Failure

Life is creeping up on me. I feel like I am very quickly seeing my childhood in my rearview mirror, and I don't know how I feel about it. I am suddenly bombarded with life decisions I feel like I need to make now, even though I don't really have too.
The fact that I don't know how my life is going to play out stresses me out beyond belief. I want to know that the people I have now will still be there for me after I make these decisions, and that they will WANT to be there. I am afraid that in all the craziness I call my life, I will lose the people closest to me. It is a distrust that comes from countless disappointments and let downs. It scares me. Especially now.
I don't mind change. I actually enjoy it. I like the refreshing feeling of a new start. It is just scary, because I have never faced something so life changing as I do in the coming months. I can handle it. I know I can. It is just slightly overwhelming, and with other factors such as the medicine I am on, I feel quite hopeless sometimes. Like there is no way I can go on. I do not like that feeling, but I can't seem to help it.
This whole journey has been a test. A test of my strength. I want to reach the end and look back and be able to say, "I finished High School in 3 years, and all the while stayed a big part of my youth group, had time for family, and was able to maintain a very good relationship with you." I want to feel like I accomplished something, but it is so hard. It is hard to find time for everything. It is hard mentally, when I feel stressed a lot of the time. It is hard when I feel guilty for just about everything I do. It is hard.
My family sent out our anual Christmas letter this past year. For each person there was that persons accomplishments for the year, and stuff about them. I don't remember the last time there was something I accomplished for my section of the letter. I don't really feel like I have done anything worth talking about. Maybe this will be it. Maybe.
Although I am very excited for what the next few years have in store, I am scared to death. What if I fail?

Tech Life?

I am growing up in a society of technology. Everything is on some sort of touch screen or portable device. Even this very blog is being written from a laptop as I sit on my parent’s bed. I have come to enjoy the conveniences of things such as smart phones and laptops. They make my life easier in so many ways. You know that pain you get in your hand when you’ve been taking notes to long? Yeah, I can skip that and just take notes on my laptop now, and the world is at my fingertips now that I am the proud owner of a smart phone. But what is hard when everything is so easy? Where is there hard work? It seems there is a growing number of people who can’t live without their technology. Smart phones can even turn your lights off in your house. People can live their life sitting on the couch. They can buy things off the internet, have things delivered, even do work from home with a laptop and a phone for conference calls. It all is just so easy. Where being sent to their room used to be a punishment for kids, it is now something kids love, because being sent to their room means uninterrupted time with their electronics and so called punishment. Does anyone ever stop to think that this may have a negative impact on us? Instead of going and spending all day outdoors, kids stay inside and play on the newest app they just bought on the App Store.  Kids don’t know what an uncomfortable situation even is because if they get close to something that might even be considered such, they just pull out their phones and pretend to text, or their IPods and listen to music. Maybe kids need to experience uncomfortable situations. Life isn’t always going to be sweet and comfortable. Has anyone ever stopped and wondered what would happen if all technology in the world just shut down? No one would know what to do. Suddenly no one could communicate and barely anyone even knows that letters still exhist. So what would happen? I'll tell you. Society would shut down. No one would be able to function. At least for a while.  Hopefully, life would somehow sort itself out, the chaos die down. People would begin to understand hard work again, not letting everything in their lives be run by silly little machines. People would appreciate life a little more if everything wasn't so easy to obtain. Maybe that's what some of the world needs. Just maybe.

More Stuff, More Happy

Black Friday. The most selfish day of the year. As Americans we have set aside an entire day to be thankful for the things we have. Things like life, the people we are surrounded by, and the things we have are just a few of the many things people say they are thankful for as they sit around the big dinner table on Thanksgiving Day. We spend all day focusing on that, and then wake up the next morning to go and buy more things. Could there be anything more self-absorbed? More selfish? I don’t think so. If we are so thankful for what we have right now, why do we need to go buy more stuff just because it’s on sale? Companies have become so self-absorbed that they have even started opening their doors on Thanksgiving night. They are so focused on all the things they could sell and the money they could make that they do not seem to even give thought to the people that are missing family time to work for them so that they can actually make that money. Don’t forget about the customers. They sit outside of stores like Best Buy as early as Wednesday night and just camp out till early Friday morning. They skip Thanksgiving with their family and the message all this sends to other people is a general “I want to be first. More stuff, more happy.” Is this really the message we want to send to people? Does it really matter that much that you get a hundred dollars off a TV when you already have three at home? Is the fact that you shopped through the night starting at 8 o’clock on Thanksgiving really something to boast about? Is it not the most hypocritical thing to give thanks one day and not even a full day later go rushing around, pushing and shoving, with rude and inconsiderate words coming from your mouth just because you want more stuff and people are in your way? All this for things you may use for a few years or even as little as a few months, only to put it away and forget about it. Why waste a day doing this when you don’t even know what tomorrow will bring? If Black Friday was your last day on this earth, would you want to spend it like that? Would the knowledge of this being your last day put things in perspective? Would you suddenly realize how silly and petty and selfish the whole day is?

Blessed Beyond Measure

I tend to get ahead of myself and think to what is going on the next. Next week, next month, next year, even as soon as the next day.  I can't seem to stay in the here and now for reasons beyond my understanding. So today, on this day of giving thanks, I am stopping to live in the here and now. I am stopping to count my blessings and thank God for what he has placed in my life particularly this year.

This year I am thankful for two things. The first being relationships.
I am thankful for my growing relationship with Jesus. Always growing, always a journey, always worth it.
I am thankful for my relationship with my only living grandparents. I have been blessed with their guidance throughout my 17+ years and I am blessed with the fact that they are still around  to guide me.
I am thankful for my relationship with my parents. They are the most solid, Christian influences I have in my life, and for that I thank God every day.
I am thankful for my relationship with my brothers. My closest allies, my forever friends.

This year in particular I am thankful for a new type of relationship I have experienced. I am thankful for my relationship with my boyfriend. I have experienced a relationship that thrives on me being me. It thrives on me WANTING to put him before myself. It thrives on our individual relationship with Jesus, and our relationship together with Jesus. It thrives on making each other laugh and being there when the other person is having the worst day. It thrives on us loving each other even when we don't deserve it. Through the good times and bad. It is the most unselfish relationship I have ever experienced. This leads me to the other thing I am thankful for.

I am thankful for Love.

This year I have learned what loving someone really means. I have learned it is unselfish. It is a deep desire to give of yourself to make someone happy long before you ever thing about you. It means listening instead of talking. It means giving the best advice you have even if it feels like it can't help anything. Loving someone means you have someone you don't think you could live without them, without their smile, or their laughter, without their dorkiness and joy. Loving someone is wanting every moment to make the other person's eyes light up, and see their smile spread across their face. I have found this sort of love, and this year that is what I am most thankful for. For anyone who has found that sort of relationship, that sort of love, is blessed beyond measure.