I am home in Bakersfield. i slept in till 11 today! I didnt realize how tired i have been lately. Today i have been by myself a lot. It has been good. I just discovered pandora.com which is an online radio! looove it! today i went on a drive and i went to a park by the river (down by the river!! chris farley) haha, anyways the leaves were all different colors and there were beautiful peacocks running around! i took some pictures on my phone. I walked around and just felt so content. This rush of joy flooded in. Then it started raining! it was beautiful, i spun around and i couldn't stop smiling.

gender and jazz

Okay so my title is misleading, this blog has nothing to do with jazz. I'm proud of you ladies for protesting and going against the norm. it is interesting to hear your views on woofest. When i went to woofest freshman year, i didnt think twice about it. i felt ugly all dressed up though to be honest. I remember all these insecurities i had when i got all dressed up and i felt weird when the guys danced around and stuff. I never thought about the message behind it. I think that woofest for many is just a fun event and an excuse to dress up and take pictures. But there is still a message that it sends whether you see it or not.
To be honest, if i didnt know the girls protesting, i would have thought...hmm thats weird. But actually hearing the reasoning behind the protest opened my eyes to something i never thought of. So thank you friends for speaking truth no matter the reaction.
It is easy to just be complacent and believe everything you are told. It is easy to go with the crowd and not ask questions. But it takes crazy courage to stand up for something you believe in.
jazzy

linear algebra+headache=

im stresssssed. I've had this headache for four days. I am a big test on friday and i need to get an A on it. There is so much material that i need to know for it and i feel so lost. I can do it! i just don't want to study. Thanksgiving break please come quick!

weekend and thoughts

I had a good weekend. I went home on friday and went to a carrie underwood concert with my mom haha. it was a good concert, i was more entertained with the lights that looked like laser beams and with watching people. I am such a people watcher, i love it. On saturday i hung out with the familia. My brother and i had a tap dance dance off...amazing. i hung out with a friend and then watched an amazingly cheesy movie with my mom. Then i talked to kristen wellers! i miss that girl soo much. Then today i had breakfast with a friend and came back to school.
I really am blessed to be in the family that i am in. I take it for granted and i shouldnt. On saturday at one point my mom, my brother, and i were just laying on my bed talking. It was great.
I realize that i love good conversations. Not the shallow conversations, but deep meaningful ones where you walk away thinking wow. I have been so blessed lately with conversations.
I had a few with my mom this weekend (i have a lot with her). We were talking about marriage and i told her that it freaked me out. After some probing, i finally admitted that it freaks me out because i am afraid of failing at it. I am afraid of getting hurt. I am a person who loves with everything inside of me. I am scared of being completely vunerable and giving everything i have and then being rejected. But the truth is that God does that with us everyday. He lets us reject him over and over and He still loves us. Its crazy. but i am scared. But one thing my mom pointed out is that i am just going to try and avoid being hurt by being alone, but then i would just be lonely and be hurt anyways. She wasnt telling me to get married to avoid lonliness but she was saying that someday i will need to take the risk of being rejected. And if i do get rejected, God will get me through it.
And then i was talking to my brother about trying out for entourage and how scared i was. He said "Why? what do you have to lose?" and i thought about it, and once again i am just scared of rejection. But i need to take the risk. No matter what happens, God will never forsake me.
Overall, it is all about trusting that God will get me through things like rejection. But i must trust Him. I cant live inside my safe little walls forever. I have to step out of this comfort zone which can be more of a prison than a comfortable place.
So overall a good weekend. I am torn between wanting to go home for break but now wanting this semester to end. I dont want to grow up!

heart on the computer...

Maybe I'm learning something in my research writing class. it was the class i was most nervous about and it has turned out to be one of my favorite classes...maybe because dempster is awesome. Anyways, he was explaining foucault's theory of the 'gaze' and about the realization of people looking back at you. he said that once you recognize people watching you, you start acting different and are aware of every action.
It got me thinking. I think that is where i live my life, in that state of being aware that i am being watched and potentially judged. i wondered why i tend to feel apologetic of who i am and why i always think about what i am saying and beat myself up for saying certain things. its a very vicious cycle...bondage basically. no wonder i want to be free.
And i realize that the more i look to other people to shape my opinions of myself, i will never be satisfied. if i keep looking out to others to validate me, i will never have a solid opinion and acceptance of myself. So maybe if i stop looking to others for my validation and just "accept that i am accepted" (brennan manning's wording is the best way to put it) then i can live in the freedom that i have always wanted. i can live in the freedom of being accepted and then i can be the person that God created to me. i wont get so caught up in the opinions of others. I can then just get caught up in Him. That is what i really want...to be caught up in Him.
That is another thing...acceptance. we all strive for it. we all need it. we all search for it. but we already have it. we are accepted. Sure we aren't all accepted by the world, but those who are...do you really feel fulfilled? do you still feel empty. Maybe the striving for validation and acceptance of the world is meant to leave us empty. Maybe thats why we keep buying and buying and buying. and thats why we keep comparing and comparing. and that is why we still feel empty. Maybe God made it all that way for a reason. I mean if the world completely fulfilled us, why would we turn to Him? Yes yes, this may sound cliche from sermons past. But it makes sense though. we are already accepted. JUST AS WE ARE. we are accepted. so why do we keep striving?
"Stop and let me love you." I am always doing something. a ministry. praying. reading the right books. Saying the polite things. bettering (is that a word?) myself. i am always doing something. but how often do i just stop? How often do i just let Him love me? And by stop and let Him love me, i don't mean doing more to earn it. I just mean what i say...STOP. breath. accept.
That's all i got.

just be yourself

I hear that a lot. "just be yourself" but then i wonder, who is that? For a long time i let my family think for me. So i always tend to look to others to form my opinions...even opinions about myself. But lately i have been realizing, 'hey i want to think for myself' So it is hard not to look to people for an opinion about myself. i have grown into being more and more comfortable in my own skin. I have this bad habit though of comparing myself to everyone. I say to myself, 'if only i was like them' or 'dang, why am i not like that'. i can be hard on myself. But i am working on breaking that habit...or just working on offering that habit up to God. Because all i can hear when i start to compare myself is "You don't have to be anyone else". That is kind of my theme this semester. I am learning to trust that when God made me, He made me the way i am for a reason. its nice to feel this weight of needing to be something else lift off of me...God is gooood

weird

I feel weird today. I don't know how to explain it. For the first time this semester I am homesick. But I don't want to go home and hang out with friends. I want to go home and just be by myself. I think I am trying to escape. Going home is my way of escaping the stress of school and then i try to escape the things i am feeling. The funny thing is that going home doesnt help me escape, everything follows. Wow i sound depressed, im not though, i just feel weird. I wish i knew how to explain it.

bloggity blog blog

Hello.
Blog blog blog time!
The election is over. To be honest, i am more surprised by the reactions of people than by the results of the election itself. I understand that people have passionate beliefs about certain things, but is it worth getting so upset? It is okay to be disappointed that the candidate you voted for lost, but to call obama hardly a human? Bash him like that? He is the president so support him. And to think that our country will fall apart? yes it will change, but fall apart? i think we are going to be okay. And the tension just makes me sad, why must we say such hateful things to people who have different ideas? I don't understand it.
I saw something on someone's myspace the other day, it was a little bumper sticker that said "democrats, brave enough to kill our unborn children but not brave enough to kill our enemies." Really? is that what bravery is? i think we have got it all wrong sometimes. LOVE. we must LOVE.

Enough about that...
In about 30 minutes i have to give a presentation for my history of math class about myself. We just have to talk about ourselves and where we see ourselves in 5-10 years. the problem is that i have no idea where i see myself in 5 years! I know i want to teach but i am freaked out. I don't really have a 5 year plan or anything. i just want to be a person who is transparent and genuine and loving. I dont want to be rich and i dont want to live in the suburbs. I dont want to be a missionary in another country (which would be really cool), but i want to be me. I want to teach and i want to love kids that arent loved. i want to be that really weird teacher that everyone remembers. i want to be the teacher that kids feel comfortable talking to when they are lonely. And when i am old, i want to be the crazy teacher. And then a crossing guard. the funny part is, i am completely serious. I want to be different from the world, but still relatable. I dont want to be stiff and legalistic, but real and loving. I dont know if i want to get married, it scares me! and raising kids...even scarier. But who knows? i dont want to plan my life out. i dont want to be perfect. I want to live and love.

"You don't have to be anyone else"