Vindicated

So today I got on to blog and was all ready to start complaining about how much I hate that I really like someone that lives in another state thats going on a mission soon. And how the other guy that means a ton to me doesnt like me and how it hurt to find that out and about all that I think about that. And I was ready to go on about how you can't stop people from making bad decisions and after its done, there are just some situations that are beyond the handling of a seventeen year old. And, granted, I did just get out all of those things, but there is something much more important I want to type about.

Because before I started to write, I reread all my blog entries since I first started last April. Last year was a rollercoaster ride and things have been confusing and hard, but gosh in a way it was one of the best years I've ever had, simply because I've grown so much, and I've learned so much. And so, I decided that all of last year's entries plus this one will be my Individual Worth project for church. Reading through the entries gave me a better understanding of it, and for once I think I'm starting to get the full meaning of it. Individual Worth isn't just liking yourself when your perfect and when things are great. Individual Worth means liking yourself through the good and the bad- and when bad things happen, coming out of them going, "yeah that sucked, but its gonna be okay because I'm okay and Heavenly Father still loves me and he's got a plan for me" And, truth be told, its really easy to lose sight of, but its always there.

Its okay that this year meant the ending of a big part of my life, because I think its making room for something bigger. And this year was probably the time that I've spent the most by myself- the year I've had with the fewest friends. But I've learned to like myself on my own terms, instead of by other peoples, and I've learned to just observe more and try and look beyond just the immediate.

And its funny, looking back I saw things that I'd forgotten- feelings of such happiness and self-worth that I forgot had happened, but I realize that they are still there. I was feeling like I'd changed so much from this summer and that I wasn't gong to be happy like that anymore. But those feelings never left, I just never tapped back into them. Because once I started reading, that happiness filled me again and I know its been there all along.

Its funny, because in one of my first blog entries I talked about how much I wanted some kind of adventure, some fantastic thing to happen to me, and I didn't realize it until now, but I got my adventure and it came to me in my own journey. It wasnt the one that I'd wanted, or expected. But I'm so grateful for it.

Thanks to everyone thats been there for me. Whether it was my close friends that got the whole ride, or just people that asked how I was doing, it all means a lot. Even if a lot of times I was wrapped up and didn't show it.

And my biggest thank you is for Heavenly Father and for all that he's done for me. He knew what was best for me, even when sometimes I didn't like it and it was hard. I'm just sorry that it took me so long to realize it.

So I want to make this into a little book for my individual worth project, not so that other people can read it (because it is personal and a little embarressing) But instead because I don't want to forget how much I collectively learned about Individual Worth this year and how happy I am to be who I and to be a daughter of God- even when I am being an angsty overdramatic teenager haha.

So I'd say that 2009 is going to be just fine =]

So todays pic is from Cerenimo and the song is "When I Go Down" - Relient K (which could be a theme song for me haha)



"When I go down I lift my eyes to you, I won't look very far cause you'll be there with open arms, to lift me up again."

Love Bites, Love Bleeds

It's been a long time since I've posted anything. But I didn't want December to go out without a single post being written, so here I am. Confused as ever.

Or maybe its not really confused, I think its more lost. I mean, I know a lot better who I am now. But I feel like I'm just sitting watching life pass by and I can't get a hold on anything that matters. I mean, I'm not depressed, but I'm not happy either. I'm just nothing. No love left. No hate. No drive. Nothing. Just watching the rest of the world swim while I hold onto the bank. Figuratively, I guess I'm just scared of drowning. I don't know why, but it seems like I've slowly distanced myself from everyone. I don't do it on purpose, I just do.

I mean prime example- Jon. He was the first guy that wasn't Connor that I'd actually really felt anything for. And he called and emailed and left me voicemails, and what did I do? Nothing. I looked and listened and got scared of getting attached and hurt. And then the calls just stopped. =[ And gosh even though its been a while, I miss them coming. And its so dumb.

And there are a million other people that I do the same thing to. Anyone that might hurt me, I cut them out of my life without realizing that I'm doing it until its done.

Onto the next thing. People are saying that I am going inactive. First of all, I have no way to drive there, and its not like you see my parents at church without me. When they go, I go. But second of all, lets observe some things. One of the three girls that are my age, hates me. And the other two are close friends with her. And of the six guys that are my age- two of them think that I'm a loser, two of them could care less, one has been a jerk to the majority of my friends, and the last is just hard and weird and sad to be around. And I would say most of them think I'm stupid. Its just hard to be there. I mean, I still want to go, but I'll admit its harder to want it. I used to feel like church and my ward was the one place where I really belonged, and now its gone, and I think thats been one of the hardest things for me to get used to.

And last of all, I'm going to get closure tomorrow night on my incessant feelings. And then 2009 I'm starting over and letting go and getting over everything. 2009 means its over once and for all. I've been holding onto something that I want to be there, and if its not there then its not there and there's no use sticking around. I'm not going to try to be close friends again, thats not what I want, it never has been. So tomorrow night will settle it and then I'm going to finally just leave it alone. Put away everything. Leave well enough alone. I've thought about it a lot and this is the last time that I'll try this and then we can be just cordial friends and leave the past behind.

2009 will hopefully be a new start for me. Wish me luck.

Picture is by Henki24 and the song is Congratulations - Blue October ft. Imogen Heap



"My heart won't take this cover up."

The Battle of One

"Solitude is the profoundest fact of the human condition. Man is the only being who knows he is alone." - Octavio Paz

"Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty." - Mother Teresa

"What loneliness is more lonely than distrust?" - T.S. Eliot

"People who lead a lonely existence always have something on their minds that they are eager to talk about." - Anton Checkov

"Who knows what true loneliness is - not the conventional word, but the naked terror? To the lonely themselves it wears a mask. The most miserable outcast hugs some memory or some illusion." - Conrad Joseph

"Memories are the treasures that we keep locked deep within the storehouse of our souls, to keep our hearts warm when we are lonely." - Becky Aligada

"We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone." - Orson Welles

"One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul, and yet no one ever comes to sit by it." - Vincent Van Gogh

"Little do men perceive what solitude is, and how far it extendeth. For a crowd is not company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures, and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love." -Francis Bacon

“When we truly realize that we are all alone is when we need others the most.” - Ronald Anthony

“When so many are lonely as seem to be lonely, it would be inexcusably selfish to be lonely alone." - Tennessee Williams

"The eternal quest of the individual human being is to shatter his loneliness." - Norman Cousins

We've Got A Big Mess On Our Hands

I've been using anger as a barrier for the past couple months. I've hidden everything behind it. And it made things easier to deal with. It made me feel like I was in control.

But now that its gone, there are these new feelings of confusion and fear and hurt. I feel this really overwhelming sadness all over me and I don't understand it.

Why do I care so much??? Why can't it just be over?

I'm just really confused. How do you erase whats been done? How do you fix things that seem beyond repair? Or should you at all?

I feel very very sick, to be honest. I just don't know how I got myself into this mess and I don't know how to get out. There's something wrong with me. There's something wrong with me. There's something wrong with me. And I just don't know how to change it.

Will things ever be good again? Sometimes I just wish I could erase the world.

Disintegration

I feel so lost.

Like there isn't a way back to having a place where I feel safe anymore. Because its not whats outside that scares me, its whats inside.

If I had died, who would really honestly completely care? Who's lives would it change? Who really cares about me now? Who really knows me now? Who really wants to know me?

My friends are gone. My safehaven is gone. I feel like a stranger around everyone.

How many people heard and didn't care? didn't call? didn't say anything at all? Too many to count. So many that it doesn't feel real. The only reminder I have is the pain in my body and on my face and in the eyes of someone else who could have died.

All these thoughts are just too much for me to carry around. What have I done to leave behind? How would I be remembered? As a stranger? As someone who was never forgiven? or loved?

My head hurts and my heart hurts and I don't know where I'm at anymore. Its October and I can't tell you one truly great thing that has happened to me in the past three months. Nothing meaningful even. Three months of wasted time. But what else can I do? I feel like I'm just stuck at this house with my thoughts and my anger and my sadness, with only two or three people outside this house that care at all. If I was in the hospital, who would come? Who would be there?

I guess I just wish that I had someone to hold me and tell me that theyre so happy that I'm okay and that they love me. Someone to hold my hand and tell me its all over now. I guess I want to go out being loved and in love. People say there is plenty of time to find someone you love and who loves you. But what if there isn't?

What if there isn't?

What does it matter if all that you have is hate and anger and jealousy and grudges that were never forgiven?

I mean, I am so grateful for the family and close friends I've got. But I just wonder, is that all there is ever going to be for me?

I deleted my MySpace and Facebook. Because I can't stand to keep on pretending like everything is normal and fine and I'm just peachy, when things aren't like that. I'm tired of pretending, and if that makes me weak then so be it.

I'm just so scared.

Scared of dying without leaving behind anything meaningful.

Scared of no one knowing who I am.

Scared of never falling in love again.

Scared of it always being me and my thoughts.

Just scared to death.

And I don't know how to fix it.

Picture is from Pyrotechnician and the song is Pictures of You - The Cure. I've been listening to their album Disintegration constantly. Its possibly one of the greatest albums ever created.

"Looking so long at these pictures of you, but I never hold on to your heart. Looking so long for the words to be true, but always just breaking apart."

Never Take Friendship Personal

I was thinking about something today. Its odd, when you're little you are taught what to do when a stranger comes up to you, or what happens if theres a fire, or what to do in an emergency, and all those things. Those things that have simple answers. Don't talk to them; meet at a designated spot; call 911.

But its funny, looking back, the things that actually matter the most are the things that no one told you about. How do you deal with peer pressure? How do you deal with loneliness? What about when your parents get a divorce? or when someone dies? or how do you deal with an addiction? Why doesn't anyone teach you about anything that matters? They don't tell you how to deal with real anger and jealousy; they don't tell you how to forgive someone who really hurts you. They don't teach you about falling in love or getting your heart broken. They don't tell you about wars and starvation and poverty; they don't tell you about nuclear weapons and crooked politics. They don't teach you about how to deal with lack of confidence or confusion or how to decide your future. I mean, I know its like telling a kid that Santa isn't real. But you grow up thinking that life is a cake walk, and then its like BAM! Now, deal with it. I don't know. I guess its just like, all those years worrying about being kidnapped or my house burning down or having to call 911, I should have been thinking about how to defend myself against things that are so much more personal, you know?

In other news, honesty is dying. Just thought everyone should know. Lies and dishonesty seem to be eating away at the people in my life. It makes me sad.

Anyways, I don't remember where else I was going with this. So I guess I'll end it. The quote is from Never Take Friendship Personal by Anberlin, and the picture was made by Plim-Chan.

"Once a skeptic, now the critic. And you figured you finally found a place of your own amongst the cold and timid souls where only failure knows your name. Look around for the closest to blame, but look no further than the hands beneath your arms."

Vulnerable

How do you get rid of hate and anger?

How do you get rid of compassion?

How do you make things go away?

How do you know what to do at all?

Time and patience, maybe? I've got no idea. I've been trying to figure it out for the past two weeks. If you've got an answer, please tell me.

So, I keep on thinking about how I'm a senior now. I know I'm not that old, but I feel like saying, "no! go back, I'm not done being a teenager!" You know? And I was just looking at some pictures from a couple years ago and my transcript from freshman year, and I just wish I could go back and change things. I would have done things so much differently. I just feel like I was so busy worried about how I should act and be that I missed out on everything. And I know I could have done so much better in school if I had just really tried. I don't know. I guess I just wished that I hadn't worried so much about everything and instead just been myself and talked to people and stuff. Then again, maybe thats just not who I am. Who knows. Whats done is done and its got me to this point and I'm okay with that.

I still don't regret leaving public school though. I'm a lot happier here, doing things like this. You know, I don't like talking about why I left, but I think that maybe I need to get it out. So if you read this, I guess you get to be one of the few that really know.

I have never been able to make good friends at school; I had a few in middle school, but for the most part I was a loser. And then from then on out I had Sarah plus a few people at school depending on the people in my class. But after Gabriella was born, it was like I never had time for my homework either. So I felt stupid, along with feeling like a loser, boring, weird, and ugly. I just was always wondering what was wrong with me that made people not want to be friends with me. I hated Hickory Ridge. Its just the looks I got. I don't know. I just don't know. But I felt ugly and stupid and weird and worthless.

And then around December I started getting really sick because I was worried and stressed out all the time, I remember one week where I was just so depressed and upset and no one noticed and so that just made it worse. The one person who did know about it, I never got the chance to talk to them about it. And then one morning during seminary I just broke down, and I started bawling in Austin's car and he took me home. And I wrote this,

"I was just so upset. I hate school. I hate the environment here, I hate the learning here, I hate having to be here with these people who are always looking down on me. And I have huge self esteem issues that I don't know how to fix. And I feel like I'm losing Sarah. And like I'm a failure as a daughter b/c I never talk to my biological dad. And like I'm a bad sister because I don't spend enough time with the baby. And like I'm not good enough for any boy. Heck, I'm 16 and I still haven't been kissed. That. Is. Pathetic."

So that pretty much explains that. And so thats when I started thinking about homeschooling. Sarah wasn't too happy with me because of the homeschooling idea (understandably), my family was worried about me, I found out the story behind my parents divorce, and I was confused about stuff with a guy. I felt like everything would just be better if I wasn't here anymore, honestly. I'm not being melodramatic or anything, I just was so upset a lot of days and I didn't feel like anyone cared about me and that I was just a problem and that no one wanted me around. And so I thought a lot about how if I died it would be so much better. I never hurt myself or anything, it was just on my mind a lot. I just didn't think that I was worth anything at all. I was sick and went home a lot of days. And it was then that I decided that public school just was harming my self-confidence and that it wasn't worth it. I lost two of my closest friends because of it. One sooner than the other. And I didn't want that to keep happening.

So anyways, here I am. Its been like eight months since all of that, and I have not felt like that one day since. I still haven't been kissed and I have the least amount of friends that I've ever had, but I am still 100 times happier, because I like myself, even if no one else does. It didn't come right away, but I think I'm getting better every day. I probably didn't explain it very well, but its something thats really personal and complex and really hard to put into words.

I know that I sound like an angsty, crazy, overdramatic teenager. And I am. So I guess its okay haha. But I know that what I felt was real, its the most real and terrible feeling I've ever had- worse than getting my heart broken (which sounds really retarded I know, but there is no other way to put it because thats what it was). I know that other people go through a billion times worse though, so believe me, I'm appreciative that thats the worse I've ever gone through and that it had a relatively easy solution.

So anyways, my fingers hurt so I'm done being angsty and reflective =]

The quote is from E.E. Cummings and the picture is by DontPanicMedia.

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing it's best, night and day, to make you everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle, which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting."