New Year’s Resolutions December 30, 2008

Maybe, if I post them on my blog, I will be more likely to keep them. I don’t know, but it’s worth a shot.

What I want to accomplish in 2009:
1. Eat better.
2. Exercise at least once a day.
3. Get into a good circadian rhythm (i.e. stop going to bed really late and waking up really late)
4. Practice my instrument every day.
5. Work on general knowledge of music every day.
6. Compose a little every day.
7. Organize my life.
8. Develop better study habits.
9. Read through the Bible.
10. Make my life God-focused, and discover my identity in Him.

Some Thoughts on Death (Inspired by a Dying Pet) December 28, 2008

My sister’s rabbit, Candy, is about to die.  We’ve had Candy for 9 or so years (she’s about 10 1/2), and she’s a wonderful rabbit.  It will be a hard loss for my family, especially my sister.  Now, facing this reminder of mortality has made me reflect on my own mortality.

Earlier this year, I became absolutely paralyzed by agoraphobia (the fear of everything).  While this woke me up and brought me to a position where I could finally accept Christ as my savior, it also made my life miserable for about 6 months.  Fear of death was a very prominent part of the problem.  Watching Candy die has brought it up again.

I think I’ve finally begun to make peace with my mortality.  Unless the Lord arrives in the very near future, I’m going to die sooner or later.  It’s just a fact.  There is no Fountain of Youth to prevent it.  I’m not sure I would even want to drink from it if there was.  Isn’t life precious because it’s limited?

God has given me today, and today is all I need right now.  “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”  Not only is that an awesome scripture, it pretty much sums up my life philosophy right now.  I try to let all my worries and all my stress melt in rejoicing in the day I’ve been given by the Lord.  I don’t know for sure that I have a tomorrow, or even an afternoon today, but I know I have right now.  I want to serve God moment by moment, loving Him with my whole heart and rejoicing in the gifts He has given me.  When I do this, I realize that that’s what I was made to do.

Putting God in My Christmas December 24, 2008

So, in two days I’m going to celebrate Jesus’ birthday.  I kept wondering about what kind of gift I could possibly give Him on His birthday.  Being the only “extreme, religious” person in my family (a term I don’t like so much), I found it slightly humorous to see my little brother’s reaction when I explained that Christmas is Jesus’ birthday.  Then I realized that I don’t actually know that.  I tend to treat Christmas much like the secular holiday it has turned into thanks to the growing commercialization of our culture.  What can I do, I asked myself, to celebrate Jesus’ birthday rather than “the holidays”?

I’m still open to suggestions.  I’m fairly new to this whole Christian thing.  I was raised Mormon up until age 13 (yes, I have done “baptism for the dead”), and after that I wavered between lots of other things.  However, what I’ve decided for now is just to spend the day in a quieter, calmer way focused on Jesus and His ultimate gift to humanity.  I also want to renew the gift of my heart, my mind, my strength, and my soul to Him.  I’m hoping to make this Christmas all about Christ.

Hoping for Perfection December 20, 2008

New Years is coming, just as it comes every year, and the most horrible thing about it is New Year’s Resolutions. 

I like new beginnings, but I don’t like the New Year.  Why? I get stuck in this mentality that I have to be perfect, that it’s my one chance to finally iron out all my faults and figure everything out.  I’ve already thought about the ten things I’m going to work on, and I know that I’ll just get discouraged when it doesn’t turn out exactly the way I planned it.

I can already see the perfect me: attractive, healthy, thoughtful, organized, confident, motivated, wonderful, etc.  Unfortunately, that person only exists in my imagination.  I have to admit, when I examine my life, that I’m rather plain, unhealthy, impatient, disorganized, etc.

Recently, though, I’ve been realizing more and more that this fantasy is hurting my life.  I get so frustrated when I make mistakes that I take it out on other people – and even God occasionally.  I replay all the embarrassing moments of my life over and over in my head until I want to cry.  Not only is it hurting my life, it’s a form of selfishness and conceit.  Selfishness, because I focus only on myself, never on others, and conceit because I believe that, somewhere deep in my heart, that I, out of all people, can someday obtain that perfection. 

Realizing this, I had a sudden realization last night: I can’t be perfect.  I can try to improve, but I will never be perfect.  It took me a long time to let go of myself, but now I have decided that God is the only One who can even get this unmotivated, lazy person moving in the right direction.  I asked God to redefine me and help me become more the person He wants me to be.  It may not be the person I want to be.  But that person isn’t real anyways and is all about being recognized by the rest of the world as a magnificent person.  Why should I try pretending to be something I’m not?

Cool Christmas Quotes December 18, 2008

I love reading quotes.  I thought I’d share some great Christmas quotes on the blog.

He who has not Christmas in his heart will never find it under a tree.  ~Roy L. Smith

Christmas, children, is not a date.  It is a state of mind.  ~Mary Ellen Chase

Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home!  ~Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers, 1836

I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.  ~Charles Dickens

I sometimes think we expect too much of Christmas Day.  We try to crowd into it the long arrears of kindliness and humanity of the whole year.  As for me, I like to take my Christmas a little at a time, all through the year.  And thus I drift along into the holidays – let them overtake me unexpectedly – waking up some find morning and suddenly saying to myself:  “Why, this is Christmas Day!”  ~David Grayson

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so?  It came without ribbons.  It came without tags.  It came without packages, boxes or bags.  And he puzzled and puzzled ’till his puzzler was sore.  Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before.  What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store.  What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.  ~Dr. Seuss

I truly believe that if we keep telling the Christmas story, singing the Christmas songs, and living the Christmas spirit, we can bring joy and happiness and peace to this world.~ Norman Vincent Peale (1898-1993), American Protestant religious leader, author.

In far less eloquent words, Christmas is wonderful!

Another Strange Night December 9, 2008

Keeping with my unhealthy sleep schedule, I went to bed at around 11:45 last night. Yes, that’s right. I should be going to bed an hour earlier or even, to stay in the right time-zone mentality, two hours earlier than that. But I’m not. That’s right.

I fell asleep pretty fast, but I woke up at various points during the night due to the storm that decided to hit yesterday. Now, storms where I come from mean lots of wind. My bedroom lacks a lot of insulation. It was very amusing to watch the leaves of the plants on top of my bookshelf waving in the wind blowing in through the floor and the walls. However, the temperature of my room was a little less amusing.

Besides that, my brain has been doing strange things to me lately. Whenever I closed my eyes, I would hear a sort of buzzing at regular intervals. Crazy, I know. I finally decided it was because I was too tired and my brain was about to explode. After that, I was ok.

My dreams were also crazy. They ranged from musings about almost getting hit by cars and how I would react in such a situation (the person in the dream said, “Don’t you know that it’s not nice to hit girls?” to the car, which I found strange even in my dream) to strange beigish lumps of food that were probably supposed to taste like stuffing and be stuffing (in my dream, we couldn’t decide if they tasted like fish or stuffing). One of those paranormal people would have a hayday with my dreams.

What other recent developments are happening in my life? I’m sure you’re dying to know.

Well, I just started a Facebook group called The Book Club which I am very excited about. It’s pretentious, yes, to be “The” Book Club, but everyone should join anyways. I’m not trying to be Oprah-ish, though it might come across that way. Actually, it’s all thanks to an article Boundless Webzine published recently called “Mind Ink Soul Paper” by Rachel Starr (go to http://www.boundless.org/2005/articles/a0001912.cfm for the original article). I’ve always loved reading, and I agree with almost everything Rachel says. I know I could sit in a used book store for an entire day, just flipping through books on all sorts of things. The book for this month, December, is Three Cups of Tea, which I’ve heard is a wonderful book from so many people. I think reading it now will give me a very different perspective on the recent Mumbai Terrorist Attacks.

Besides that, I am still going strong on the Bible in 40 days plan that my friends and I are doing right now. It’s great. Sometimes I get lazy and don’t actually absorb anything, but I’m usually pretty good at writing down observations and redefining my faith based on what I find.

I’m also trying to study lots of French because I feel like I’m letting my year in Belgium go to waste by forgetting everything I ever learned while across the Atlantic. This really came home when I realized that it was very difficult to reply to my Belgian friend on Facebook chat yesterday.

What is Homlock doing lately? Well, he’s enjoying himself immensely on vacation with the rest of his invisible family in Yellowstone, which he assures me is much more beautiful in the winter.

I’ll close with some more quotes, this time about weather and dreams:

Weather is a great metaphor for life – sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, and there’s nothing much you can do about it but carry an umbrella. ~Pepper Giardino

Wherever you go, no matter what the weather, always bring your own sunshine. ~Anthony J. D’Angelo, The College Blue Book

Last night I dreamed I ate a ten-pound marshmallow, and when I woke up the pillow was gone. ~Tommy Cooper

Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives. ~William Dement

Changing Life December 8, 2008

My father just found out that he didn’t get a job he had been expecting to get, which almost guarantees that my family is going to move again. While this doesn’t affect me as much because I’m away at college, it definitely feels weird.
“Why?” you ask with big, round, curious eyes.
I suppose because I’m going to miss my bedroom, with its window seat and big space and blue walls. When I visit over the holidays in future years, I’ll “come home” to a new house that won’t feel like I’ve ever really lived in it. It will feel like visiting a grandparent’s house or something like that.
I’ve moved a lot and lived in three different states, but this feels especially weird.
I spend so long getting emotionally attached to a place, only to leave it again. This has happened over and over again at various different locations: Virginia (the happy Utopia of my childhood), Belgium (for eight months, but it already felt like a heart-place to me when I left), and now the canyonlands of the Southwest. Every time I get ready to leave somewhere, my heart panics. The idea of leaving college in a few years already frightens me. Starting fresh can be great, but I’d like to find someplace calm to settle down and get involved in a community that won’t change completely every few years. Some people are nomads by nature (Homlock, for example). Some of us just fall in love with places too quickly.