Just a blog about me, so I'm sorry if you wanted a blog about Snoopy or Darth Vader, deal with it.
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December 16, 2012
My Personal Narrative
December 2, 2012
This Is What We Do
November 22, 2012
Hey. It's been a while.
It's been a while! Where have I been? Well lately my life has been the high school musical, just like it always has been twice a year. (Not High School Musical, THE high school musical.)
Unfortunately I have nothing to post, and so I devote the next five minutes to writing whatever comes to the top of my head. Then I'm off to eat some turkey.
Ready... Set... GO.
Lava lamps are what drive, not cow dung. Simmering soufle of brown substances are fed to me on a silver platter in the middle of a very large dining hall.
Uh.
So Scungilli, we meet at last. FOR THE LAST TIME. ~Bszheeew waaaahw mwaaooow~
Proceed to cliff face. Enjoy the view but don't pick the weeds.
RAMALAMALAMA KADINGIDDY DINGADONG. TOGETHER FO-EVAH LIKE SHUUWAHP BUDOO LABBY YIPPIDY BANG DI BANG.
Now that we are on the subject of music I will have to ramp up the bass. Prepare to take flight. No seriously. I'd hold on to something.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWW
So. How did you enjoy that? Ok well eat my beanloaf. I make a beanloaf nice. BEEEAAANLOOOOAF. NICE.
I love Pokemon. Especially Dragonite. He boss man. So is Gyrados. And... and... Oh look, a talking squirill. Make way folks, I'm coming through.
Whew! Ok. I'm done. Well I don't really know what just happened there, but I have a feeling when I read back on this post in like, a year, I will probably either die of hystaria, or imagine how freak-like I must have been to write something like that.
BIE.
October 28, 2012
My Favorite Year - Character Bio
So for this show, my character's name is Rookie Carroca. This is the first time I have been a semi-important character in a show, and so I did have to follow at least a little bit of back story. However, that mostly just comes in the last paragraph. The rest is just my wild imagination. Enough of it, anyway, to fill a Times New Roman, 12 pt. font, single spaced page. And so I decided I would post it on my blog, since I have nothing better to blog about! Enjoy people!
October 21, 2012
I Wish
I wish now that we could have found the space between the lines we were supposed to read. Summer came and went, and I'm to blame. But it's all the same because I'm still not free. I wish seasons changed the reasons I had to keep so I could reach the ground. I wish you had seen the view of the sky erupting, and the stars gone down.
I wish I made up my mind, because I can't rewind time. The days I have all left behind are past now. I'm looking for signs.
I wish to stay, though I'm bound to fade. Come and find me - I'll stand out. I wish we had caught the sea, 'cause the memories make it hard to doubt.
Oh I wish I had made a list of the things you do to flip my frown, and I wish you had been there, too, when the sky burst open. . .
And the stars fell down.
August 20, 2012
Owlsome
Back in 2009, I was in 8th grade. And I distinctly remember driving home from my grandma's house with my 16 year old cousin. He leaned over to me during the drive and said, "Hey man, this song has the greatest line ever to say to a girl!" And then proceeded to play me Vanilla Twilight, pointing out the line as it came up.
Me, being 14, just gave that awkward smile and nod. The kind of face you give when you're thinking, Greaaaaaat... Can I just enjoy the quiet drive home now? Now, don't get me wrong, this is my favorite cousin we're talking about! But I'm the kind of person where when somebody starts talking to me, and my mind is on something else entirely, I put them in the zoned-out zone. And give them that face.The silence isn't so bad'Till I look at my hands and feel sad'Cause the spaces between my fingersAre right where yours fit perfectly
So needless to say we finished our drive home and life went by wonderfully. Then, on the last week of school for 8th grade I was in the cafeteria sorting out yearbooks to hand out later that day (I was on yearbook staff that year), and we had the radio blasting over the speaker system. Then this song came on the radio, and my ears perked. If you have ever seen a dog's ears come up as somebody walks through the garage door, or when a bag of potato chips is opened, it was kind of like that. But I could tell immediately this song was different than the others we had previously been listening to. This song had a sort of energy - electricity, you could say! (Har har) I'm sure you have made the reference to Owl City's "Fireflies" by now. And if not... Then you have just been enlightened. And I was hooked from the first note.
So I got home from school that day and ran through the front door with reckless abandon, screaming "MOM, MOM! You gotta hear this song I just found!" And I showed it to her. She liked it too, and so we bought the whole album (which is really rare now days because there are options for single-song purchases). I then listened to the whole thing right then; cover-to-cover one might say, for books. But of course this was 100x better than just any book! It was my first Owl City album! And so the interest took flight.
From that time until now, I have been gaining ever more respect for the music wizard behind it all, Adam Young. Not only does he produce amazing music and write beautifully, but he is a guy with values. And that's hard to come by in a musician today with all of the filth floating around cyber space. He doesn't brag, he isn't full of himself, he doesn't support unwholesome activities, and that to me (and so many others) says so much more about a person than anything they could say about themselves.
But the thing that I love most about Adam is that he is religious, and he isn't afraid to admit it. What's more is that he shares his beliefs with whoever will listen! He is constantly giving his credit back to God with whatever success he has. Not only does he stick to his standards, but he is a light to all the others who follow his career with interest, even if they don't share his exact same beliefs. I personally don't share all of the same opinions as him (I'm part of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or Mormon as we are also known by), but a very good majority of our views are parallel. Which could be a good reason as to why I admire him so much, but I know you all have your own opinions and I respect that as well.
So I suppose the last thing I would like to say about Mr. Owl Young (haha, see what I did there?), is that I wish him the best. For everything! And I for one will continue to follow his ventures anonymously, just enjoying the ride.
And, of course, the music.
August 3, 2012
Why The World Needs Superman
So tonight I decided I was in a movie mood. Being in this state of mind, I began to rummage around through what movies we had to watch, and I found Superman Returns. Great movie! I had seen it about twice before, but I was kind of in a superhero-movie mood, and so I thought that would do. So I put it in and plopped down on the beanbag with the nice little blanket I use when I watch movies.
As the beginning credits were rolling, I remembered something I had heard my neighbor say about when he and his wife went to see this movie while it was in theaters. He said that when the movie ended, he came out like a typical guy does out of a superhero movie. "Yeah that was a sweet movie! Action was awesome, great ending, I wish I was Superman!" (Not his exact words, but you get the general idea) Whereas his wife had a totally different view on the movie. While driving home from the theater, they talked about what they liked about the movie and such, and he was amazed to hear his wife's comments. His wife said that throughout the entire movie, she found references to the Savior. The whole movie there were symbols and connections referring to Jesus, whereas the husband was just enjoying the fight scenes and the plot line. So remembering this, I decided I would look for those symbols in the movie.
And let me just say I was amazed at what I found. There were tons! I will try to name as many as I can here, but I probably will forget a few. After each reference, I'll give a little commentary on my thoughts.
- In the beginning of the movie, Superman hears his father talking (in his memory). I believe they were lines from the first movie, but this is what his father said, "You will travel far my little Kal-El. But we will never leave you . . .You will make my strength your own. You will see my life through your eyes as your life will be seen through mine. The son becomes the father, and the father, the - The son" Commentary: I believe this is, obviously, symbolic of Heavenly Father speaking to Jesus before he goes down to earth. I also think that it is symbolic of what a lot of Christian churches believe - the Trinity. Because they don't see Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ (and the Holy Ghost) as 3 separate beings, but all as one. Many of them can't really explain this, it's just what they believe.
- Superman again hears his father's voice in memory a little more into the movie. Again, I have the quote, "Live as one of them, Kal-El . . . Always hold in your heart the pride of your special heritage. They can be a great people, Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you... my only son" Commentary: This is symbolic of Heavenly Father actually sending Jesus to earth. He knows that the people need light, and help. This quote is really self explanatory, in symbolic terms. The world needed a Savior. Which brings me to my next observation.
- After being gone for 5 years, Superman returns to Earth, only to find that Lois Lane has fallen in love with another man. Of course, being devastated, he then learns that during those 5 years, Lois had written an article entitled "Why The World Doesn't Need Superman." A little later in the movie, he confronts her as Superman and gently questions why. She gives some sappy movie answer, but I thought that the whole dialogue was really enlightening.
- Superman: Why did you write it, Lois?
- Lois: How could you leave us like that? I moved on. So did the rest of us. That's why I wrote it. The world doesn't need a savior. And neither do I.
- Superman: Gently takes her up into the sky, and pauses for a minute. Then says: Listen; what do you hear?
- Lois: Nothing.
- Superman: Pauses again. I hear everything. You wrote that the world doesn't need a savior, but every day I hear people crying for one.
- (Twice during the movie Superman is referred to as a "savior")
- Near the climax of the movie, right as Lex Luther is making his diabolical plan come to life, Superman comes to stop him. Unfortunately, the giant land mass that is being created by Lex contains kryptonite (of course). So the moment that Superman lands on this crystal-like island, he becomes weak. He starts to talk to Lex, but, being the villan, he just starts punching and kicking the no longer invincible Superman. Then Lex's goons come out and start doing the same. They kick him around, they push him down, they grab his hair, etc. Then Lex Luther comes over again, stabs him in the side with a piece of kryptonite, and pushes him off a cliff into the ocean. Commentary: This was symbolic of the persecution Jesus went through during his life. After Jesus was sentenced by Pilot (and even before), the people spat on him. They jeered and laughed and mocked. They put a crown of thorns on his head and made him carry his own cross. I felt like this part of the movie was representing that very well, because Superman didn't fight back. And neither did Jesus.
- After being pushed off a cliff, he is eventually rescued by Lois and Richard in his plane. After Lois takes out the broken piece of kryptonite in his side, Superman recovers, and then tells them that he has to go back. (My work is not yet finished). So he says goodbye to Lois, then flies out of the plane. Using his laser vision, he melts the earth beneath the rapidly-growing crystal island and flies underneath it. Then the scene goes to on top of the island where Lex Luther and his gang of thugs are playing poker and smoking, when suddenly the ground begins to shake, and then things start to crumble. Lex rapidly gets out of the way, but his thugs aren't so lucky and they are smashed by a falling pillar. Lex escapes in a helicopter, but that's not important. After showing these scenes, it cuts to a wide view of the entire island, which is gradually, but surely raising out of the ocean. Soon you see that it's Superman underneath it lifting it up, and he slowly flies it up all the way to space. The strain is evident on his face, and you can see the kryptonite in the island weakening him. But he completes his task, and throws the island into space. Then probably the most symbolic thing in the movie happens: he forms a cross with his body. He then plummets back to Earth and is declared dead by the doctors. Commentary: Wow. This whole series of events was probably the biggest symbol of Jesus' life in the whole movie. I'll take it piece by piece. First off, he goes back to the island after being rescued, because he hadn't finished his work, just like Jesus did. He needed to atone before he died. Secondly, he flies underneath the island to raise it out of the ground: Jesus descended beneath all things. Next, after the ground starts to shake, the wicked are destroyed, just like what happened after Jesus' death (this whole series of events aren't exactly chronological, but you get the picture). After that you see Superman raise the entire land mass out of the ocean, and you can see the strain on his face and the kryptonite making it extremely difficult. Just like Jesus carried the world's burdens, the world's sins, the world's heartaches, the world's losses, the world's disappointments, the world's feelings, it wasn't easy. And this was the symbol of the great and infinite Atonement. Then, after completing his task, Superman makes a cross with his body and plummets back to earth and declared dead. Obviously, this is symbolic of Jesus dying.
- After being declared dead by the doctors, a doctor comes in to his room to find him gone. There isn't a body in the bed he was in, and the window is open. Of course, he went to Lois first, but the point was that he came back to life. Commentary: I hope you can see the symbolism in that. Jesus was resurrected.
- This is the final one I can think of at the moment, but after coming back to life, Superman goes to speak with what we found out in the movie to be his son. (Jesus NEVER broke the law of chastity, but movies have never been perfect, have they?) He talks to him while he's sleeping and this is what he says, "You will be different, sometimes you'll feel like an outcast, but you'll never be alone. You will make my strength your own. You will see my life through your eyes, as your life will be seen through mine." Commentary: We are all children of our Heavenly Father, and knowing that when so much of the world doesn't can make you feel like an outcast sometimes. Just having different beliefs, or different standards can make you feel unwanted; but we are never alone. Heavenly Father is always with us, and he can give us strength if we ask for it. We see Jesus' life through our eyes - symbolically saying that we witnessed everything Jesus did for us by reading the scriptures, and how he wants us to act. And He will always be watching us.
Oh and one more thing. You may or may not have noticed in the first two quotes by Superman's father, he called him Kal-El. El, in Hebrew, means "God." Kal means "simple" or "light." So put them together and you get "The Light of God." I just thought that was kind of neat as well.
"For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved."
- John 3:17
July 30, 2012
100th Post - The Ancients
July 29, 2012
Sea Life
...And I am stoked! :D Not just because I will be getting paid if people buy it, but just for the fact to say I have a song on iTunes! So if you wanna check it out, I would be honored. And I would be even more honored if you were to purchase it for $.99! Because that would be awesome.
Anyways, here's the link!
Sea Life
July 15, 2012
Life Lessons
Survivor Man was this past Thursday through Saturday morning, and it was quite the experience. I still am no a camper, mind you! But the experiences I had were worth going for. Let me share two of the biggest ones right here.
Lesson #1
After meeting at 6:30 AM Thursday morning, we headed off to the mountains. Upon reaching the parking lot, the leaders split the YM into two teams, and gave each team a map. I should mention that this map was void of names. Nada. They were all blotted out. All that was on the map was nameless lakes and trails, with one lake circled: our destination. "Get us there!" they said. And so each team had to figure out which lake we were trying to get to, and then get there. First team there got a prize.
My team was quite indecisive. It took us about 20 minutes just to take a guess at which lake was circled, and then about every 5 minutes on the trail, Jordan (one of the priests in my group) would stop us all and take out the map to look at it again for 20 more minutes. But here is the lesson that we learned upon finally reaching the lake (which, by the way, I was right from the start. Island Lake!). Every time our group would stop so that Jordan could triple check the map again, our leaders would scratch their heads, get this pained/confused look on their face and say one syllable. "Huh!" That's it.
The whole way to the lake went this way, and upon finally reaching the right lake, the leaders took the time to give us this analogy: The devil makes us doubt ourselves. Every time we make a decision, he tries to get us to think it's the wrong one. Especially if it's the right one. Every time that we decided to keep hiking on to Island Lake, the leaders would always say something that planted just that little seed of doubt in our hearts. But through it all, I had made my decision that the right lake was Island Lake, and so that's where I urged our team to go the whole time. And upon reaching the lake, we not only realized that we were the first team there, but that this whole Survivor Man experience was going to be full of little lessons like that.
The other thing we learned from that experience was that our leaders are like the devil.
Lesson #2
This lesson took part during the second day. After waking up Friday morning, (if you could call it that. Not many of us got any sleep) we packed up camp and went off hiking to our next destination which was supposed to be six miles away. But that's another story.
After about .5 miles, we got lost. Figures, huh? Well, we went up over a mountain, and as we peaked the top of it, there were some really marshy areas where the trail we were on just disappeared. After spending about 40 minutes looking for the trail, we just decided to put our orientation skills to the test. So we got out the map we were using (which was much like the first map we had - no names), found the direction we needed to head in, and started down the canyon. Unbeknownst to us, one of our leaders had a GPS with the trail loaded onto it.
After hiking a ways with just using the compass skills we had, the leaders collaborated and made an executive decision to turn us around. We, with the compasses, had felt that it was a good idea to just go strait for a river that we needed to follow. But Brett, with the GPS, had seen that we were most definitely NOT going in the correct direction. So finally, the leaders instead of being followers, became leaders and decided to take us back to the trail. Here is what our path looked like (the black dotted line in the bottom right was roughly our path).
The lesson we learned from this experience was thus: sometimes, bush whacking can be pretty fun! You can feel really accomplished sometimes by using your own reckoning to find your own way to the destination, but they way our leaders put it, and I totally agreed with them, was that they would rather get there knowing that they were on the right path than just blindly walking. Brett, with the GPS, was watching our trail as we made our own way, and he said for the first half hour, we were going pretty parallel with the right trail. But soon, we veered off and became quite a far ways away from the trail. That's when they decided to stop us and give us a little lesson.
What I took from this experience was that this hike is a lot like our life. We can feel really confident with ourselves, justify every little thing we do, say that we're good people, but when it all comes down to it, we may not be on the correct path. Even if we have been going parallel with it for a long time, we haven't been on it, and thus we don't know when it could make sudden turns and we could get completely lost, like what happened to us. The GPS on this hike we compared to repentance, or the prophets trying to get us back on track. Because, as you can clearly see on the map, we were quite a ways before we finally turned around to go looking for the trail again.
Anyway, there were many more experiences I had, but it would make this post much longer, and so I settled with these. All in all, it was a neat experience!
. . . But I still dislike camping.
July 5, 2012
If I Ruled The World
Because, you see, anything goes
If I ruled the world
June 28, 2012
Top 10 Things - Reasons Summer is Aweseome
- Summer is warm! And being warm is marvelous!
- The nights have more daylight which means it's warmer for longer!
- There are more songs about summer than about winter! (Cause who wants to listen to a song about frostbite? Ew.)
- NO SCHOOL!!!! That should have been the first one, but you know... Yeah I don't know either. But that's one of the best reasons for sure.
- Tons of free time to spend on whatever you want!
- Walking to the snowcone shack is only done in the summer time, folks. You wouldn't trudge through 7 feet of snow for a mile or two just to get a snowcone and go back home. (Plus the snowcone shacks are closed in the winter time anyway!)
- You can totally mess up your internal clock by staying up past midnight and sleeping in past 9:00 every day! (Yeah, laugh all you want about sleeping in past 9:00, but for me that's an accomplishment.)
- Vacations! Summer time is the vacation season! I mean, yeah there are people that go on vacation during the snowy months, but for that you have to miss school and even though it's nice to get a break you have to catch up on homework and blah blah blah... It's just better in the summer, ok?! Yeah, I can see everyone nodding their heads and agreeing, so that settles it.
- Ever tried swimming in a frozen river? Yeah me either. And I don't plan to! It's much better to swim in warm water and you can only get that in the summer! (Unless you have artificially heated pools indoors or something... But stop looking for loopholes!)
- You have enough time to think of ridiculous blog posts! :D And I plan on doing many of those. XD
June 25, 2012
The World of Sea
Alright so first I woke up. (Good thing to do if you want to get your day started - I highly recommend it.) Then I had some cereal, because that is my breakfast food of choice (except for french toast, but that wasn't an option this morning). Then I showered and we headed off!
We got to the park at about 8:45. The park officially opens at 9:00, but they were letting people in anyhow, so we followed suit. The first thing we did inside the park was head to the new ride, Manta. It was awesome 'cause we were one of the first ones so there was no line! . . . But there was still problems with the ride, apparently. So after getting right up to the ride and then waiting to be seated, we had to wait for 30 minutes while they ran into technical difficulties and sorted them out by changing out two roller-coaster cars. After our 30 minute wait at the front of the line, we were allowed to ride the ride. And it was pretty sweet! But we were all a little bit bitter that we had to wait...
Next we went to the Atlantis ride! The log flume ride. The semi-wet ride (because the SUPER-wet ride comes later in the story). So I got to sit in front with my brother, and I'm proud to say that I didn't get very wet! (I won't be so proud later on...)
Then off to the dolphin show we went. It was pretty neat! It was kind of like a ballet concert with dolphins and diving acrobatics. They had divers jumping off of these super high platforms and doing about 20-bajillion flips before landing in the water. And not one of them did a belly flop!
Now the wet part comes. Shipwreck Rapids. 11:00 in the morning. It hadn't even gotten super hot yet! And yet I went on it twice! (Stupid, stupid, stupid...) The sad thing was, I wasn't even that wet after the first ride, but there wasn't a lot of people in line, actually there was nobody in the line, and so we went again. (Stupid, stupid, stupid...) That time I got it all. And I mean ALL. Emphasis on the ALL part. I didn't get dry again until 4:00 that afternoon and my feet were prunes!
So we went to one more show at 5:00 - the Shamu show. It was alright, I mean, I think Killer Whales are pretty majestic and smart, but I was just feeling so tired by that time that everything was starting to seem a little "meh." Know that feeling? Yeah. It was a long, awesome day, but at some point you gotta call it quits!
So before leaving I got my souvenir T-shirt. It said "Blue Horizons," which was the dolphin show we went to.
After leaving we decided to eat some food (because that's kind of essential to human survival), and so we stopped at a local place called "Fat Burger." Mmmmmm! I know. I got a Fat Burger, and everybody else got something like that. Everybody else except for my uncle. My uncle, whilst walking in, saw a challenge. The Triple King Challenge. And when my uncle gets a challenge, my uncle takes the challenge. And that's how he ended up with the 1 1/2 lb, triple patty burger.
Amazingly, he finished it! . . . After seeing stars, of course (at the moment he is laying on the couch groaning). But for his outstanding finish he got a certificate and a picture on the restaurant wall! Lucky him.
As for right now, everybody is out back swimming in the house we are staying in for the week, and Caleb is trying to get Chris (the Triple King uncle) to come swim off the calories with him! Even though he only had a hot dog.
Anyway, that was my day! We are planning on watching M.I.B. pretty soon as well, so over and out, folks!
June 23, 2012
Mikel Has Saved My Blog
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks Mikel. :)
For those of you that are wondering, it's the new player I have. Up top! Take a listen and stay a while, folks!
June 21, 2012
Playlist No Longer Does Embedding
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
RAGE.
June 11, 2012
The Reason Behind It All
The Quest
In forest glad and yonder glen
There sat a rooster and clucking hen
And no one knew how hungry then
They were for one small biscut
Some say they traveled far and wide
Searching every countryside
And all day long they clucked and cried
For one small measly biscut
They looked in every farmer's barn
The signaled aliens with some yarn
But all the aliens had was carn
And maybe a fat cow or two
And oh! The poultry wailed and wept!
For sixty days they never slept!
And in their hearts they always kept
The thought of that lovely biscut
So while their journey carried them far
From Santa's lair to Farmer Joe's car
From ocean depths to an Irish bar
They never found that biscut
And so if you're ever asked by Pete
Why a chicken did cross the street
You now know what carried their feet:
The quest to find a biscut.
June 8, 2012
Summer Goals 2012
So I am pretty terrible at making goals. I'm just gonna say that right now (or at least carrying them out). But there is something to be said about making them, that's for sure! The way I see it, if you make goals (and more importantly write them down), then you have something to work for. If you write them down, you will remember them easier, and you will actually have something to do and work on instead of laying around the house all day like a bum (which I have been a culprit of many times...).
So for the summer of 2012, I have decided to make some goals. Woot woot! And I have also decided to post them on this blog so that the readers of said blog can check up on me and tell me to get my rear in gear to work on my goals! So here goes:
1. Read my scriptures and pray every night.
2. Go on a walk at least once a week.
3. Work more hours. (More hours = more mula!)
4. Write an EP and put it on iTunes. (I'll inform ya'll if that happens so you can go check it out!) :)
5. Write on my blog at least once every two weeks.
6. Write in my journal at least once every two weeks.
7. Hang out with my friends. (EASY!)
8. Finish The Hobbit.
9. Spend more time with my parents.
10. Become a dragon.
So there you have it! My 10 goals for the summer of 2012! Farewell fellow blog readers, and enjoy your summers! :D
P.S. I will complete goal 10, if any of you were doubters.
May 22, 2012
As Long As You Love Me
But anyway, back to the song, I later found out the name of the song after it ended and that it was by the Backstreet Boys (oh snap, I am good!). It was called "As long as you love me." I didn't really pay much attention to the verses though as much as I did to the chorus. And as I listened, I think I had a little mini revelation. I know it sounds weird, seeing as I was listening to the Backstreet Boys, but if you were to hear the chorus of the song, you might understand what I am talking about.
Anyway, the reason I say it was a mini revelation was because it came as more of a thought. An idea that just formed in my mind as I payed attention to the lyrics of the chorus. Of course, the song was talking about girls (because that's all boy bands ever sing about), but in my mind for whatever reason, I took the meaning differently. I took it as though Heavenly Father were saying these words to us as his children. Here's the chorus:
May 6, 2012
Anti-Climactic
I wish I had something to say on this fine Sunday.
Something to pull at your hearts,
Or have you sail away.
A piece of writing that may be frightening to think.
Something that sends you dreaming,
Maybe swimming in the sink.
Or possibly crawling with ants a-hauling some food.
Creation in the star-lit sky,
Just something to lighten the mood.
There never was a day so fine to play as new ones.
To find just the right things,
And join all together with loved ones.
Yes, I wish. Oh how I wish I had something to say!
April 29, 2012
April 22, 2012
Born to be King
The King's Son
Sometime between the time of 1774 and 1793 A.D., King Louis XVI of France was taken from his throne and imprisoned. The captors of the King then kidnapped his son, the prince, and took him to a community far away from his father's kingdom. They knew that if they could destroy him morally, he would never realize the potential for greatness that he, as the King's son, contained.
After arriving in the community with the prince, they immediately exposed him to all of the filthy and vile things of life. They exposed him to foods of richness that would make him a slave to appetite. They exposed him to all sorts of coarse language that they used constantly while around him. They exposed him to immoral and lusting women. They exposed him to dishonor and distrust. They exposed him to virtually everything that would drag a human soul as low as it could possibly slip.
This continued for six months.
Finally after intensive temptation one day, his captors questioned him. Why would he not give in to all of the things that they were offering him? To this, the young prince replied, "I cannot, for I was born to be King."Ever since I have heard this story, I have been inspired. In this life, we too face intensive temptation. Some days perhaps more than others, but we have still been told that as the youth, we are being raised in enemy territory. One question to ask to yourself following this story is this: What would have been the outcome had I been in the prince's place? I honestly don't know what my answer would be, and that scares me. I am definitely glad that I was not in his place! But listening with our spiritual ears, this story holds true for every single person on the earth. We may not be in a position to inherit a kingdom here on earth, but without a doubt we have an opportunity to prove to ourselves and to God here in our lives if we are worthy to receive one.
Speaking of Kings, in the Book of Mormon as you may recall, one of the sons of Mosiah, Ammon, went to preach to the Lamanites. Upon entering their city, he was bound and taken before the king. As was the Lamanites' custom, any Nephite captured and brought to the Lamanite king was to be done with as the king so chose. When the king questioned Ammon as to what he was doing in their land, Ammon replied that he wanted to serve the king. The king was so pleased with this statement that he offered Ammon a wife from any of his daughters (wow!). Ammon refused, and said he just wanted to serve the king. And so, Ammon, himself being an heir to the Nephite throne, became a shepherd and watched the flocks with the king's other servants. (Alma 17: 20-25)
There are many lessons we can learn from this story, but the thing I caught from it this time was humility. Ammon as a prince obviously knew humility and service. How do you think this story could have been different had Ammon had answered the king's question with this instead, "I am here to preach the word of God and repentance to you and your people." Of course, this was the truth! But Ammon knew that if he said that, he would most likely be cast out or killed. So instead, Ammon chose to be patient and wait for his chance to preach by serving the king.
Anyway, this post is getting pretty lengthy, and I don't want to be teaching a second Sunday School lesson today. I only wanted to share a story that I remembered whilst pondering. So go have a great day, and remember:
March 22, 2012
Comparisons
Last night, my mom emailed me a link to a blog that she reads every now and then. It was about "being enough." When are you enough? When have you arrived at the destination you want to get to? And probably most importantly, how can you compete with the world around you?
The blog post talked about a memories that this lady had had. Memories of growing up. School, family, things like that. She said that that was when she learned about talents. Her parents helped her develop talents. She thought she was on top of the world!
...Until she grew up. Soon she found out that "[My neighbors] could back flip circles around my wimpy trampoline flip and my supposed babysitting and art skills dimmed almost to obliteration when compared to the flashy talents of others."
Then she continued on to talk about our specific talents. We all have them. We all have developed a few of them (though definitely not fully yet). But if you compare your skills to those of your peers, well then that's basically a dead end road right there. Let me just share a few quotes from the post.
I began to strive to reach that pinnacle peak where I would be “enough” to all those around me. But I realized that the trouble with that tactic is that if I compared myself to others, I’d never, ever be enough. Because it’s part of human nature to compare our worst to their best. And that’s not what “being enough” is all about. We must realize that the only person we can truly compare ourselves to is ourselves. We want to be our best selves. And we are the only ones who can discover who that “best self” really is amidst the layers of self-criticism and uncertainty that filter in from the world.Brilliant. I couldn't have said it better myself.
I have been faced with this problem plenty of times. I'm sure that everyone has! When you think things like, "I'll never be that good!" or maybe, "How can I compete against this?" It always has a single effect: SELF DOUBT. Don't let that be you! You dig yourself into a deep pit, from which it'll be hard to get out of. A pit where the only way out is down.
Without a doubt we are surrounded by people on all sides who are going to be able to do things better than we can . . . This can be inspiring and uplifting or it can throw us into a swirl of depression. My answer to this is that I try not to compare myself to others. I try to compare myself to myself. Sure it’s great to be inspired by others. Sure it’s great to have role-models and to strive for excellence. But the tricky part is to figure out what is enough for us personally. That is what will bring true happiness. We’re competing only against ourselves.Personally, I think the only person, the only human that has ever lived on this earth, that we need to strive to be like is Jesus Christ. But again, we are far from being like him! He was perfect, we sin daily. He has perfect love, we get mad at our siblings for taking too many cookies. But it's not unrealistic to strive to become like Christ! Because of the Atonement, we have an infinite amount of restarts, try again's, and start over's.
I thought that this blog post was amazing. If you want to check it out, I'll put the link below.
http://www.71toes.com/2012/03/being-enough.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+71toesrss+%2871+toes+RSS%29&utm_content=Google+Reader
So farewell, and remember! You don't have to strive to become better than your neighbor at air hockey (even though that's a glorious feeling!). You don't need to be the smartest fish in the bowl to feel successful.
The only thing you need to measure yourself are your past accomplishments.
So shoot for the stars! |