What Does God See?

I watched the Bruce Jenner interview and I really tried to climb outside of my confusion to try to understand what this experience must be like for people in that situation. Here are a few of my thoughts:

First off, I think it is one sided. Women through the decades seem to tell a tale of victory in becoming equal with men. We fought to vote, work, and even wear pant suits like them. We can cut our hair like them and be celebrated for playing their sports. A heterosexual woman can dress in a suit, cut her hair in a "pixie" (because we get cute names for our boy haircuts), become a CEO, wear no makeup, and be the MVP of the office softball team and never once have her sexuality questioned. Look at Ciara's "Like a Boy" music video. She is dressed like a male singing about being like a boy and somehow it makes her more appealing to the opposite sex.

A man could not do this.

A man that decides he wants to wear a dress, grow his hair long, stay at home, wear makeup, and play paddle tennis would be ridiculed and bashed. IT DOESNT MAKE ANY SENSE TO ME.

I love to bum around in basketball shorts and an ex boyfriends T shirt. I have the underside of my head shaved. I almost never wear makeup. My sneaker collection far outweighs my heels. I am obsessed with anything that looks like a mens dress shoe. I LOVE TO BOX OMGGGGGGG do I love to box. What am I???? I am a tom boy!!! We even have a name for it. But a man who feels feminine is? Gay? I know many gay men who are not feminine at all.

Why is liking feminine things so looked down upon? Why is being a girl or acting like a girl or playing like a girl something that has become despicable? For example: "You're being such a girl about it." That is always meant as an insult.

Bruce said in his interview something along the lines of "I wonder what God sees when He looks at me.". That really struck me. He is battling the weak opinion of people and what we see. If we are uncomfortable with what we see we attack it. We're no better than a pack of wolves. What DOES God see? What does He see what he looks at me? It humbles me to think of it.

When a skin care line wants to show you how damaged a face is, they turn on that black light and suddenly someone with a great completion looks like complete shit. That is how I imagine God examines us. We put on these great faces and facades. We act socially acceptable and judge others when they don't. But when He turns on that light I can guarantee that some of the best faces are hiding immense damage caused by their secret sins and hateful dispositions. I can't even imagine what He sees when he looks at me.

He doesn't see dresses and pant suits. Those are fleeting trends anyways. He sees a persons heart, mind, and soul and I'm sure Bruce/Caitlyn's looks better than the people who have anything to say about it.

men? where?

Just a thought.....

I get confused about value and other people understanding the value of things. These "things" mostly being people.

And I think this is the problem:

I am expecting, or maybe just assuming, that such people understand the value of....hmmm, let's use Burberry for examples sake. They understand what it is, what it cost, and what it represents.

But the rude awakening is...they don't. They are still stuck in the mindset that Hollister is cool and what everyone is wearing....

Sooooooooo, they really have no idea what the hell Burberry even is and because of that is has no value to them.

One day they will realize that they threw away a Burberry wallet for a Hollister sweater and it does not make the wallet worth a penny less because of their ignorance.

I am going to stop feeling bad or confused about myself just because someone can't recognize quality.

Live the Life You Choose..???

I was thinking tonight about "living the life you planned", or things going the way we plan them to. Then I thought about the saying "live the life you choose". But, the "life we choose" IS the life we "planned", right?

My life has not gone the way I would have planned by a traditional standard. I have said so many times while telling the story of me, "I did not plan for (enter a millions different things here) to happen". So, I guess I would say I am not living anything that was planned.

But I realized, I am living the life I chose.

We never expect for things to not go according to the plan. It's like we make plans that don't allow for any detours. A detour means your plan failed. But I think life is like maps. There is more than one way to get there. Who cares that you didn't go the way everyone thought you should. You didn't go all highway and it took you longer, but you got the scenic route instead.

I AM living the life that I chose. I chose the people and actions that landed me exactly where I am right now in this moment. I did not "plan" for what would happen if these people and things went left instead of right. But sometimes they do, and then we play victim. I am living a life a victim of my own choices. If I don't like it maybe I should make better ones.

My plan is to make the best choices possible and roll with the changes, taking full responsibility that just because what I chose didn't go the way I assumed it was doesn't change that I CHOSE it.

So far in my life the things I thought were the worst left turns ever have brought me to the best destinations. Much much better than I could have planned :)

I forget

I feel like I've forgotten a lot of stuff. I don't remember how to write anymore or something. I lost my love for it? Or forgot how to love it? I also feel like I don't remember the things I used to like or I don't have the same passion for them maybe?

Here's my question: How do you know when you've actually lost sight of yourself or when you are just outgrowing your old dreams/interests/passions?

As we grow and mature and gain experiences I would agree with the theory that it is normal for our interests and goals to do the same.

But how do we know if that is what is happening when we forget the things we used to like or if it is something else? What if I am swallowed up in so many other forced ideas from other circumstances that I have forgotten how to remember my own?

It becomes easy and understandable to everyone how one can lose themselves or choose not to follow a dream when life gives situations that are out of your control. But how long can you use that as a reason why? Even if life throws in an unexpected stop sign, its still just 3 Mississippi and then you can go. I feel as if I have become paralyzed at one of lifes unexpected stop signs and I have not moved forward because I have forgotten where I am going.

Untitled.

Im not sure what to call this one. I haven't blogged in a while. Since September I turned 26, went to the FSU-OU game and met someone wonderful, watched my brother get married (and DJ'd it thankyouverymuch), had the worst wisdom tooth extraction that led to 3 root canals in the the adjacent tooth and also included a piece of bone birthing its self out of my gum, found a house signed a lease and moved, and then dealt with the annual curse we like to call "The Holidays".

But now I guess I'm back ;)

I keep thinking about the way we argue with people. In any type of relationship you will come across some sort of conflict. There are different levels depending on many factors, but the one constant in all of them is how we make them go away. How do we deal with dissolving the issue and clearing the air between each other? The best of friends or spouses or even just business partners are those who can communicate well. I have met people in business that have almost nothing in common out side of the workplace, but they are thriving because they "work well together". This can't mean they never run into a problem. They must be able to communicate well and change their perspectives by keeping an open mind.

I think it is important to be able to see things from the other angle. I like who I am and the way I think, but I would be ignorant to assume that sometimes there isn't a better way of doing or thinking about something. Occasionally my viewpoint is going to be the fresh perspective that the other person needed and other times it's not. Not being able to communicate through issues in a relationship where one or both parties are not willing to adjust their perspective is like dropping rocks in to a glass of water. That issue is not going to go away. When you look back at past relationships where the communication during a negative situation was unhealthy, your cup is just full of rocks that eventually ended the whole thing. I feel like I hear people say "Oh, there was these few big issues that we fought about constantly and then it just became every little thing.". Little rocks don't dissolve any easier than big ones do. Things don't just "go away".

But being able to listen and hear each other and change our perspective is like dropping alka-seltzer into the glass: it dissolves. The issues will never stop coming because we are not perfect, but what does it matter if we know we can handle it? I can look back and my water is clear with that person. Everything was able to dissipate between us and the connection remained healthy.

I want to learn how to dissolve my issues throughout my life and learn what I can about myself while I do it. I am interested to hear how other people think about something, even if its something I've done. I think about the experiments they do in psychology where they show many different people the same picture and ask them to describe what is going on. Almost everyones answers are completely different, or the same idea worded differently. There are so many ways to look at the same thing, and I am open to hearing about all of them.

Outer changes always begin with an inner change of attitude.-Albert Einstein

Why do we become so obsessed with the negative situations in our life to the point that we ignore all the positives? I think we need to learn that we can stay positive and focused on the better things without letting the negative go unresolved.

I feel like sometimes in life a situation can become so consuming that it is always on our minds like a hamster on a wheel. But that hamster is going nowhere and using all its energy on a circumstance that it cannot fix just by fixating on it. I want to train my attitude and thoughts to be focused on all the good things, even if they are the smallest part of my day, and learn that I can still find a solution to the obstacle without letting it define my life.

I have been completely obsessing over a boulder that I cannot move myself. It was like I had my legs and arms wrapped around it with my nails digging it because it was NOT FAIR that this was in my way. I used all my energy focusing on how I did not deserve this and etc etc...Guess what? Draining myself and becoming a person I didn't even like being did not do shit except hurt me more. Life is 10% what happens to you (the boulder) and 90% how you respond to it (take yo'self off that damn rock and back off...focus on all the million great things you have and learn that eventually things will fall into place, especially since your attitude will be right).

If I had been focusing all on the things that make me happy I would BE happy. I had to learn that just because something isn't the way I want it does not mean it is going to go away when I want it too. I can be positive and focused on other things and still supervise the removal of the bullshit.

Change needs Routine?

Change needs routine. It sounds contradictory, but in order to make a necessary change you have to make it a habit. In order to make something a habit you have to do it 21-28 days consecutively (thats actually a fact FYI).

I have mentioned how I am sick of feeling trapped in the same cycle of things, and I need to make a change. And while talking to a friend about this, she compared her situation to mine. I have no constant distractions from my present situation, and she has too many. I do basically the same things every day, and she isn't even always in the same country every week! But we realized neither of us are making our change routine. I keep doing the "same shit different day" routine, and she keeps doing the "I have no routine" routine.

We haven't made our change a habit.

Change is scary, even if it is a change you desire, because it shifts our routine up. Humans are made to adapt as we are creatures of habit, so when we fall into a bad place, parts of us adapt to the circumstances, and that is what makes it difficult to change back.

I also think we are creatures of the "slow fade". I rarely see someone slowly fade into a good thing. It can happen, but I wouldn't call it the majority. The majority of us slow faders gently glide into less than desirable situations and then one day wake up and get the "omg how did I get here" moment. We want to immediately jump back into the before, but we can't. It is like a slide. We easily slide down, but once we realize we are at the bottom and don't like it, we can't just slide back up. We have to climb.

Climbing is going to mean we need to make that change, or continue sitting at the bottom. Make change routine. Make it a habit. If doing positive things that are good for me was a normal part of my routine (like it was before), I would be just peachy.

If I am going to be a creature of habit, I want my habits to be excellent ones.