i'm falling on my knees, offering all of me.

i don't know entirely what to say right now except... wow.
all day i've felt very empty and discontent. i know that i want God back in the center of my life. i know that i'm just not complete without Him.

i ended up listening to christian music all day, and then i rented Fireproof. if you haven't seen it - i highly recommend that you go out and rent it as soon as you possibly can. it moved me to tears. all it made me think of is how wonderful God's blessings are when we just put our trust in Him - fully, not half-heartedly. even in the midst of the most hopeless circumstances He is working, and He is waiting for us to trust Him. He uses the people and the things in our lives to prick at our hearts. to get our attention. i felt that even though the movie centers on a married couple and their relationship, and i am not in that situation at all... i felt like God was speaking to me. i feel like lately He has been tugging on my heart, just asking me to open up to Him again, and i've been pushing Him aside. and little by little He has been getting ready to intercede. and intercede He certainly did...

Romans 5: 3-5 : We rejoice in our sufferings because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not dissapoint us because God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us.

i know God is surrounding me with His love right now, and is reaching out to hold my hand and lead me in the right direction. i intend on following Him to the best of my abilities. i know i'm going to keep screwing up, but i'm going to start falling on Him again. i want to have joy again. i want to have peace. i want to accept His mercy. i want His unconditional love. He alone is our God, my God, and i need to put Him back in the center of my life where He belongs.

sacrifice your soul.

i'm not exactly sure how i have the ability to be so moved by the littlest things, but its the way i am, and when i feel something i have to discuss it, i have to write it down. i just watched indecent proposal, if you haven't seen it here's a quick synopsis: a man and woman get married at a very young age, high school sweethearts. years later they get in a money crisis and travel to las vegas where a billionaire takes interest in the wife. he pays the couple 1 million dollars to have one night with her, and from there their marriage falls apart as the billionaire keeps pursuing her...

i don't know why, but i was moved to tears.

how much do we sacrifice for those we love? or rather
how much do we take for granted of those we love?

we all have those people who make up our lives, who drive us to be better people, who are a huge part of our story. those people we would be nothing without. those people who make us who we are. those people who are there to delight in our happiness, and there to comfort us in the midst of our sorrows. do we assume that they will always be there? do we lack in the attention we give them on a regular basis because we believe that there is no way we could ever lose them? do we make reckless decisions because we are under the impression that they will forgive us no matter what? they are the people we love the most, but are they also the people we hurt the most. are we not more cautious in the midst of new relationships to earn their trust... and when that trust is earned, do we abuse it? i guess i'm not sure. i know we are all guilty of hurting those we love. i know we have had to ask forgiveness from those people more than once, and i know that most of the time they take us back with open arms. but how far do we push it? will we one day end up pushing someone away just because we didn't appreciate them as much as they deserved. i would like to hope not, but it happens every day. we should sacrifice things for our people. we should go out of our way to mmake their lives better. we should try every day to be the best we can be for them. you have to give and take, not just take. treasure every moment. treasure every blessing. treasure the people that God has placed into your life. don't let them get away. if you care enough about someone, i believe you can work at keeping them in your life. it just takes effort. hold on, don't let go.
because to let them walk away might break your heart beyond repair.

"I thought we were invincible. But now I know that the things that people in love do to each other, they remember. And if they stay together, it's not because they forget. It's because they forgive." [quote at the end of the movie]

when you can't sleep - blog.

so i was seriously so tired while doing my homework that i couldn't read anymore so i turned on the tv... then i was so tired watching tv (my eyes kept closing) that i decided i should go to bed... that was an hour ago. after frustratingly tossing and turning, i am now so angry and wide-awake that i decided i would make use of my time and perhaps write a thing or two...

i would like to believe that one day we will all wake up with the answer we've been looking for.
i would like to believe that one day the good girls will finally find their soulmates (myself included).
i would like to believe that one day we really will take the bad things with grace and open minds.

the world is never going to make sense, not as whole. some parts might on one day or another, but we will never be able to understand everything. sometimes this is a hard concept to grasp, because i'm one of those people who wants answers - who hates leaving things things unresolved. when i get in an argument, i have to fix it or else i am not the happiest person to be around. sometimes i think i care too much, that i let things get to me too much. i feel so deeply about things, that i am moved to tears over the littlest things. a quote in a novel for instance. [i apologize now for the inconsistency of this post, and the rambling fashion it follows. i am sleep-deprived and my thoughts are jumbled at the moment, so things are coming out in spurts.] every day is a new adventure, every moment we are given the opportunity to do something with our lives. we can choose to accept that gift whenever we are ready... i'm gonna stop over-analyzing things. looking into the future and speculating about what may or may not happen... stop hoping, or rather imagining a future that i really have no idea is even possible. i'm gonna try not to read into things so much until i really know where they are headed. i'm just going to go with it... let things happen as they come. and go from there. and i'm going to make the last few months in k-town as good as they possibly can be. i'm going to spend time with the people i'm going to miss, put everything into my school-work, and leave feeling accomplished and ready for the next adventure. [colorado?! wyoming!? we will see!] blah. okay. i need to stop. this is not worth anything lol. sorry for the lack of real depth on this one guys... better luck next time!

what are you afraid of?

"Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive -- the risk to be alive and express what we really are." - Don Miguel Ruiz

1. I am afraid of icy roads, winding corners, highways covered with blowing snow and fog
2. I am afraid I like Qdoba way too much for my own good :)
   
3. I hate swimsuits.
   
4. I am afraid I'm going to get in a car accident, and wake up in the hospital barely there...
   
5. I am afraid of passing cemi's on the interstate
6. I am afraid of sleeping past my alarm, missing an important class, being late for work
   
7. I am afraid of getting fat, or gaining more weight than i think is acceptable... than people think is acceptable...
8. I am afraid I care what people think more than I let on
9. I am afraid that sometimes I drink too much
10. I am afraid that sometimes I'm too emotional for my own good, but after years of trying to turn it off, I have realized it is who I am, and there is nothing I can do about it
    
11. I am afraid of graduating college and not finding a job, just because I followed my dream to pursue English - and then
    
12. I am afraid of hearing "I told you so"
    
13. I am afraid of transferring schools next semester, of going someplace completely brand new and not knowing anyone, even though I know its what I need to do
    
14. I am afraid of stepping out of my comfort zone
15. I am afraid that only a few people know who I really am, and there are so many things I keep hidden that I wish I could share with the world
16. I am afraid of losing someone else that I love, every day when I realize how much of a hole is left in my heart after my Aunt passed away, I am afraid to wake up to find it happening all over again...
    
17. I am afraid of dying young, and not so much the dying part but leaving behind parts of me that matter. I want to make a difference. I want to make an impact on the world and the people around me. I want to be the best person I could possibly be. I want to die, holding on to Jesus and all His promises - and I am afraid that right now I would not be ready for that to happen.
18. I am afraid that I am losing the people I care about the most, whether its because we are growing up and changing, or that I am putting in less effort than I should be - what if someday soon I no longer have many of the friends I now care so much about? My friends are my life, more than they probably should be, but I am not good on my own - and I need them. I need them more than I probably express, and I am so so afraid of losing them.
19. I am afraid that my guy friends will soon disappear out of my life to girls who they actually care about in a romantic sense (it has happened so many times before, so why should I be surprised that it will happen again?) I would much rather talk to guys, hang out with guys, confide in guys - but will that backfire to one day when they choose their significant others over me? Leaving me all alone with no one...
    
20. I am afraid my life holds little significance, and that more often lately than not I get caught up in the little temporary satisfactions (the drinking, the socializing, the late nights) and lose sight of what really matters. I choose sleep after a long night than getting up and going to church with my family. damn...
21. I am afraid that I put so much time into my words, so much time into what I write on this screen, and so much hope into what might become of it - that maybe I am not as talented as people say that I am. That these words are simply that - words, and me and the combination of them will never amount to anything. Then where will I be?
22. I am afraid of growing up. Already I have thought about getting my masters, not just because I want it so incredibly bad, but to postpone the real world just a couple more years. In practically two years I will be graduating college. The last two years have gone by so fast, that I don't know how I am ever going to be ready when the time comes. We are getting older, but yet still so young to know anything...
    
23. I am afraid I'm not the best sister I could be, and I wish that I could connect to my brother more - but I feel like I fail time after time, and I am worried where our relationship will end up when we both have lives of our own.
    
24. I am afraid of people reading this, people who are so close to me - yet have no clue what I do on this blog, or that it even exists. I guess, I wish I wasn't so afraid to let them read it, because in reality - they are the people I want to know the depths of me. to really understand parts of me that I have a hard time saying out loud, but that are relatively easy to put on paper.
25. I am afraid of blogger deciding one day that they can no longer function, the sight crashing, and losing all these pieces of me that are only kept safe online
26. I am afraid there is so much more I could say, but right now... I just can't.