changed+scattered+processing=mind

I forgot what I was going to write this blog about...and now I remembered. It's finals week, therefore I'm cutting my scattered brains some slack.

Seven statements, things, to dos. thoughts. Expect the rest of this blog post to be like. this.

1. I've decided I need about an hour out of every day to find and download great music. My startup disk is almost full because I have so many songs on iTunes but I need MORE. I'm like a music junkie right now. Luckily Pandora, Grooveshark, and Soundcloud keep me from tweaking most of the time.

2. I think I just sneezed up my frontal lobe. That was painful. This whole record high pollen count thing needs to stop. I'M NOT JOKING. Check out pollen.com also known as my new homepage. It's not as bad today as it has been so I should probably be thankful for that.

3. I typed 2 and had to go back and delete it to make it a 3. Sorry number 3, you're going to be a pointless point anyways.

4. I can no longer watch commercials or look at advertisements the same way, which is interesting but also pretty annoying. I guess I'm learning something from my classes. Mom and Dad should be proud. Example: Tonight I was watching Gossip Girl in the informal with Danielle and Lauren. A Slim Fast commercial came on during the commercial break, and not just any slim fast commercial. This one. Why would you put a middle aged woman trying to sell a weight loss product on during a television show watched by high school and college aged girls? Most of us eat cheetos and qdoba every night, we don't care about the slimfast 3-2-1 plan (or maybe everyone else does and I don't. wamp wamp). Gossip Girl has a new style of trailers though which I really like. They've got a sepia kind of haze and big bold headlines. Me likey.

5. I'm getting selfish. I have started every sentence in this blog with the letter I. But really, I need to do a volunteer project of some sort.

6. I had a really interesting conversation with my research methods professor today. Normally I am not a huge fan of that class. Don't get me wrong, the professor is a very approachable nice guy, I just don't understand those methods well and I hate it when I can't pick up on a concept quickly. We were discussing my topic for my research question (which I should be working on right now) and began talking about social media, smartphones, and generally technology's impact on Gen X versus Gen Y. For instance, how a group of people can be gathered together at a restaurant yet all be talking to other people on their phones rather than engaging in conversation and "living in the present." Or for instance how today the average teenager sends 50-70 texts a day and 7th graders own Blackberrys. We even began discussing the implications of this communication shift in relationships, and how it has contributed to the new "hook-up culture." The average age of marriage for a woman is 28 now. That means that most women probably won't meet their future husband in college and most want to develop their careers and establish themselves professionally before settling down. Therefore they see no reason to settle into serious relationships and instead engage in those kinds that are merely physical -- hence the use of distanced communication like texting rather than calling or talking in person. It was very provoking, definitely gave me something to think about as I walked around campus today.


7. I need to get this whole fall internship thing figured out. My biggest fear is just that I'm not ready. I keep convincing myself I haven't had enough experience -- but I have and I know I can handle a really challenging position. I'm sure you've all read the whole "Our biggest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure" psych up pep talk speech and I've gotta go with FDR on this one. The only thing I should be fearing now is fear itself. I need to just send those resumes out. Some will get rejected, I might get an interview and still not get the job, but it's worth a shot. Looking at all of the seniors at the awards banquet tonight made me realize that they went though this same shabang. It's all part of the process. Just have to suck it up. A lot of times I'm just lazy and I forget how good it feels to step up to a challenge and face it head on.


Back to work

Taking my own advice

I feel like I'm definitely sitting at the same place I have been for a while. Actually it's the reason I blog like I've said so many times before. Just trying to define myself. Figure out what makes me and who I want to be.
I had a friend who contacted me about a year ago after I hadn't seen him for quite a while. This is what I wrote him back. I'm a pro at dishing out advice that I find hardest to follow myself:

Just take things one day at a time. enjoy the journey and don't be so worried about the destination. I've made a lot of mistakes and really messed up in the past. But I guess lately I've realized you have to stop looking back and just move forward. You have to do things for yourself and stop worrying about what other people may or may not think because they don't really matter anyway.

I think for a great deal of my life people put me up on a pedestal or expected perfection from me and I hated that. At the same time that didn't mean that I needed to prove my imperfection. I was trying to see myself through their eyes rather than how God sees me. He sees all my flaws, all my human faults and desires and loves me just the same because with him all of those mistakes are erased and forgotten. You just have to remember what he thinks of you, not what the world thinks. and thats a really really hard thing to do.