Pondering a Picture

                                     
So I found this picture while on tumblr and I just thought it was extremely interesting.  I could have seen it and just moved on, but actually going back in my mind to when I was 6 made me think.  At the age of 6, I was a little girl obsessed with princesses and fairy tales.  I honestly believed I would grow up and be a singer, blissfully unaware of my inability to sing.  It shows you how beautiful life really is.  We start out believing in everyone and everything, and we can see the beauty and laughter in everything.  As we grow older, we become aware of more; we see and hear about bad things in the world.  If we let those things and our struggles overcome us, we aren't maintaining the child-like faith in God that we need to.  I guess what I'm trying to say is that this picture reminds me and should remind everyone of what it was like to believe in life and how God will get us where we need to be, even if it is sometimes hard.  We just have to hold onto that child-like faith, and if we do, we can see even more beauty.  We can become who God intends us to be.  Sorry if this is confusing, I just found it interesting and needed to rant.  I'm just so blissfully happy recently, even in my struggling because I have finally found what I never had: a faith in God that helps me to know that it will be ok, no matter what happens.  I finally think my 6 year old self would be proud and ok with where I have ended up.  I want that for everyone. 

In addition, this Bible verse seems to apply to how God wants us to hold onto the child-like faith that is free of doubts:

"Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem:  This is what the Lord says: 'I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the wilderness, through a land not sown.'"- Jeremiah 2:2

Tonight, we are young.

So you know how everyone says that as people get older, they are wiser? Well, I'm only 18, but I think I've learned something that's made me a little bit wiser about getting older. I used to think that changing from a child to an adult meant that you went from one completely different mindset to another. However, now I don't think that's the case. Take a house, for instance. I used to think that our thoughts and beliefs were the foundation and each stage of life was a different level starting with childhood, but now I have learned that childhood is the foundation, and our thoughts, beliefs, and deepest emotions stem from there and grow as we move through life. We still feel like children sometimes, even when we put on a suit and go to a job interview, or become parents ourselves, not that I've had that experience yet, but I've seen it in others. We just do the best we can with what we started with as children and have learned since then. I guess the reason why I've figured this out is because I visited my family over thanksgiving and I realized that, even though I had a good time, holidays are different when the magic is gone and when you can actually interact with each member of your family. It sounds sad, but it really isn't. My cousins and I have grown up and we can now have real conversations with each other and our older relatives. We're not just kids that get the stories sugar-coated. However, even though we've all grown up, I still feel like the little kid I was sometimes. That's why it's hard to grow up sometimes, even though the future is exciting. Anyway, this was definitely super random, but I felt like writing.

CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS!!!!!

For this Christmas, it took me awhile to decide what to give my family and friends.  Due to my college budget, I don't have much to offer when it comes to gifts.  Also, I've always felt that more personal gifts are so much better.  So, I've decided to write a letter to everyone I love to tell them just how much they mean to me.  Now, why would I blog about this?  Well, first I just felt like talking about it, which happens pretty often because I like to talk about things even if they aren't so interesting.  Mainly, however, I just wanted to talk about two things I've learned in the process of writing the letters. 

1) It feels good to take time to think about each person in your life that you love as individuals.  It really is beautiful that God carefully thought about how and when to place them in your life and what impact they will have on you.  There are reasons why people are in and out of our lives at certain times.  God chooses the perfect time to place them there.  Sometimes we ask ourselves why we couldn't have grown up with a friend we become closer to when we are older.  Think about it this way: if we started life with everyone we were going to love already in our lives, how would we grow and change with the fluidity of our relationships?  We become the person we are intended to be because of how we follow Christ in various situations and relationships.
2) Because I'm writing a letter to each person, I find myself paying extra attention to the things they do that I appreciate.  I want to include every possible thing I am thankful for about that person in their letter, so I really have started to notice how special each person really is to me.

Anyway, it has ended up that writing these letters is a great way for me to appreciate my friends and family as gifts from God.  I highly recommend it.

Merry Christmas!

Home is where my heart is...

Because of a few recent events, I've realized a few things that I think are relevant and interesting enough to post. Now, I won't get into detail about why, but one of the biggest things I've learned about life is that sometimes you have to go away from things you are comfortable with and people you love to do what God intends for you to do. I'm perfectly fine with this, however, the most difficult part of taking that leap, in my case, college and growing into who I believe God wants me to be as an adult, is being away from situations you feel you are needed in. For instance, when a friend is upset. Have you ever had that friend that you are so close to that it physically hurts to be away from them? Well, when that person is upset it is extremely difficult to stay where you are and continue to follow your path. It feels selfish. Another thing that is difficult is just missing people in general. I'm really enjoying my college experience and the people I've grown close to in college, but I've recently been extremely homesick. This may be cheesy, but I always visualize having the people I love and miss in front of me and crushing them into my heart so that I can take them with me wherever I go. The same thing applies to mortality. When you realize that certain people you love are eventually going to die, you want to stop time and hold that person in your life so that you can keep them forever. We all know that that can't happen, but it's difficult that we can't. Anyway, the gist of this huge spiel of thoughts is that I've realized how pursuing what is right for me and thinking about my own path can be difficult even though it is the right thing to do. This might be because I absolutely hate thinking of myself. If I could, I never would and I would make sure everyone was happy without even considering me. However, God wants me to serve Him, so that is what I'm doing because that is part of trusting Him and giving your life over to Him. Even if a situation He leads you to is different and scary, it can become better than you ever could have predicted. I just haven't figured out how that is going to happen for me yet. Guess we'll see!

Dancing Free

Happy Halloween! It's been great for me and I hope you too! Now, I realize that, like my first post, this one is going to be long and basically just a paragraph-long rant.  However, this is always how it is when I feel like writing because I have so many thoughts just buzzing around waiting to come out.  So, I hope that eventually my giant rants will become part of my charm.  Anyway, there's a certain lesson to be learned from Halloween.  Think about it.  We dress up as someone/something we are not and spend an entire night as that person/object.  I don't know about you, but sometimes I find myself more confident as that other person because, being that I only have to be that person for one night, I don't really have time to fully develop their character.  Okay, that probably didn't make sense.  I'll try again.  In our lives, we don't wear a costume.  We are just ourselves.  We try to cover ourselves up sometimes or hide from ourselves, but when it comes down to it, we will never be anyone but who God intended us to be.  When we wear a costume for just a short night, we only have to act like that person externally; we don't share the feelings and innermost thoughts of that person.  That's why it's easier to be confident in it.  However, I learned something tonight, in my cute little red riding hood outfit, that will probably change me forever.  I'll share it with you, but it will probably make more sense with some background.  During my childhood, I never quite figured out how to be myself.  Even in high school, I would be my usual crazy self at home but just quiet and timid at school.  I didn't enjoy social events because I didn't feel comfortable in my own skin.  So, realizing that this was a problem, I decided to let my entire self come out in college.  For instance, if I wanted to admit my love for Celine Dion to my new roommate, I would.  When I got to college, this proved harder than I thought it would be.  It was scary to be who I really am.  Now, back to the lesson.  I recently have been pretty comfortable with myself and putting myself out there.  However, one thing still made me uncomfortable: dancing.  It might seem weird, but to me, dancing is an expression of freedom, or letting go and just enjoying life for a moment.  When in a social situation, it was hard for me to let go and be totally free with people I hadn't yet made an impression on yet.  Tonight, at the Halloween party I went to, however, something different happened.  I resolved to just let myself have that freedom, that it didn't matter what other people thought, and that the other people probably were just enjoying themselves too.  I let go.  I can now say that I am completely and totally comfortable with who I am, and that is the most joyful and free feeling I have ever experienced.  Now enough about me, the point is that I want to encourage you to just let go.  Be who you are and you will be more beautiful than you could ever imagine.  Think about this.  How could we be more beautiful hiding and covering up what God has created than when we let it show?  There is no way we can create a version of ourselves that is better than the one He intended.  Let yourself feel the freedom you deserve.  When you accept and love yourself, you will accept and love the other people that you are meant to impact during your life.  So, if you're feeling a little bit confused about your purpose, maybe you need to take the time to become confident in the gifts you've been given and the person you are. 

All 6,973,738,433 of Us

Since this is my first post, it seems natural to talk about why I created this blog/what I will probably talk about/random introductory junk.  However, I really just enjoy jumping straight to what I want to say, so that's what's going to happen.  Before I start, however, it will probably help if I first explain a little something about me.  I have a huge appreciation for the miracle of life....I know, extremely cheesy, but how else do you phrase it?  Anyway, tonight I was just thinking about how I already have this huge room in my heart just full of love for my children that haven't even come into existence yet.  Now, don't jump to conclusions and assume that I, a youthful child of merely 18 years, want a child right this minute, but there are definitely at least 3 in the future just waiting to pop into existence.  Anyway, continuing on about this room full of love.  You know that chair that you love, the one that every time you sit it you fall into a comfortable cloud of happiness?  Well this room is full of those.  Also, there is a huge bowl of cookies right in the middle of the room, and smiling children just frolicking all over like a beautiful sappy dream.  Obviously now you can tell I am an emotional person.  Moving on to a more serious note, as I thought about this love I already possess for my children, I began to question something.  Do my children already exist somewhere, in the process of being beautifully knitted by God, or does God create humans in a split second?  I immediately realized that this isn't even the the right question to ask.  God doesn't live within the parameters of time.  The revelation I ended up having was that God takes the time to knit every tiny part of us together, every SINGLE one of us.  Time doesn't constrain him.  All 6,973,738,433 of us were doted on, with God sewing together even the smallest parts of our souls.  The three hours you spend studying for that dreadful sociology test don't even exist to God.  He loves us so much that He takes the time to do this for every single one of His children.  I'm probably being very repetitive, but its a beautiful concept to me.  I guess the point is that, no matter what we go through, all of us were created in the same miraculous way yet all of us are completely unique.  Most of us could think of maybe twenty different traits a human could possess, but God has thought of  6,973,738,433 different variations.  We should live to model that same kind of love.  So, even though I've rambled on about my emotional and probably confusing thoughts, the point is that He loves you.  There is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING you could do to run away from or lose that love.  If you have read this entire thing I am extremely proud of your ability to follow my thinking, and we should talk more.

"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
Romans 5:8, NIV