Yesterday was my parents 26 wedding anniversary. I am very fortunate to have parents that still love each other and have never considered any kind of split or divorce an option. Since my parents have never been divorced, I feel like I am in the minority. I'm not condemning people that get divorced. It wouldn't be my place to do that. It just seems to be something that is more and more prevalent in our society.

Sometimes I feel like people don't take marriage seriously anymore. They see divorce as an easy way out and it something goes against how they want it to, they take that way out without hesitation. That isn't what marriage is supposed to be about. You are supposed to love each other for better or for worse.

I don't believe that people just "fall out of love". Yes, people can grow apart, but usually there is a reason for it. Maybe there isn't proper communication and you feel like you don't know the person very well anymore. That can cause a couple to grow apart. If you find yourself in that situation, go out and rediscover each other. Go do things that you used to do when you first started dating. Have fun again. Just sit and talk about all the things that have been on your mind lately. Always keep things honest and don't be afraid to upset the other person. People get offended. It happens. But people also learn and grow from it.

Making it through a rough patch will only make your relationship stronger. The best things in life are always worth the fight, so don't give up on someone. Learn to appreciate the other person for who they are.

I don't know who reads this, but I will tell you this. Before you love someone else, you have to learn to love yourself. It all starts with you.

Happy Anniversary to my awesome Mom and Daddy!

The Smallest Acts

This past Sunday I was thrilled and blessed to be able to attend a family friend's CD release party. He is/was a worship leader at the church that I attend and is the coolest and nicest guy one could hope to meet. He is now starting the exciting journey of being a Christian recording artist. He recently released his EP and will soon be hitting the road to promote his music. If anyone is interested in listening to his music, his name is Joe Banua and I will link his website here. I can't even put into words how excited I am for him.

For his release concert he asked a very local non-profit organization called The Andy Project to be there and talk for a bit. If anyone wants any information about the organization, click here. For a bit of background about them:

There was a high school mission trip that went to New York City and was working with the homeless there. They met a guy named Andy, brought him to church, and helped him get back on his feet. They brought that idea back with them and now help local homeless people by offering love and kindness. A more in depth back story can be found on their website under "About".

The coolest part of the organization is that it was actually started by that same group of high school students, also from the church that I attend. The kid that runs it is someone who I actually grew up with and my parents have known his family for as long as I can remember. He is just a teenager and yet he is running a state and nationally recognized non-profit organization. They had a purpose and desire to do something meaningful within the world and they went out and did it, regardless of their age. They are influencing people's lives for the better and are doing it fearlessly and passionately.

What if we all had that mentality? What if we all did small gestures to make someones day brighter and more hopeful? This group is bringing meaning to these people's lives. This is exactly what the Bible says to do, so why do so many of us turn a blind eye to the homeless, less fortunate, or otherwise needy? I'm not saying you should hand out money left and right because, let's face it, most of that will go to something it was never intended to go for. But what if you could buy a meal for someone that needs it?

Now I am quite aware that many of the people reading this blog aren't Christians. But that doesn't mean that you can't impact someone's life. So many of these people just need love. Maybe a hot meal. If asked, would you give a homeless child the coat off of your back during a cold winter? What about buying someone a cold bottle of water in the middle of summer? The smallest gestures make the biggest difference. You may not see it immediately, but just one small act can set off a chain reaction and lead to a better and brighter world.

Think about it.

Quick Post

This post isn't going to consist of anything too earth-shattering.

I actually just wanted to link you to my other blog in case you were interested in checking that out. I will link it here. I kind of talk about random things on there. I will probably end up writing reviews about different things on that blog. Actually, I just wrote a review on a couple of CDs that I bought and a review on a book/series that I have just finished reading will go up soon on there as well. So yeah... If that interests you at all, go ahead and check that one out. Maybe leave a suggestion on something that I should check out next.

That's about it for now. I'll check back in soon!

Well Hello

Whoo! Second post... how many months later? Yeah...

Anyway... I know... I'm bad at this.

Tonight I was just kind of sitting alone in my room listening to Lights (seriously, if you haven't heard of her or her music, check her out) and was just kind of thinking about stuff that is going on in my life right now. No, I won't give you completely specific details because, frankly, I don't care to nor would you care to read them. But at the moment there are some huge life changes going on all at once and it can be hard for me not to be overwhelmed by all of it. Maybe overwhelmed isn't a strong enough word. I'll be honest: it all terrifies me. And then a couple of Lights’ songs came on, one by the title of "Face Up" and the other by "Lions!". To give you an idea of what these songs are about since not everyone will be at all familiar with them: Face Up’s chorus says "…The way you feel is something everybody goes through/ Dark out, but you still gotta light up/ You need to wake up/ Gotta keep your face up". Now Lions! is actually written about World of Warcraft, but it is still applicable and some of my favourite lyrics say that "Lions make you brave/ Giants give you faith/ Death is a charade/ You don't have to feel safe to feel unafraid".

So, while I was listening to these songs I started to think, which admittedly can be interesting with the things that tend to run through my head. But I’ll let you have a snippet just this once.

A lot of things scare me. Clowns, for example, make me quite nervous. Geese terrify me. But I have never felt the apprehension about a situation that I do about the one(s) coming up. Why is that? Going to a new place can be hard (one of the things that will be happening to me soon), but I am certainly not the first one to do so. People do it every day for various reasons.

“The way you feel is something everybody goes through”. Fear is a very common emotion and one that many people let take over entire situations and how they react to different circumstances. Yes, there are some things that should be feared, but most fear is unjustified. My fear I would categorize as such. I have no real reason to be afraid of going somewhere new. I can still easily stay in touch with people I am leaving and it is very easy to make a trip back. There is no reason to be afraid of any of it.

“Gotta keep your face up”. Sometimes we need to push through uncomfortable situations and keep a positive outlook on it. We are put in the positions that we are in for a reason. If God didn’t want it to be a certain way, it wouldn’t be. So sometimes we all just need to learn to ‘go with the flow’ and rise up against the fear that we all feel. Every circumstance that we go through helps us learn and grow stronger as a person. We shouldn’t look at them with dread; we should look at them with anticipation about what we will learn about ourselves and how it will help shape our lives.

Now for my favourite part. “You don’t have to feel safe to feel unafraid”. This, for me, is the lyric that I can identify the most with. I may not feel comfortable with what I may encounter, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be fearless and take on life head on. I will be putting myself way out of my comfort zone (feeling slightly unsafe) in the near future. I can look at it in different ways. I can be afraid of it and try to avoid it as much as possible or I can be brave about it and make the most of it. Many people choose the former, which is a shame.

Bravery, I believe, is a part of someone’s character- but it can also be shaped and made more evident in somebody. We are all brave in some way. Some may show it differently than others. But no matter what situation one is going through, there will always be someone that has gone through it before and has come out a better person for it. You don’t have to be OK with that particular situation, but that shouldn’t keep you from being bold about who you are and what you will do about it [the situation].

So, this post may have been more to my benefit than yours. It was simply me thinking through things on paper (well, actually a computer screen). I apologize if much of it didn’t make any sense or felt it was chopped. It wasn’t meant to be a perfect blog post. It was just something that was on my mind that I needed to get out. If anyone has any comments, agreements, disagreements, etc, feel free to leave them.

Next post shouldn’t be so long in coming and it will probably be more put together. But until then- keep an open mind and don’t take everything at face value.

Some thoughts about Christianity within Society

I decided to delete this first blog post of mine for a couple of reasons.

First: I didn't want someone ripping off my paper and using it as their own.

Second: It was quite long and I didn't figure too many people were interested in reading it anyway.

If anyone had read it or is interested in reading it, let me know and I will repost it.