You are Not an Accident

Today in my physics class we were learning about the big bang.  Stay with me here.  I don’t know whether or not you believe in the big bang, and frankly, I don’t really care.  This isn’t about the big bang.  This is about you, and it’s about me.  In order to make my point, however, I need to explain something about this theory.  So buckle up and get ready for some science.

According to the big bang theory, a long, long, long time ago the universe was nothing but a miniscule, incredibly dense pocket of particles.  Each particle has an antiparticle, and when the two meet, they annihilate and form light.  Think about that.  Every single particle had an antiparticle, and these were colliding and destroying each other.  If that was the case, everything should have been destroyed, leaving only light.  Obviously that’s not the case.  So what happened?  Somehow, some of the particles must have survived.  How many particles?  Enough to form all the planets and all the stars in all the galaxies in the entire universe.  How many particles is that?

One in a billion.

One particle out of every one billion particles.

1/1000000000

To put this number in perspective, if there were as many particles in the beginning of the universe as there are people on earth right now, seven of them would have survived.  Seven.  Well, there were more than seven billion particles in the universe.  A lot more.  And an unbelievably small fraction of them survived.

How could that have happened?

“By mistake,” says my professor.  “You are an accident.”

That’s where he’s wrong.  Read these next words carefully, my friend.

 

You are not an accident.

 

Those particles – those one in a billion – came together to form a glowing ball just the right size, to create a little rock at just the right distance, and eventually, to create me – and you’re going to tell me it was all a cosmic fluke?

No.

When my professor said those words, “You are an accident,” they struck me to the core.  They made me shudder.  My mind immediately rebelled.  No way, I thought.  No way I’m here by chance.

Forget the improbability of that happening and think about what it would mean for us, personally, if that were the case.

What would be the point?

If we exist only because of some great cosmological accident, then what the heck is the point of our lives?  There’s no reason for us to exist.  In fact, by this logic, we shouldn’t exist.  We are accidents, like my professor said.  What do we do in the face of an accidental existence?

“Take advantage of it,” some would say.  “Live it up while you’ve got the chance.”  Get the best job, make the most money, have the best car, house, life.  Me, me, me.  Get, get, get.  Only it’s never enough.

You will never have it all.  There will always be more, and you will never be satisfied.

I think I know what my professor would say if I asked him to tell me the purpose of his “accidental” life.

“To learn all I can.”

And I understand that.  We as humans are naturally curious.  I certainly am.  I’m not majoring in astronomy and physics because I like math.  I’m curious.  I want to know more about our universe.  There is nothing wrong with that.

But that can’t be all there is.

We can never know it all.  There will always be another mystery, some confounding problem that cannot be solved.

“I’ll get one step closer to solving that mystery, so that the next generation can build upon what I’ve discovered.”

And they’ll get one step closer, and the generation after them will get another step closer, and the mystery will still never be solved.  Even if it is solved, another one will be there.

Your life will be forgotten.  Meaningless.  An accident.

That’s depressing.

 

But that’s not the whole story.

 

What if – again, stay with me here – what if those one in a billion particles were not an accident?  What if each one was chosen specifically?  What if it all happened for a reason?

Well, that’s already comforting.  That would mean that our existence has a purpose.  Even if we don’t know what that purpose is, we know it exists.  That’s better than nothing.

I can go one step better than that.  I know what my purpose is.

I know the one who picked out each of those particles way back at the beginning of the universe.  Not only that, he looked at those particles and knew, way back then, which ones would combine to become me.

I am talking about God.  The God.  Of the universe.  My God.

He could have just snatched out some particles at random, sent them on their merry way, and said, “Good luck!”  He could have, but he didn’t.  He picked out each one and put them together to make me exactly the way he wanted me to be.  Little old me, less than insignificant on the scale of the universe, hand crafted by the Creator.

And he loves me.

How could he not love his creation?

Think of someone making a model car, or airplane, or ship.  They put so much time and effort into their creation, painstakingly putting every piece exactly where it belongs.  They don’t do it just because they were told to, or because they feel some obligation to do it.  No.  They do it because they love it.  And when they finish their model, they don’t hide it away in a drawer somewhere.  They display it proudly on a shelf where people can see it and they say, “Look what I made.”

 

“Look what I made.”

 

God, the God of the universe, says this about me, and he says it about you.  He says it about every single person on this little rock floating through space.

He says it even though we keep making mistakes, the same ones over and over again, and new ones every day.  We are his creation and he will never, ever give up on us.

He loves us so much that he sent his only son to die for us.

For me.

For you.

For every bad thing that anyone has ever done and will ever do.

Because he loves us, and we are his.

So the next time you look around and wonder what the meaning of it all is, what your purpose is, why you’re even here at all, remember this:

 

You are not an accident.

 

You were created individually by the God of the universe, and he loves you more than you could ever imagine.  You, one tiny person on one tiny planet, are more important to him than all the stars in the sky.

 

I have a purpose.  I live for the God of the universe.

 

What’s your purpose?

 

 

Do you have questions about this?  Would you like to talk to me about it?  Send me a message or leave a comment.

Long Overdue Update (which is sadly lacking a cool title)

So, I just realized that I haven’t updated in over a month.  Oops.

Where to start?  Well, I’ve been working at Burger King since July 2nd, which has been an adventure and a half.  Today was supposed to be my last day, but alas, rain makes business slow, so my boss called and said I didn’t have to come in.  I have worn my Burger King uniform for (hopefully) the last time.  I can’t say that it was my favorite job, or that I’ll miss the work.  However, I will miss my coworkers.  I got to know a few of them rather well, and they are all such amazingly nice people.  For the most part, I think there are two things that make or break a job: your attitude, and your coworkers/boss.  I already talked about how my attitude toward working at Burger King changed radically, and that definitely helped me on days when work – frankly – sucked.  But in addition to that, my coworkers and managers were incredible.  And after all, they’re the real reason we’re here.  We didn’t come to Miami to get minimum wage jobs for a couple months just because we needed the money.  (In fact, yours truly has yet to receive all her paychecks.  More on that later.)  We came here and got these ministry locations in order to better serve the community, get to know people, and ultimately share the love of Jesus with them.  If we were able to be a light in a dark place to our coworkers, then our real purpose here has been accomplished.

Obviously it hasn’t all been fun and games.  I knew there was a reason I avoided working in fast food for as long as possible.  It’s just not my kind of job.  But there was an even bigger struggle than coping with a job I didn’t really enjoy.  I wasn’t getting paid.  Yeah.  Payday came and went, and there was no check for me.  The next week, same thing.  Three weeks in, I finally got my first paycheck.  I’m still missing at least one paycheck, but honestly, I’m not too worried about it at this point.  It’s been a stressful, confusing process, but that seems to be the way I learn lessons.  And boy, have I learned them.  I have learned to swallow my pride and rely on others to help me financially.  (Gee, you’d think raising support would’ve taught me that lesson.  Obviously not well enough.)  More than anything else, I’ve learned to trust God for, well, everything.  I trust that I really am where He wants me to be, because nobody ever said following God was easy.  I trust that I will be provided for and taken care of, though perhaps in ways that I wouldn’t expect or particularly enjoy.  I trust that He loves me and has a plan for me, and that no matter how badly I screw up, He can still use me to further His kingdom.

So what now?  Well, now I have less than a week left in Miami.  This week is going to be interesting, because we don’t work, some of the staff are coming back, and the schedule’s completely different than it has been all summer.  Basically, we’re focusing on processing and preparing to return to our homes and campuses.  I don’t think I’ve ever had so many conflicting emotions.  My desire to go home and return to “real life” is as strong as my wish that I never had to leave the amazing community and awesome friends that I’ve made here.  It’s so different than anything I’ve experienced before.  Last summer, when I spent two weeks in Colorado, it was over too soon.  I felt like we were just getting to know each other, and then we had to leave.  (That’s not to say it was bad.  Colorado was amazing!  Ask me about it sometime.  Seriously, I’ll talk your ears off.)  This summer, it’s been long enough to get to know people really well, to form real bonds, and – let’s just be honest – for some people to start pushing other people’s buttons.  A group of approximately 60 people seems pretty big, and it is.  There are people I’ve barely talked to all project.  But it’s also small enough that we’ve seen a lot of each other over the past two months.  You know how distance can make relationships stronger?  We could do with some distance.

But in all honesty, it’s been a blast and I will miss each and every one of these people immensely.  I can’t believe that it’s over so soon, but I feel like I am ready to go home and see my family, and go back to campus and spread Jesus’s love to my friends and classmates.

This will probably be my last update from Miami.  Sometime in the (relatively) near future, I’m going to go back through my things and write a post for each week of project, going over struggles, lessons, anything that happened that week.  (I wish I’d done that during project.  Note to self: weekly updates are cool, especially during life-changing experiences.)  So be on the lookout for that.

Until then, farewell.  I have 6 days left to enjoy Miami, and I’d hate to waste them!

The lesson I needed to learn: Nehemiah 4:9

One thing I really struggled with through this process of getting a job was balancing my effort with my trust in God.  I know that, even though I’m trusting God to provide a job and funds and everything else, I still have to do something.  I can’t rely on God to do it all for me.  But I also can’t fall into the trap of relying on my own effort.  I can’t just do all the work, get all the benefits, and take all the credit.  So where’s the line?  Well, I still don’t know when to quit.  I still try to do too much by my own effort.  But Wesley, who gave a great talk last week, cleared this up a little.

The answer can be found in Nehemiah 4:9, which is probably one of the most obscure bible verses I’ve ever heard used in a talk.  I’ll be honest, I didn’t know Nehemiah was a book of the bible.  But Nehemiah 4:9 says this: “But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat.”  I don’t know the exact context, but the gist is that, when their city was under attack, these people had faith and took action.  You can’t rely on one or the other.  You have to have both. 

Think about it in another context.  If you or someone you knew was really sick and needed surgery, what would you do?  You would certainly pray for their recovery (assuming you’re a believer), but you would also do your research, find the best hospital and the best doctor to do the surgery.  You would take action to get treatment, having faith that you will be healed.  That makes so much sense, at least to me.  The problem is that we – or at least I – don’t apply this to other situations. It doesn’t matter what you’re doing, you still need to have faith and take action.  Fill out job applications, visit stores, call managers, and trust that God will provide a job for you.  Write letters to supporters, send out Facebook messages, make phone calls, and trust that God will provide the funds you need.  Fill in the blank.

Where is the line?  What is the right balance between faith and action?  I don’t know.  I think it partially depends on the situation.  Was filling out online applications until 2 am crossing the line?  Probably.  But more importantly, I think it’s your heart that matters.  What is your motivation behind, say, filling out job applications until 2 am?  Are you working in faith, trusting that God will honor your efforts and provide a job?  Or are you thinking that you just need to do more, work harder, to get that job?  I can tell you that mine was definitely the latter.  That’s how you know you’re crossing the line.

Obviously this isn’t a one-time lesson.  I’m still going to make mistakes with this.  This is one of my biggest struggles.  Luckily, we have a God who forgives us again and again, even if it’s for the same sin.  This is probably the most valuable lesson I’ve learned so far on project, and I only learned it because it took so long for me to get a job.

Burger King, Here I Come!

Miami Summer Project Update: Day 23

Guess what… I HAVE A JOB!

Finally!  It’s only been three weeks of almost constant searching!  Here comes that success story I was talking about, right?  Time for me to brag about how diligently I worked to fill out the application, follow up with the manager, and nail the interview, right?

Nope.

I literally did nothing to get this job.  Brent, an amazing guy on staff here, has been working nonstop with a corporate-level guy from Burger King to try to get jobs for the five of us who were still looking.  This project has worked with the local BK’s in the past, and part of the problem this year was that we were originally told that they could take 6-10 people and they only took two.  That was two weeks ago.  Since then, Brent has been on the phone with this guy Jamie almost every day trying to get more people jobs.

Last night, everyone was at a local church for our Tuesday night group meeting.  One of the other jobless students came up to me and said, “Hey, I think we have jobs!”

“What?”

“Yeah, Brent said he wants to talk to all of us.  He looked really excited – he was running.”

Apprehensive and excited, I found the other students and met up with Brent, who told us that good ol’ BK finally came through.  The five of us will be divided between three different locations.  I was stunned.  I honestly didn’t know how to react.  Everyone seemed really excited, but like many other job situations, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect.  Was this a done deal?  Would we still have to interview?  What if it fell through?  He certainly made it sounds like we for sure had the jobs, but I had reservations.  Old habits are hard to break, and I have a very old habit of never getting my hopes up, because I’ve learned the hard way that that’s how you get heartbroken.  So I took my seat with tentative, reserved excitement.

That changed a couple minutes later.  A different guy on staff, whose kids I’ve been babysitting, put a hand on my shoulder and said, “I couldn’t be happier to be losing our babysitter.”

Suddenly, it hit me.  I had a job.  I almost burst into tears right there.  That would’ve been embarrassing.  I waited until I found my friend Allison and gave her the news.  Then I burst into tears.

Just before the meeting started, they made the announcement that, as of now, everyone on project had a job.  Monica, the awesome woman I mentioned last time, happened to be sitting right next to me.  I hadn’t told her about the job, thinking she might’ve heard about it from Brent.  (The staff talk to each other, right?)  Well, she hadn’t.  Upon hearing the news, her face lit up, she actually let out a little squeal, and she gave me a huge hug.  “Oh my gosh, what?  When?  Congratulations!”  It took me a moment to be able to explain – tearfully – the BK situation.

When I woke up this morning, I was still nervous and excited.  There was still that nagging sense in the back of my mind that this could fall through and I would be devastated.  But I met up with my friend Nikka and we went to the BK we were assigned.  I didn’t know what to expect.  Would we be interviewed?  Would we start orientation today?  Would we be turned away?  We spoke briefly to the manager and… we’re not in his system yet.  He has to call the corporate guy and get us transferred.  He told us to come back tomorrow to fill out the paperwork.

Well, that was anticlimactic.

But hey, WE HAVE JOBS!

This was such a humbling experience.  See, I’m a very determined, hard working person.  I never quit, to the point of it being a fault.  That’s part of the reason these past few weeks have been so exhausting.  While everyone who had a job had a set schedule, a concrete time to start and stop working, my job was to look for a job.  And I always felt like there was something more I could be doing.  Even in the evening, after everyone was done job searching for the day, I always thought I had to do more.  There were always more job applications to fill out, more positions to look for, more phone numbers to find.

That, in turn, lead to pride, anger, and resentment.  I couldn’t believe that I didn’t have a job.  I deserved it more, needed it more, than almost anyone else, and I was probably working harder at it than them too.   Yeah, right.  Lies, all of it.  And yet, that’s what I thought.  I resented the people who got jobs without much effort.  I was angry when the people who were still looking for jobs took a day to go to the beach while I stayed home and filled out online applications.  I was prideful.  Yeah, I said I was relying on God to get me a job, but come on, I was convinced that my hard work made me deserve it.

So you can imagine how I felt when I did nothing to get this job.

And perhaps you can imagine what it felt like to realize – holy cow – that’s a demonstration of the gospel.

I don’t deserve this job.  I don’t deserve a job at all.  I’ve been thinking all kinds of sinful things.  I haven’t been relying on God.  I am sinful, just like everyone else.  I deserve to be punished.  But because God loves us so much, he doesn’t give us what we deserve.  Instead, he forgives us.  That’s called mercy.

Forgiveness is already more than we could hope for.  We certainly don’t deserve to be given anything on top of that.  But God doesn’t stop at forgiveness.  Just as I was offered the gift of a job – which I did nothing to earn – God offers us the gift of salvation, eternal life, the gift of a savior: Jesus.  That’s grace – an undeserved gift.

The thing is, I don’t have to accept this job.  I could turn it down, take my chances, and put my faith in my own ability to get a job.  But who looks a gift horse in the mouth?  I guarantee that if I turned down this job, I would not get another job this summer.  The same thing applies to God’s gift to us.  It’s not enough to acknowledge that Jesus died on the cross for our sins.  We have to accept his gift – accept him as our personal Lord and Savior – to experience God’s plan for our lives, and eternal life after we die.

Realizing that was kind of like getting hit with a bag of rocks.  In a good way.  I was so humbled.  Nikka and I prayed together before going into the BK, and I honestly couldn’t think of anything to say other than “Thank you!”

This summer has been crazy.  I’m sure it will continue to be crazy.  If you had told me before I came here that I would be working at Burger King for the summer, it might have given me pause.  It probably wouldn’t have been a deal breaker, but I definitely would have thought, Come on, God.  Can’t you give me a better job than Burger King?  Now I am so beyond excited just to have a job that I couldn’t care less where it is.  I know I don’t deserve this job and that I am extremely blessed to have it.  I know that I am exactly where God wants me to be, and that he had excellent reasons to make me wait this long to get a job.  One of the reasons, I’m sure, was to teach me this valuable lesson.  Were there other reasons?  Probably.  Will I ever know them?  Probably not.  And that’s okay.

23 days into Miami Summer Project, I’m feeling blessed, humbled, excited, thankful, and ready to take on whatever comes next.

Perspective, Plans, and Power

Miami Summer Project Update: Day 18

Half the reason I started this blog was so that I could chronicle my experiences on this wonderful adventure known as Miami Summer Project.  The observant among you will notice that I have not posted anything since I bought the plane ticket to come here, and that I am now 18 days into the project.

Oops.

There are a couple reasons why I haven’t updated until now.  One is time.  They’ve definitely been keeping us busy!  The other, I am ashamed to admit, is because I was afraid.

Let me explain.

A big part of coming down here is that we get jobs for the summer.  They serve as ministry locations for us to get to know our coworkers and hopefully have meaningful spiritual conversations with them.  They also let us make money, which, as poor college students, is something we all need to do.  They’re also required by the project.  18 days in, I am one of 5 people (out of 60 total) who does not have a job.  This has been a huge challenge for me.  I have applied to over 50 stores and restaurants at 3 different malls.  I have never had this much trouble finding a job.  Ever.  The very first time I got a job, I applied to… maybe 5 places in my tiny hometown, explicitly avoiding fast food places, got a phone call, got an interview, and had a job within a week or two.  Same thing with my second and third jobs.  So why is it so darn hard to get a summer job in Miami?

The other issue that’s been nagging at the back of my mind is the fact that I haven’t raised all the financial support I need for the summer.  I’m behind.  By a lot.

The two of these, combined with a nonstop schedule of searching for jobs 5 days a week and having group activities and sharing my faith on the other 2, has really worn me down.  As in, I cried pretty much every day this week.  Last week, I would come back from job hunting and nap for over an hour, because I couldn’t bring myself to do anything else.  It has been physically, emotionally, and spiritually exhausting.

So I put off updating my blog, because I wanted to come to you with some amazing success story of how God provided this job out of nowhere, and how I’m super thankful for it and I learned a lot and grew in trust and patience while I was searching.  Well, I don’t have that success story for you.  Not yet, anyway.  But I have been growing in my trust in and patience with God.  It hasn’t been easy.  I know he has a plan and his timing is perfect – but man, couldn’t it match up with my plan just a little bit?

It got to the point where I was seriously wondering whether or not I’m really supposed to be here.  And boy, did that scare me.  There were no clear signs that I was supposed to come to Miami this summer.  In fact, there were some rather convincing signs that said otherwise.  Even ending up on this project was a fluke – I originally felt called to Jersey Shore, but it filled up, as did my second choice, North Myrtle Beach.  My family is missing me.  I’ll be away from them for Father’s Day, my dad’s birthday, and my brother’s birthday.  I could easily have stayed home this summer, spent time with them, and gotten a part time or even a full time job.  So what was I doing in Miami, not fully supported, and going on 3 weeks of job hunting?  It seemed like these were signs that I was not where God wanted me to be this summer, that I was wasting my time here.  The thought terrified me.

2 days ago, my friend Nikka and I were in the middle of calling all 50 Burger Kings in the greater Miami area when, after hanging up on a particularly unhelpful manager, I had a mini breakdown.  I couldn’t call any more BKs – mostly because I was crying – and frankly, I didn’t want to do anything but curl up in a ball, cry, and sleep.  Instead, I talked to Monica, a wonderful woman who is on staff here.

All over the Bible, it says that we should seek counsel.  This past year has taught me just how much the members of my Christian community care about me, that they’re willing to take time to comfort me if I need it, no matter what’s going on at the time.  Just this past Sunday, the pastor mentioned how, if we are going through hard times, we need to surround ourselves with people who can support us.  So what did I do when I had all these meltdowns?  Did I go to my roommates, the staff, the 60 other students on this project?  Uh…. no.  I hid in my room.  By myself.  I tried to handle all my stress and problems myself, to persevere by my own strength, because darn it, I’m a strong woman and admitting my struggles to others is a sign of weakness and I would never do that because I’m totally strong enough to handle everything that comes my way completely on my own with no help from anyone else whatsoever.  Yeah, right.

So Monica took the time to talk to me – imagine that! – and I felt so comforted and so much more at peace than I have pretty much since I got here.  I still don’t have a job.  I’m still not fully supported.  But what I do have is perspective.

I know that I’m not alone.  First and foremost, God’s with me, and no matter how it looks, he’s always on my side.  Secondly, I’m surrounded by people who can and want to help me in whatever way they are able to.  Thirdly, I’m not alone in my situation.  There are still 4 other people who don’t have a job, and plenty of others who aren’t fully supported.  Of course I told myself these things, but somehow, it’s different when you hear the words from someone else, especially someone older and wiser.

I also have a plan.  My problems aren’t solved, obviously, but I have a concrete, step by step plan for tackling them.  Just because God has a plan doesn’t mean I don’t have to do any work.  It can be overwhelming when all you’re facing is a giant task and you see no possible way to reach an end, but when you break it down into small, tangible steps that you can complete one by one, it becomes much more manageable.

The other thing I have is power.  I am here doing what God wants me to do, and I am relying on him completely to allow me to do it.  That doesn’t mean it’ll be easy, but it does mean he’s always got my back.  Monica reminded me that there is a very real enemy, and he does attack us, especially those of us who are working to spread the gospel.  My illegitimate fears, the idea that I’m not meant to be here, those are flat out lies that the enemy was using to poison my mind.  Now that I am aware of it, and have given it up to Jesus, those lies can’t affect me anymore.

I’m still not in the clear.  I can tell this summer is probably going to be the hardest summer of my life.  But if I keep my focus on God and let him mold me into the person he wants me to be, it will also be the most rewarding summer of my life.

Nothing about my situation has changed.  Tomorrow, I will need every ounce of strength God can give me to get out of bed, because I won’t want to go out again looking for a job.  I will need to trust that people will respond to the support letters and messages I send.  It will be hard.  But my attitude has changed.  I have perspective, I have a plan, I have power, and with God on my side, nobody can stop me.

Miami Summer Project, bring it on!

It’ll take a miracle

Project countdown: 6 days.

I just bought a plane ticket.  …

I just bought a  plane ticket.  …

I just bought a plane ticket.

I didn’t realize it was possible to experience this wide of a range of emotions.  First of all, I feel like such an adult.  Like yeah, I just bought a plane ticket, with my own money, to fly by myself.  Look out real world, here I come!  (Well, kind of.)

With that, of course, comes some nervousness, and dare I say it, a little fear.  I’ve flown before, but never by myself.  There’s a long layover in some city in North Carolina that I’ve never heard of.  I’ve only ever flown twice before, and only one of those had a layover, and I was with a bunch of people that I knew, as well as “real” adults who knew what they were doing.

There’s also a slight cringe in the back of my mind at the state of my bank account, and no small amount of worry there either.  This is the first time in my life that I’ve legitimately had to… I won’t say worry, but think about having money, and where and when I spend it so that I can afford everything I need.  It hasn’t been fun, let me tell you.  This real world stuff is pretty hard.  But I’ve also learned a lot.  I know how to be smart with my money, and that’s what’s important.

Above all, I’m just plain excited.  This suddenly became a whole lot more real to me.  I was accepted to this project back in… February, was it?  Wow, that seems like a long time ago.  A lot has happened since then.  But really, it’s one thing to say, in February, “I’m spending the summer in Miami on a mission trip.  I leave on May 28th.”  It’s quite another to say, on May 22nd, “I just bought a plane ticket for Miami.  I leave from O’Hare at 7:45 on the 28th.”  That makes things a whole lot more real.

If I’m being honest, this is the first moment that I’ve gone from thinking if I go to Miami to when I go to Miami.  For a while, I wasn’t sure if that was where I was supposed to be this summer.  I saw my family for the first time in a couple months, and I realized how much we’re going to miss each other.  Support raising wasn’t going so well, and I was worried I wouldn’t get the funding I need in time.  Now I’m feeling much more confident.  I have a week to spend with my family before I go, and I’m trying to make the most of it.  I’ll also have some time to spend with them when I get back.  Support raising is still hard, but it’s going well, and I’m 100% certain that one way or another, God will provide the funds I need.  I’ve always known that it will take a miracle to get me to Miami.  What I know now is that there’s a miracle headed my way!

Am I nervous?  Yes.  Am I scared?  All things considered, not really.  Am I excited?  You bet!  This is going to be one of the best summers of my life, as well as one of the most challenging.

And when I look back on  it in the future, I’ll remember that for me, the adventure began not with an application or an acceptance letter, but with the purchase of a plane ticket.

This is me

I figured, if I’m going to make a blog, I should probably introduce myself so people know what they’re getting into.  That said, I’m going to take a page out of a friend’s book and describe myself using 24 pictures (more or less… okay, it’s probably going to be more.)  This is actually surprisingly hard to do.  It’s surprisingly hard to find certain pictures (like ones of my family, for some reason), and even harder to come up with 24 things to say about myself, hoping that not all of them are superficial.  Well, I gave it a shot.

  So, since I’m describing myself with pictures, I figured I should probably post a picture of myself.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any very recent pictures of just me, so this will have to do.  It’s from about a year ago, so my hair is a bit shorter now, and it was taken in Colorado.  (More about that later!)

Alright, you know what I look like.  But what am I like?  Let’s see what you could figure out by looking at the surface…

This is my room, from two different angles.  Yep, it’s messy.  I’m a little disorganized.  It’s also basically an I-Spy into things that I like.  Can you spot… my favorite band?  Some awesome movies?  A hint about my career aspirations?  My favorite color?  How about something I collect?

(Answers: My Chemical Romance, Inception, Harry Potter, The Avengers, a space shuttle, teal blue, calendars)

Delving a little deeper….

My favorite band is My Chemical Romance, and this is just some of the memorabilia I own.  I also have several t-shirts.  The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys is my favorite of their albums, and yes, I did make myself a Killjoy costume complete with a name and a blaster.  Haters gonna hate.

Took this photo at a museum.  What does this say about me?  Well, that’s my life dream in a nutshell.  I want to be an astronaut.

There, I said it.  That’s why I’m majoring in astronomy-physics.

Hey, speaking of college….

  I just finished my sophomore year at UW Madison.  That’s right, I’m a badger.  ‘Nuff said.

Back to some things you could find in my room.

I’m a Christian, and my faith is very important to me.  I’m actively involved in a Christian organization called Cru, and I love it. 

Through Cru, I’ve been able to join a bible study, lead a bible study, go on awesome retreats and mission trips, make amazing friends, and most importantly, learn more about Jesus!

  This is my dresser.  In addition to collecting calendars, I also collect knick-knacks, especially fairies.  I love anything to do with fantasy.

Perhaps this is cheating a little, because you wouldn’t find these lying around, but they are in my room.  I absolutely LOVE to read,

and these are some of my favorite books of all time.  On the far right is one I’ve just started reading.  Yeah, it’s the unabridged version.  It could take a while…

I felt it was necessary to include my collection of cds and dvds because I also love listening to music and watching movies.  My taste in music has been described as ‘eclectic’ (which I think is a polite word for dorky) but, as evidenced by my favorite band, is primarily stuck in what may or may not be classified as “punk rock”.  As far as movies, give me action, fantasy, sci fi, or any combination thereof.  I love the Lord of the Rings; I hate The Vow.  Yes, I’m a female and yes, I hate chick flicks.  (Sandra Bullock movies are the only exception.)

Hidden under my bed is my baby, the beautiful instrument you see in this picture.  I’ve had her since I was in sixth grade and I love her. 

I love making music as much as I love listening to it, although I rarely have time to play anymore.  I also play the piano, but not as well as the violin.

The last thing you might be able to guess just from looking at my room is that I am a child at heart.  I own a wand from Harry Potter World.  I am, in fact, a Hufflepuff.  Treasure Planet, Peter Pan, and Rise of the Guardians are some of my favorite movies ever.  I was 18 years old in that picture with Peter Pan, and I am not ashamed.  If I went back to Disneyland now, I’d get my picture taken with him again.

Those are some things that define me, but people are often best described by other people.  You’ve seen the whats, now meet the whos:

These are my parents, and I love them both very much!

These are my siblings.  My sister Julia, the middle child, and my brother Tyler, the youngest.  They are hilarious and fun, and often drive me crazy.  Because, let’s face it, that’s what younger siblings are supposed to do.

Friends!  Where would I be without my friends?  Nowhere good, I can tell you that.  These are some of the amazing women I’ve met through Cru, who have been there for me for the past two years.  They’re amazing and I’m so blessed to count them all as my friends!

More friends!  Old friends from high school, who I will never forget…       

and new friends from college, who I love dearly and am getting to know better with each passing year.

  And one friend who deserves a section all to herself.  This is my best friend Caitlin, who I’ve known since the sixth grade, and who has been there for me through thick and thin ever since.  She’s amazing and I love her.  There’s really not much else to say.

Of course, no list of friends would be complete without including my lovely animal friends!  That’s my dog Tiny, who I’ve had since he and I were both very little.  He’s old, he’s cuddly, he’s freaking adorable!  I don’t have a picture of me with my pet snake Yuri, who sadly, is no longer around, so a picture of me holding a grass snake will have to do.

Alright, so we have what and who… what else is there to talk about?  I already touched on some things, but I suppose I could tell you more about what I like to do.

This pictures a bit old, but I was in karate for a while and loved every minute of it.  The guy in the middle with the awesome silver hair is my incredible Sensei.  He taught me so much!

Also in the category of things that I love but no longer have time to do falls theatre.

You might not guess it, given that I’m generally shy and quiet, but theatre was a huge part of my high school career.  That’s me in Dracula, one of my favorite plays ever!

  In addition to dressing up on stage, I sometimes dress up offstage as well.  Remember how I’m a child at heart?  Well, part of what that means is that, on occasion, I do enjoy dressing up as characters from my favorite animes and going to anime conventions.  That first picture is me hugging one of my favorite voice actors ever, Vic Mignogna.  Coincidentally, I am dressed as one of the characters he does the voice of.  (Fai from Tsubasa Chronicle.)  In the other picture, I borrowed my friend’s jacket and orange wig to dress as Hikaru from Ouran High School Host Club.  (Yes, I’m Hikaru!  Look how the wig is parted!)

This is probably cheating, because I obviously didn’t take this picture myself.  But I have a tendency to obsess fangirl be very passionate about things that I like, be it books (like the Infernal Devices or the Name of the Wind), movies (Thor, Rise of the Guardians), tv shows (Doctor Who, Once Upon a Time) or certain male characters from said media (Jem, Bast, Loki, Jack Frost, 11, Rumpelstiltskin etc…).  This picture represents my current obsession(s), Les Miserables, and specifically, Enjolras.  Because just look at Aaron Tveit.

But I digress…

I would be completely honest with you if I didn’t address some of my fears.

Some, like these, are more obvious than others.  I don’t know if you can tell from these pictures, but I’m terrified of heights.  In fact, I’m crying in both of these.  I’m afraid of quite a few things, not the least of which are public speaking and meeting new people.  But I’ve recently learned a very important lesson: bravery is not the absence of fear, but the courage to act in spite of it.  In light of that, I try to take a page out of one of my favorite books, and follow one brave character’s example: “Whenever I do something, I pretend my fear doesn’t exist.”

  That lesson was hammered home last summer, when I spent two weeks in Colorado on what’s called a Summer Project (which is basically a fancy word for mission trip.)  I got to do cool (and scary) things like rappel and zip line, as you can see above, as well as learn more about my faith and share that faith with others.  It was an amazing experience, one that really changed me, and one that I won’t soon forget.

All this is great, but most of it’s in the past.  What’s next?

  Well, technically this is also in the past.  (I haven’t managed to get a ride on the TARDIS yet, but rest assured I’ll tell you when I do.)  This is from a retreat/mission trip that I went on this spring, to Panama City, Florida.  It was amazingly fun!  I made new friends and learned a lot.  But what does that say about my future?  Well,  this summer is basically going to be an extended version of that trip.  I’m going on a summer project to Miami for 9 weeks!  I’m so excited.  After that, who knows what I’ll do or where I’ll go?  I love to travel, and one day I want to see Europe.  All I know for sure is that I’ll go where the Lord takes me!

So that’s me in a (rather large) nutshell.  I’m also a bit long winded, if you haven’t figured that out by now.  I hope you enjoyed that, and have gotten a taste for just who I am and what sort of things I might be blogging about.