Phew!

I finally finished everything with my grad school application. Yay!  I feel like a huge weight has been lifted.  For the past two weeks I've been scrambling to finish and perfect my resume, the essay, and the application and to get all the materials together to send off.  And now after all that stressing, it's now officially out of my hands.  It's such a relief on one hand, but on the other hand it's nervewracking.  All I can do now is wait in anticipation and hope that I get accepted.

After the stress of recent and irritations and such, I decided to just get off campus and take a me day.  I went to my second home aka Barnes and Noble and was there for about 5 1/2 hours.  It was bliss. I studied, and read C.S. Lewis, listened to music...During the time I was there, there was these two people sitting at the two tables next to me who started conversing about beliefs and God and the Bible.  So I paused my ipod, but kept my headphones in so I could discreetly listen.  The man said that he was an anti-theist, not an atheist, an anti-theist.  He had some really interesting arguments, several of which I'd never heard before.  He cited specific scripture verses several times too, and I looked them up as he talked about them and some of them he was just taking completely out of context, but others had me thinking "what Bible did he read?"  It was really interesting.  There were several times I wanted to interject, but I was not sure enough of my knowledge to do that.  I hate that.  I want to be confident enough in my faith to be able to talk to people openly about it.  However, even if I would have been confident in this situation, the man seemed very set in his ways and not open to suggestion or in changing his viewpoints.  As he brought up new arguments and sub-points for each argument, I opened a word document and began typing out his conversation (unbeknownst to him of course).  Now I can take his arguments and study them and turn to the Bible so that next time I can perhaps feel more confident speaking about my faith.

I've been so busy lately that my priorities have gotten a little skewed.  I've pushed God to the sidelines and said "I'll get to Him when I have time."  I've really been working on changing this lately.  I'm beginning to feel distance from God and it's my fault and I don't like it.  I've started up daily time with God again, but half the time I don't know where to start.  I know that may sound silly, but that's how I feel.

We serve an awesome God!

I was recently going through old sermon notes and I found a quote my pastor made saying "God can grow roses out of life's manure." I really like how this quote is put. No matter how stinky and yucky life gets, God can make something as beautiful as a rose come from it. God can work even through our sin to fulfill his will. Wow, what an AWESOME God we serve!

Note to self: God loves me for me

So, I have decided I am going to try to keep up with my blog. Writing provides a release for feelings, thoughts and struggles that I’ve been holding inside. So here goes for my first post in like forever! Haha.

Lately I’ve really been struggling with constantly putting myself down. Nothing I do is good enough for me, everyone else is better than me. I find myself constantly comparing myself to those around me and in my mind I am always falling short. I am full of insecurities about who I am. For example, I love playing the piano, it's my way to relax and melt away my stress. But lately, I hear others playing and all I can think about is how much better they are then me and that causes me to analyze and criticize my own playing which does not make it very relaxing. I came across this quote the other day and the words ring true to me right now, but at the same time, they haven’t quite stuck yet. "Don't rely on someone else for your happiness and self-worth. Only you can be responsible for that. If you can't love and respect yourself - no one else will be able to make that happen. Accept who you are - completely; the good and the bad - and make changes as you see fit - not because you think someone else wants you to be different."

That last part of the quote is precisely my problem recently. I don’t accept who I am. I feel like I don’t measure up and that if I truly let go and be myself around people that they won’t accept me for me. I want so badly to be accepted and loved that a lot of the time I try to change who I am. It’s okay to change things about yourself, but not if the only reason is because you think someone else will like you better for it. Somehow I need to ingrain this into my head. I know I’m probably not the only one that that struggles with this, but sometimes it sure feels like it. I look around at all these beautiful girls who appear confident and appear to have it all together and then I see me and practically see the opposite. I just feel awkward all the time and I think what is wrong with me? 

I feel horrible for feeling this way, I feel like it’s a slap in the face of God because He made me who I am and God does not make mistakes. Psalm 139:14 "I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well." I need to be looking ultimately to God for this love and acceptance I desire because only He can give that unconditional love and no matter how I act or how much I mess up, He still loves and accepts me for me. And this is comforting to know that even if everyone hated me (which isn’t true, but if it was) God would still be there with open arms waiting for me to run in. This is just something that God is continually working with me on.

It's been a year...

Last year at this time I was preparing to go to Australia and anxiously awaiting the day of departure. Now I am back at Simpson. It's been an interesting adjusting period. Everyone asks about Australia and it's a challenge to know what to tell them. How long of an answer do they want? I want to tell them all my stories, but at the same time I don't want to bore them and for most of the stories they would be meaningless to those who weren't there when they were actually happening. The more time goes on the more I realize that while I was in Australia, though I was having the time of my life, I was also constantly thinking of people back home missing them, but now that I'm back home I constantly think about the people who I was with in Australia and wishing I could go back with those people and about how many more things I could have done while in Australia. Why is it so hard to just live in the present where I'm at and enjoy the here and now rather than always dwelling on the past and wishing I could go back to it?

Though only in Australia for four short months, it definitely did take some adjusting coming back to the states. Even just little things, but things like remembering which side of the car to get in and not freaking out when it looks like no one's driving....lol. Things like having to go to class three times a week instead of once a week, not being able to just catch a bus/train or ferry to go on random cool adventures with friends or by myself, not being able to simply go to the beach to do homework whenever I feel like it and things like not going out and doing stuff with friends almost every day and night.

I recently joined a program with a group at Simpson where we read through the Bible in 90 days. We read about 12 pages a day and then once a week we all meet for discussion and there's a video we watch with a speaker. This along with resources to help us makes it so it's not simply reading through the Bible but helping us engage in it as well. I have only just started but I am super excited to see where God takes me on this journey. Some people might ask why you would want to read the whole Bible and my answer is that I want to know the Bible in it's entirety, to be more familiar with it and I hope it will draw me closer to my Savior Jesus Christ. Also, when people in my life ask me a question about Jesus or the Bible I want to be able to better answer the question and better direct them on where to look in Scriptures. While in Australia, I had a couple instances where someone on the street in passing heard our American accents and started talking with us. We mentioned that we went to Westley University which led to talking about how we are Christians. One instance in particular, a woman began telling us her story and asking lots of questions and I found myself unsure of how to best answer. Thankfully my friend with me answered with specific verse in the Bible and other knowledge about Jesus that comes from a closer relationship with Him and from knowing His word. This instance really encouraged me to strive to learn more and more so I can better answer questions that are thrown at me.

I hope to continue to update this blog as the semester continues, but we'll see how busy I get.