Excited For My Return.

I am so excited for my return to APU. Not just because I love the school and the community and the classes, but because there are so many faces I miss seeing. There are people I miss sitting on campus with, so many friends I miss going on "dates" with and laughing the day away. I made some memorable moments and valuable friends that have helped change my life for the better.

There is just something special about this year that makes me feel genuinely happy. Life is looking up. Love is in the air and God is good! Seriously, I feel so loved at that school. I feel important! I feel smart too! And I hated school and homework! But of course, that was high school and not many people actually like high school... Well, at least I didn't!

This is a more casual blog entry, sort of like a facebook post entry. But I felt this blog needed an update nonetheless. I'm learning a lot this year! I'm learning to be happy too. I'm learning to be myself.

Nothing compares to what God prepares.

The Hardest Part.

The hardest part of letting go of fear is getting yourself to realize reality. I wish I knew why we as humans were capable of undergoing any such fear, but I guess that is life. When our desires mix with our actual possessions and life choices, things can get messy. But when reality comes riding by showing you things you wish were not so, it's not fun at all and it probably never will be.

But how do you prepare yourself to accept a "no" to what you wish was a "yes"? Or how do you prepare yourself for the answer you'd instead dread if it came to be true? I've of course not mastered this at all, but daily I might fight my mind over it. If I'm to let go of fear, I either need to face it first, or accept the thing I fear the most may very well happen.

I'll admit this: one day I'm afraid that someone will discover how amazing you actually are and steal you away. If that day comes, I am not sure how well I'll handle it. I imagine though that I am not the only one who sees this and you're definitely not a game to win. I'm not looking for competition, fighting for a prize that I may not achieve. But you're special enough to fight for, if I ever found the right amount of courage.

But they'll find you and I'll have to let you go. You'll be extremely picky as you've always been and I'll be behind you wondering who will ever be good enough for you. Yet I'm too afraid to selfishly tell you that I don't want to let anyone take you. I respect what we have, and yet I'm hiding so much from you because I'm just afraid of your response. Not that you'd be hurtful about it, but I know you'd be honest and I am not sure I'm what you will ever want.

Often times you make comments as if I could be, and I go off in daydreaming a day you change your mind about us. I didn't realize I lost a ton of hope until I found myself desperate for just a dose. It's what I now pray for, that God could simply give me hope. In this story and in my entire life. Maybe I've forgotten what hope feels like and with the lack of it, I feel awful. I pray now that He will fulfill me and grant me back that hope that will get me through this.

You are quite the treasure, and even if I cannot attain you, I will still try to value you and love you the way I know you deserve. If one day that means letting you go, I'll love you enough to do so. And one day I'll find the strength to tell you all of this.

Stuck in Climax.

There is always a format in which great books and great movies are written and created. They all contain a plot that has its climax and conclusion to seal the deal. We are drawn in with being able to connect to the characters, understand the issue, and long for a solution. Right before it reaches its happy ending, with all issues resolved, it hits a rough climax of the story. In this moment, it’s as if everything has gone wrong and all looks worse. But in due time, the pieces connect and all characters can breathe once again because they've instead learned a valuable lesson and received their reward for enduring.

I like to say this is the typical way of life. In fact, perhaps script writers for these type of movies only use this format because it not only lets the audience get the most out of a story with all questions hopefully answered, but because it also reflects how life can be. We all discover an issue or situation in our own lives and we all work to find a solution. In a sense, it’s inevitable because we’re all somehow looking for that “good life.”

As for me…I’m not sure I’ll ever get past the climax. It’s frustrating to think about, sad to admit, and incredibly stressful to deal with. In fact, I spend a lot of months pushing it aside. I've mastered the idea of standing back up and continuing forth. I can proudly say that I am a patient and persevering human being. But by proud, I do not mean I shout it to the world. I only mean that I've found myself doing this for years on end and each thing I’ve faced has yet to find its rightful solution.

But today I simply feel like crying. I feel like once again I just want to give up and I have no idea how. In fact, it seems so impossible to give up. But this want to give up is exactly what caused me to even write such an idea that even when I reach the point of giving up, nothing changes at all. I actually think about the lack of change now, as if I caught on to my own pattern that I subconsciously acted out beforehand. I’m that character in a movie who confesses they cannot do what they’re doing anymore because it hurts. Only in this movie that I call life, I don’t get that wonderful and rewarding solution.

To me, this sounds so negative. As if I don’t believe in myself or in God. But that is not true, I know it is not. I’ve spent plenty of years believing in myself and plenty of years believing in God. He is the reason why I’ve managed to endure with the patience I recognize I have. I've believed the impossible so much so that I had friends tell me, “You of all people are the most deserving I know with how much you fight and how long you’ve waited.” In shock I would look at them and think to myself, wondering if it really seemed that way.

It seems that in my life I have managed to pick the largest issues I've faced, and believe they would change. I would spent an excessive amount praying, waiting, and believing. Eventually I would lose the strength and either accept reality, or walk away. No, in fact, I was pushed enough to run away. I don’t know what a reward really is, or so it feels that way. Things come my way, I have this faith that maybe God sent forth certain people and then in the end, I feel like I've lost and they won. So I walk along and try to find happiness again.

To be honest, I don’t really know what to pray for anymore. I’ll pray for requests, like a friend in need or a family member who is sick. I’ll pray for my own self, to make it one more day or as usual, just get up and endure, even if nothing changes. I’m twenty-three years old and I still suffer the same things since I was seventeen. I think that’s long enough to safely say that I am most definitely tired and out of reasons to continue on.

It’s just that I spent a great deal of time praying for the situation I once was in. I made a friend, accidentally fell in love, learned he didn't want more, and then later discovered God wanted me to learn what love was. So I loved him while learning and sacrificed more than I ever have in my life. I prayed daily and nightly for years, going back and forth between my own pain and praying for his salvation. I begged God, bribed God, questioned God, and cried out many times to God. I still believed He would do something and that something would change. But in the end, I lost the ability to go on. My heart was hurting, my faith was confused, and I was blinded to reality.

I chose to turn it to God at last minute, to get up and go, to walk forth, and suffer even more when I could have chosen to simply give up. But I couldn’t. My faith was still strong, somehow…and I wanted to still believe. I just wanted to believe that God had something greater for me. During that time a huge change in heart occurred.  Not the friend’s heart, but mine. I gave up that battle and felt nothing anymore. The pain was gone, the suffering ended, and I believed I could do anything. I just didn’t know what to do yet.

I left that story at its climax. The friend I prayed daily for grew worse, became an atheist, and I looked back wondering what the point was. But sure, I did move on. But it’s so hard to believe that my faith could do anything. Because along with that huge story, I’ve had plenty of smaller stories. Stories where I feel like I am sent into people’s lives, but I never see that person actually become changed in any way because of me. Often, they even grow angry and our differences show, and I lose them instead. Even if they come back later apologizing, we are never the same.

I can never seem to see a change, or a solution…a conclusion. Everything gets left the way it was, if not worse, and I move along trying to simply find my own happiness for the sake of my sanity. But I’m tired and quite frankly, I am broken. I feel like begging God for one reward so I can just feel like my prayers mean something, that they make a difference.

And now here I am, in love all over again with someone else and this one is already saved. I’m not begging God to save him or change him, I’m not hurt by what he does to me, and I’m not worried over his life. He asks me for prayer when he’s in need and prays for me in return. He has his issues and he deals with them as best as he can. He doesn't bring me down, he doesn't offend me… He’s just that one friend in my life who makes me feel better when I’m around him and afraid when I’m away. I've become afraid that I will keep on falling for him and that one day I will just give up. And nothing will ever change on his part.

I believe this without trying because it is all I know. I am not sure how to know otherwise anymore. When I want to give up, there is no beautiful solution, a change in scenery, and a happy ending. It is this constant climax, where everything goes wrong when I feel like giving up and then that is it. It stays that way until I have to choose to get up, continue on, and believe anyway. Believe what? I’m not sure anymore. I can’t make him choose me, I can’t make anyone choose me. If I could though, it wouldn't be that satisfying. And although I know God chooses me, it’s really hard to feel a certain way when I lack to feel it on this earth.

I have no examples to go off of. And if I did have an example, it would have been the way my dad bragged about me. But the truth and reality of it all is that my dad is gone now. To add to all of this lack of reward, I lose my one and only dad. I find myself trying incredibly hard to now instead believe that I am at a proper climax in my life and that soon enough, I will find my reward. I can’t help but want to believe that. I think that I will feel silly, as if I’m one step away from it all… But that never has happened. I’ve been here before. I’ve felt this before. The only thing that happens next is another set of years waiting for things that never happen. I wish I could have better endings to my stories. But all people hear from me are helpless looking situations and no solutions. No rewards. No exciting news.

Maybe I embrace my ability to make it into a top Christian university because it’s that one thing I could proudly say, “Hey, I got accepted. Hey, I finished my first year. Hey, I’m going for BFA in production.” And no, I’m not graduated yet to say I actually completed it, and I don’t have a job in movie production, but I’m on my way in hopes that this one thing in my life will have its ending, solution, and reward to one day share this story. But yet I didn’t even spend years wanting this. In fact, it hit me overnight and took a few months to happen. I didn’t spend as much time praying for this the way I spent with other things.

I’m writing this to say that I want God to change my heart. I want Him to teach me why I feel this way. I’m writing in hopes that I will understand what’s going on because I want to believe. I want to keep going. I want to know what a reward feels like for enduring all these years that I have.

I want to feel special and important the way I am taught God feels about me. I want to experience what that really, truly means. I want to one day look into someone’s eyes and believe them when they say that they love me and value me. I only want that because it’s built into me to want that but I am one step away from giving up that dream. Because it’s that one dream that I cannot reach on my own.