There's So Much I Could Write About Right Now...

Whether I would rather have love or happiness. What it means to be truly beautiful. Being willing to be confused and sound stupid for the sake of the love of learning. Being fake versus being real. The big True Grit poster my roomie put above her bed. Loving others so that I can love myself correctly. That love is worth it. Feeling displaced. Wishing that change will never come but knowing it will. Modernist poetry. That I just came from the first session in at least a week where I followed the discussion the entire time and came out feeling rejuvenated instead of discouraged. But, I don't think I'm going to write about any of it. I'm just going to wonder, think, and try to pray from the heart.

The depth of the human soul amazes me. Yesterday (and into the wee hours of this morning) I spent 10 of my 18 waking hours talking with people over meals or just one-on-one about all kinds of things: theology, our past experiences, love, the nature of humanity, our purpose in this world, family, the future, God's provision...

And after 10 hours of talking with these people, I don't fell like I know them, even though I have "known" them for almost seven months. I want to get to know them more even after spending hours talking with them. The human soul is a glorious thing to be so deep that it takes years for us to uncover, and even then, I'm not sure we fully uncover the true entity of the soul.

I thank God that college gives me the time, the energy, and the excuse to stay up until 2 am talking about life.

Tonight Quadratus had their second Reynolds session of the semester...

My brain is exhausted, my heart aches, but my soul is encouraged.

I am very glad I had the foresight to take a nap before session today.

Laughter is good and brings people together.

I love hearing Dr. Reynolds talk about education.

And all this after I promised myself that my next post on my blog would not be about me.

Nostalgia

I was recently told (in different wording) that I'm too nostalgic and I need to stop wishing for the past. Which is probably true. But I don't want to forget about the past. It's too important to me.

One year ago today I spent the day in Fresno at a speech tournament instead of going to my senior formal. I had never been to a formal, and I really wanted to go my senior year, but I had also been working all year on extemp and I really wanted to go to state in that event. I didn't end up qualifying for state. But, looking back, I see that I made the right decision. That tournament is one of my most memorable high school experiences. It ranks higher than my one and only high school dance (my senior prom). Right up there with the time I won first place in extemp and the time Stef and I beat the top teams from Fresno and Bakersfield back to back and nearly made it to state in parli.

Looking back, I can't believe the day I gave up going to formal in order to go to a speech tournament was a full year ago. The memories from that day are still fresh in my mind, and I never want to forget them. I still look back on that trip and feel like it was only yesterday, but it was a year ago. At that time, my life revolved around two things: forensics and college stuff. I was applying to colleges, applying for scholarships, waiting for acceptance or rejection letters, waiting for answered prayers, and just waiting for my senior year to be over. I also lived, breathed, and even prayed forensics. I scoured the papers everyday, quizzed Brice on anything I could do better, and was constantly practicing my speeches. Now, I'm in college and I haven't given a speech in ten months. At that time, I had not yet been accepted to Biola, I had never heard of the Torrey Honors Institute, and I was fairly certain I would end up at APU for college, though I was hoping to make ends meet in such a way that I could go to Hillsdale. It never occurred to me that one year in the future, I would be a student at Biola, in Torrey, not on the debate team, with enough money to cover my first year in full. I am so different from who I was a year ago...yet so much the same. Life is weird that way.

I Am So Sick of Just Being

I'm tired of being in passing. Of being, hoping, wishing, planning, and thinking. I want to do. I want to change the world, cry out to God, dance for joy, roll down the windows and sing my heart out, have a really philosophical discussion that alters someone's life, work so hard that I am covered in sweat, get sunburned from chopping weeds for so long, clean the whole house, run until I can't run anymore, fight the system. And I want to succeed. I want to throw all of my being into something and live it fully. I want to do that with my walk with Christ. I want to live it so thoroughly that I feel God, His love, and His mercy. I want to have passion for what I do that is so strong and fueled by my stubborness to such an extreme that God alone can stop me from acting.

I'm sick of this "just being" business. This apathetic, media-drenched, half-way-sufficient, over-commercialized, brain-dead, thoughtless, mouthy, death-obsessed, lazy, rude, crass generation and culture. Where is our desire to live? Where is our desire to find answers? Where is our heart for the world? Where is our pull to explore? We're Americans. We believe that hard work gets us anywhere. So why have we given up on it? This generation of Americans doesn't believe that hard work can get us anything we want; we believe the government, Amazon.com, Youtube, Hulu, iTunes, and Facebook gets us anything we want. Where's our honest nature? Our unwavering stance on what is moral? Our urgency to fight anything that contradicts God's law? What happened to those morals that our founding fathers had? We now settle for what is easy, even if it means breaking some moral boundaries. We run to the classes that give easy A's, the job that makes a lot without requiring a lot of work, the minimum work with maximum benefits. Aren't we the nation who is willing to fight against impossible odds for our freedom? Aren't we a nation of pioneers who left their homeland and fought drought, flood, famine, snowdrifts, Indians, and wild animals just so we could have a piece of land to call our own? Aren't we the "rugged individualists," the adventurers, the pioneers, the founders, the fighters? What has happened to us?

We now prefer having something handed to us on a silver plate, even if its not really ours. As long as we get the easy life, we don't care what strings are attached. We don't care that we aren't living whole-heartedly for God. We don't care that others have control over our destinies. What happened to our American, our human desire to live? To live every moment as if it was our last? To live each day as if God was watching? To look at each person as a child of God? To take every oppurtunity to praise Him, love Him, learn about Him? Let us live in faith. Faith that He will bless us and lead us if we give all to Him.

Catch-All Post

So much has been going on, which is good...and bad. I am learning so much, but it is so incredibly exhausting.

So much has been on my heart lately. Worries. Thoughts. Lessons learned. Lessons that I wish I had learned earlier.

-I had so many worries about my major this week. Last week, I had the same worries, but I had zero time to think about it. I'm not sure what I want to do for the rest of my life. I'm a sociology major...but now I'm not even sure my dream job (opening a children's home in the country) is even going to work in so many different capacities...which makes me wonder why I'm majoring on sociology if I may not even use this knowledge. And I'm planning on getting my teaching credential, but I don't agree with many things related to public education, and I don't really want to teach in a private school, either...so I spent a large chunk of the last few days wondering and worrying about all of this. Until I realized that there are only two jobs I have had my heart set on at any point in my life: being a teacher, and being a mom...so maybe this course of work is right for me after all.

-Rest. It's something that I tend to do, but it is never restful. When I'm studying, I take little breaks, but these breaks are sometimes as busy as my time spent studying, so they are rarely restful. But if I take a real rest, then I feel like I don't deserve it because I haven't worked hard enough (because I've been taking all those little breaks).

All this culminates in very little rest for me. I've been trying this week to learn to be disciplined in certain areas. I think putting rest into my schedule is going to have to be one of those things that I am disciplined about: working when I know I have to, and taking a rest so I can do my best the rest of the time. Using Facebook less. Reading my Bible more. Setting aside time to do something where I refuse to let myself get distracted. God gave me time to spend in college, and I need to use it wisely. I need to do my schoolwork and do it well, even when I dislike the work. I need to invest in the lives of those I am with: the girls on my floor, my Torrey group, other Torrey kids, the students in my classes, my friends in Bakersfield and all over the world. I need to rest. Most importantly, I need to put God first. One reason why I felt like last week (Torrey-paper-frenzy week) was so horrendous was because my devotional times were non-existant. If I spent time with God, I would have been able to get through that week with significantly less stress. Instead, my friends had to sit me down and tell me that my health was more important than writing a paper.

-I had to read six chapters of Walt Russel's Playing With Fire this week before reading the Bible for my Torrey class. I was amazed at what I learned: It's not all about me. Fancy that.

I realized that when I read the Bible I look at in in the context of "What does this have to do with me?" as my primary motivation, when, this is not the true context at all. God didn't give us the Bible to help me decide what I should major in, or to give me a comforting quote every so often. He gave the Bible to mankind to reveal Himself to us. To reveal who He is, what He likes and dislikes, how He is involved in history, how He is using history for His glory, and so on. Reading the Bible is not about me! The fact that I made it is incredibly foolish and conceited of me.

This explains so many of the problems I have had recently reading the Bible. I have lost interest in it so quickly because I felt that nothing I was reading applied to me, and the verses that did apply to me were already memorized and in my head. Now, the Bible has a new meaning to me. I have the privilege of learning how God works in history...a complete story, not a sound bite or two.

Ah Ha! Moments

I love "ah ha!" moments. I've gotten a lot of them since starting college. Sometimes they pertain to the Iliad, sometimes they pertain to my walk with God, sometimes they just pertain to a joke that I was too thick-headed to get until five minutes after the joke was first made...but I still love "ah ha!" moments. Here are my latest...

-When I realized in the middle of the lecture Timothy Goeglein gave tonight why Killer Angels is such an important book. (Apparently Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain was a scholar who read the Great Books, and that helped him form battle tactics so that the 20th Maine could hold their position at the Battle of Gettysburg on Little Rountop...which allowed the Union to win the battle. Who knew that Torrey could connect itself to a seemingly pointless book from my AP U.S. History class?)

-When I heard the song "Before the Throne" in chapel today and realized anew that the "great High Priest whose name is Love" loves me enough to die for me.

-When I looked up the specifics of a sociology major and discovered that it might actually be the perfect major for what I want to do with my life.

-When I realized again why God put certain people in my life. People who finish my sentences, read my mind, and know my heart.

FYI...

I have no idea how many people read my blog. I know there are blogs I "follow" but don't always read, and blogs I read, but don't "follow." So I don't know how many people who read this are my friends on Facebook or how many people check this thing even when I don't post a link on Facebook, but I figured I would put an update here: I have deactivated my Facebook account for a week, possibly longer. I am hoping I have the self-discipline to actually keep it deactivated for a week. I feel like I need time away from the "addiction," so to speak, of Facebook. I spend way too much time on there, and it needs to stop. Plus, I have a load of work that needs to get done, and procrastinating it on Facebook doesn't help.

By no means am I trying to separate myself from the world and disappear into the sphere of Biola. Please call me, text me, e-mail me, come knock on my dorm room door, track me down in the library...I love people, and it's hard knowing that I have severed the only connection I have with some of my friends, but God comes first. Way too much of the time I spend on facebook should be spent focusing on Him. I have come to use Facebook as a relaxation and wind-down time after classes and Torrey sessions. Truly, it needs to be God I go to to rejuvinate me, not a website.

Continue to check back here because I still need a creative place to let loose all my craziness and so far this seems to be working. I will update regularly.

I'm Half-Way

I'm half-way a romantic and half-way a cynic.

I'm half-way a sensible girl and half-way a rebellious one.

I'm half-way a creative and half-way logical.

I'm half-way smart and half-way idiotic.

I'm half-way shy and half-way outgoing.

I'm half-way cautious and half-way impulsive.

I'm half-way a debater and half-way a listener.

I'm half-way wise and half-way foolish.

I'm half-way serious and half-way silly.

I'm half-way a woman and half-way still a girl.

I'm me.

Pearls of Wisdom From Various Places

On Prayer:
"Prayer is more than words; it is an attitude of the surrendered heart to be conformed into the image of Christ." -Josh McDowell
"Prayer doesn't 'work.' God works." -Dustin Adams

On the Christian life:
"Morality is not our god. Jesus is our God." -Anonymous
"There's nothing like your heart being at rest with God." -G. Bruce Hatton
"God isn't a Build-a-Bear god." -Andrew Levins
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." -Jim Elliot
"My task is to love God, make God loved, and lay down my life to these ends." -Elisabeth Elliot
"Keep making God smile!" -Gabi Hickman
"Life is repentance." -Martin Luther
"Life is so much more exciting when you give it away." -Dustin Adams

On Beauty:
"I'm so thankful for friendship. It beautifies life so much." -L.M. Montgomery
"Her beauty was not her own." -Jill Mason

On the Sanctity of Human Life:
"The womb is holy ground." -Dustin Adams
"Because, after all, a person's a person, no matter how small." -Dr. Suess
"If you don't believe the baby in the womb is the living handywork of God, you will do nothing to protect it." -Come What May

I Am Very Tempted

Right now, I am quite tempted to set my Facebook status as a pro-life and/or pro-traditional-family rant, just to see how angry some of my Facebook friends who are on the opposite side of those stants would get. I am particularly interested in how a lesbian friend of mine would react.

Then I remember one of my favorite movies, Come What May, and how the female main character acted when proposed with a situation like that. She stood up for what she believed in, but didn't do it just to anger people, but if she knew it would have a purpose.

But I'm not a fictional debater-heroine. I am a Christian kid who gets sick and tired of how people tell me to be "tolerant" but aren't tolerant of my intolerance of mistreatment of humans. So I may do it anyway. And I think I have a really good one in mind...

Twelve

When we were growing up, my brother and I thought twelve was the magic age. Being twelve was very grown up indeed. When I was twelve, I was allowed to start helping in the nursery during service at my church. When I was (almost) twelve I entered a new world known as junior high school. At age twelve my brother was allowed to get a pocket knife. He used to say things along the lines of, "I don't like bell peppers, but when I'm twelve I will because then I will be all grown up."

Now my brother is fifteen and I am nearly eighteen. As I clean out my bedroom and prepare to leave for college in a month, I don't feel the least bit "grown up." I still want to curl up under the covers when I'm scared and cry when I feel alone. I still read the books I read when I was little. I still watch Disney movies and sing the kids songs I learned at Vacation Bible School.

I feel like I know less now than I did when I was twelve. The more I learn about God, the more mysterious He becomes. I readily admit, that I only know the tiniest fraction about God, life, and any other area of knowledge. I thought then that I knew everything there was to know about God, the Bible, my peers, and life in general. Now, at seventeen, I laugh at my twelve-year-old self. "You didn't understand true pain or suffering at that age! How could you have understood God's healing power? You had not known real, deep joy at twelve! How could you have understood God's calming and sustaining presence? You didn't know what conviction was when you were twelve! How could you have possibly understood the prickle of the Holy Spirit in your heart?"

God has taught me so much since I was twelve. At that age I told God, "Get me what I want, when I want it." I am so thankful that He didn't listen to me. I would have lost a myriad of oppurtunities. I would have attended a different high school, and I would have had different friends. Most importantly, if God had listened to me when I was twelve, I would still have the mind-set of my twelve-year-old self, and I cannot think of any greater tragedy.

Curly Girl

Curly hair is something I will never quite understand. When I was little (as in five years old) I had straight hair. I would look at the girls in books with beautiful curly hair and say, "I wish my hair would look like that..." Of course, whenever you say that, you automatically expect that whatever you wished for will never happen, right? Wrong. Somehow, I ended up with curly hair.

I don't understand how it happened. My mom has stick-straight blonde hair. My dad and brother have thick dark hair. So I can't figure out why I got curly hair.

After much stress of trying to figure out what in the world I should do with this mop of frizzy, curly, unmanageable, crazy, wild hair, I finally learned to let it curl. I'm still experimenting with what could work with it, but at least I learned to like curly hair. Here's why:

Curly hair is so much more forgiving than straight hair. It doesn't have to be cut "just so," it still looks fine if it is tousled by the wind, and it looks cute when it's messy (well, sometimes).

Curly hair is so much more fun. It's a new experience every day. One day it's tame, the next it's wild, the next it's half-and-half. Always entertaining.

So, if you have curly hair, stop wishing it was straight and just have fun with it. If you have straight hair...start wishing for curly hair like I did!

Notes to Self

Self, please refer to this post if you ever consider any of these things.

-Self, you are not a computer person. Never claim to be so. Never change your major to anything computer or mathematical related. You will regret it.

-Self, never let your dinner consist only of a chocolate milkshake. Even if it is homemade.

-Self, stop being late everywhere you go. Why is it that once you learn to drive, you are always running late?

-Self, when you get lost in downtown Bakersfield, just call your mother instead of wasting time, gas, and sanity trying to find it yourself. Otherwise, you will end up on the Garces Circle getting honked at for being too slow.

-Self, when you need to get some serious reading done, don't stay in your room where you can hear the strains of Hogan's Heroes coming from the TV.

-Self, just buckle down and read the Iliad already.

I wish...

...I wasn't such a procrastinator.
...I would stop worrying.
...I was braver.
...I would stop feeling sorry for myself.
...I would rely on God more.
...I wasn't such an idiot so often.
...I could handle problems better.
...I would talk more when I need to.
...I would shut up when I need to.
...I would stop thinking about myself so often.

These wishes and I have a love/hate relationship. I love that I have the power to make these wishes come true. I hate that making these wishes come true requires my hard work, not a genie.