menerima kenyataan bahwa pilihan studi, karir, ataupun jalan hidup anak-anak kita adalah misteri ilahi yang perlu kita telusuri bersama dengan anak-anak kita. Memang sangat tidak tertutup kemungkinan anak-anak kita mampu dan mau melanjutkan apa yang kita bangun. Akan tetapi kita harus benar-benar jujur, apakah kita memaksakan kehendak dan ambisi pribadi kita, atau kita menghargai dan ikut mempelajari bakat, minat, dan kepribadian mereka dengan seksama dari semenjak mereka kecil. Tipe Ibu 3 justru merupakan tipe orang tua yang kemungkinan besar mempunyai anak yang paling stress daripada anak-anak lain pada umumnya. Anak-anak yang multi-talent adalah anak-anak yang akan dikarunia banyaknya pilihan untuk berkarya dalam hidup ini. Akan tetapi , seperti yang kita ketahui, banyaknya pilihan, secara alam sadar akan membuat kita ataupun anak-anak kita, menjadi sangat sulit untuk memilih karir ataupun jalan hidup, karena akan sangat mudah sekali dibayang-bayangi dengan pertanyaan "What if". Apa jadinya kalau seandainya saya memilih jalan yang ini bukan yang itu? Apa jadinya kalau seandainya dulu saya teruskan untuk mencemplungkan diri di bidang itu bukan yang ini? Terlebih kalau seandainya orang tuanya yang selama ini sangat berperan dalam mengarahkan dan mengasah kemampuan anaknya tanpa benar-benar mencoba untuk memahami minat atau passion dari anak terebut. Memang diawal anak perlu dituntun, tetapi kita sebagai orangtua tidak boleh lupa bahwa seiring dengan perjalanan waktu, kita harus terus berdialog dengan anak kita dan mulai melihat secara jujur dan terbuka, apa yang merupakan passion dari si anak dan menomorduakan ambisi pribadi sebagai orangtua. Dan tentunya mungkin sudah tertebak bahwa tipe yang ideal adalah tipe Ibu 4. Ini adalah gambaran orangtua yang menyadari bahwa anak merupakan makhluk individu yang di bekali dengan 3P (potential: Bakat, passion: Minat, personality: Kepribadian) yang unik dan spesial yang membutuhkan atensi dan perawatan khusus dimana tidak bisa disamaratakan dengan orangtuanya. Anak kita adalah handmade products, bukan produksi masal. Oleh karena itu, kita harus pastikan adanya komunikasi yang luar biasa yang terjadi, dimana komunikasi ini memampukan kita untuk mengenali dan mengetahui hasrat terpendam dan keinginan terdalam dari anak kita, yang akan mendefinisikan siapa mereka dan apa yang akan membuat mereka menjadi sangat istimewa di dunia ini. Pride (Ambisi dan Rasa Bangga) kita sebagai orang tua memang tidak terelakkan, tetapi inilah salah satu tugas mulia kita sebagai orang tua untuk bisa menomorsatukan apa yang benar-benar menjadi passion dari si anak , bukan pride kita. Dengan beginilah, rasa bangga kita sebagai orangtua diposisikan di tempat yang benar, dimana pride ini menjadi salah satu motivasi terbesar untuk anak berkembang , karena sang anak bertujuan untuk membuat orang tuanya lebih bangga lagi dari sebelumnya. -JIMBO the Educator- Co-Founder & CEO of Tes Bakat Indonesia

Seize the Kairos! - LOST in Jesus

LOST (Love-Oriented Slave Trait) in Jesus

Luke 15:29New International Version (NIV)

²⁹ But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.

We have been taught countless times as Christian to serve Jesus and have a servanthood mentality to serve God and others. In fact, knowing how much God love us even He sacrificed His Only begotten Son so that we can be saved (John 3:18), shows the level of commitment for us to love Him back. The level of commitment where we also give our entire life back to Him. Realizing that it is not about us and our agenda, but it is all about God and His agenda. It’s about being God’s slave where our rights are no longer applicable, but His rights are. For we know, that Jesus has lost his rights in order to save us. This is the true image of unconditional love. For when we love someone wholeheartedly, we are more than willing to lost our rights and become slave to the other person’s needs.

However, the Bible reminds us that this entire “being slave for Jesus” can be easily misunderstood without we even realizing it. There are 2 kinds of slave with different traits here: Love-Oriented Slave Trait and Reward-Oriented Slave Trait.  Many of us are actually practicing our selfless life in order to live for Jesus, but the pure underlying motives to do so is because we are still chasing God’s rewards and blessings. The oldest son in the story of the prodigal son is actually the heaviest case of the prodigal son. The oldest son is truly are the one who actually lost…really lost. He has been serving God by becoming a slave for Him and willing to lose all of his rewards and demonstrated total obedience to Him. Yet, he missed the whole point.

What God really wants for us is to have the right trait of being a slave, the Love-Oriented Slave Trait (LOST).  A selfless life dedicated to God with total obedience out of love to God, not because of the rewards and blessings, but because we truly love Him wholeheartedly.

Have we become slave to God in a proper trait? We might have been living a selfless life with an egoistic motive all this time without realizing it. Let us examine our hearts and ask God to search our heart so that we can truly become LOST (Love-Oriented Slave Trait) in Jesus.

-JH-

Seize the Kairos - Do You Truly Love Me?

Do You Truly Love Me?

John 21:15-19

All of us have different perceptions about love. Our perception about love is heavily influenced with the culture and the norms that we are raised with and sadly to say, media.

It means that when a couple say that they love each other, it does not necessary means that they truly love each other according to their own standards and expectations. Because “love” for one person does not necessary means “love” for the other person. Some might categorize love as the tingling feeling or butterfly inside of your stomach, but for some might be a serious commitment that goes beyond feeling, and some might have a completely different ideas about love. That is why it is so important to truly understand each other’s definition of love before we say that we love that person.

Same thing with God. Do we really understand what God means with love? Because if our version of love is different with God’s version of love, then it means that either we have been loving God in such a low standard or worse, we have been loving Him in a wrong way because of the mislead paradigms.

Jesus truly questions Simon Peter in His appearances to His disciples after the resurrection. Jesus asked Simon Peter 3 times in a row with very similar questions but not the same. The questions translated in English will be all the same, “Simon son of John, Do you truly love me?”. But notice that the first two questions and the last question were actually different based on the Greek translation.

There are 2 Greek words of “love” is used here. For the first two questions, the word “love” that is used is agapao – which speaks of an intelligent, thoughtful, and purposeful love involving the entire personality, but primarily a decision of the mind and the will.

For the third question, the word “love” that is used is phileo – which speaks of a warm, natural and more spontaneous sense of feeling and affection – a more emotional love.

From this verses, we learn that God has 2 expectations when we say that we truly love Him. The first expectations , or God’s paradigm of love, is that we love Him wholeheartedly based on our minds’ decisions and our constant will and action to prove it. It means that loving God is a conscious commitments that we have to make, conscious decisions everyday that we love Him by doing His commandments. To like what He likes and to hate what He hates.

However, making these conscious decision and commitment to love Him is only halfway right. Notice that Jesus asked Peter, whether Peter truly love Jesus in a more emotional love (phileo). A love that is full of tingling sensation, butterflies in our stomach. A love that is full of passion and warm feelings.

A complete understanding of love according to God is a love that consist of agapao and phileo. Many God’s children stuck in the zone where they say that they love God, they make the conscious decisions to follow Him, but hardly, or even never felt a passionate kind of love with God. Or perhaps, some of us might have the burning passion to love God, but hardly ever have the unshakeable commitments to follow and obey His commandments. God wants us to have and experience both kind of love – agapao and phileo EVERYTIME.  

This is our journey in loving God wholeheartedly. Knowing that these two kinds of love (agapeo and phileo) must exist in our love to God then, it is our job and duty as God’s children to pursue God not only with our conscious decisions but with passionate love as well, so that we can truly say, God I do truly love you!    -JH-

Seize the Kairos! - Formula for a Satisfied Life

The Formula for a Satisfied Life

Proverbs 13:12 - "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life."

The Bible teaches us the simple, yet powerful formula for Satisfaction and Unsatisfaction in life. 

Everyone has what its called hope or longing. Hope or longing in a general term is Expectation.

According to the verse above, we can conclude that the formula for having a satisfied life in general is Expectation equals to Reality (E=R).

When "hope deferred", which means that, the reality of life does not equal to the hope (expectation) that we have, thus the Bible says that "it makes the heart sick". Heart is the source of life. When our heart sick, it means that we are in great distress.

However, when "a longing fulfilled", which means that, the reality of life equals to the expectation that we have, the Bible says that it "is a tree of life". A tree of life portrays comfort, certainty, growth, fruitful, and life, which all leads to great satisfaction.

By understanding this formula of a satisfied life from the Bible, we can learn some important things.

When we feel that we are unsatisfied with our lifes, we have 2 options. First, we change our reality by being proactive in repenting to God and ask for His help to be committed in making real changes in life, or we change our ultimate expectation about our life. 

Many of us have expectations in life built based on our dreams, goals, values, beliefs that have been in our mind for sometime. In fact, the Bible teaches us that the ways we live and think have been inherited from our ancestors. That is why the second option is to renew our minds daily with the Word of God, so that eventually, with time and process, we start to adopt the new expectation that is not from this world, but from His perspectives - the Word of God.

Because if we think about it, it is as simple as what the Word of God teaches us: the Formula of a Satisfied Life is Expectations equal Reality (E=R).

-JH-

Seize the Kairos! - Did You Get It?

Seize the Kairos! - Did You Get it?

Matthew 13 talks about the 7 parables: the Sower, the Weeds, the Mustard Seed, the Yeast, the Hidden Treasure, the Pearl, and the Net.

These parables were shared by Jesus in sequence by purpose starts from the parable of the Sower, all the way to the parable of the Net.

These parables are connected to one another to give the complete picture, explaining the essence of the Kingdom of God that only those whose eyes and ears have been touched, will be able to fully understand and grasp the significance of these secrets of the Kingdom of God.  "But blesses are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear" ( Mat 13:16)

These parables seems pretty straight forward, however, the Bible strongly remind us, "...many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it. " (Mat 13:17)

How come the teachings (the essence of the Kingdom of God) implied from the parables were not being able to be grasp, even by prophets and righteous men? Prophets and righteous men means that these are the people that live for Christ and in fact, shows commitment to live righteous for Him, but at the end, they are not able to truly grasp the essence of the Kingdom of God.

The above dilemma showed that we have to be very serious about our commitment and our faith to Jesus. Many might have shown great level of commitments, but in the end, they still can not see the essence of the Kingdom of God. It means that we have to really ask God to truly search our hearts, to help us understand what we need to do, what we need to change from our ways of thoughts and life. Because committed itself is not enough. We have to be truly prepared to really give up everything and live for Jesus and His Kingdom only (Mat 13: 44-46).

Can we truly say that we love Jesus wholeheartedly when everything in our life is being stripped down? Let's Be Ready and Be Prepared for 2015. It is no longer about us and our needs...but It is about Jesus and His Kingdom. Let us have the mentality of Job, when everything else fails us and we no longer have any reason to trust Jesus, we would still love Him wholeheartedly. And when we have this kind of intimacy level, the essence of the Kingdom of God will be embedded in our life and we will thoroughly understand the death and the rise of Christ. 

-JH-

www.tesbakatindonesia.com - BE HUMBLE TO SEEK COUNSEL

www.tesbakatindonesia.com

BE HUMBLE TO SEEK COUNSEL

``Advice is like a snow – the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper in sinks into the mind.`` - S.T. Coleridge

As we all know that in the journey of finding our purposes or the things that we are passionate about might not be an easy ride. Some people might already know what get them passionate since they are still young, but some people might know and start doing what make them passionate about in their late careers or even in their late life when they are old and retired. One of the strongest reasons why some people can identify their passion faster than others is because they are humble enough to seek counsel from others.

Advises can either bring you forward in life or backward. Remember that not all of the advises that you receive are good advises. Use your heart and mind to filter these advises. And never feel embarrassed or shy to ask for advice, especially regarding your future and what you are passionate about. You never know. Perhaps, some of the moments where you ask for advice would be the moment that you have never expected, because those are the moments that are so called, MIND-OPENER SESSIONS.

Don’t limit your options. Best advises not only come from your closest family and friends, they might come from professional help as well from those who has been there and knows what to do to make you save time and cost in pursuing your dream and passion.

Please keep in mind that no matter how good and how much advice we have received in our life, these advises will not do any good if they never been acted or pondered upon.

Thus, Be Proactive in Seeking Counsel. Better yet, Be Proactive in Doing and Pondering the counsel and advises that you have received. Prepare to be amazed, because you will come across some MIND-OPENER SESSION that will truly shape and change your life for the better and get you super passionate about your life.

-JH-

Seizing the Kairos! - Make the Most of Every Opportunity

Make the Most of Every Opportunity

5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. - Colossians 4:5-6

Everyone knows that time is constant and precious. Time is constant because it will always tick without stopping. Time is also precious because once it is ticking, it would never come back again.
Supposedly, everything that is constantly moving and will never come back should be appreciated because this thing will never be repeated in our life, and we only have one chance to seize this thing.

Yet, the reality presents different thing. Many of us waste our time in things that are not bringing values nor building our life at all. In fact, some of us might have destructive habits whether we realize it or not. Some of us might also stuck in demeaning and destructive relationship with other people or even things, that somewhat have become addiction.

 The Word of God reminds us to go back to God's original plan for our life. God reminds us to "make the most of every opportunity", to always seize God's given chances (kairos) in every moments and opportunities that life have been presenting to us. It means that there is always light in every darkness, sweetness in every bitterness, salt in every tastelessness. It means that we can be the light and bring Godly perspective in every hardship and troubles.

How do we make the most of every opportunity?

The answers are there: Stop wasting time and start building healthy and Godly habits. Be Wise and ask God for Wisdom and it shall be given to you. Fill our heart and mind with God's grace through the meditation of the Word. Pray to God so that everything that comes out of our mouth is truly impeccable and bring strong flavors to those who we encounter everyday.

-JH-

www.tesbakatindonesia.com - SHOWING UP FOR YOUR FUTURE

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SHOWING UP FOR YOUR FUTURE

“Great things might show up in our life when we simply just show up to new things.” – J. Hariyanto

The greatest, yet the scariest thing about life is that it presents us with endless possibilities and opportunities.  We are told that we can be anything we want, but not everything.  One of the prominent characteristics of successful people is that they are focus in what they are passionate about in life.  Thus, the most important questions for us would be, “What do we want to become in the future?”, “What are the things that we are passionate about?” In order to answer these questions, we are often confused and have no idea at all where to begin.

One of the best advises to start exploring our passion is to “show up”. We have to be open with new things such as seminars, gatherings, trainings, and/or any introductory events that are introducing us to new hobbies, skillsets, and/or paradigms.  Being open means that we proactively find these kind of events and just show up on time. No special skill or preparation required to show up at these events.

I believe that by just showing up to these events, we are opening our hearts and minds to new opportunities and possibilities to seek and explore our passion in life. Showing up will definitely help us take the first step to seek and explore our passion, especially when we have no clue at all.

So, make sure that we attend seminars, gatherings, and / or events that might potentially lead and prepare for our future. And the beauty of all of this is that it is mostly free and all we need is just to show up.

-JH-