“Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”—Galatians 6:9

We are living in the era of romanticizing the construction of building great things again. From reindustrializing manufacturing and rebuilding America’s supply chains, to constructing great defense technology for national security, to racing towards building the world’s most powerful AI systems imaginable—humanity yearns to build great things.

And it all began with our Creator, the gold standard of excellence and who we strive to model ourselves after. Just take a moment to pause and look around you. See the sky and how the sun perfectly rises and peaks through the clouds without ever missing a day to give us the light and energy that nourishes the soil beneath our feet and everything that grows from it to sustain the very air that we breathe. Nothing is random, accidental or made without purpose—including every single one of us, God’s greatest creation.

No wonder we long to create our life’s work or build a family! We are fashioned to be Christlike, not only in the fruits of the Spirit, but in the hands we use to labor and create. Yet we constantly walk a thin line between faithful ambition and worshipping our own creations; between multiplying what has been entrusted to us and restlessly striving for more in search of self-validation. Therefore, we must be vigilant in sowing good seeds within ourselves and others.

So here are a few good seeds I’ve been tending lately.

I. seeing the absurdity of everything

“No one can comprehend what goes on under the sun. Despite all their efforts to search it out, no one can discover its meaning. Even if the wise claim they know, they cannot really comprehend it.”—Ecclesiastes 8:17

Qoheleth, the preacher in the book of Ecclesiastes and perhaps the original observer of the absolute absurdity of everything, can easily be interpreted as a nihilistic philosopher. He observed that effort will not always be rewarded. The righteous will not always prosper. The future can never be certain, no matter how much we carefully plan for it. So what is the point of striving at all? Why labor and wrestle so hard if nothing can be controlled and everything will eventually pass?

Well, in modern absurdism, philosophers conclude that life has no inherent meaning, so we must bend the world to our will and create our own meaning to satiate our deep, human longing for order and clarity in a world that refuses to provide clear answers. Gosh, that sounds tiring! Because it is.

Qoheleth actually dismantles this. He repeatedly uses the word “hevel” (often translated as “vanity”) to describe life. It’s not meaningless, but it is much like vapor, breath, smoke—real, but impossible to grasp. The absurdity, then, is not that life lacks meaning, but that we keep trying to force certainty from a world that was never ours to control.

Augustine famously wrote: “You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” Longing isn’t a problem that we need to solve for. It’s God’s way of stretching our capacity to receive the greater purpose He has for us, and it’s uncomfortable because the space between what is and what could be is often really messy and incomprehensible. So let go of the absurdity of certainty and just faithfully tend to the lot that you’ve been given.

I recommend the book Everything is Never Enough by Bobby Jamieson.

II. no more delaying joy!

Perhaps one of the most stereotypically “un-asian” thing about me is that I went to school to study fashion, and that is the degree I graduated with. What were my parents thinking for allowing me to pursue that? I have no idea. But what they did get right and understood was that I am a creative at heart, and they gave me permission to follow that.

What a gift. Too bad I refused to receive it. Rather than dreaming about being a creative, I dreamt about being a useful, productive person in society. Indulging in joy can be delayed after stability, after success, after becoming the kind of person who has earned the right to it.

Can you imagine all the gifts that God wants to give us, but we’re just too stubborn to receive them? Or even better, we believe we have to perform to deserve it. There’s that restlessly striving nature again.

So here’s a good seed for you: let yourself indulge in unproductive hobbies, specifically something that you’re not good at yet and will be forced to be imperfect. I recently picked up a new sketchbook and pens to people watch and start drawing again. I’m allowing myself to “read for fun”—topics to satisfy my curiosities in architecture, Renaissance art, and theology. Even this, right here, writing with no agenda. Joy is a gift that does not need to be earned, but you must choose to receive it.

III. audio love letters

My love language comes in a few different forms: thoughtfully written words, voice notes and music. I’ve already given you some words, and voice notes are reserved for certain people. So music is the last love letter I can leave you with today.

There is nothing like someone sending you a song and saying that they thought about you. To me, that’s like a warm hug or like receiving flowers. I first heard the song, Easy Does It by Goldford while on my long drive from Toronto to Texas. I had already been crying in the car, and as this song came up on my Spotify radio shuffle, the waterworks started again.

Most things in life arrive later than we expect. As Valentine’s Day passed the other day, I was reminded again about how easy it is to believe that certain hopes may simply not be meant for us. We manage our expectations so we won’t be left disappointed, again.

I have gone through the perils of grief, believing that there may not be someone out there for me. But as much as I anguish over feeling like I’m unchosen and uncalled, somehow, I also believe that I could be special enough to be called to a life like Apostle Paul. How absurd! I’m not foolish enough to believe I’m that set apart, and here’s the truth: a majority of us aren’t. We are all significant, yes, but we are also not that special and different from one another. The time that God takes to work on us is never wasted.

Take it easy. Building something great takes time.