Given Away pt. 2

well apeariently i was thinking about that thought for a while cause its been ten days now.

To pick up where i left off though, I have invested into things that I myself have deemed to be good, and things that other people tell me are good. for instance, there is a part of me that wanted to go into the movie industry, write movies, act in movies, direct them. I didn't follow this dream however because people have told me that it is really hard to break into this scene. So instead I am becoming a computer engineer because it is smarter as a degree. I still plan on following my dreams to own a company and make media in the form of games, but if that fails i have a backup plan, or backup degree more like it. My mind doesn't drift towards the idea of failure very often so i don't really have a back up plan, just the degree.

This is an investment that I have made, not really because it is the one that i really wanted but because it was the next best choice. this makes me wonder what might have been had i decided to follow what i really wanted to. Now when I look at that i don't really get to sad because computer engineering was a very close second for me, possibly a tie between what i really wanted to do. for some people this is not the case though, we give ourselves up because it is that smart thing to do, but in the end we have a person that is smart, yes, but is that person happy.

outside of career choices, for those are not as important as this, we give our selves up for the sake of popularity. now you're sitting there saying, "I never did that". I think if you look hard enough you have, in fact if you haven't, you probably have no friends:) For real though i mean that, because to a certain extent we have to tone ourselves down for others just so they can stay sain. If i didn't do this i would probably complain about the latest Apple product and how its worthless all the time. No one wants to hear that. So I tone myself down, I invest in a less "in yo face" version of me. This is not a problem, it is a necessity. the time where this becomes a problem is when we invest so much into someone that we aren't that we forget who we are. So here is what I'm aiming at with this one. Yes we have to tone ourselves down. We do not need to change who we are though, big difference. Sure the sports players might end up with more friends then your geeky crew of four, but you know what, you'll be more happy with your geeky little group than you'll ever be with a group of people you're not. case closed, sport yourself, love yourself, be comfortable with who you are. Thats what people really care about, you want friends, be genuine and you'll have more friends then you can count. wow this is a run on paragraph.

so invest in yourself, do whats smart but take a risk every now and then. don't end up in an office because thats where people want you. Anheuser had it right when they said, "Live life responsibly". be smart, but for sanities sake have fun the right ways. the ways you know to be innocently fun, not guilty pleasures.

Given Away

Just moments ago I was reading my speech book when a thought came into my head, and it refuses to leave until I write it down.

We give ourselves away to so many things in life, whether we realize it or not we are constantly investing ourself into things. Our future, our habits, our friends, family, and Romantic interests. this thought at first saddened me because at some point in time I will have given so much of myself away that I am no longer myself. I was thinking of it as a one way exchange, I give and give until there is nothing left and I'm left as a shallow hull of a man.

It didn't take me very long realize that this was not exactly how it worked. It is more like a stock market, I invest in things for a future, whether I am looking for a quick return or a long term investment depends on the situation. Take a daily conversation for instance, I might simply agree with the person or go along with whatever they are talking about(an investment of sorts) for the hope of a short return in the form of my relationship with that person changing for the better. Or for a more long term investment one could look at a relationship with a girlfriend (or I suppose for girls this would be your boyfriend). I will invest a large part of myself into any relationship with a girlfriend because my ultimate goal with any girlfriend is marriage. This is a long term investment that has a lot of myself in it, whether thats good or bad I'll save for another time but either way I give a large portion of myself to that person.

This thought gave me peace because Its easy to think of life this way, once the stock market goes bad( i.e. a relationship) I can simply sell the stock and get over with it. But it doesn't work like this, there is much more to it. there is a stock portfolio of sorts, it keeps track of all of the things we have invested in and the world can see this portfolio. so when i simply go along with a conversation with the mentality of a quick turn around, it leaves a mark on the record that people will see as something that I believe in. this can be an interesting thing because although I know that conversation really didn't mean a whole lot other people make their judgments on my personality based on my portfolio of previous investments. this is turn will lead them to believe that this is what I like to talk about so when they come ad talk to me they will talk about this or that subject based on what my portfolio says I have liked to talk about(invested in) in the past. this will lead to more people believing this certain thing about me even though its not true, but when people believe something about you, you begin to believe that about yourself(I suppose this is where this whole idea relates to Speech, because this is one of our theories.)

aside from the previous point I like the analogy of the stock market for another reason. In the stock market you invest in things that are smart to do, you want to make money after all. often times we do not know what to really invest in so we invest into what we are told to invest into, why do you think that advertising is such a huge thing? these kinds of decisions stretch from things like careers to how we handle ourselves in love to what we want to eat that day. this is the part where I really had to slow down and ponder. What have I invested myself into? better yet, what have I allowed to tell me what to invest in?

I guess I'm going to have to come back to this.

Awesome Lord Most High

Do we sit by, see people cry, and let people die?
with all of the turmoil of our world, we sit by and watch.
What can we do? We are not perfect we are unclean.
Yet is there something we can do to ween our culture off of its reliant pain?
Reliant pain I say because we seem to be one with pain, enjoy pain, laugh at pain.
After all, Bad things make news right?
Conversations generally start negatively, yet i can't understand how i could possibly be a negative person.
Gossip fuels every day talk, but how do rumors start?
i must be better than you, I know it because i am special, and hence, if I'm not better than you surely my lies will be.
How did we get here?
Better yet how do we get out?
Am i a bad person because i fail once a week?
Surely i am because the good people are good once a week, and they are saved.
The world was formed in seven days and one to fall apart.
But in one day the savior came and victory is won.
Now this was long ago but long after where is salvation?
Salvation rests in the saved, placed there by a king, not locked away and not secured but placed for all to see.
For all to see, there one can take, so secret I shall make.
Yet in the secret none can see what none could take. Two 's' words with two meanings.
Secret and secure.
For the later is not dependent on the first, it is dependent on the king.
the king sits high, there secure our salvation lies, for all to see.
A fragrance kept in a box, is a very regular box, all boxes hold a fragrance.
Yet a fragrance on a stand is unique and impactfull. so let your fragrance of salvation set on a stand, for there the world will see and long.
For the turmoils of here to be dead and done.
The world is in our hearts, is it in turmoil or salvation.

Blessed

So, I haven’t written in a while and I figure it’s about time. I’ve actually got a couple of things in notebooks that just never made their way here and I’ll hopefully get those in here soon.

About a month ago God took a day to show me how blessed I was, well, a couple of days. I usually get stuck in ruts during my walk through life where I find myself longing for what others have; usually it is a person who has a less busy life or something along those lines. This longing will turn into resentment and resentment becomes anger which is right around the point where God smacks me on the head with a wakeup call. The fact of it is, and this is what He showed me, that I only see the good parts of everyone’s life, and hence I want that. What I don’t see is the struggles and other things that that person has to deal with.

The ironic thing about all of this is that I used to have a life where I could be lazy to my heart’s content, and I was everything but content with it. It is actually the thing that caused me to search for God because I thought that there must be something more than just seven hours of halo every day (no joke, seven hours) and powning noobs like no other mother. In this search God gradually broke me away from my reliance on gaming and showed me a life that’s full of things and people. So now that I live this life that I now live I find myself longing for my old life, never seeming to be content.

This is where I found myself when God decided to open my eyes again. First I went through a session of failures in technical areas, which for me Is a frustrating thing since I like to think that I’m good at that stuff. But God humbled me in my mind and showed me that I’m not the invincible technology wizard. While these techy things were happening I also got to get a glimpse of the a few kids’ lives that live in rough areas. In fact some of these kids seemed so happy even though they lived in places that I could not even fathom having to live in. then some more technical problems happened, then a bombshell of a message about worship struck me good.

After taking some time to ponder these events I came to a long conclusion that can be summarized as follows; I am able to give more and do more because I have been blessed way more than most people. Honestly, I mean I grew up in a home that I couldn’t imagine being more perfect, my parents are God’s gift to earth and I got to experience that every day. Even still I’m only allowed to do many of the things I do because of them. While most people are working to pay for their car and house or college I’m doing ministry. The only way I can do so is because my parents pay for many of the things that most don’t. When it comes down to it, I have absolutely no right to have pity on myself because God has called me to do things when others aren’t because He has provided for me to be able to do so.

The funny thing about all of this is that I’ll sometimes find myself getting mad about things that I perceive as people being lazy, when in fact I have no idea what they are going through. I can’t compare them to me because they have been given what they have to work with just as I have been given what I have to work with. Their God given life and my God given life are two very different things, after all, I don’t want to be judged against someone such as Paul, because I’ll never be able to do what he did just as others don’t have the leisure’s I have in order to do my ministries.

Just to properly relate my ideas here, I’m not saying that I am in any way better then someone else, or that I do more for the kingdom of God, and I’m just now realizing this. What others do in there day to day life, as long as it is in God’s will, is just as important as anything I can ever do For him. After all, I don’t do anything, but it’s the strength that he gives me which allows me to stand.

Acceptable

This one was inspire by something that I wrote about the movie Watchmen. I said that there was probably language in it, and a lot of it, but it just didn't register with me anymore. I later looked it up and the movie had more than 50 curse words that i failed to recall just one hour after watching it. once again i would just like to say i don't promote this movie for reasons noted in the forward. But for purposes of this topic I will refer to it because it is a perfect example of what i am about to talk about.

This got me thinking as to what simply "didn't register" with me any longer, and why that certain thing doesn't register. As i was thinking about this i became reminded of a time when i was really young and had just heard my first curse word and how it was used. Wanting to use my newly discovered vocabulary i tested it on my mom, who proceeded to throw me outside of the house for a while after strictly telling me to never use that word again.

So if I was to study this story, and apply it to life the first thing I noticed is that once I learned something new, it became acceptable to use it until someone told me that it wasn't. Now this philosophy works as long as I do whatever I am told, but unfortunately as human beings that period of our lives does not last very long. At some point in our lives the authority shifts to where our parents no longer control what is acceptable in our lives but we ourselves do. This change for most people happens gradually while we take a little bit of control at a time until we are driving the car I call life on our own.

So once we gain authority in our own lives we begin to make decisions as to what is acceptable and what is not, and this line becomes very specific. For example, I will allow myself to hear this word and say it, or i will allow myself to hear this word, that is fine, i just can't say it, or simple saying that this word is unacceptable. And we decide what is ok for every single word that we hear. But this doesn't simply stop at words either, violence, sexual content or virtually anything else also apply.

How does one go from the stage of life where it is unacceptable to even hear something to the point where basically anything that is said is not only allowed to be heard, but will be included into my mental vocabulary where it will eventually spill out into my verbal vocabulary? I think it starts at the point where one thing becomes acceptable. A good example from my life would be the F- word. When i was in middle school this word used to bother me when i heard it because it was always said in anger and it was perceived by my brain as a nasty word. As i grew up this word began to carry less and less baggage with it and i think the point when i truly accepted the word as something that was fine to be heard was my freshmen year of high school. Now till this day this word is still not really a part of my vocabulary, but as i am beginning to find out while I have been playing halo the past few days this words is most diffidently part of my mental vocabulary. This scares me because i don't want to be a person that curses, but i never really knew why i was thinking that word so i had no way of reversing the problem and eventually i would start cursing. Now I know that the reason i am thinking this is because I have heard it somewhere in my past, and the more i hear it the easier it is to recall. So in order to fix this problem i have to stop allowing myself to hear this word, it has to once again become unacceptable. The system of hearing things to saying things somewhat works like a multi leveled fountain. the top pool represents what you allow yourself to hear, or the amount of some word that you allow yourself to hear. once that pool fills up it overflows into your mental vocabulary which will eventually overflow into your verbal vocabulary as long as you allow yourself to hear that word, or anything else you might want to apply this example to.

I know that up until now i have used only words as an example so i'm going to briefly switch to sexual content. just as in words there becomes a point where we accept certain sexual material. the problem with this point is that it is not as clear cut as the word line is. With words you can simple say i refuse to hear this word or that without it bothering me, and thereby accepting it to some degree. with sexual content, however, its not as simple as you won't look at some material and not others because there are so many factors. I.E. this length of shorts is ok but only if the girl is this height... this logic will not work. Now in some cases it is easy to distinguish what is right and wrong, a nude scene is wrong, but what about some tight costume that really doesn't show any skin but might be a little too tight? Well, this really can't come down to a cut and dry case but when it comes down to it the whole idea of what you put in is what will eventually come out still applies. If you women who walk around in really tight clothing all the time, that's what you will eventually begin to see girls as in general. This is why Pornography and all sexual material as a whole is so dangerous, because it gets stuck it your brain and eventually begins to make you objectify women and continually lust after them. Just being real Wit Ya. Now i know that I have only talked about guys looking at girls but it is important to acknowledge that this happens with women too i simply don't have any experience with this so I won't even go there:)

I know its a lot but it was on my mind, you get out of life what you put into it. our mind has no kidney to purify what we feed it. So we simply have to monitor it because if we don't change what we accept then society will continue to push whatever they can get away with, we have to stop it because they won't.

Forward

So, the first thing you need to know is that i am terrible with spelling and grammar, in that area I am not smarter than a fifth grader. So if you want to have fun and comment about how bad it is go ahead, it won't bother me.

That being said i just wanted to write a little bit about why I decided to start this up. I always have random thoughts or complaints or ideas that I used to write down but have currently stopped doing so. this was brought to my attention in an odd way, through a movie. I saw Watchmen tonight, and I must say that it was the first movie in a very long time that I left thinking about life in general, which got me thinking about this. Just a side note, I am not promoting this movie seeing as how it had to many sex scenes, a whole lot of violence that even made me cringe a little, and although i can't really recall it I'm sure there was a lot of fowl language also, sad as it is those kinds of words don't register with me anymore. So its not that the movie itself was bad plot wise or lacked ideas, it just had too many salty things in it for me to suggest it to anyone, perhaps once its on DVD and you can skip stuff.

But back to the main topic, so i left the theater thinking about life and all it holds, which made me get the idea of starting to write my random things down again because i like to enjoy them at a later time. then i got to thinking that if I would enjoy them then maybe others would enjoy them too. So here they shall be placed, for all to read. Of course I'm not going to put all of my thoughts on here because i just don't want you knowing some things:) But whatever i do put on here i hope you enjoy, and if you don't, well , ok.