A woman stuck on Earth

​There will be a celebration for my dad's 70th birthday while we're there. It’s a massive event—hundreds of people are invited, with a detailed program and a host to navigate the dinner through games, entertainment, and speeches. ​I was assigned to give a speech as his daughter. "Here, this is your script for the speech," my parents told me. They had written the entire thing. I am just supposed to walk onto the stage and read it out loud. ​"How can they do this?!" my husband reacted. "They truly control everything they can, and they never give you a chance to be yourself, do they? A 41-year-old woman isn't even given the chance to write her own speech..." Even after 17 years together, my husband is still in fundamental shock every single time things like this happen. ​But it’s true. This is the authoritarian relationship my parents and I have. Or, perhaps I should say, the authoritarian relationship they have enforced upon me. ​Family dynam...

The only thing we can think about now is the trip. And I know the only thing they can think about now is our arrival. We have all been planning, booking, and communicating for months—especially over the last few weeks. As I walk through this life's events, I understand more and more why there is absolutely no force in the universe that could sever my connection to that place, the place I still call home: because of love. I was born out of love and raised in love. All of my senses have been filled with love since day one, and all the lessons of life I learned there were about love. Love—unconditional love—from my parents, my grandparents, my uncles and aunties, my baby cousins, my entire extended family, my friends, my teachers, and my first love. My heart is always so full and ready to give because of them; I unapologetically receive and naturally give unconditional love because of each and every one of them. They poured love onto me, each day and each night, wherever I walked and ...

250 human years; 17 years of a taste of it. The self-immolation of Lobga Rangzen; the forever push-and-pull deep in the bones of my identity as a Han colonizer and a colonized, Indigenous South-Chinese. The stalled, unfinishable sci-fi novel turning into a raw reality in the awe of my new revelation; one story after another, new stories birthed by old stories that I am mindfully and intentionally navigating my path into. Is any of this real? I created this entire universe in my mind, didn't I? Visited M and Y in their Oakland apartment: "My consciousness, my mind, and my body are distinct from one another. My true existence—my consciousness—is not confined to my body and mind, but exists in everything in the universe; in fact, it is the universe itself, and I am the director of my own physical life's film," Y calmly narrated. "Consider yourself extremely rare, because you arrived at the gate of spirituality out of a sense of happiness, contentment, and fulfillmen...

I woke up from a dream yesterday morning. It was a message sent to me from the spiritual realm.  I have been receiving such messages my whole life. The moment that truly made me believe they were from a spiritual realm - in fact, the moment that made me believe there was a reality entirely different from the one we currently inhabit - was when I had distinct birth dreams while pregnant with my two children. In those dreams, I received all the information I needed to understand my children's genders, their personalities, their purposes for coming to this earth, and the immense power they carry.  If I suddenly wake up and vividly remember the images or stories that came to mind, I know they are true messages, rather than the blurry murmurs generated by my own physical brain. Since those birth dreams more than a decade ago, I have received only a handful of these messages - they are not frequent at all, appearing perhaps once every few years. This is because I have never actively...

As I was updating my Chinese friends on my thoughts about the "Why," our discussion went a step further as we applied our own unique perspective - the Chinese circumstance. We do that all the time; every single issue can be slightly or vastly different under the unique realities of being Chinese.  "Think about Buddhism. Although it was first fiercely promoted by Wu Zetian - China’s one and only female emperor, who used it because Hinduism and Buddhism view Goddesses as equally powerful, thereby increasing the masses' acceptance of a female ruler - the ruling class later never actively promoted it again. Instead, it was the ordinary people of China who embraced and spread Buddhism themselves. Why? Because if a 'religion' or way of living aims to liberate people from their physical bodies and help them achieve enlightenment, that school of thought will only bring trouble to a ruling class by creating too many freed souls. Instead, Confucianism has been the sole...

​If all physical entities on Earth - animals and plants alike - are merely temporary dwellings for our souls, and if our souls are just drops of water belonging to a vast, interconnected ocean of the One, then why is human connection so fractured? ​There are countless animal communicators who can telepathically connect with other species. Yet, we humans, who self-recognize as "the same species," rarely speak of communication that goes beyond words and physical vibrations. We should be able to telepathically communicate with each other, shouldn't we? Why aren't we doing it? Why don't we even believe in it? ​The "why" is simple: animals are pure, open, and spiritual. They communicate with their hearts, their whole bodies, and their intuition. Humans, on the other hand, generally exchange thoughts using only our minds, leaving our hearts out of the equation. We habitually block our intuition. Our minds are always guarded, on defense, and under control. We c...

It is finally time for us to welcome our third child. The difference this time is that the initiation came not from me or my husband, but from our daughter. She has been begging us for a dog since the day she could speak a full sentence. I take these milestones seriously. Just as I fiercely researched child education for a year before my firstborn arrived, I have recently been immersing myself in the role of a "dog mom." One thing led to another, and as if waking up from a dream, I suddenly found myself on the path to becoming an animal communicator, exploring telepathy for interspecies communication. I haven't had my first breakthrough yet - that initial moment most animal communicators describe as shocking because "it really happened." However, after listening to just one story, I believed this to be absolutely true. I do not have a single doubt that living beings can connect and communicate telepathically, nor do I lack the confidence to do it myself. Within ...

​I believe I have arrived at a very good place in the ups and downs of my life's journey.  First of all, I started hearing this from my husband: "I'm an extremely confident man, but you're even more confident than me. You're supremely confident; it's sometimes hard to keep up with you!" ​ It's true that I have never felt a tiny bit of inferiority in any aspect of my life or myself since I was a little kid. I have also never doubted my ability to do anything I decided to do because I have never really cared about who said what, for as long as I can remember. I am simply progressing through hard work and living my journey at my own pace, on my own terms. ​ But this "supreme confidence" energy that my husband is experiencing from me now - I think it truly blossomed after becoming a mother. It bloomed after opening my legs in the delivery room in front of a crowd of excited family and friends welcoming their first newborn, and after losing myself...

I was trying to explain to my mother-in-law why matriarchal social structures are far better for raising children than the fragile, traditional familial structure (one man and one woman), which is largely a byproduct of patriarchy and capitalism. ​"It’s normal for people to grow apart and break up, especially in romantic relationships," I told her. "Relying on a single man-woman couple to stay together forever is like relying on a single bridge cable to hold a massive ship - if that one line snaps, everything drifts away. But if, like elephants, children were born into all-female herds, they would never have to experience the loss of a significant part of themselves the way they do when a mom and dad divorce. In a matriarchy, the guardian structure - consisting of moms, aunties, and grandmothers - is fluid and flexible." ​"But children need a mom and a dad..." My mother-in-law was not so convinced. ​"I’m talking about a matriarchal structure, Maa. ...

​I had an appointment with an OB/GYN nurse for a vaginal swab and ended up learning a lot about perimenopause. ​For about 10 days, I experienced significant joint pain, most likely due to hormonal changes - even though I have a progestin-releasing IUD in my uterus that magically topped my periods (God bless IUD!!). The nurse noted, "It could be a sign you're entering perimenopause, too." ​From our 20-minute conversation, I learned that: 1. ​Definitions: Menopause is clinically defined as the point 12 months after your final period. However, there can be a transition period of 7 to 10 years of perimenopause before reaching that point. 2. ​Timing: On average, menopause occurs between the mid-40s and early 50s; therefore, perimenopause can start as early as age 35. 3. Testing Limitations: If you take hormonal level tests, a hormonal IUD can impact the results. To get a perfectly accurate "natural" reading, you would have to remove the IUD, though this is often un...

My son didn't eat the lunch Grandma packed today because he won second place in his class vocabulary competition and was rewarded with free pizza. He’s been furiously studying vocabulary on his school laptop recently. I was worried about his screen time at first, but whenever I sneaked a look and saw him learning, I chose not to intervene. My son has always been praised for being ultra-focused, whether it’s horse riding, fencing, music, or school subjects. He can spend hours undistracted, researching and building airplanes or rocket ships from cardboard and shampoo bottles. As a mother, I take some credit for his level of focus. I always go back to how strictly I implemented a "no screen policy" for the first six years of my children's lives. It was so rigorous that no adults were allowed to use devices in their presence. I learned about the devastating impact of screens on development when I was pregnant with my first child. Most programs - even those labeled "e...

This parallel universe we exist in is deeply corrupted and malignant. In my understanding, the root of all suffering and misery is the Center Shift: the absolute center of human beings, in this reality, has shifted from Love to Possession. ​The center was supposed to be love - at least, it should be if we truly want to prioritize connection and happiness. If all human behaviors were centered around love, women would naturally take the lead, and children's wellbeing would shape our destiny. What an entirely different reality it could have been; yet we have become the walking dead, our imaginations too atrophied to even dream of a different path. ​In this universe, however, the human center is ownership, possession, and power. Where Love builds, Possession occupies; where the Mother nurtures, the Patriarch exploits. As a result, the center of all things is not the matriarch, but the patriarch. The greed of old men is placed at the very center of the podium; collectively, we live un...

It always puzzles me why, in modern spoken language, "fuck" and "fucking" are the most used words when it comes to intensified emotions. It is true in English, in Chinese and Hindi as well; I suspect it’s the same across the board. ​Obviously, propagation has been the most essential purpose of any species on Earth. However, if you have tasted the depth of love-making or the soul-intertwining that occurs within physical proximity, you know that the raw physicality of sex - the act itself - cannot compare to the emotional weight it carries. ​Then why is our most common linguistic "exclamation point" centered entirely on the word "fuck"? ​I think the most prominent reason is how bodily intimacy has been demonized and turned into a taboo under the propaganda of mainstream religions and rigid social structures. For centuries, the act was stripped of its spiritual or recreational nuance and reduced to a shameful necessity or a hidden sin. When a word r...

I had been struggling with recurring UTIs (Urinary Tract Infections) for years. One trick that worked for me for a while was to "pee within 10 minutes after any sexual activity"; a PCP gave me that advice in my mid-20s. ​However, over the past two years, even though I strictly followed this preventative hygiene ritual, I still experienced symptoms abnormally often. I dealt with a frequent urge to urinate, a burning sensation while peeing, and an inability to hold my urine -- yet my urine cultures often came back negative for bacterial infection. I was chronically troubled, lacking both a reasonable explanation and a foreseeable path to recovery. ​During my most recent OBGYN visit, I discussed this further with the Nurse Practitioner. At the time, "overstimulation" was the most likely cause I could think of. Based on that, the nurse suggested that "while stimulating the clitoral area, stay a little higher so as not to disturb the urethra." She also pointed ...

The scene of Alex Pretti's murder has been stuck in my mind since yesterday, turning into a nightmare, much like the scene of Renee Good's murder and the countless lives lost and the families shattered by ICE since last year.  I keep asking "Why?" even though the answer has been clear since the day this country has chosen a leader like that. ​When you are born into freedom, it is easy to take it for granted. But as someone who knows the weight of China’s history, I recognize the cruel truth: once rights are stripped away, it takes generations of sacrifice to win them back - if they return at all. ​I have gone through many ups and downs, and for a long time. I once believed I could retreat into a quiet life, unbothered by the storms of the world. But aloofness is a luxury we can no longer afford. We are witnessing a "make or break" moment that will define the lives of generations to come. ​Democracy and the rule of law are all that stand between a life of dig...