"Where do you see yourself in 5 years?" "That's a good question..."

I am unemployed. It’s not fun. I’ve been home for about a month now, and I’m starting to get bored. At first, it was like vacation. “No more pencils, no more books! No more teachers’ dirty looks!” But now I need to find a job or I will go crazy. I need purpose. I mean, I’ve started to exercise and play the piano more, and that gives me something to do each day. But they’re kind of pointless seeing as how I’d really rather gain weight to fit my clothes again and get my curves back and the piano doesn’t even hold the same magic it once did. I need something to stimulate my mind and not make me feel like I’m wasting my life, or as Friend with Special Place puts it, being an “oxygen thief.” (I would like to put “I feel like an oxygen thief” as my facebook status, but that will garner a lot of “what’s wrong?” questions. It sounds rather suicidal, which I’m not by any stretch of the imagination, so I’ll just leave that alone.) You would think I’d use this time to get back to where I used to be with God, but I believe Howard Dude is getting in the way. Which probably means I need to get rid of him. The thing about him is that he’s been through the same thing I’m going through right now, so it’s nice to have him there because he understands. We’re compatible on so many levels. All my friends who’ve seen us together think we’re great together and ask me why we aren’t dating. But being with him means that I will probably eventually compromise my morals (again) and I feel that the closer I get to God, the further I’ll get away from him. This sounds like a no-brainer: get rid of the dude who you’re not even in a real relationship with to be with the God of the universe who’s waiting to be there with you and for you. But a part of me wonders if I can have both. I know our relationship is going to change, but do I have to cut him off completely? It feels like we’re in an actual relationship, which I haven’t had since high school. I like the notion that someone who doesn’t have to care about me or spend time with me wants to care about me and be with me. He misses me. He likes my body. He likes me, and I feel like I have a piece of his heart (I don’t want all of it because I wouldn’t know how to handle it anyway). I also feel like he needs me in some way. I’m not entirely sure if this is true, but it seems as if he’s opening up to me more and more and is beginning to consider me part of his go-to circle when he wants to vent.

I tell myself that when I get a job everything will right itself and I will not be tempted to compromise myself in any way. But who’s to say this is true? Why is a job the be-all and end-all? Probably because ever since I was little, I wanted the amazing job that paid for the amazing apartment and let me lead my amazing social life. I always pictured myself as together: Sex and the City without the sex part (although the sex has been creeping into my goal. See, compromised morals). To achieve this image would mean that I’ve accomplished my life’s goal, which should make me feel fulfilled. So theoretically, fulfillment is only a job away. The problem is that this goal is shallow and short-sighted. I don’t have real details of how I’m going to achieve this fabulous life. When they ask me in interviews what I want my life to be like in 5 years, I make something up on the spot. It would seem that I should face reality and make new life goals that have more substance and detail. But I don’t think I can do that because I feel like my first job will set me on my life path. In other words, I have no real idea what I want to do with my life and I’m just looking for a job to give me some kind of direction.

This is no way to live.

For the record..

When I get a prophetic word spoken over me, I like to write down the day, and even the time it was said so that I can look back and read it to remind me when I inevitably forget what God said. For some reason, I didn't do this last week, so here it is before I forget:

Saturday, April 10, 2010, at 8:49 p.m., my dad called me and said God put it in his spirit that He has a job for me, and that I will like it.

You have no idea (or maybe you do) how that made me feel. Earlier that day, my mom called me to say that I'd gotten a letter from the place where I'd had an interview weeks ago. Letters are never good, and I knew that if I'd gotten the job, they would've called me, but I still had some hope that maybe I was wrong. I wasn't. Even though I knew it was coming (they told me they'd have an answer in 3 weeks, it'd been 6), it still hurt and I cried like a baby on the phone while not trying to let my parents know I was crying. I really wanted that job. Like really. There was a small part of me that somehow wasn't too keen on the job, but the rest of me wanted it sooo bad. Hearing that I didn't get it was a dagger. I mean, how many rejections can a person take? My Plans A, B, and C failed. Plan A's, yea, you hope they come through, but it's not exactly certain, so you make a plan B. That's why people have Plan B colleges they apply to, so they know they have somewhere to go. Rarely do you ever hear about Plan B falling through, and who talks about Plan C's? So I was walking around with a heavy heart. Most of the day I was fine, but then at some point everyday I was having little panic attacks and mini-breakdowns because I have no idea what I'm doing after graduation, and when I saw a way up, inevitably I seemed to crash back down. Those times, my future looked...blank. That's a scary thought.

So that word was timely for me. Everything that my dad has told me is coming from the Lord has come, which is one reason why I hadn't had a full breakdown yet. He'd told me over the summer that God was planning on doing great things with me. So if I had this word, why was I so distraught over a simple little job that I probably won't keep for that long? I don't know. I guess I looked at it as something that was far off, that eventually I'd get there, but the steps to it were hazy and dim. To use a cliche, I couldn't see the forest for the trees. I've been keeping scriptures like Jer 29 in my heart: "I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." I'd begun to actually believe this when my dad gave me this word a week ago. The panic attacks had started to come less frequently, but the bad news about the job set me back like 2 weeks. Once, I tried to write about my fear of being a failure, but something in my spirit checked me. Confirmation is a good thing. So now that I know what's happening, I have more peace now. There's some part of me that's still a little anxious, hoping it's going to come before I graduate. But since it's coming, I'll keep the word close to me, and work on completely getting rid of the anxiety.

Can you really call it trusting in God if you're constantly worrying?

Transitional phase

This is the phase that no one talks about in speeches and biographies. And if they do, it’s often romanticized, and by the end of the book, it’s a distant memory while basking in the glory of your accomplishments, after you’ve “arrived.”

This is the phase when the things that happened in the past don’t matter as much anymore because you need something good to happen in the here and now.

This is the phase when you see glimmers of light and pray that you didn’t misread the signs, that the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t an oncoming train about to crush you.

This is the phase when I remember why I don’t write anything during phases like these, why there are big gaps in my diary. I don’t really want to remember this feeling and relive the pain. I know it will hurt a little to read a few months/years from now, whether because it was as bad as I thought it was, or because in the big scheme of things it was trivial and realizing that I wasted time worrying about it when I could’ve been doing other productive things.

I blame my parents…

Since I’ve gotten out of the house, I can see why my parents did a lot of the things they did, and I appreciate it much more now. The only thing that still bothers me a lot is the music thing. Since I was only allowed to listen to gospel, and even then, there were some gospel artists they still didn’t like, my repertoire of music is relatively small. I don’t know any of the so-called “classic” music – those songs and albums that every black person knows, or should know by the invisible Council of American Negroes. So now that I’m basically grown, people talk to me and expect me to know these things, but I’m like, um, yea, uber-sheltered kid here. I used to get a pity look and a sympathetic nod, but now it’s just a major side-eye or an incredulous “What?! You don’t know about ____??!!” So I just shrug; what can you say? I mean, you can’t catch up on 18+ years of music in 4 years at school. You can catch up on a lot, but you’ll never get to where the people are who’ve been listening to the stuff for a while. There’s a whole nostalgia thing attached to the song that I will never be able to get.

*reading over*

This sounds…real whiny, like the-other-kids-are-doing-it-so-why-can’t-I type thing. Or like a Christian that wants so hard to be like everybody else, and not be different. Even now, there’s a lot that I don’t even try to listen to cause I don’t feel like the possibility of being exposed to something that’s gonna mess me up. I know there is good non-gospel out there, but you have to wade through so much junk to get to it, I don’t know if it’s worth it. I guess I’m at the point where I’m leaning toward ignorance of what’s out there; in this case, ignorance is bliss.

Transition period

Being in a state of flux is uncomfortable. I’m not one for incessant anticipation, sitting on the edge of my seat for a seemingly interminable amount of time for the next event to pop out at me to scare the crap out of me. Then I just get angry and frustrated, but I still can’t stop watching. It's like a slow-moving train wreck. So I’m fighting to get out of the angry and frustrated phase, cause that’s no way to live. It’s mad stressful. Something is around the corner, whether it be a job, or feeling like I’ve finally come to the place in God I’m supposed to be right now. But I will keep praying, constantly, because I can’t do this life without knowing that I’m doing the things I’m supposed to be doing, that even if I’m struggling, that God has a purpose for it, that it’s not in vain. Friend with Special Place is always emphasizing the struggle part of it, but I just can’t dwell on that. As long as I know that God is with me, then I can deal with it a lot better. When I’m not sure if it’s me screwing up or God testing me, that’s when I freak out. As I’ve been doing for the past few weeks. It just seems like it’s been one thing after another, with people actin a fool for no reason, missing job opportunities by this much, and juggling school and credit card payments so my bank account doesn’t suddenly converge to zero, especially when there’s been things coming up that have been taking me away from working (but really, I wonder why I’m spending so much, cause I usually don’t do things like this. I feel like I’ve been constantly whipping out my school/debit/credit card. Mint.com here I come.) I really didn’t want to touch my savings this semester at all, and since I decided that, it’s been cut in half. Ohhhhh, life.

Just to give you an analogy for what I feel is going on: In football, when the receiver is running with the ball, there’s usually a line of people coming to tackle him. If he can get around that last dude and “turn that corner” to run up the sideline, then he could possibly go straight for the touchdown.** But even though he’s really close to getting clobbered, there’s a very real chance he could make it. I just know that if I don’t let despair and fear tackle me, I will be ok. Actually, I’ll be fantastic. The people who can “turn that corner” get put on the highlight reel. Not that that’s my goal, but you know what I’m saying; it’s a signal of a good play. I just try to think about the things that can come to me, the things I can accomplish when I defeat the things that are trying to defeat me. So here’s to overcoming.

He don’t want you sad, He wants you seeking
I watch and pray as I’m peeking
Have you now known, have you not heard
Isaiah 40:28 words?

- “Strong” by Adrianne Archie

**Shoutout to Dad for unknowingly teaching me lots of things about football over winter break.

Finally, a useful snowstorm

The last storm was on a weekend = useless. So in all my four years and snowstorms at school here, this is the first time we've had a snow day. So now I'm just hoping my job closes so I can write this paper.

I'm realizing all the time I've wasted at school, so now I'm gonna use this last semester to leave my imprint and do what I should have been doing for the last 4 years. So here goes...

What would you do?

My coworker is gay, and he told me some story about his (gay) best friend stealing a guy from him when he was trying to talk to him, all while said friend is in a monogamous relationship (A lot of gay dudes I've met are catty. Like Mean Girls, high school catty). What do I say to that? “Excuse me, I’m a Christian and I don’t agree with homosexuality, so I really don’t want to talk about this with you.” Something like that would lead to a whole discussion about me being homophobic, hostile feelings, and possibly a trip to HR. I didn’t really say much except “wow” or “that’s really mean.” My face didn’t look all that interested (so he says), but I was thinking frantically, “O my God, what do I do??!!” and quickly found a way to change the subject without being rude (I hope). The thing is, I don’t have a problem with hanging out with gay people. I’ll do regular, non-gay, things like go out to eat with them, chill with them in somebody’s room, laugh and talk. But do not ask me to go to the gay clubs or drag queen fashion show with you. I do not want to participate. The thing is, situations like my co-worker’s happen to both homo and hetero-sexual relationships, so does it matter if I talk about it? Am I encouraging behavior that I don’t agree with or cosigning it simply by not saying I disagree with it? Inquiring minds want to know.

Early reflections

Every year on New Years Eve, I write in my journal before I go out anywhere about what I’ve done over the year, how I felt about it, and what I want to do in the next year. The usual stuff. Unfortunately, I left my journal at school, so that probably won’t be happening. So as a quick (and early) summary, this year hasn’t been the greatest, although I’ve been tremendously blessed. I’ve screwed up a lot of things, and made my life a lot more complicated than it had to be. For me, it’s worse knowing it’s my own fault that things didn’t go right than if someone else had a hand in it. But all I can do now is look forward. I’ll be graduating next year, and there are so many things that go along with that that I’m ready to jump into. I need this phase of my life to be done.

Vacation musings

As I said earlier, I’m over my extra-curriculars. One of them has these conferences all the time, but I really don’t think I can come up with the money to go this year. If there were a couple others going with me, then I could’ve applied for a grant and paid nothing. But now that it’s just me, I have to pay close to $400. My advisor isn’t too happy that I won’t be going, but nobody is going to convince my parents to let me fly by myself, and she isn’t going to convince me to spend $400 if she’s not kicking in; I have to buy books next semester.

I told myself I would use this time to get in the spirit when I pray, and make my list of scriptures for various situations. This is so important for next semester so I don’t drive myself crazy. There is no way a child of God should be worried about these things.

Oh PMS, you have caused me to apologize more often than I should have to. Please go away. ASAP.

I've taken my last undergraduate accounting class!

I'm talking (in a way) to a dude I'll call Yellow Sweater, but he's too thirsty. Yesterday, he sent me a good morning text, then called me at 1:53 PM, and when I didn’t pick up, he sent me a text at 1:54 like “Are you ignoring me?” Um, yes. This is not the first time I’ve ignored you, why is this puzzling? And maybe I’m busy, did you think about that, stalker?

Why is my ex texting me now?

Christmas vacation is…eh. There were so many things that I wanted to use this break to accomplish, but now that I have time, I don’t feel like doing any of it.
Being able to go out without thinking about the ton of work I need to do is fantastic, but I need to do a bunch of things to get myself ready for my last semester in college (wow).

Life path

See, three posts in one night :)

I like knowing why people do things. What is the reasoning and what outside factors are affecting them and how? But I don’t just want to know why people do things, I want to use that information to make arrangements to fit their unspoken desires, and help them that way. I don’t see myself being a psychologist or psychiatrist, but I want to use that info to come up with a plan to translate those unspoken desires into concrete solutions. For example, person or business tells me, “We do this process this way because of XYZ,” but after doing some research I find that the underlying cause is actually ABC. So then I could change the process to address the issues and make it better fit their needs. This sounds to me like management consulting, but I’m open to any other ideas that incorporate business and psychology.

Bringing up old problems

I've actually written a lot of things in the past month, and will be posting soon :)

When I hear something I don't like, I don't always say something right away because I haven't decided yet how I feel. And so if I start talking about it I’ll more than likely get too emotional and won't get out what I need to say. So then I end up revisiting it multiple times over, which I think is more stressful and annoying then telling you about it later when I know exactly what the problem is. So how do I resolve this issue? How do I make my brain go faster and understand my reactions and emotions in two minutes when I'm used to taking days to get it together?

Jesus loves the little children...

I realized the love of God today (well, yesterday, while sitting in church). In Isaiah 55, the pastor was emphasizing the forgiveness of God – the sure mercies of David. He especially pointed out verse 7 that says He will abundantly pardon. David did so many things, on purpose things, but God still called him a man after his own heart. This stuff I already knew though. I was sitting there and thought of the verse in I John 4 that says that we love God because he first loved us. I just didn’t see a reason for my lack of self-esteem. God is chasing after me, wanting me to be closer to him, setting up circumstances so that all I have to do is walk into them and I will have all the love that I want. What got me about this is this is what I feel about Friend with Special Place in my Heart sometimes. I have done everything for him. I’ve pretty much been his girlfriend since we got back to school, but he doesn’t fully see that (he sees it, but he doesn’t see how it hurts sometimes when he puts up walls for no reason. I’ve given him no indication that I would betray him, yet he still believes that. It’s an affront on my character, which hurts that after all this time he doesn’t see who I am and how I feel about him. But that’s another story for another day). And I looked at what it’s like to be on the other side. Maybe this isn’t a good thing, but part of me was like, man, I give this dude a lot of love, and all he has to do is say yes, and I would give him even more. Wow, I really love this dude. But it was nice to realize that for once I was wanted. That if I made the effort, and it wasn’t even a really big effort, I could have all the love in the world that I wanted. God was just sitting there waiting for me, and it floored me to realize that he wants me. He wants the good and the bad of me, and is ok with my faults. He wants to gently change me, not rip me to pieces to break me down. I don’t really have to do anything to deserve His love. He accepts me for me. He loves my natural hair because he made it. My lips because he made them. My small hips and thighs because he made them. The things that he’s said about me will come to pass. If I stay with him, he won’t let me become a failure at life. I will do great things and affect people in a positive way. I can take for granted the things that he says, because His word cannot turn back to him void.

Energy

I have a lot of love to give. I have some energy deep down that’s trying to get out and attach itself to something. Until I find out what that is and what life has for me in the near and distant future, I guess I’ll have to deal and pray more. Living in the moment is rather foreign to me, but unexpected twists and turns are pretty run-of-the-mill in this thing called life.


But for the moment, I want to get this slightly negative energy off my chest.

Dear Roomie, thanks for finally cleaning up your mess. I know some of that was mine, and I take responsibility for my mess (and cleaned it), but this was probably the first time you’ve cleaned since we’ve gotten to school. And we’ve been here a month.

To the rest of my roomies: I love you all, and you’re very entertaining. Except for when I’m trying to study for an exam. Pipe down.

To the president and board of my resume-boosting extra-curricular activity that I’m SO over right now: If I tell you that we have $300 to spend, that does not mean plan events in the span of three weeks that require us to spend $250. You seem to forget that we have 3 more months and an entire semester left. Yes, we have fundraisers coming up, but really? You need money to make money. In your short time at the university, I know you've figured that out. Oh, and we do not have to have pizza at every event. Chips and soda will do.

To the Gospel music industry: Can I get some non-corny, non-preachy music? I want to hear your heart, not regurgitated sermons. The people listening to your music already go to church.

To Friend With a Special Place in my Heart: I’m really glad you explained yourself, even if it was just to explain why you don’t explain yourself. Your vagueness was pissing me off.

To my hormones: SHUT UP!!


Whew, that felt good! :)

Speak to me

Songs have a way of speaking to you in ways that spoken words just can't sometimes. I've been freaking out lately about my life, and after a really inspiring message on Sunday, I've (mostly) relaxed. My pastor was texting me and encouraging me, and right after I read his texts, Kirk Franklin's song 'My Life is in Your Hands' came on Pandora. I'd asked God for a word this morning, some type of encouragement just to let me know he was there with me and he had my back, and some direction on what I'm supposed to be doing. He answered my prayers! It's great when you can count on somebody to be true to their word. He said he's a present help in trouble, and he proved himself again. It seems small, but it's these small moments that help move me in the right direction.

Reaally long post coming on overdosing on church.

It's a little cloudy

So I just finished watching the movie Juno. I’d refused to watch it before out of silent protest. If a black girl gets pregnant, it’s the same old story of an irresponsible slutty hoodrat having kids to stay on welfare or WIC. But a white girl does it and she gets an Oscar nomination. However, after watching it, I see why it won an Oscar. It was very well-written and acted. The subtleties and themes could probably make a nice little paper, if I actually wrote papers. There’s a reason I’m an accounting major. Watching movies like that makes me wish I could verbalize my thoughts in an eloquent manner. Or should I say, verbalize them quickly in an eloquent manner. I can come up with great arguments, but I need a lot of time to get them together. I have passed classes with flying colors after failing tests because of my superb papers (exhibit A of grade inflation). I feel like I could have a lot to say, but I need to practice getting my thoughts out of my head. There’s a line in that same song I talked about in the last post (Elevator Music by Othello) that says “responsibilities rest on the tongues of the educated mind, now accountable to verbalize truth.” Those words may not be completely right, but the gist of what he’s saying is that if you have knowledge, you should share that with someone who doesn’t have it and try to help them out. I get these vibes from people and I see inconsistencies and flaws in explanations, but many times, I can’t quite put my finger on it. But when I finally do get it, it’s even better than that proverbial light bulb. It’s that feeling you get when the sun finally breaks through the clouds after you’ve been secretly pleading with it all day to come out because you knew that the day would be absolutely perfect if it would just shine as brightly as you knew it could. So until I get that feeling, I keep tweaking my thoughts, keeping in mind that the hard work will be worth it when the cloud is finally lifted from my mind.

I'm over it

*Btw, after that whole rant I had about my best friend, she called me two days later talking about how we need to stop these long breaks in between talking to each other (I'm pretty sure she doesn’t read this blog). After that it was like we hadn’t skipped a beat. I may have overreacted...

I was looking forward to this vacation from work, but now that it's here, I'm bored. Well, today I was bored. I’ve been going through so many emotions lately that it’s hard to trust my feelings. I’ve had so many conflicting feelings about school. It’s my senior year, the exciting and scary year that juniors dread and alumni constantly reminisce about. One part of me is just over it. I’m over the whole staying up all night studying (well, studying period), worrying about the event you’re planning, catering to the freshmen so they’ll keep your group going after you’re gone. I’m sick of it. I liked the work world and feeling like what I was doing was significant in some way, even if that way was that I could feed my ridiculous obsession with having money, even though I don’t like spending it. Since I must go to school, I just want to study to shore up my GPA, get a job, and have a good time. The only negotiable part is how I’m going to have a good time. I get satisfaction from my extra-curricular activities when I’m on top of things, and they turn out to be a success. The problem is the stress that comes with trying to make events successful. But I think my attitude for the next semester – not the year, I can’t think that far ahead – is to just get it done, and plan so that I have the least stress possible. The frustrating thing about this is that I feel like I should’ve had this attitude already in like, sophomore year. And in some ways, I’ve had it, but it hasn’t been entirely consistent. So now I feel like an idiot, even though I’ve mastered the art of looking like I have everything together. I hate that I constantly feel like I’m struggling to keep afloat. Maybe that’s why I liked working so much. I had a fresh slate, and I worked to take that opportunity and make a name for myself in the company. The actions I took had a direct effect on the results, unlike school, where I could work my butt off but still had no guarantee that I would succeed.
But I still feel like I’m missing the point. There’s a big empty space that supposed to be filled, but I feel like there’s a big hump I have to get over to get to the thing that’s supposed to fill me up. Really, I think my fluctuating emotions are a result of my fluctuating relationship with God. (Sidenote: I used to hate reading things where they would randomly start talking about God with no lead in, or have an obvious plot of ‘These were/are my problems, but I turned to/need to turn to God, and He fixed/will fix them.’ So I’m sorry if this seems like that, but really, I’ve been thinking about the reasoning behind these thoughts for quite some time now and I started noticing some patterns, so bear with me.) Whenever I’m talking to God regularly, I’m at peace with life. The craziest stuff will come up, but I freak out and then stay relatively calm because I know from experience, and not just from somebody’s grandma saying it, that God has an uncanny way of working things out. There’s this song by Othello (good rapper, you should check him out) called Elevator Music, and in the first line he says, “I guess that my stress is a direct effect of lack of elevation…” That’s exactly my problem. I hate that I feel like I write this every six months or so, but for some reason I keep doing this. I put myself on a rollercoaster that’s about to make me puke.