Crunch Time

So this year has been a year of changes and I feel like I have grown more in one year than I have the past two years. A lot of things have changed: New city, new apartment, new possibilities that I would never have thought I would have been blessed to have. But while things are working in my favor, there are some things that stay the same for the wrong reasons. Every year that I have been in college, whenever it gets to the mid-semester point, I would hit a wall. I'd stop going to class. I wouldn't do my homework, and I would do the bare minimum just to get by. And that was fine with me.....back then.

But this semester will be different. I am working through the wall because there is more on the line this time around. And it's not just a grade or a point on my GPA. It's my life. And these are the days that will affect the rest of my life and how I go about doing things. And that is worth putting everything I have into making sure things go the way I want them to. You can win anything unless you're willing to make the effort and put in the work.

Overcoming Disappontments

Wow...this came at the right time. I received this message on Facebook after getting some disappointing news that my parents have finally filed for divorce and that my father has decided to use the money that should have gone to me after my car was totaled as the means to pay for the divorce. It's just a sad thing when you even trust your own family members. I literally made list of the people in my life that I can, without a doubt in my mind, trust completely and trust me, it's not long. Only 11 people made the cut. Well anyways, I was starting to get upset when this message came to me. It is entitled "Overcoming Disappointments":

TODAY'S SCRIPTURE
"Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past"
(Isaiah 43:18, NIV)

TODAY'S WORD from Joel and Victoria
Every person, no matter how much faith they have or how good a person they are will face disappointments. It may be something simple like not getting that promotion you really hoped for, or not closing that big deal you worked so hard on. Maybe you didn't qualify for a house you really wanted. Or, it may be something more serious like a relationship not working out, the death of a loved one, or some kind of illness in your body. Whatever it may be, the reality is that we’re all going to suffer some setbacks. But I believe one of the main keys to overcoming disappointments is learning to let go of the past. The past weighs you down and holds you back.

If you feel "stuck" today, you may want to examine what you're holding on to. Be willing let go of the past by choosing forgiveness. Who hurt you? Who wronged you? Release it to God. Do you need to forgive yourself? Do you need to receive God's forgiveness? Make the choice today to let go of the past so that you can experience the bright future God has in store for you!

A PRAYER FOR TODAY
Heavenly Father, search my heart and mind today. Show me any area where I may be holding on to the past. Help me to receive Your forgiveness so that I can extend forgiveness to others and move forward in the wonderful plan You have for me. In Jesus' Name. Amen.

I hope this elightens you and offers guidance in some parts of your lives, because it did for me.

Millisecond Glance

Our eyes meet and
for one millisecond...
time stops...
nothing moving.
nothing matters
but the electricity between
2 pair of glassy eyed stares
rapt in vigorous conversation
divulging secrets we dare not
tell aloud...
secrets of heartache and unclosed
doors and requited but unreturned love...
then the moment breaks.
and we look away knowing
that in the history of moments
there will never be another
like it. From one millisecond
glance, we know each other better
than we could have anticipated
and the air will forever hold
our secret…forever…

New Beginnings

Okay, I accept that I have been slacking on the blogs (don't judge me!), but I am back and I have a lot to catch you up on. First off, an update on the status of my car. For those that don't know (which is all of you...lol), a couple of weeks ago, my car was bombarded with hail that resulted in several cracks in my windshield, a cracked tail light, and countless dents in my car. I have since then been trying to get the claims adjuster out to evaluate it but he was never in my part of town. He just came yesterday to let me know that my car may be totaled. Now that's one thing I didn't expect him to say. But it maybe a blessing in disguise. If it is totaled, I may just get a new car. And with the way the economy and the auto market is right now, this would be the perfect time to do so.

Also, things are looking up poetically as well. For the past 7 months, I have been competing in the Dallas Poetry Slam almost every Friday to see where my poetry is compared to the best of Dallas. The goal of the slam is to get high enough scores to place in the top 3, with cash prizes for the top two. If you place 5 times before the end of the slam season, you qualify for the Dallas Grand Slam Championships, a giant free for all with the top 4 earning a spot on the 2009-2010 Dallas Poetry Slam team that represents Dallas at the National Poetry Slam later on in the year. So far I have 4 places and I am hoping to get my 5th very soon. It's funny that last year I wouldn't have ever recited my poetry out loud, even less in public. But new beginnings are here and I can only sit back and watch God work.

I do believe the tide has changed in my life and in a very good way. Things are working out in a way I wouldn't have expected them to this time a year ago. I guess I never really realized my growth until now, when things are starting to show and pay from the hard work I put into my life just to make it.

That's it for this edition of "Skech my Dreams". I'll leave you with this: things may look grim now, but trust that the end of the tunnel is coming and you will see the light shine in your life in due time.

Keep your creativity close, let your imagination run, live for the moment, and always have fun.

.......yeah, this is a good feeling.

Don't you love the feeling when everything starts coming together and things are just working in your favor? That's how I feel right now. And it's really amazing that only 2 months ago, I was wondering if I would ever feel like this or be in the place mentally ever again. I felt like I had the mythical "weight of the heavens" like Atlas (quick fact: Atlas in Greek mythology was responsible for holding up the heavens to keep heaven and earth from touching each other.) But one day, I made a choice. I chose to not let my troubles keep me from my life. I had too much to do and too much to live for to let any kind of problem create a wall in front of me that I can't climb. But isn't that just how life is? One great big obstacle course full of walls and pitfalls, and forks to see what will make you crack? This reminds me of one of my favorite poems by Robert Frost called "The Road Not Taken":

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Like the rain, the happiness washed away all my negativity and renewed my confidence and faith that everything will work out and that all I need to do is keep moving forward and let the pieces fall where they may. (preferably in my favor, but you never know.)

Well that's all for this edition of "Skech My Dreams". Remember: Don't linger on bad things and focus on the good in life.

Keep your creativity close, let your imagination run, live for the moment, and always have fun.

I need a title for this. I'm stumped.

Okay, I wrote this poem a while back, but I am still fiddling with it. Read and comment on what you think it needs. Thanks!

I am going on a trip to the future with destiny. So just to be sure I asked her what I needed. She told me all you needed was everything from your closet that you keep locked afraid to bring sunlight into that place. Then I told her she was wrong. I am not afraid to bring light in there because I no longer have skeletons in there. I have mountains. Mountains of all of the people that ever tried to dissuade me from dreaming. I packed my suitcase full of mountains and forgot to leave room for my valleys of hope and peace but she don't worry. We can pick those up along the way. All you need is a smile and an open heart to pay for those valleys until you have enough to make real estate out of dreams and build skyscrapers out of words, love, and life. And I understand what she I saying but I can't see myself able to do that, but she say that’s why I am here. She sees what I can't. She double tap dances on my footsteps to make sure that I am on track. I arrive at my gate confident that as soon as I got on that plane all my fears would be over, but I was stopped by security because they said I couldn't have my bag back because I was carrying concealed weapons in the form of mountains. I told them that yes I was carrying weapons. My weapons are words and I keep those mountains as stepping stones that I can't make my way to the future without. So as I leave the gate behind look out the window of my plane of purpose and seeing that past asking for constant postcards and calls because it knew I was finally going....home.

It's finally here!

Okay you can call me what you will, but I am super stoked about the new Harry Potter movie - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It's been too long since the last movie came out (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) that I had to re-watch the series over again, which didn't take long. I was very frustrated with Warner Bros. when they pushed it back from it's original release date in November, but as it turns out, that may actually have been the best move. Because not only did it create a bigger feeling that this movie will trump the last 5, but to wait until the summer to get peak output on the age range (12-24 - I know very well that most of you don't fall into that age range, but it is the target.)

I hope that the movie stays more true to the book than the last 5. The last movie, while entertaining, left so much out that it really angered me. I really think that they should go back and redo all the movies and do them by the book, no matter how long the movie will be. If you take a look at the following, one would come to the assumption that the revamped movies will do surprisingly well.

Don't you love the feeling when you pick up a good book and the moment you start reading it, you just can't bring yourself to put it down until you have finished reading it cover to cover? That was the feeling when I first started reading the series. I originally started reading them because i was bored and I didn't have anything to do while I was incapacitated (I had a broken ankle...but that's another story) and I was hooked after that. I knew I had to keep reading them. I would have my best friend drive me to Barnes & Noble to buy the other ones as I finished them.

Ahem....sorry for the tangent

All in all, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince = a MUST see. You'll regret it if you don't.