Meditations on Thankfulness: Day 1

"Thanksgiving enables us to be fully present in each of the moments of our lives and, at the same time, be fully present to the eternity which is crashing into those moments (for those who have eyes to see). We have the ability to resist the culture of despair by bearing witness to life and hope! Cynicism loosens its smugly fearful, icy grip, warmed by winds of thanks."

I am starting a new series (and ideally continuing it). I have felt very thankful lately but the reality is that it has not yet affected me as I wish. I am aware of my thankfulness, but it has not shaped me as a person quite yet, so I have decided to take some time everyday to spend time meditating on thankfulness. I am not sure yet what will come out of this, but I think that thankfulness is extremely beneficial in a variety of areas of life. So, that is the background.

Day 1: I think that thankfulness goes a lot deeper than most people realize. Not simply politely saying "Thank You" now and again, but having an honest attitude of thankfulness. Lately I have been very thankful just for the gift of being alive every day. I have not done anything to earn this life and the fact that I have new days each and every day is something that I am continually thankful for.
Thankfulness changes things. Someone who is thankful as an attitude complains less. It is quite simple, if you are thankful for something than that person is far less likely to complain about it; it is a blessing merely to possess it. Additionally, I think that thankfulness as an attitude is the antithesis to anger. If you are really truly thankful for something, than it is awfully hard to get angry about it. Really, try being really thankful for a certain relationship and see if you can still get easily angry at that person. I think that what I am trying to say is that thankfulness as an attitude makes you a better person. It may seem obvious to say such, but I try and give objective reasons for things. Hence, enjoy some objective reasons that thankfulness as an attitude makes you a better person: you generally complain less, it takes more to get angry (and I think you generally get angry at more correct things), and I would say finally that you live life with more purpose. Allow me to elaborate on this last point.
Suppose that you get a Christmas gift and it is something that you have really been wanted and you are so thankful for this, and I mean truly thankful. You will do your best to protect this item, be it a toy, clothes, etc. You do not take lightly this gift and you do not take it for granted. Or, if you get money as a gift, you are more lightly to spend it wisely and not foolishly. So, it is easy to see how when you take the attitude that your life is a gift and you are really thankful for it, you do not want to waste it; instead, you want to spend it wisely, understanding that you get but one life. I am so thankful for my life right now, and I do not want to waste it, I cannot. This is yet another way that thankfulness practically makes you a better person: you value life more and thus live it with more purpose; I think that it is even more difficult to grow complacent when you are really thankful for life. Seeing as you have so few days, it is vitally important to be thankful just for life because in that you are freed to find purpose.
I guess that I would just encourage you to just value your life, be thankful for just being alive, and watch as you practically become a better person, at least that is what I am trying to do.
This has been the first of my meditations on thankfulness.

Emotions

I am not sure if anyone really reads this blog anymore. I have been undeniably inconsistent in my postings and have not had proper motivation. This post might help explain why. I have not felt emotions lately. It is something that I have long struggled with without really understanding why. My mind is so logic based, and that is so often a beautiful thing, but when joy seems foreign, it is little respite. And I do not mean that I am sad, I mean that I do not know what I am feeling. Emotions altogether seem so foreign. I try and understand why, try to diagnose why, and often when I think that I am making progress therewith, it is more of the same. Perhaps this is just what it feels like to be an adult, but I do not think that it is. If I had to posit a guess, I would imagine that because I miss so many people and feel so often like I miss the mark, when I do have the beauty of a gaze inwardly, I experience a rush of love and difficulty and sadness and joy, and I do not know how to process or deal with these intense emotions, so I suppress them, choosing to focus on whatever task is at hand. The consequence of this is that my waking mind feels utterly divorced from my emotions, and I cannot express in writing the strange difficulty I have therein. Granted, all of that could be wrong; it is merely a conjecture at the thoughts running through my head on this night when I feel so utterly empty emotionally. I do wish that I knew why I feel so distant, so divorced from any sort of feelings. Perhaps it is just now that I am processing emotions that have been long buried, since I graduated from college. I honestly do not know.
But one thing I do know: I would give whatever it took to get those back. Would I trade my intense logic, my ability to seemingly robotically complete tasks, trade my intellect and the depth of thought and intuition? Perhaps. And for one simple reason: I want to love people again. Despite an incredible ability to understand things, I do not even understand myself anymore. When emotion is out of the picture, things seem to lose their sheen, their gusto. Sure, there are still some things that get me semi-riled up, still some things that give me some loose semblance of the joy that I used to be so familiar with, of the love that I at one time I exemplified. But these things are fading, and bleak, and ultimately it does nothing to relieve the feeling that I no longer know myself. I no longer feel that I love people, although I want to; I no longer feel like the same things bring me joy, though I want them to; I do not even feel any longer like I am properly a whole person.
You are probably reading this (if there is anybody left who does) and would say that it is really a bleak picture that I am painting, and you are probably wondering if there is any possible solution that I have discovered. There is not solution. I pray a lot these days, but at its worst, even that feels bleak and empty. I do hope that this is a temporary thing, but sadly I do not know. I do ask that if you have read this far, then regardless of what you believe or feel, I ask that you say a prayer for me, however quick or simple. I would appreciate that.
As for me, I have learned to function robotically. I can manage surprisingly well despite the bleakness I feel. I will continue to operate at peak performance, understanding things and shirking away from things that I do not understand. I hope to feel again, hope to love again, hope to regain the part of me that I have lost, hope to loosen-up, hope to be willing to share myself with others, hope to be unafraid and unashamed to be emotional with, in front of, and for people, hope to get better at expressing this affliction and opening myself up to this, hope that this is all so very temporary, and most of all I hope to feel so many different types of emotions.
Lord God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

Jenny and Snickerdoodles

This post is a bit late, so forgive me.
This is Jenny:

She is a lovely housemate of mine and the reason that my house looks and smells delightful. When I asked what type of cookies I should make not too long ago, she quickly quipped "Snickerdoodles." I like Jenny. She's fun, easy to talk with, has my back, and will eat what I make, so I could think of no better person to inaugurate this new era of blogging with then Jenny. She is still in school, but working a lot this summer. Jenny has a subtle selflessness about her that I do not think she gets enough credit for, and a livelihood to boot. I have already had many god conversations with her.
Unfortunately, we did not have any cinnamon, but a trip to Costco for the huge cinnamon fixed that, and I got to work. I checked my archives and dusted off my old snickerdoodle recipe. I did not have cream of tartar so I substituted that and the BS for baking powder. I also did not have nutmeg (and still do not), so I painfully omitted it. I also used all butter instead of shortening, and brown sugar instead of white. I have a brown sugar obsession. I combined the dry stuff and the wet stuff, and mixed it together:

. Of course, part of the fun of making Snickerdoodles is rolling them in the cinnamon sugar mixture

, so I got Jenny and my friend Troy to help me with that part. We rolled them and set them on a buttered cookie sheet:

. Pop into the oven, 400 for ten minutes, and they slide right out. Now, we made a couple batches of these because they are simply heavenly, and even then they went super quick.

. Not only did Jenny have several, but our other housemates and guests had several as well, and everyone loved them. I tell you, these things went fast.
I am telling you, these cookies are delicious, and I have tried them unaltered, and they are very good as well. Also, I am very excited to be living with Jenny this year. She recently drove a friend and me back from the bay over July fourth weekend.

.
Anyways, good Luck and good Eats.

Revamp

I'm revamping my blog. As any of my loyal readers (all two of you) can probably tell, it has grown rather stale. Because of this I have decided to start doing things a little bit differently. It's going to become, I think, a people-story-baking blog. By that I mean this: each week I will feature something that I have made, with pictures, and a story of a person that goes along with it. My reasoning is several-fold: to ensure that I bake every week, to make sure that I am with people frequently, and again, because of stagnation. I think that it will also help me improve my writing and my story-telling. I will regulate facts and updates about my life to the state of the blogger address, which I will try to do more of because of the change, just not too many because that is not the point of it all. So, I intend to do the first post in a couple of days, and Snickerdoodles will be involved, so stay tuned!

Not Enough Time or Too Many People

I have been blessed with an abundance of relationships, and I know it. I have great relationships, and even my casual friends I would do anything for. But make no mistake about it, I put the effort in to make these possible, at least the vast majority of them. True, some of these other people put good work into our relationship as well and those are the ones who have ended up the most beautiful at all (and indeed the ones that I am perhaps the most thankful for), but besides for those exceptions, the vast majority or my relationships I have been the one putting the vast majority of work into. Most of the time I do not mind as I make a point in my life to invest in relationships-to be constantly forming new ones, to spend time with my good friends, to talk with those who I am incredibly close with. But over the past maybe eight months there is a realization that I have come to: I do not have the time anymore. I work about 30 hours a week and I do not have the time to invest in relationships as I would like to. Additionally, I have realized how much it takes for the relationships that I do have and so I have invested further into those.
To exemplify this point, I liken it to music-as my music taste has grown, I have expanded the amount of songs that I love, and there are always more songs coming out. Sadly, I do not have time to listen to all of these songs anymore; I have to sacrifice certain songs for a long period and not listen to them. It is not that I have lost my love for these songs, there are just a lot of songs I want to invest in. And people take up far more time than people, and I value people far more than music.
That is how ti goes in relationships. There are some I just have to put on the backburner for a time But the reality is that there does not have to be. I started off saying that I put in most of the work, and that is not to brag or to somehow exemplify myself above people. Frankly, I still do not think that I do that great of a job at investing in relationships and loving those around me. But, there are people who put very little effort into their relationship with me. If they changed that, then our relationship would never go on the back burner because I am so appreciative of when people put time into me, I inevitably put forth effort as well. So, I guess the point of all of this is to say two things:
One, that I am so very thankful for the rich relationships that I have. I am glad that being only 23, I will only get better at understanding how to pursue people more, how to purusepeople better, more efficiently, and how to love people well. But everytime someone tells me that they love me or are thankful for me I am so glad about it, not because I have insecurities such that I need to be told, but because I know that my efforts are paying off. I am so thankful for relationships.
Secondly, its to say that I am sorry. If you are reading this and feel that I have neglected our relationship, then I apologize. Just as with music, it is not that I love you any less, it is simply that I have to spend my time wisely. Pursue me, and you will be pursued in return, that much I can guarantee you. I try to show my love in other ways, weather it be an encouraging text message or a video I make for you, but understand that I love you and this is just the reality. But it does not have to be.

Tragedy(?)

It seems like there is no way that I can have a blog about Isla Vista and not talk about the tragic events that took place a couple of weeks ago. However, I have never been one to say what is popular just because everybody else says it, so let me give a disclaimer-most of what I am about to say is not popular opinion. These are the opinions and understandings of one man, and you can feel free to take them for what you will. That being stated, let me start by saying that what happens sucks. It sucks that seven people died, it sucks that however many more got injured, it sucks that people still living got messed up emotionally or scarred, it all sucks. There is nothing good about what happen, no glass half-full. Also, it is great that this community feels a need to come together for each other and feel unified, that is phenomenal. Also, those that lost people close to them, well that sucks too. And I feel for those people even though I myself have never really had that experience, I can imagine it being incredibly hard. For everyone else though, a question comes to my mind-why are you mourning? If you did not lose someone you know, why realistically are you mourning? I think that the answer, so far as I can tell, is that they feel unsafe now or did not think that 'this' could happen to their little IV. So, I think that what they are really mourning is a destruction of their utopian view of this place. The reality is a city that has riots, bank burnings, frequent armed robberies, rapes, etc. can hardly be called safe. These people feel happy going out and partying on the weekends, as they have every right to, but so far as I can tell, that happiness had given them a false sense of security. The reality, as I heard it so poignantly put a few days ago is that "IV is a happy place, but not an honest place." IV is not safe, just as anywhere is not safe. The reality is that people have evil in their hearts that cause them to do all sorts of evil things-cheat on their wives, rape, slaughter, murder, stab, shoot, yell, scream, berate, etc. This evil will always persist and the only way to stop is to come to Jesus, and even that will not totally eradicate it in this lifetime. I am not advocating for a constant sense of feeling unsafe, but I am advocating for an end to living with your head in the sand, and an end to the amount of violence and sex that the media puts forth. Be it television, movies, music, advertisement, video games, we as a culture continuously stream sex and violence at a high rate into our hearts and the hearts of our children. Until we stop that, we are simply treating symptoms of a disease that continues to persist without treating the disease. We are foolish people really that we do not realize this.
Along with that, all of the agendas that have been furthered through this tragedy, be it gun control, women's rights, mental health awareness, anti-news, etc., they all grossly miss the point. We need to make sure people have good hearts. Until we do that, it matters not what protocol, law, or regulation we put into place; people will find a way around it. Do not get me wrong, I am not blaming media for what happened, but let's please get this straight, media and what we allow into our hearts plays a major role into who we are, that is the bottom line.
Which brings me to my next point; the blame entirely rests on Elliot Rodgers and he is exactly where he deserves to be. Actually, he is exactly where we all deserve to be. Like I said, we all have evil in our hearts, and we should all be paying for it, if not for a King who decided to die. I have advocated for much of this year not condemning people and characterizing them for what they do. I would be a hypocrite if I started with Rodgers. Granted, what he did was especially heinous, but had he lived and had I met him, I would treat him like a human. We are all broken, sinful, messed-up people, and it is by God's grace that more of us do not succumb to our evil urges. I was born into a better a situation than Rodgers and with people who love and support me. he did not have that luxury, so I cannot completely demonize him. However, that does not abscond him of the responsibility. It rests solely on his shoulders.
I have something to say about many of the people, current students and alumni, who have been talking about 'solidarity' and 'Isla Vista overcoming together.' I understand the desire to want to partner with those hurting, but honestly, many of these people have spoken to me about just how much they hate Isla Vista. They think that it is a terrible place and are or were sick of it. They have every right to mourn, but they should not do so without feeling hypocritical. These people do not care about IV, and when the remnants of this tragedy have blown over, they will return to not caring. They will not pray more, they will not care to care more until the next time IV makes CNN. Until then, they will continue to turn up their noses at it. I know, they have told me as much, and it is a common sentiment. The people that I feel have the greatest right to speak on solidarity and oneness are those who have invested much into the community. Those are the people that I thank and respect because it is a difficult community to invest a lot in, I know firsthand.
Finally, (lest this reach a length that is unreadable) I will give one urging to the people of Isla Vista and the
community as a whole: move-on. What happens sucked, like I said, but you do not move past by dwelling on what happened. You move forward by making new memories, forging new relationships, creating new bonds, laughing until your gut hurts, experiencing new hugs, kisses, hand-shakes, watching The Office together late at night, getting Freebirds because you are up until 4 studying for your Bio midterm. Basically, continue to live. It is ok to take time to mourn, but once you have mourned, you need to move on.
Again, these are just the opinions of one man, and insignificant opinions at that. Take what you will and trash what you will. I just ask that you read this with an open mind. If you do that and you sincerely disagree me with, great.
~Good Luck and Good Eats

Graduating...Ed Gonzales

I know several people who are set to graduate in about a month. I would be remiss if I did not take some time to talk about what they mean to me. I have been so impacted by these kids, and I feel that it is high time to tell them. This post is about Ed Gonzales.
Ed, you are a light. Your laugh brings so much joy to me and I enjoy making you laugh so much. I also enjoy that I enjoy it and am good at it, if that makes sense. I have always enjoyed your willingness to be and to hang out, and it would not be an incorrect description to say that you have gifted me with your presence. I do not mean to seem dramatic, but I have always felt like you have such a stabilizing presence in my life. I have been able to be present with you, and that is a gift that you have given to me. It is has been a joy to see you in bible study every week and to see your faithfulness and growth that has come from it. God is turning you into a great man, and I have seen that already from you. I encourage you to continue to press into God and let Him transform you; do not let others, but let Him. I think that you are also a really trustworthy person, Ed. People feel safe with you and I think that that will increasingly come in handy in your life. One of the coolest things this year is literally getting to see you seniors grow up and that has been so true in you as well. You have brought me so much Joy Ed, and are a no-nonsense type of friend. I think that I do not even fully value you, but I do appreciate you.
Ed, thank you for what you have done in my life. Thank you for always being available for me and pursing me in the ways that I needed it. Thank you for being faithful in bible study this year, and thankful for your faithfulness in your commitment to Christ. It will only get harder, but your reward will be great, my friend.