Ready to begin again...

Alright I’ll be honest…yes: I totally stole the idea for the title for this blog from Taylor Swifts’ new song “Begin Again” and while I am on the subject…I will willingly add that I am COMPLETELY STOKED for her new cd, Red, to come out Monday…wait…tomorrow!!! I am so tempted to pre-order it…but there is just something about going to Target to pick it up in person…aaaand I am in the mood to buy some cute new leggings anyways...so it will give me more of an excuse to travel a whole hour some time in the next week…any ride-alongs welcome =]

Anywho.

Back on subject.

Beginning again…

Lately…I have needed just that.

I have been stuck.

In a mood that I do not particularly favor.

Or at least I thought I did not favor it.

But lately, I think I have.

Another word for “mood” or “attitude” is “choice”

Like………If I am in a poor mood….I am making the “choice” to be in a poor mood…

And so on and so forth…you get the drift. (I have also been pretty impatient lately…)

And lately…I have been making the choice to…just not be happy…and not heal…

I think when we are hurt…a lot of time we feel as if we have the “right” to be in a certain mood…we have the “right” to act hurt. To be sad. To cry. To completely and utterly obsess over our sorrow…(maybe that is taking it a little too far…oooor is what I am saying an actual realistic view that some have…?)

It is natural to take time to mourn when we have been hurt. In fact – it is completely healthy to do so. But I was not being healthy about it.

And thinking about it today and processing everything…I don’t think I really wanted to heal.

I’ll be honest. I just was angry. Angry at so many different things.

Myself…

People who have hurt me…

God…

I was angry, and I wanted to be.

Sometimes it is easier to just lay down on my bed and throw a fit.

Haha…just thinking about it now…I feel so childish…

But seriously…

Sometimes it is easier to just be angry. Correction…it is ALWAYS easier to be angry.

It is ALWAYS easier to just be bitter and let hurt consume you.

And for a week or two…that’s what I wanted.

Not just bitter about one little thing…a few things.

Why do we get bitter…?

I thought about it…and I thought…and I thought…

And I realized…I was bitter…for the same reason that I am every other horrible emotion…

Pride.

I know I have mentioned this before…the word “pride” is so unattractive to me.

Just thinking about someone who is prideful…………is sooooo irritating…

(Side note: This makes me think about a study we went over in one of my Psychology classes a few years ago. We thought of someone we really did not like and then we wrote down all of the characteristics of that person that made us not like them. When we were finished, we were told to compare those characteristics, to characteristics we see in ourselves…and sure enough…most of the class [including myself] found that we, ourselves, seemed to posses just about all of the “negative” characteristics we stated to dislike in this other person…pretty disturbing isn’t it…?!)

Anywho…So: pride.

I could not dislike the word and its’ negative meaning more.

But I get bitter…because of my pride. Because something has turned out to be different than what I had originally thought or hoped. And different in a negative way.

Basically…things don’t go the way I plan/hope…which leads me to being bitter.

I know this is such a shallow example of all of this…I apologize…

I am not even sure if my point is coming off clearly…

I guess…normally…I am so…optimistic about things and situations…

And for a while there…I just didn’t feel like being the “optimistic” one…I kind of just wanted to have a bad attitude.

I feel like everyone is entitled to their bad days…but I was taking it much further…

I was having a bad few months…

I guess I was thinking about what I wanted my life to look like at the moment…and I was actually looking at it…and I saw that it looked somewhat different than what I wanted…

But then came a voice of reason (a.k.a. one of my dearest childhood friends)…and she basically just gave it to me straight:

I was measuring my life’s success by the wrong standards.

I was prideful and bitter and hurt because I was measuring my life by my own standards of success. (sure there is legitimate hurt in there…but isn’t there always?)

Let’s be honest. My way of “measuring” is WORLDS different than Gods’ way.

And thank goodness.

I’m just going to be honest…my “worldly” view of success is my obtaining my Masters degree…a well paying job (in my field of interest)…a new car…my own home…extra spending money…aaaaand heck, we’ll just throw in an amazing, empathetic man with Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s face, Zack Efron’s body and Buddy the Elf’s personality!

But then when I think about it...I’ve been working towards my Masters…I used to have a very well paying full-time job (granted not in my area of interest…but a fresh-out-of-college student could never complain because of the pay), was on my way to buying a new car, had my own apartment, totally supported myself…paid all of my own bills and still had a little left over cash…

And…I just knew that that was not where God wanted me anymore…

So clearly…my measure of success is not God’s…

Not saying that God will not have all of that for me some day…hopefully what I am saying is not being taken TOO literal…

I just mean…maybe God’s view of success for me at the moment is…

Learning to just TRUST and RELY on Him and make decisions that I would not normally make or that seem crazy to me…

Maybe it is taking this time to appreciate what I do have in life…instead of being my normal self and just always wanting “more” and maybe it is living for what is “right now” instead of what “will be”…

Maybe it is not desiring a best friend for myself so much…but being a best friend to someone else…

Maybe it is forgiving that person…

Mending that broken relationship…

Who knows?!

Maybe I will wake up tomorrow and meet someone completely new and different and go on an insane adventure that I never dreamed possible! (Hey if I can dream up something amazing…imagine what God can/will think up…)

I just don’t want to ever shut myself off to new adventures…and when I am hurt…I definitely am tempted to shut myself off to new things…especially new people…

And I never want to do that…

I never want to become this bitter old miserable person that shuts everyone out just because they are afraid…

I think it just goes back to…don’t let someone who has hurt you, turn you into someone you hate…

It doesn’t only apply to saying a bitter comment in the heat of the moment…

But it applies to our actions too…which eventually…determine who we let ourselves become in life…

So…I have had my moment of weakness…and I know…I’ll have plenty more…

But for right now…I need to grow up.

I have been hurt.

So what…

It’s not about me.

It’s not about what the world says I have the “right” to do because of what has happened to me.

It’s about me being apart of something bigger.

I am not my own. And THANK GOD for that.

"These words are mine..."

I know I’ve written about “words” before…or at least…I know I devoted one whole entry just to pictures expressing how much weight words hold…

But I have been reminded these past few days just how much of an impact words can have in life.

Okay – so I lost my voice…completely…and let me just say, I have noticed how incredibly quiet the world really is without my ongoing, rambling! Haha...seriously…

I am currently back in Phoenix for the week and it really sucks because I am with my friends who I have not spent too much time with in the past few months, and I can hardly even socialize with them!!!!!! And I am meeting new people, and I am halted from being my nosey, outgoing self and learning everything about them in the first 5 seconds of meeting them because I have no voice!!! So, I just catch myself creepily staring at them with a huge, exaggerated smile, hoping they’ll magically be able to read my thoughts and just answer every question I have in my head without me having to struggle with vocalizing it!!! It is sooooo frustrating!! Haha…

But that is not the only reason I have been thinking about how much of a value words hold…

If we choose so…words can be uplifting and life changing. They can make a person’s world whole. They can save lives. They can bring healing to the most hurt and broken people.

I still remember specific words that people have spoken to me at certain times in my life.

I remember bits and pieces of sermons that have stuck out to me, which to this day, have continued to grow and encourage me.

I remember uplifting words that friends have spoken to me when I have gone through hard times.

I remember words that I hope will stick with me forever because of how comforting they continue to be.

But I also remember words I never wanted to hear.

I remember words of rejection and hurt.

I remember words that created insecurities and doubt in me.

And at times, when I allow myself, I replay certain hurtful things that certain people have said to me, over in my mind…

Not the healthiest thing to do, some would say…but in most cases when I allow myself to do this…it is because I am protecting myself…not in a crazy obsessive “I’ll use these words to block myself off from the world and push people away” sort of protecting…that wouldn’t really be me protecting myself…rather, it would be me avoiding much needed healing from things I have been hurt by…but protecting myself by using the words as a reminder of why I should or should not do something.

For example: When I was really young, I spent a lot of time with my grandparents. I remember one time when I was at their house; I was painting a picture on their table and had gotten some paint on their nice white carpet. I remember my grandpa being SOOOOO furious with me that he yelled at me for a few minutes straight telling me to never paint over the carpet again and he frightened me so much that I peed myself!!! (And it was crazy because somehow my grandma knew that I had to pee so right after my grandpa got through yelling at me, my grandma told me I could go to the bathroom now...) Anywho…embarrassing? Yes! But from that day on, you can bet I never painted over their carpet again!

Haha okay…maybe that example was a liiiiiiiittle too personal…(clearly losing my voice is a dangerous thing because when I finally get ahold of some form of communication, who knows what sorts of things will come out!)

But the gist of my point definitely applies…I replayed the words of my grandfather telling me to never paint over the carpet again (and me peeing myself) and I used it to remind myself to never do it again.

I will be the first to admit that I, at times, can be a pretty insecure person. But, because I know this about myself, I have learned how crucial it is for me to explore these insecurities and locate the root of them.

But there was a time, where I would take my insecurities only for how they made me feel, and I would never take the time to maturely discover what created them. I’d just jump to putting myself into defense mode and lash out at whatever or whoever I thought made me feel insecure.

Now, for the most part, I am so aware of how other peoples words affect me, that I hope I also stay aware of how my words can affect others.

Of course, most negative words that I hear directed towards me, still create insecurities in me, but for the most part…I have learned to use these words to push me away from negative things and into positive things…

And THESE are the words that have helped mold and shape me into the person I am today.

Maybe I remember words that you, yourself have said to me…

Maybe they were negative things you said to me…

Or maybe they were encouraging things you said to me…

Either way, it is possible that you have helped mold me into who I am at this very moment…and for that…I am very thankful for whatever words you used…

But I will admit…that there are words that I have heard that have tempted me to be someone I would not be proud of.

When someone uses words to hurt me, I automatically go into defense mode. Whether or not I show it…I most likely am lashing out (in my mind) with a hurtful response…

I used to act on this “defense” and turn into a loose cannon and let whatever came to mind just come out of my mouth…

One of my favorite “go-to” movies to watch while I’m sick is You’ve Got Mail…I think it’s because in the movie, Meg Ryan gets sick and Tom Hanks brings her daisy’s and its just such a cute story…anywho…in the movie Meg Ryan’s character and Tom Hanks character are emailing back and forth and talking about lashing out at people who hurt them…Tom Hanks character is saying that he feels like he is becoming the worst version of himself because when someone offends him, he basically gives it back even worse…and their conversation always comes to mind when I think about this stuff:

MR: “What happens to me when I’m provoked is that I get tongue-tied and my mind goes blank. Then I spend all night tossing and turning trying to figure out what I should have said. What should I have said, for example, to a bottom dweller who recently belittled my existence?...”

Always having the “ideal” thing to say…sounds great right?

TH: “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I could pass all my zingers to you? And then I would never behave badly and you could behave badly all the time, and we’d both be happy. But then, on the other hand, I must warn you that when you finally have the pleasure of saying the thing you mean to say at the moment you meant to say it, remorse inevitably follows.”

So true…

Where am I going with all of this…

I guess…my point is…there are many words going around in my head right now…

Words that eventually, I will want to express…and words that I hope I never allow escape my mouth…

The crazy thing about words is…you can always say more and more…but you can’t ever take any back…

So I guess…next time someone is using their words to hurt you…just stop and think before you respond…

Take a moment…or maybe even a few days…or weeks….or months…to really process your “initial” reactions and feelings…

I know it seems a little drastic…taking a few months to process initial reactions instead of acting on them…

But I believe time heals most things in life…and how we feel right now…may not necessarily be how we feel in the future…

Don’t let someone who has hurt you in one moment, turn you into someone you’ll spend hating for more than a few moments…

Recycled from a previous entry...buuut I think the below are worth posting again...