incredible.

Before I attended Biola, Journal, I was a christian, and I knew who God was, but I had not come to the full respect and gratefulness that I find myself in now. It wasn't about living for Him, it was about surrendering my life and being apathetic towards God's plan for my life, and in result, I was apathetic to holding close to the bond I had made with Him. But then I came to Biola, and maybe it's not just the school being an amazing place, or the people who have driven me to pursue Him further, but the little things that He does for me everyday that prove to me that I am so unworthy of a love like this.
Tonight, I came to my room to see my fish belly up, gasping in final breaths. I didn't want my fish to die, he is like the friend who is always there and then as I was praying over his tank (yes, God cares about Figgero) I realized that God is my only constant, and that everything at this school, this school itself could be gone in a moment, everything I know could be gone in a moment, except for one thing and that is God. And i do not deserve it at all, and there is no way that I can repay Him, except for my love to Him and my love for others.
And so, after praying for the last month and a half about everything, and really feeling closer to God than ever before, I started to get the feeling that art was not where I was supposed to be anymore. That, yes, God wanted me to be a art major for a little while so that I could see that my "passion" was not really a passion at all. Art is a very introverted major, you are by yourself a lot and it seems like when you create art you are expressing yourself, and I am not trying to bring down Christian artists, or even any artist for that matter, but I am trying to say that the gifts God has so graciously given me not only include my artistic abilities, but my ability to connect, empathize, and just be with people. I love art, and I am still an artist, but I'm not an art major. It is introverted and I'm definitely an extrovert, and also, I'm not trying to show who I am through what I do, but who God is. Art gets me away from the world and even as I hard as I try not to, it gets me away from God. The art world seems to be so stuffed up and demanding of excellence or bust, and if I'm trying to win in the world, I come in last in the Lord's eyes...Last time I checked, that is not what I want.
And what am I going to do then, you ask Journal? Well, I am going to be an ICS (Intercultural Studies) major and get a minor in art, this is so I can refine my skills, but also not let my first semester go to waste, and God so perfectly planned it all. Starting with ICS next semester, I will not only be taking less credits and having more time to really put my all into everything I need to do, but also, I will have time for the art minor because with both, I am taking less credits than I would if I did the full art major. I am doing ICS because it is the way that I can at least glorify the Lord since I am in no way capable of repaying my debt to Him. By reciprocating the love that He gave to me without hesitation, I can't imagine not living my life letting Him shine through me.
What did I learn at school today, Journal? That I am so unimportant in the grand scheme of God's great plan and the fact that I have grace is beyond indescribable and that I willingly will do all I can in my life to not live for myself, but live for Him. And that's totally not "nothing".

P.S. Either we have an amazing God, or Figgero is a great actor, because right now, he is swimming around like he didn't almost DIE! Crazy. Love.

Until next time Journal, live for the Lord your God.

i cannot depend on myself.

Dear Journal, today I realized that in my "being on top of things" and turning in my Torrey Paper extra early through the online submission, that I completely dismissed the fact that I needed a hard copy turned in as well. And Journal, the worst part was getting the email. I felt like I had failed Torrey, that as of now, I had made the BIGGEST fumble of my life so far, and the whole time I thought I was doing everything right. And in that Journal, I think God wanted me to learn something: That even when you think you've got it all under control and can do everything yourself, you can't. I had gotten into a "GO ME!" state of mind, and forgotten that the only way I even got this paper done, the only reason I was in Torrey, the only reason I was at BIOLA, was because of God. I had made my success about God, so this is a formal apology, not because I want people to see how trusting in God I am in my time of need, but to publicly reveal my humiliation and most of all my...forgetfulness. My forgetfulness of my paper and my forgetfulness of God's FAITHFULNESS and his grace and provisions. I'm for sure that God has a sense of humor, and I'll laugh a little about it, but He also is getting the message across.

Journal, if this DOES mean that I get kicked out of Torrey, I will be heart broken, and I will have lost $150 worth of books...(ok, sorry, that's pathetic, haha!), but I feel like that is God's justice and His will. And I'll get over it, and HE will get me back on my feet. Its not about me, and I forget that so often. I want so badly to be able to make my life about me, most humans do, but really, even more I want my life to be about giving glory to He who gave me a life that I can be so selfish with. And to get what you want, you have to work at it. Life is difficult. Life is about relationships. Relationships are difficult. Get over it. Then you can enjoy it.

Until next time Journal, I'm going to be praying my butt off that I can stay in Torrey and not have my mentor hate me. :/ And also I'm gonna try and laugh a little, because other than what God will permit me to do to fix it, all I can do is what I love second best and that is laugh.

grateful.

Well, Journal, Thanksgiving is coming up and I am very excited. This means that I can see my family and my friends that I haven't directly seen in three months. I cannot believe it has even been that long, I cannot believe that I am actually here at this school and that I get to be here. I always had a weird feeling it wouldn't happen, but it did. And I am so grateful for it.

I've learned something about being grateful, and it's that it's not about feeling like you're grateful and saying so that you can convince everyone else, but it's actually feeling it and when you think about all you have you realize all the problems in your life are really not that bad, because you have so much that you can be happy about. Grateful=happiness. If you are not happy, you are not grateful, and if you are reading this right now, if you are walking and can see and hear and if you are breathing, you have something to be grateful about.

Now we all forget about these things we should be grateful because the world tells us we can and should have more, and I'm not saying you can't have more, but before you say you NEED it, think about it, DO you? Journal, my message I'm trying to get across to everyone, including myself, is to appreciate everything you have. We are blessed beyond our imaginations. Our very existence is a blessing. Happy Thanksgiving Journal, and until next time, be grateful. :)

Facebook me about it!

Journal, I'm pretty sure on a weekly basis I'm on Facebook enough that had that time been spent with the person instead of just "facebooking" them, I might actually appear to have a life. I mean, we're sometimes just a dorm away, sitting on our computers, chatting it up, when we both could actually get off our lazy butts and find each other.
I'm pretty sure A LOT of people are on Facebook enough to say this is true too. Why is it that we are so addicted to communication source that allows us to "Like" something by pressing a button and "poke"someone who is on the other side of the world? Have we been so accustomed to staying as physically far away from relationships as possible that we don't even realize how bad it is? I mean, I can call my friend and tell her over the phone that I'm going to the Caf in a few minutes and she can text me when she is running a few minutes late because she was skyping with her other friend. When we finally meet we can talk about the funniest video we saw on YouTube, and then stop in our track to go and watch this. Then we can realize the caf is closed and just go on pizzahut.com and order food that we can track the order of until it gets to our school, then we receive a call from the pizza man who is trying to locate Alpha Chi on his GPS, and we make the effort to meet him outside.
This is not about Facebook, Journal! This is about our world's dependence on technology! If computers just crashed, people would die. Not only because hospital equipment could go down, but the stress of not having an immediate connection to your life and the world would just break people. I remember a few years back, I heard on the news of some girl who took her own life because MySpace went down for like... EIGHT hours. No offense to the girl, but really? Journal, YOU are what I depend on to rant my most likely unimportant and relatively unnoticed opinons of the rest of the world's problems because I can't deal with my own because I am too busy on this stinking computer!
I can't say anything else but HOUSTON WE HAVE A PROBLEM! Technology. Until next time Journal, live a little.

He loves me...He loves me not.

Recently, Journal, I've been presented with many occurrences of "marriage talk" and "dating talk" and bla bla bla. Biola has their "ring by spring" joke and rumor that girls who attend Biola are just looking to be a pastor's wife. We have the Alpha Chi stereotype that all girls are boy crazy and if a guy wants a girlfriend quick they need just walk down a hall. The pressure of finding your life partner seems an underlying concept that is just called a "stereotype" because really, Journal, everyone knows it's true for the majority. Probably twice a day at least I will hear girls talking about this guy or that and how they "don't want to get married until they are graduated" however, if God "shows them the right person..." Students here cannot decide for themselves whether or not they want to play into the tradition, so instead they just play it safe with the "if God wants me to, I will" card.
Sorry Journal, I'm sure I've used "quotes" enough in this one post for about five...but I couldn't really think of any other way to get this across. So, Journal, what do I think about it, you ask? Well, I'm not sure whether to call this stereotypical or unstereotypical, but honestly, I don't think you should even date in college, let alone get married. Why am I any different than all the other girls hiding the fact they really want to date? Because I can back my position up with solid, passionate opinion! Yeah.
I guess I'll tell you my opinion. So, I don't want to date in college because there is no point unless I'm ready to get married. And I'm not. I know people like to say you should date so you can get to know what you like in guys, but honestly, that's dumb. There is nothing you can't learn from a guy when he is just your friend than if you were dating him. If anything, Journal, I think that you can learn more because you see them for who they are, not who they are trying to be to impress you. If you have those four years or however many to get to know this guy as your friend, then once you decide that you want to date them, 1) you'll really know if you want to date them and 2) you'll know if they start changing once you are dating for whatever reasons. Dating shouldn't be a time of learning who they are as a person, but who they are as a possible...husband.
I guess I should wrap this up, but all I'm trying to say is that girls tend to rush into relationships because all they really want is attention from a guy (you can get that from a guy FRIEND) and they are excited at first, but then it dies and they get their heart broken and then they move on to some other person they don't' know. But how exciting would it be to actually know this guy and get to date him after you both know you want to be with each other. God says that patience is a virtue, however, last time I checked Journal, it wasn't a very practiced one. If people were more careful about who they wanted to be with, maybe the divorce rate wouldn't be at 50% or whatever it is. Or marriages would just be happier. I think when we are pulling petals off a flower and reciting "He loves me, he loves me not..." we manipulate the outcome because we want what we want. Sound familiar?
Who knows Journal, maybe I'll completely ignore my own advice and be dating someone next week. But until then, I'm staying true to what I believe because if you think about it, it kinda makes a lot of sense. Until next time Journal, stay single and happy!

happy halloween. no really.

So, here I am, Journal, finally able to sit down and do work that doesn't have to do with CandyDandyLand or little screaming children or people's last minute costumes and yet, even as I travel far from Alpha to work, everywhere people are dressed up in their this and that costumes, some have far more skin showing than should be, and others are just...creepy. There are the lovely select few who don't celebrate Halloween, hanging out in the caf with other non-believers (haha!), but I don't know any of them and so I just stay here and people watch and have people come by feeling sorry for me, but why? I'm doing what most do on any other day... I guess. Feel sorry for yourself when you have work to do tomorrow morning.

Well Journal, Voldemort just walked by and he has a cellphone and is talking in a much higher pitched voice than the original as he waves his wand around talking with whoever. And then someone I don't know in some weird outfit decided to try and scare me, and he just realized he doesn't know me either. So it was a combined reward of one) giving me a heart attack and two) making an awkward situation for the both of us. Well done sir, well done.

The benefit of all this, I'll probably get fat off the leftover candy this week, the little kids will have the time of there lives and best of all Journal, I don't have to clean up. Happy Halloween all!

Wow, if they let ME in...

It's a very uninteresting experience sitting in a room for three hours twice a week as a teacher shows you all the cool things he can do with photoshop and flash player, expect you to learn from his greatness and then, when you don't, mark you down for some absurdity, like stuttering. I'm sorry, sir, I can't help it if I'm not the best speaker. Last time I checked, however, I'm an art major, not a powerpoint presentation major. But, I suppose I must be patient. Well journal, maybe this will turn into a Karate Kid thing, maybe these dumb assignments will make me be able to defend myself against the "dark arts..." Ok, sorry Journal.
But, I want to make a point about education in general Journal. I feel like even in this class, this boring almost unnecessary 1/8 of my day, I'm still learning more than I did in most classes in high school. I have found that in college Journal, school isn't about just getting by and getting a little better than "by" so you can go to a decent school. In high school, you basically learn: how to cheat, how to write an "A" paper on a book you read on SparkNotes, how to convince a teacher that they said the test was next week, and best of all, how to know exactly how many more minutes you have to endure a class period. Journal, it's appalling.
I mean when I came to Biola and started Torrey, I felt like the most unprepared person in the whole program. When I was accepted, based on my knowledge of my own schooling and skills, I thought the program was less credible because they accepted someone like me. I mean, they asked a question about "moral absolutes" and I had to google what that even was before I could begin to answer how it played a role in my life. I felt bad, it was like I had tricked them into thinking I was smart.
Journal, I think that they should make education more like Torrey, even for pathetic public schools like mine, they should make education like it was before 50 years ago when everything started to take trip on a downward slope. Maybe I wouldn't be sitting in this class writing a blog instead of paying attention because my mind has be brainwashed to not be able to care.