Palanca fuss

Retreat is nearing and I haven't started yet on these Palanca letters. I have made retreat letters before but I haven't really got the whole context and point of it. Sooooo, I searched the net (which is what I oftentimes do) and I came across with this article about it.

Basically the gist of the whole thing is that a Palanca is a letter of encouragement. 


I'll just copy and paste verbatim the introduction of the article: "Palanca is Spanish; it means to give lift, to rise. The word is used here to describe the effect of a letter of encouragement on a retreatant. On a retreat, a new retreatant can be overwhelmed, brought to tears by Palanca from family and friends, but in some ways, even more by those from complete strangers. 
* A Palanca means lever. A lever is used to lift and move heavy things, in this case the Palanca helps to lift one's spirit.

To "do palancas" or "send palancas" is to offer prayers and sacrifices. so it's kind of sacred and should provide some sort of spiritual encouragement. They're not supposed to be love letters or compliments or aids for confessing things. Anyhowwwwwww, I'll try to start with it tomorrow :)  perhaps ako lang naman nagsearch nito, so might as well disregard the real meaning and just write a plain positive and quite moving letter ;) hah