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| May I first appologize to those of you who have usually tried to keep up to some extent with my life and what is going on in it....the last few months have been full of busy times, trials, and A LOT of change.
And so now as I try to enjoy my week of spring break...while all the rest of you head back to school-I shall try to catch you up....to the greater extent.
My last post was in the midst of my interterm class. Which has since finished and I've further gotten through the first half of my next semester.
School is going okay.
I have a lot of gen-ed classes that I am doing right now so it is a change for me to actually have to work at a few of my classes. I still don't so much study, but I do try to get my work done.
Astronomy-is probably my most challenging class. it involves a lot of phsyics which I really don't get making it that much harder for me to keep up. On the flip side however, I try really hard and I love looking at the stars every monday night through telescopes so somehow it usually weighs out and I don't end up dispising the class.
Advanced Writing- has been another challenge. The ultimate issue mainly being that I have to learn yet another teacher's ideas of what "Good writing" is and how to write to their tastes. Which I am more and more convinced is really what "good writing" amounts to-catering to the readers and critiquers.
Sculpture- is a great class, it is my secret love...carving and creating things. the struggle with this class has been having time to do it-I don't actually go to the class due to having over lap in my classes and therefore I have to make my own time to get my projects done. Outside of that- it has been good.
Christian Thought-has been one of my favorite classes. It isn't actually at midland, instead I drive 25 minutes to Blair, NE to go to DANA College and take the class. I had to take it at DANA because it wasn't offered before I graduate and I need it to graduate. My teacher, John, is a really great guy-very wise and extremely intersting to talk with about various theologians.
History- Well...lets just say I RARELY go to this class....it is extremely boring and frankly....she doesn't care if we are there.
Work is not so existent...and yet it is good.
If you didn't know I am mainly working two jobs right now. I know I know-for some of you this is a shock to here Julie only working 2 jobs, but honestly it has been so refreshing to get a break from working full time hours. This fall was really rough on me-full time school, full time job, and 3 part time jobs. Right now I am working at a country club in Omaha....although I haven't gotten hours for awhile. Then I am still working at the Registrar's office at school. It is nice to have some time off to get work done in my apartment and to do homework. Money is tight...but I'm working on that.
The rest...is complicated....
I've been backing out of my friend group for a few months now. It got too hard for me....it hurt to bad to have to try to be okay all the time...to accept people being there...and so I kinda quit. And to an extent I'm not sure the bulk of them really have noticed the extent of the pain that I am truly dealing with in it all. Most of them are too involved in things in their lives that they can't know how much I wish they could open their eyes and see my heart. I know it isn't the best thing, but I cna't figure out how to make it all better. I don't understand what it is God wants me to be doing.
And recently the complications and the hurt have been stuck under a magnifying glass in the glare of the sun- and like ants in the summer, I am getting fried.
It is so hard to be a person of positivity because you fight yoruself-and even when people are being jerks and even when you are getting hurt...you put blame on yourself and you try to fix things; not to make yourself happy...but to make everyone else happy.
Have you seen the movie, THE HOLIDAY, with Cameron Diaz, Jude Law, Jack Black, and Kate Winslet?
If you haven't it is worth your time- I actually own the movie which says A LOT!!!
Anyhow-I and a couple of my friends have decided that I am Kate Winslet's character in the movie.
I am the girl who fell in love with a man who does not and will not love me back...and now that I've finally realized the truth of the relationship I have been, for the past 8 months. desperately trying to get over the one sided relationship which has torn me apart and left me so disoriented.
I've decided that love hurts...
and the idea that God deals with such a painful bitter sweet reality for us all....blows my mind.
Again I say...if you haven't seen the movie WATCH IT! It is my hands down favorite movie, probably of all time!
BUT-so that you know that there is a light in my life....a bright spot....a part that makes me smile just thinking about it....here is my positive note I will end on for the sake of my positivity.
I have been dating an amazing guy for the past 2 and a half months more or less. It was on the DL for awhile as I tried to make sure I was really ready for it and as i tried to make sure he was a guy that I could truly date. But he is...he is so good to me....and he tells me that I deserve the world....and he tells me how beautiful I am....and how lucky he is....and takes me on dates...REAL DATES....and he buys flowers for me....and he communicates to me where he is at and the road he'd like us to go on. And he spends time with me....and hugs me so tightly that I know I am just safe.....and for the first time in a very very very long time....I actually feel worth something. I actually feel I deserve things in life.
So in the midst of all the craziness crap junk that is giong on in my life that makes it hard to do so many things and be with so many people I love.....I have a boyfriend who I know will care for me...and who I know is on my side...backing me up and supporting me and I am so blessed.
And with that I shall leave you...
Blessings abundantly!
And in case somebody hasn't told you for a long time- YOU ARE WORTH THE LIFE OF A MAN WHO DID NOTHING AND YET DIED TO GIVE YOU EVERYTHING...>AND YOU DESERVE TO BE TREATED WELL REGARDLESS OF ANYTHING THAT HAS HAPPENED IN YOUR LIFE! YOU ARE CARED FOR AND YOU ARE LOVED! | | |
| My biggest revelation of the last month has come through my January class, Sociology of Addictions.
here it is:
You have a right to all of your feelings! Profound, I know, but honestly seriously take a minute to think about it.
How many times have you been told you are wrong for feeling a certain way...or been told you "shouldn't" feel a certain way. Perhaps it is just my issue, although something in me says otherwise, but for me I have been torn apart by people telling me that how I felt was wrong in some form or another. What is worse is that through them saying in effect that I couldn't shouldn't and don't feel a certain way-guilt for every emotion and feeling started to develop. Now here is what the Lord has revealed to me as of late-WHAT I FEEL IS NEITHER RIGHT NOR WRONG, RATHER IT JUST IS. And now for some quotes which have further reinforced this revelation....
"when I ask you to listen to me and you begin to tell me why I shouldn't feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings."
"you get frustrated for the circles I speak in but if you would just accept as a simple fact that I do feel what I feel, no matter how irrational or how many times we have been over my feelings, then I can quit trying to convince you and you and I can start the business of understanding what is behind the rational/irrational feelings."
"Irrational feelings make sense when we understand what is beneath them"
"When I ask you to listen to me and you feel that you have to do something to solve my problem(s)-you have failed me, strange as that may seem." And now for my final bits of knowledge for you...
*Life should have choices beyond mere survival.
*You have a right to say no to anything when you feel you are not ready or it is unsafe. (this is HUGE!)
*Life should not be motivated by fear.
*You are probably not as guilty as you convince yourself you are.
*There is no need to smile when you cry.
*You have a right to terminate conversations with people who make you feel put down and humiliated.
*It is ok to be relaxed, playful, and frivolous.
*You have a right to change and grow.
*You can be angry at somebody you love. I think we all are the victims of these traps....ladies, you especially.
I think they are worth pondering... | | |
| Forgive me for the time which has elapsed since my last entry. (or perhaps the lack there of it)
I feel as though for once in such a long time I am fully live, fully living, and fully passionate about just being who I am. It is amazing how much we are co-dependent creatures and in that how much we get trapped by things which never satisfy our desires, passions, or needs. Even those of us who love the Lord, find ourselves to be stuck in these same traps. But, when-if ever-we realize such things and are able to be freed from them...it is then that we are able to fully live the abundant life God desires of us.
So many things are lost in life....people, places, possessions. In fact all of the things we base wealth, power, and status on are things we could lose in an instant. We are gaurnteed nothing in life (Bible). What is sweet is that there is one thing we really are always able to have....a gift the Lord has given us-friendship.
Okay-hang with me here I really do have a point.
All I am saying is that so many people go through life thinking they have to live alone. These people believe that nobody can or would help them and even if they somehow found somebody who would, their independence is not worth laying down one's pride in order to receive from another. The thing is it is not only pride that keeps us from accepting friendship, it is fear.
Some people fear trusting: maybe they were hurt at a very young age, or maybe they saw such distrust manifest in the people closest to them that the thought of surrendering and humbling oneself to the point in which they let someone else see who they truly are seems completely stupid and absurd. vulnerability is to be avoided not sought.
Other people fear judgement: these people are so scared of being real that they put on a constant facade of arrogance and "too goodness" oh yes, you know these ones well-they are the ones who at first glance seem so full of confidence in who they are, but eventually you realize it is not confidence at all; instead it is fear-intense fear- of being judged. The people who fear judgement are the people who judge immediately. And over time you realize they are those same people who are too good to talk to you, too good to associate with you, too good to acknowledge you, and too good to thank you.
There is one last group of people...
The final group is the group who fears failure:
(failure?? You may question this but I am more and more convinced of it every day.)
People who fear failure are people who perhaps as children only found acceptance by achievment. These people may have been the ones to win awards, be the all stars, or get straight A's. However, as they grow up they forget a very important reality of life is the very thing that binds them in fear-Failure. For some of them they realize they are no longer the all star athlete and that somebody is better than they are. For others they seek after what they want. they seek it fully with their whole self and in the midst of it.....they find they mess us, they realize they are human and imperfect...and then they become trapped in what I believe is the strongest most difficult kind of fear. After messing up with what it was they had pursued for so long, they refuse to let others in, to help, for fear of other people seeing their imperfection; and so time after time they mess up over and over again until finally it all breaks. It is after this breaking point occurs that the person hits a wall and is forced to make a choice between living in fear or living in the unknown. Most people chose the path of fear because it has already been travelled. Down the path of fear the person believes lie after lie. Some lies return from their past and other lies are brought up brand new. But this person is living in such great fear of the unknown that they can't possibly know how greatly they are misunderstanding.
Truth is fear's greatest enemy. For it is truth that sheds light on fears. It is truth which give clarity to the confusion fear instates. And it is Truth which binds fear and frees those entrapped by it.
The people who fear trusting must understand that the-TRUTH- is that by nature we are humans prone to failure, but simply because people fail us does not mean we should not trust. For without trust, love and compassion cannot exist in the true form they were meant to exist. Without trust, relationships would never come to pass and people would forever live falsely assuming their forced loneliness. THE TRUTH IS WE WERE MADE TO BE COMPANIONS OF ONE ANOTHER AND IN ORDER TO DO THAT TRUST MUST ALWAYS BE ALLOWED EVEN IN THE KNOWLEDGE THAT THERE IS ONLY ONE UNFAILING THING-AND HE ALREADY KNOWS YOU. ONE MUST LEARN TO TRUST AT ALL TIMES.
The people who fear judgement must understand that the-TRUTH- is that while it may seem as though people are constantly judging you, truly they are too worried about what people think about them to care about what you think about them. If others aren't judging you and if the creator of the universe brought you to life so that you could be the exact way that you are.....what possible right do you have to judge anything or anyone. THE TRUTH IS THOSE WHO JUDGE WILL BE JUDGED AND IF YOU WOULD STOP BEING SO FAKE AND STOP PRETENDING YOU ARE TOO GOOD FOR EVERYONE ELSE, THEN YOU WOULD FIND THAT PEOPLE LIKE YOU FOR WHO YOU ARE AND NOT WHO YOU PRETEND TO BE. IT IS YOUR FAKE SELF WHICH KEEPS PEOPLE FROM BEING CLOSE TO YOU, NOT YOUR REAL SELF. and finally to the people who fear failure...
you above any other, I beg you, to understand this, the -TRUTH- is that your success or failure in life will not define you if you do not let it. you have the choice of how you want to see yourself, which nobody else can change. It is yours and only yours to decide how you will see yourself: through the eyes of failures and messing up or through the eyes of the One who knows your failures and mess ups and says I love you Fully despite your failures and mess ups. THE TRUTH IS THAT WHAT YOU PURSUED FOR SO LONG WAS WHAT YOU FOUND JOY IN BECAUSE YOU COULD ACHIEVE IT BUT WHEN YOU FAILED IN IT YOU COULDN"T FIGURE OUT HOW TO FIX IT AND SO YOU BROKE AND THEN YOU QUIT BECAUSE YOU FEARED YOU COULD NEVER BE FORGIVEN-YOU FEARED YOU HAD LOST ALL YOU HAD WORKED FOR WHEN HONESTLY THE TRUTH IS THAT YOU ARE FORGIVEN IN EVERY WAY. THAT WHICH WAS BROKEN CAN BE MENDED IF YOU WILL TRUST YOURSELF AGAIN. YOUR FAILURE DOES NOT DEFINE WHO YOU ARE IN ANY EYES BUT YOUR OWN AND EVEN THEN YOU HAVE A CHOICE TO WALK THE UNKNOWN PATH- TO TRUST OTHER PEOPLE AGAIN, TO STOP JUDGING YOURSELF AND IN DOING SO JUDGING OTHERS, AND MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE YOU HAVE THE CHOICE TO BELIEVE YOUR FAILURE ONLY CONTROLS WHAT YOU LET IT BECAUSE YOU ARE MISSING SO MUCH. YOU AREN'T BOUND TO FAILURE-BUT IF YOU CONTINUE TO LIVE IN FEAR, YOU ARE BLIND TO THE GOOD THINGS IN LIFE....BLIND BECAUSE YOU REFUSE TO ACCEPT LOVE AND CARE FROM EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE.
THE TRUTH IS YOU ARE MISSING IT..... wow, sorry-my heart spilled all over. perhaps this is the reason i have stayed so far from this.
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| Life's been crazy. I can barely believe January is half over and my Spring semester is coming faster than I know what to do with it.
I can't really put my finger on the reason, but whatever it be, this year (school year specifically) has flown by.
For those of you who haven't talked to me or heard from me in awhile...allow me to catch you up a bit.
I am in school, obviously. I am a full time student on the verge of entering her second to last semester of school.
And if I'm honest with you-it scares me to death.
In a year from right now I will be finishing my last class of college-probably over seas somewhere.
And the excitement and nerves that the thought of this brings can't be described in any words I know.
so...to move on
on top of school> I work 7 hours a week at the school registrar's office (although I haven't been there since early december due to my crazy schedule)
I am also coaching girls basketball team. Now for those of you who me well you may remember that in high school I wasn't huge on sports and in fact preferred simply cheering on the sidelines with pon poms and a sweet outfit. But here I am coaching the 7th grade girl B team for Trinity School. It seems almost a daydreams at times. On the plus side it has been a great experience so far. We have roughly a month left in the season before we finish completely. I look forward to the end but love my girls and am always excited as they improve game by game.
I am also recently employed at a country club. And strangely enough-I really enjoy it there.
My boss is an amazing guy, and his wife was my assistant manager at my last job as a massage clinic. I love both of them to death-they are so good to me. Its been a busy week so I haven't seen them lately and for real-I miss them. At the club I serve banquets, serve cocktails, and set up for parties. Hopefully once summer comes I will be able to lifeguard at their pool and help with their weekly summer camps-which will rock!
On top of my jobs-I still help at the church. I am on jr. high leadership and i love it.
it has been really tough at times and i've been through a lot of junk at the church as a whole, but i love what i do there. the leaders, musicians, and pastor who i get to work with are unbelievable people.
and seeing my girls maturing and learning each week is a priviledge.
Recently I decided the Lord was calling me to on the Jr/Sr High mission trip my church is taking to Nicaragua this summer. 10 days with about 80 youth and 30 adults. I'm apprehensive and nervous, but on the whole I'm just really excited. I've always had a huge heart for missions but have never truly been able to use my passion the way I had desired. I'm not sure what the trip will bring, but I do know I"m excited to see.
I hope you are all doing well-those of you I saw over Christmas break...
(especially those of you who happen to be engaged-It was so great to see you both!)
And to those of you who I didn't have the opportunity to see....i miss you and pray God is giving you blessing greater than you can count.
until next time,
jules | | |
| So I think I'm sick. Or perhaps I am getting sick.
I went to bed feeling icky last night...and when I woke up this morning I had a horrible sore throat.
I have prayed and prayed all day-and I know God has and is healing me...but I'm still not feeling 100%.
Actually, cool story-this morning when I woke up I felt terrible and thought I wasn't going to be able to get out of bed. So i started praying for healing and as I was praying litterally my throat stopped hurting completely-like all the junk that was in it just went away and I could breathe and swallow without pain. God is so good to me.
Anyways, my throat hasn't hurt all day apart from a bit of scratchiness. Please please pray for me to stay healthy, the enemy is trying to bring my spirits down and destroy the things God wills this week for me. I still feel really exhausted and weak and dizzy.
Apart from all of this, today was a good day.
Towards the end I was utterly exhausted/am exhausted, but it was still really good.
This morning we worked in the store to set everything up-it is insane how many books, cds, dvds, etc are set up in such a short amount of time.
At noon me, along with the rest of my team, went to get lunch.
We spent lunch discussing various ideas for the week and going over schedules, money, and supplies.
After the meeting we organized and then headed out into Charlotte to shop for our supplies for the week.
It took us forever to get done shopping. We couldn't find anything we wanted/needed...but we settled on something and just skipped over the rest.
When we got back I picked up some pizza to have for dinner, unfortunately I just don't have much of an appetite.
So I am currently sitting in the lobby phone booth (so as to have an outlet for power) trying to waste some time before I crash and burn in the hotel room. 2 hours of sleep combined with losing an hour to eastern time...kind of kills you.
Anyhow, tomorrow is another big day-registration starts at 10am. YIKES!
Tonight's best moment: A random talk with my team mate about youth ministry and about why it is so important to trust the Lord and to have faith and hope in the Lord's plans. (I needed to hear what he had to say...)
Alrighty, before I fall asleep in this booth-off to bed I go...22 floors high.
night night!
(ps-thanks for your prayers) | | |
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