this is me.

from High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

"Tuesday night I reorganize my record collection; I often do this at periods of emotional stress. There are some people who would find this a pretty dull way to spend an evening, but I'm not one of them. This is my life, and it's nice to be able to wade in, immerse your arms in it, touch it.
When Laura was here I had the records arranged alphabetically; before that I had them filed in chronological order, beginning with Robert Johnson, and ending with, I don't know, Wham!, or somebody African, or whatever else I was listening to when Laura and I met. Tonight, though, I fancy something different, so I try to remember the order I bought them in: that way I hope to write my own autobiography, without having to do anything like pick up a pen. I pull the records off the shelves, put them in piles all over the the sitting room floor, look for Revolver, and go on from there; and when I've finished, I'm flushed with a sense of self, because this, after all, is who I am. I like being able to see how I got from Deep Purple to Howlin' Wolf in twenty-five moves; I am no longer pained by the memory of listening to "Sexual Healing" all the way through a period of enforced celibacy, or embarrassed by the reminder of forming a rock club at school, so that I and my fellow fifth-formers could get together and talk about Ziggy Stardust and Tommy.
But what i really like is the feeling of security I get from my new filing system; I have a couple of thousand records, and you have to be me- or, at the very least, a doctor of Flemingology- to know how to find any of them. If I want to play, say Blue by Joni Mitchell, I have to remember that I bought it for someone in the autumn of 1983, and thought better of giving it to her, for reasons I don't really want to go into. Well, you don't know any of that, so you're knackered, really aren't you? You'd have to aske me to dig it out for you and for some reason I find this enormously comforting."

another exerpt:
[about the proper arrangement of a mixed tape]
"I spent hours putting that cassette together. To me, making a tape is like writing a letter- there's a lot of erasing and rethinking and starging again, and I wanted it to be a good one, because... to be honest, because I hadn't met anyone as promising as Laura since I'd started the DJ-ing, and meeting promising women was partly what the DJ-ing was supposed to be about. A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do. You've got to kick off with a corker, to hold that attention (I started with "Got to Get You off My Mind," but then realized that she might not get any further than track one, side one if I delivered what she wanted straightaway, so i buried it in the middle of side two), and then you've got to up it a notch, or cool it a notch, and you can't have white music and black music together, unless the white music sounds like black music, and you can't have two tracks by the same artists side by side, unless you've done the whole thing in pairs, and... oh, there are loads of rules."

:)

pure wisdom

it is hard for me to distinguish "good pride" from "bad pride" in my life. i don't believe that all pride is bad- without pride people would be jellyfish, with no backbone. there are things in life to be very proud of. things you've done, overcome, created, etc. but there comes a point where being proud of accomplishments turns into selfish arrogance, which is not a desirable trait.
this is a road block i have run into recently. i pride myself in my wisdom and knowledge of various topics. i pride myself in being level-headed in most situations. compliments such as "you are wise beyond your years" encourage this prideful attitude. when people i look up to come to me seeking advice, it causes my pride to get deeper. i never saw myself as being prideful in this area, but it is something that i am now realizing i need to be very cautious about. i have to watch myself and make sure i'm not using my wisdom just to show off or just because i've been complimented on it.

James 3 talks about wisdom:
"Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such "wisdom" does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.
But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere."

i need to be very watchful of how/when/why i use my wisdom. i cannot boast in it. i cannot have selfish pride in it. any wisdom i have needs to be sincere and honest, used for the correct purposes.

confessions

i feel like i have a lot of people i should be praying for. people that i want to pray for. sometimes prayer is the only way to help someone but i wish i could actively do more. i wish i could fix problems like disease and death and emotional hurt. i wish i could open people's eyes to a more broad perspective. i wish i could open my own eyes to a broad enough perspective to see how some decisions and actions make sense in other people's minds. i wish the things i've gone through and learned from could be taught to others and make an impact on someone.

...

i am going in a cycle, as i have for the past 3 years (and probably longer...but this is the noticable time period). each part of the cycle has a different level of intensity dependant on what is going on in my life. i've been learning to cope and healthily deal with issues, and as i do so the entire cycle is starting to lose its extremes, both highs and lows. it is encouraging to me when i see improvements like these in myself. but somehow, i miss the old cycle. why? because that was "normal" for so long. and now i have to adjust to a new normal. i dislike adjustments, even when i can see that it's so much better for me. my life hasn't gotten any less stressful or any less busy and i don't have a smaller amount of issues being thrown at me, but the difference is that i'm learning to handle these things in a better way than i did.

i used to burry my issues. i would push things down until they were manifested in my heart and mind as truth. i would believe lies until they were truth. even when someone would point out that the root of my issue could be deeper than i thought it to be, i would deny it and argue that know one could know how deep it was except me. i really didn't know that it was so deep and so harmful. i thought i knew exactly where my issues lay and all i needed to do was go through trial and error until they were fixed. i was wrong. i recently had an experience where i actually caught myself- my mind and heart- letting a lie become manifested deeper within me. for the first time, i saw and felt it happen. it was the strangest, scariest feeling. i realized that i am the reason i experienced so much pain in the last few years. i caused the problems to go so deep- i let them dig so deep- that they became truth and fact in my mind. i can't believe i was about to do it again.

i am now devoting my time to finding these lies and training my brain to label them as "lie", not as truth and hurt and grudge. i am looking for truth in all situations in order to not let myself become vulnerable to lies.

...

prayer is powerful. i am giving these things to prayer and to the Lord. i am giving Him my mind and heart because i know that that is the only place they are safe.

in a true friendship you learn to carry another person's weight. you learn how to help them and be there for them and in turn, they learn those things about you. true friends share their weight. when one person is going through a hard time or tough situation, the other person steps back and forgets about their own needs, as well as compensating for what their friend cannot do and carrying the extra weight for that person, all without expecting anything back.
true friends share emotions- joy in one another's joy, pain in one another's pain.
sometimes this feels natural. other times it is much easier said than done.

The Heart of Life

I hate to see you cry
Lying there in that position
There's things you need to hear
So turn off your tears
And listen

Pain throws your heart to the ground
Love turns the whole thing around
No it won't all go the way it should
But I know the heart of life is good

You know, it's nothing new
Bad news never had good timing
But, then your circle of friends
Will defend the silver lining

Pain throws your heart to the ground
Love turns the whole thing around
No it won't all go the way it should
But I know the heart of life is good

Pain throws your heart to the ground
Love turns the whole thing around
Fear is a friend who's misunderstood
But I know the heart of life is good
I know it's good

writer's block?

i'm thinking about deleting my blog. it's becoming overwhelming to me, meaning i feel like i have to post stuff but i never really post what i want to. i end up saying what i've been doing, what i will be doing and then not posting for weeks or months at a time. i'd rather use my blog as more of a place for an outlet of thoughts or ideas, but i can't get them out in a way that i'm comfortable with people reading. i have lots of things to say, but don't have the time to put them into well written form.

back when i was in high school and college...

how is it already june??? seriously. when did that happen! kids alive is in a month and 10 days. this has been a major stress for me lately, especially with rima being in sudan right now- literally EVERYTHING is on my shoulders for this event to be successful. this is not what i was expecting when i "signed up". i'm honestly really happy to be doing kids alive this year and it's going to be great, but it's a whole lot to try to do on my own. the deadline is now in the foreseeable future, not just a date. it's getting to the point where there is no room to slack off and take a break from it. i have to focus my attention which is really hard to do right now. there is so much going on- finals, my best friend moving, the general excitement of summer (including jeff coming home, yay!), and the everyday things that don't tend to stop when i feel overwhelmed/stressed (aka work, school, random events etc).
i'm just excited to be done with june, get into the meat of july, and then be able to relax.

**last night was a ridiculously fun night filled with way too much laughter and complete insanity that i really needed and enjoyed :) [courtesy of beck, marianne, elisabeth, and melin (and of course claude...what a good fellow) also, i think some credit should go to the RIP pops man, shotgun!! men, and the "greetings" crew]