My day 4 in Taipei (2025) / What was I made for

hanalauhoiman
Jan 19
3 min read

hello my dear, how was your weekend? miss you 😊

Writing this on the plane as I fly back over from Taiwan to Hong Kong. My flight is in the late afternoon so I basically only had the morning today in the city, and I went to have more coffee and braised pork rice before headed to the airport.

This has been a really fruitful, introverted 4-day solo trip. I went to some exhibitions, did a bit of shopping, met with a friend to connect, had a lot of beef noodle soup and braised pork rice, had a lot of good coffee, and even did some people watching!

I was too tired last night so I didn’t share with you here what I journaled on my notebook. I was actually reflecting on this topic that the pastor at my church shared about last Sunday — What was I made for?

The pastor introduced this self-assessment called S.H.A.P.E., which I thought was interesting and what I had been doing over the last few nights in Taipei. They stand for:

Spiritual gifts

Heart (your passion / concern)

Aptitude (your talent / proficiency)

Personality

Experience (of your faith)

I really want to share with you in details about what I wrote down for each of these buckets, but it’ll probably take me forever to write them out. So I guess this is one of the things that I’ll have to save for that one day when we meet again.

But aside from all the specific, detailed thoughts I noted down from doing this self assessment to try to answer this question “What was I made for”, as I was looking out from the window during the take off of the plane, I was thinking about how the pastor concluded on this simple but difficult to answer question in the end of his message. He said, “What were you made for? More is what you are made for.”

You might notice, I don’t really follow the rest of the world to do a “proper” year end reflection and then new year resolutions, maybe because for me I just reflect and think about this kind of stuff all year round, haha. But I did spend some time to think back on the past year. And when I look back to 2024, I feel that it has been a year where God had tried to reconfigure me, through different kinds of challenges, trials and struggles, but also encounters and blessings, to live a life anchored in his love and presence.

The truth is, whether it is starting of a new year or any big and small, good or bad life changes throughout the year (like my parents being back to HK for 10 weeks, my upcoming business trip in 2.5 weeks’ time), the unknown and uncertainty of the future will always be scary for me. But when I think of what mindset I can carry to approach another year of unknown, I feel like God wants to encourage me that as I face another year, he has equipped me and I am ready to be “More”.

Whether it is work, friendships, church community, family, personal growth, you, my physical and mental health, after spending 2+ years to step back and take my time to heal, maybe it is time for me to challenge myself to be More of the Hannah that God has reshaped me into. I might still cry a lot (like, a lot a lot a lot) and struggle at times. But I know that God will always be there whenever I am overwhelmed, and pick me back up whenever I cave in that dark place again in the coming year. l might still be figuring out specifically how I can be “More”, but I feel like God also reassured me that he will guide me along the way as I navigate.

Starting a new week can feel tough especially after a holiday and that my parents are going to be back this Friday and I am a bit nervous about it. But I am feeling a bit more ready after spending all these time to recharge and look within to reflect.

How about you, Andy my dear? I don’t know how you’ve been doing these days, and I hope to meet you soon in 2025. But more importantly I hope you know that I am always here to champion you as a year starts 🤍

Love you, dear. Miss you a lot 🤍

Took this shot after landing that I am quite proud of, hehe.