Breaking Up, Breaking Habits

Original Posting: May 2011

God and I have a rather interesting relationship. I'm sure this is part of me still being fairly new, and not really used to devoting lots of time to my faith and getting to know Him.

Anyway, the point is that I don't habitually actively try to tune in to whatever He's saying to me. Oh, some stuff does get through now and then, but usually God has to really hit me over the head before I realize He's trying to tell me something.

Case in point:

He's been telling me for a while that I really need to step back from obligations, relax, and really work on myself. And I've been getting that; I've known for a long time that I need this long summer break to build myself back up. But it never seemed quite that necessary to happen; it was always something I could put off until a little later, right after I got past this month, this week, this final...

And then I broke up with my boyfriend.

I've had my heart broken before. But with everything that had happened leading up to this breakup, well...

I think it shows how out of my head I was that I wasn't scared of myself at all. As it was, I should have been terrified.

By the time I was done with finals (the day before the breakup), I was hanging by threads. I don't want to go so far as to say I had a psychotic break, but... I think I came pretty damn close.

I had all of the extremes after the breakup.

I had refusal to eat, and then I had binging.

I had long periods of hard sobbing, and then periods devoid of emotion.

I had complete apathy, and then I had manic episodes.

I had self-injury (not cutting, but... hitting myself, hitting walls/furniture to make myself bruise – I did accidentally make myself bleed, though...).

I currently have a rubber band on my wrist, and my wrist is covered with welts.

There were in fact warnings of this earlier. The behavior, I mean (well, the breakup, too, but that's not what this post is about). The week before spring break was hell on me, and some of the behavior I exhibited in the days following the breakup, I first displayed that week, between complete rage at other people and severe panic/anxiety over a scholarship deadline.

And then we add in that I was pretty much forced to go talk to one of the university's counselors a few months ago, and I strongly considered paying another visit a few weeks ago of my own free will (I never did, but I wonder if things would be any better had I gone).

In short, this breakup is the hit over the head that God needed to give me, to tell me, "You're fucked up. You need to fix yourself completely and get back to 100% before you can even think about balancing another person's interests with yours."

Well, okay, God wouldn't use the F-word, but... you get it. And I am; I look at where I am now and I think about where I was before the spring semester and that's the only word I can use.

So this summer break isn't just a break from classes and homework and (as of recently) committing to another person. It's also a time of personal therapy. All that happened this past semester has left me with anxieties and fears and habits that I never had before, and that threaten to be quite damaging if I don't do something about them right now.

I recently bought some books about Chinese Medicine and healing – my current obsession, as I bill it to my parents. One of them has a routine for stimulating the Meridians of the human body (if you're not familiar with CM or other alternative medicines, Meridians are paths along the human body associated with various organs; masseuses massage along them for healing, and acupuncturists insert needles along specific points of the Meridians). The routine uses acupressure, and I just tried a very abbreviated version of it earlier. I felt better, for a little while. If I can incorporate it into my morning routine, and make it a habit by the time school starts again (oh, God, help me), then I think it will make school, among other things preceding, easier to bear.

There's so much I've learned about Chinese Medicine just from that book, but that's for another post.

So I'll see what following CM healing principles to the best of my (financial) ability for a few weeks does for my emotional and mental health (and physical as a side benefit). Hopefully that'll be enough.

But if not, then maybe I will need to face the fact that I'll need to shell out for consulting an expert. I know my parents won't pay for it. Dad hasn't really said anything for or against my latest obsession, but Mom's already poked fun at me for my interest. Not exactly encouraging...

But let's not put the cart before the horse.

That's what's going on with me at the moment. I really did start this blog with the intention that everything would be cheerful, or at least not rife with me angsting. But sometimes you do just need to get stuff out to the world (believe me, I've been writing in my diary just about every day, and while it's helping, I do wonder if this might be a little more effective).

I'll do my best to have something more positive next time.

Until then, folks.

♥Sarah

Weird Things that College Made Me Do

Original Posting: May 2011
1 – Weird food combinations
Now, this is something that I've always done anyway, but I wound up doing some very bizarre stuff. Consider: Butternut squash soup, orange juice, a banana, yogurt, quick oats, flax seeds, protein powder, and cranberries. All at once, in the same cup. I kid you not. Sometimes when you don't get the flavor you want, you grab whatever will give you that value. If I want something a bit more sour, I'll throw in orange juice. If I want something creamier, I'll add some yogurt. Want sweet? Dried blueberries. I had such things in spades this past semester.

Salsa with banana chips? Best. Snack. EVER.

2 – A fridge full of condiments and no food
Well, this isn't literally true, but close enough. Oh, yes, once in while I bought chips to go with the hummus or whatnot, but by the end of the spring semester, I was just eating the condiments straight out of the container. I still like to just open the thing of salsa and eat it with a spoon.

3 – Stay up late just to play pool
There's a pool table in the TUB, and a friend introduced me to it one of the last weeks of the semester. He's... really really good at pool. And it turns out that as long as I focus, I'm actually not that bad (I credit my many bored hours of playing PC pool when I was a child...). But I wanted to say that I could beat him fair and square (meaning that I would be the one to sink the 8 ball after all else was done), so after the first night, I challenged him to a rematch. A midnight meeting was set.

I still need to sink that 8 ball. On purpose, I mean…

There's always next semester!

4 – Stay up all night just because I'm used to it
This is pretty self-explanatory. I never got to watch the sun come up, though. Sucky timing; sucky weather.

5 – Use an umbrella
This one is only weird if you know that I live in Washington. (Don't ask me which one.) And I don't mean that I live in Washington because I'm going to college here. I'm a native Washingtonian, born, bred, raised. We never use umbrellas, and we laugh at those who do.

Cos, see, in Washington, it's easy to tell who's not from around here. It's not the lack of our distinctive Washington accent that tips us off (although if you show up with a strong Southern drawl or a New York snark, we will notice). Nope; it's the people who react to our weather like they've never seen anything like it before.

Maybe it's because I grew up with it, but I find it hilarious that out-of-staters will pull out the umbrella and rain boots for a drizzle -- not even anything.

Now; I love the rain. I really do. But this year, walking in the weather several times a day (with freshly-done hair and makeup that I don't want to ruin) has made me really appreciate the umbrella.

Now, my favorite rain is the heavy rain. In summer, when it's warm. That's not so fun to walk in during the winter.

So, eventually, I caved and bought an umbrella.

I'm not completely gone: I don't have rain boots. Although I did almost buy some at one point, because I have Converse, and then all of my other shoes are sandals, or ballet flats with varying degrees of waterproof-ness. But I couldn't find any that were cute enough that were also cheap enough (I’m sorry, I just can’t justify paying any more than $20 for a pair of shoes/boots). Go figure!

If the next winter is as bad as this past one was (it's been very tentatively spring for the past week or so – we had a super-long winter), then maybe I'll get rain boots. If I find some that are cute enough...

But I still make fun of my roommate for pulling out her umbrella at the first very tiny little bead of water that lands on her.

6 – Date a musician


--

That’s all for now. I might add to this later; who knows. College has completely changed my perception of normalcy, so it might be that my parents will point new habits out to me in due time, once I’m home!

Until next time!

♥Sarah

6.2 – I totally kid
His name is Ryan. We've been dating for almost eight months. I adore him. The "little king" and the "princess." I know, right? Too sweet...

Your Dad was Right when He Told You College Boys are Better than High School Boys

(April 2012 Afterthought: But not by much.)

Original Posting: January 2011

Depraved high school girls, rejoice!

Long story short, I usually got the short end of the stick when it came to dating in high school. It always seemed to me that they didn't know I existed, or knew I existed but were taken with (or taken by) someone else, or they knew I existed but I didn't feel the same way about them. My most recent exploit before college was completely outside of my established "type." Didn't work out well on my end. He didn't contact me for a few days after I got his number, and when he finally did, he was drunk and trying to persuade me into having sex with him, should we start a relationship. No thanks. I was a little too forgiving of him after that, though, and it didn't seem to me like he quite got that I wasn't interested in him after that, but I was too nice to tell him to back off.

Lessons learned: Stick to your type, and if you're not interested, tell him NOW.

Since this was on the tail of other emotional traumas regarding relationships of all kinds, I think by the end of all of that I had decided that men were all backstabbing, heartless, selfish bastards who would only have anything to do with you if they thought you would give them sexual gratification. Who cares if your feelings get hurt? At least they'll feel good about leaving you in the dust wondering what just happened while they get to brag to their buddies about how whatever they are.

Obviously, I'm still a bit bitter. I need to learn not to be, at least not for this long.

Fast-forward into college. As per a habit that I had developed over the past three years, I scouted around for every cute boy I could spot. It was refreshing to know that, for the most part, I was an unknown in this environment. With the exception of a few boys who graduated with me and a few more that I had met during orientations, none of the boys at this school had any idea who I was. Refreshing, but also a little bit scary. What sort of first impression would I make on these people? I had finally gotten comfortable with the idea that I am a very attractive girl, but I was still embracing the finer nuances of my personality that I had never quite felt free with during high school. Would I come across as too smart, too geeky, too severe, too anything? Of course, I was not about to be dishonest about who I was, but my fear was that, just as I believe might have been one of my problems in high school, I would be a little too intimidating. Obviously I am quite verbose on paper (or screen as the case may be), but I do not actually talk much just out of my own volition; usually someone has to speak to me first, or there otherwise needs to be something going on that sets a precedent for me to follow. I've already established that I like silence, and thus I do not particularly like breaking it. So, what most people get as a first impression of me, I think, is a pretty face that won't really interact with people.

Not very interesting, right?

So I think I did go into this new pool of eligible males being aware of that failing. At the same time, however, this was still a new pool of college boys. College men, as my dad always corrects me. They tend to be made of tougher stuff than high school boys, so they might be more willing to accept the risk of rejection, so I thought.

I braced myself and waded in. I didn't even have to get in past my feet.

The second week I was on campus, I met him. He asked me out the first night we texted each other, and we've been together since.

I remember being very nervous about our prospects. In light of past experiences and my thus very skewed perspective of relationships, I wondered what I wanted from this and what he wanted to do with me. I second-guessed everything, and was perhaps more cautious than the situation really warranted. I'm sure on some level this was frustrating for him (it certainly didn't make things very fun for me), but he told me he understood where I was coming from, which was reassuring.

I also remember being very upset when it started dawning on me that maybe we just couldn't work. He was very busy working toward his major and getting stuff done so he could go to grad school, and he was also in the play. Maybe, he thought, he might have to break up with me because everything would get to be too much to handle, and he didn't want to risk hurting me like that. I had just started college, and we were both wondering if it was maybe too much to have a first, new relationship right on the heels of that. It all led to one of those moments when you can't stop the tears, and all you want to do is scream because of the injustice of it all; was that how it would end when I had finally come that close?

By the next week, we had both decided it was worth a shot. I had figured out by then that you're going to get hurt by people regardless of your relationship with them, no matter what you do. The only way to avoid that is to not live your life, and what's the point of that?

He took me out by the water on a clear night; we could see every star. He made my first kiss special.

My roommate asked me several weeks ago what I liked about him. I'm not entirely sure why; I know that she's been very happy for me with my relationship, so maybe it was just simple curiosity. And in fact, I hadn't revisited the reasons explicitly for a while, so I indulged her.

I liked that he was very straightforward about how he felt. He admitted practically right away that he was interested in me. I liked that he was very thoughtful, and considerate of my well-being. Our first date, we hung out on a couch by the fireplace in the dorm building with tea for me and coffee for him, and we kind of wound up talking about our most recent significant experiences concerning, to put it bluntly, our mental states. I talked about the fallout of the past month, and he told me about the rough time he'd had leading up the end of the past academic year and the summer. Maybe this isn't the sort of thing you should talk about on a first date, but I felt it was fair to him that he know right up front that I still had significant hangups and might not trust him for a while.

He was very kind, and sweet. Talking to him felt like talking to myself. I often say when people catch me talking to myself that I'm talking to whoever's listening – which often ends up being myself. Finally, I could ramble on about something, trying to sort thoughts out, and there was someone who would give me feedback on those thoughts and let me know if they made any sense or if they needed to be expanded upon a little more.

Cleverly disguised narcissism? You decide, because I don't know right now.

And it's continued on. We have very good communication in the relationship, which it goes without saying is very important. And every conversation we have reminds me again and again that he's a keeper.

I can't say it's been perfect; we've had our share of ups and downs and bumps in the road, but we've worked through them, and we readdress certain issues on about a monthly basis to make sure we're still on the same page. As of last week, we have been together for four months, and it has been a dream come true.

I could never have gotten this with the high school boys I knew.

♥Sarah

There is No Such Thing as a Quiet Night in the Dorms

Original Posting: January 2011

My first night in the dorms could have been better in a lot of ways. Even though I was now moved in, I was still under pressures to find out what textbooks I needed, to get things for the dorm that I'd found out were necessary, and to make it to all of the orientation activities that I somehow felt were necessary but at the same time didn't feel were necessary. After all, it's not like I was penalized for not attending things except by lack of a stamp on a card that I could have turned in for prizes if I wanted to... I never did turn that thing in.

Anyway, so the first night, I had some racing thoughts. I had also just met my roommate, and I was hoping that I'd made a good enough first impression on her (we had just spent half an hour that evening taking pictures with each other, so we already had some good memories). However, things were still a bit shaky.

The mattress felt hard as a rock. Eventually I would get a memory foam mattress pad that would make things a zillion times better, but until then, I had to suffer with the standard brick-soft variety that colleges supply.

I also had not brought my earplugs with me. I had been told that quiet hours started at 11PM. I quickly learned that though this is the policy, it is very difficult to enforce if it is enforced at all. I learned I cannot count on the dorms being quiet until something like one o'clock in the morning. And even then...

It took me something like three hours to finally fall asleep...

There is not a single night in the dorm that I have not felt the need to wear ear plugs. Unfortunately, this has led to me sleeping through my alarm a couple times (much to the chagrin of my roommate, I'm sure), but I find that as long as I get at least a moderate amount of sleep, I wake up with it. Whether I actually get out of bed is completely another story...

And no, the dorms aren't even quiet during dead week and finals week. Or at least they aren't quiet enough. I likes me some perfect silence for studying...

Happy New Year, everyone!

♥Sarah

A Collection of Visions

Original Posting: November 2010

It's been a little while, hasn't it? What with college work and NaNoWriMo, I can't spare much time for blogging (not that I ever dedicated much time to it before, anyway...)

This does not mean that stuff hasn't been happening.

--

This happened back in September.

My boyfriend and I went on a triple date with two of my girlfriends and their boyfriends, to a ceramics painting locale. I had not exactly thought about what I wanted to paint -- I wanted to see what was there first. I decided, since every time I had gone to paint ceramics before I had painted an animal, that this time I would paint a tile. But what would I paint on it?

So I thought for a while, and nothing came to me. Hannah had chosen to paint a mug, and she was not sure what to do either. It was simultaneous: we both prayed for inspiration, and He granted it to us at the exact same time!

It actually came to me in pieces as I went. God doesn't give us more than we can handle at one time, after all!

I tried to take a good picture; I had to use flash so that the colors would show up right. Sorry, guys. But here's what the tile ended up looking like:

(I should mention I did not do the shadows and highlights on the fire -- that was all Hannah.)

It currently lives propped against the back of my desk; I have no means to hang it up that I trust to keep it up. But it's gorgeous, and totally from God: I would NOT have come up with this image without His input.

I want to go again, and paint a tile for my roommate. She'll be going back to Japan after the semester is over. She spoils me rotten, and I have barely been able to do anything in return. I want to make sure she has something from me before she leaves!

--

Back in October, well... Let's say I had been having a little trouble keeping the faith. I still went to True North every Wednesday, but other than that I had not been spending much time with Jesus. So, during worship, I asked God for a vision, since it had been a while. I just asked for something to prove to me that He was still there -- I knew he was there; I just needed a reminder. And he showed me a red vase with two white stripes going across it, across a vivid sky blue background (He knows I like sky blue, I guess!). And as I watched, a green bud grew up from the soil very quickly, like in those time-lapse videos you see of the sky changing from dawn to dusk. And it blossomed into this gorgeous pink tiger lily.

And He told me, "That's you."

I drew it when I got home (yes, I know now that lilies have six petals -- the one in my vision even had six petals, so I don't know why I drew five):

(If you can't read the verse, it's Song of Songs 2:2)
I started coloring it Photoshop, but I'm not finished yet, obviously.

I looked up symbolism for the tiger lily, and it's for wealth and pride. One source had it as symbolizing femininity, but it was just the one. Pink can be for being romanced/pursued out of love by the Lord. Cool, yes?

--

I had been kinda low for a few days (bit of a ripple with the boyfriend -- bound to happen), and I'd gone to prophetic hearings that were happening at my church on a Tuesday night, because more than anything I needed to get away. I came kinda late in it, and I was in the back, just sitting, not entirely paying attention, and thinking.

God put this in my heart to do, and while it may seem strange to think that it made me feel better, it made me feel better nonetheless:


I don't know if that's an actual verse that I wrote on my hand, but it's something that He put in my heart to write, so I did it. (It says: And so My beloved looked upon My cross / And she knew Me."

--

This happened this past Wednesday. I'd been having a bit of a rough week (I seem to get a lot of those) and I was feeling kinda low again. During worship, they played a song with the lyrics, "Only You are worthy."

And I sat at some point during the song, and one time as the chorus played, "Only You are worthy," I started asking, "Am I worthy? Am I worthy of You?"

And He said, "Of course you are." And He showed me a white bird, as if I had been watching it fly overhead; just this huge white bird. And the first thing that popped into my head was "albatross."

"Albatross?" I wondered, thinking of the bird. "I think I'd prefer if it were a swan."

"No," He said, "It's an albatross."

"Okay, okay, it's an albatross. So what does that mean?"

And I recalled the meaning of the albatross, specifically as told in "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," and how the albatross was a symbol of good luck at sea.

Ahh...

And God said, "You are My good-luck charm. That's how worthy you are."

What a Word! I'm still reeling from it!

(Hopefully this vision doesn't also mean I'll get shot with an arrow... Haha!)

--

That's all for now, folks. He's always there, and He's always watching you, and He has plans for you all like you would not believe!

Jeremiah 29:11, guys!

♥Sarah

Dinosaurs in a Hotel

Original Posting: August 2010

A cracked-out title for a B-movie? Maybe, if Samuel L. Jackson ever gets this on his screen.

No, this is my first revelation!

Several days ago, I started having bad dreams, night after night. First was the standard actor's nightmare: you go on stage having no idea what the play is or what your lines are. Second was more personal terror – attempted strangulation, and no one in the crowd surrounding you coming to help. Third, to be short, my parents were getting divorced; which is extreme nightmare territory for me. I woke up crying from that one...

Last week, I was fed up with having bad dreams. I asked God that, if I was to remember my dream at all for that night, to please give me a good dream.

What He did in response was spectacular.

Imagine: A hotel. Dinosaurs invading that hotel, FULL of people. The Teen Titans (yes, those Teen Titans we loved to watch on Cartoon Network) rushing in to rescue the tenants from the dinosaurs.

There was actually quite a bit more than that going on, but that's the shortest way to put it, cos I want to get to the AMAZING part.

I was a bit skeptical, about asking God to interpret this dream – what can you possibly get out of dinosaurs in a hotel, right? But I asked Him to help me out, anyway, because there was no way I was making sense of this on my own.

The people in the hotel represent, of course, THE PEOPLE. Of this planet.

The dinosaurs, collectively, are Satan and his sinful influence, in this place where the people are trapped and easy prey to him.

The Teen Titans, collectively, are Jesus and His holy influence. They get the people OUT of the hotel, defending them from the dinosaurs. Jesus saves the people from sin.

With me so far?

Then I thought, "Wait... I was one of the Teen Titans, in my dream. What does that mean?" (I was Raven, if anyone wants to know – she's always been my favorite. And I/she was wearing a shimmering white-pink dress that seemed to reflect light a lot more than any material should, if it didn't actually emit light, and I'm quite sure there was a reason for that) I didn't get anything, but I trusted that I would know eventually, so I left it there and continued on my way to an interview.

Cut to last night; graduated seniors are prayed for by the group, and that was the night for me and two others. My mind was blown away by what some people saw as they prayed (a box in a room, me breaking out of that box and out of that room, but always having a vase around me, divine protection; a deer needing to always drink water, the water of God, to keep up its strength), but then, afterwards, Joel came up and said he'd gotten an image, and something he'd wanted to say, but hadn't because it was running long.

"Now's your chance!" I invited.

Here we go:

Joel told me he'd gotten a vision of me becoming accepted into a group – called "the elite" for sake of simplicity. Basically, people who don't yet know Jesus, who think they're above it all. This group sees me as being like one of them, and they let me in and open their hearts up to me, and then Jesus enters their hearts through me.

...

WOOOOAH!

Mystery solved!

I can't get over how world-rocking it is! Yay, Jesus!

Oh, and the following has happened twice, including last night, so it can't be coincidence (no, I seriously doubt it is): I prayed with my whole being to the Lord that those I love who don't know Him, would feel His presence and His love, and then I felt myself buzzing.

WOAH! If that's not supernatural, I don't know what is!

Oh my goodness, life is just picking up and becoming more and more incredible these past few weeks!

Psalm 104:1 – Let all that I am praise the Lord!

♥Sarah

I'm Still Alive!

EDIT: 4/9/12

I've been doing some thinking lately that I want to retool how I do this thing. For now, I've reverted all prior posts to drafts, while I continue to think about this (and bide until I have time to actually do the retooling). I don't know how this is going to affect posting dates and comments and whatever because I've never reverted a post to a draft before, BUT. I'm sure many of them will come back (and I think after some extensive editing, because they do get rather long-winded, don't they? I figure, if I'm ever going to write professionally, I need to learn to be more concise).

Not that anyone's watching who really cares, but thanks for bearing with me on this.

Begin Original Post: 

Thought I should let you know. Not that anyone follows this that doesn't know already.

Also, there are things for me to blog about once my schedule opens up. Things are kind of "Oh my goodness work what" right now, between homework and, um, actual work (well, work-study; close enough). Not quite so busy as last semester, but full enough.

Haven't had as much an urge to blog this semester cos I've been satisfying the writing itch with my Creative Writing class every week, I guess! BUT. Not dropping this. Cos this is fun.

I didn't intend this to be very long, sooooooo...

Brace yourselves. New entries will happen. Soonish... Maybe.

Ta~!

~Sarah

In Which I Backpedal

Original Posting: January 2012

Cultivate your own relationship with God, but don't impose it on others. You're fortunate if your behavior and your belief are coherent. But if you're not sure, if you notice that you are acting in ways inconsistent with what you believe – some days trying to impose your opinions on others, other days just trying to please them – then you know that you're out of line. If the way you live isn't consistent with what you believe, then it's wrong.

~ Romans 14:22-23, The Message

This passage hit me more strongly when I initially read it in context of what I was thinking about at the time. But the post hinges on this.

–

As the title suggests, this is a response to my most recent blog post. Having had some time to myself after posting it, I finally realized what it was about the post that never sat right with me.

I cited 1 Cor 7:7 and 7:38 in my last post, that God gives the gifts of singlehood and marriage to different people, and that neither is inferior or superior to the other, as a sort of disclaimer. And indeed I said it was my opinion.

The problem, I realized, was that my belief – the Word – did not line up with my opinion – singlehood is inherently better than marriage.

Keyword: Inherently.

–

You might have gathered from my last post that I have a lot of trouble seeing romantic relationships in a positive light at this time. There are reasons for that. I started to really think about it after one of the last times I was at youth group. It was a Q&A night, and one of the topics that kept coming up was romantic relationships – specifically, how do you know when you're going too far, and if you don't want to go that far again, what can you do to keep it from happening?

I thought about contributing to the discussion, but I didn't realize an "audience" member could do that. And by the time I learned that, we were wrapping up.

I only realized a couple of weeks ago that I went further with my ex-boyfriend than I wanted to go. Didn't go too far – thank God – but still further than I was actually willing to go. I didn't realize my discomfort meant exactly that at the time, because I thought I was just breaking out of my shell – stepping out of your comfort zone is supposed to be a good thing, right? Well, not so much for intimacy, it turns out. It's about all I can remember when I think about the relationship, and it colors any outlook I have on future relationships.

Takeaway: Going further than you want to go, at all, does your mental/emotional health bad.

He manipulated me. I don't know if he realized that's what he was doing, but he guilt-tripped me into pushing further and further out; I did it because I didn't want him to get bored, and I wasn't about to lose the experience so quickly when I had waited all of high school for a boyfriend. I told him once that I didn't like the "ickier" stuff as much as the innocent stuff we did in public; I don't remember his response word for word, but it came down to him not seeing it as such a big deal, and me then feeling like I was too chaste for anyone's good.

If there is a next time, I know that I'm going to have to outline my boundaries right up front – if he still wants to cross them, or agrees with me but still hopes to cross them via wearing me down, then he's going to have to move on to someone else. I'm sorry, but that's a whole mess of conflicting emotions that I really do not have the time, energy, or mental stability to deal with.

So I realized all of this a couple days after that Q&A night, because I was thinking about it; thought about posting the same thoughts on the Facebook page for the youth group, or one of the devotional Groups I'm in, but for whatever reason I never did.

I realized that even though I said I believed what God said – that singlehood and relationships are on the same level – I did not conduct myself that way. I conducted myself with the opinion that relationships cannot hold a candle to staying single, and I imposed that on others in my previous post. Given a chance, I might have done the same in real life.

I don't know how well this is coming through. What I am trying to say is that there was a disconnect between what I said I believed online, and what I actually believed according to how I conducted myself.

The real problem: it was affecting other relationships in my life, particularly concerning trust. I had difficulty trusting friends, parents, even God – BIG no bueno.

The syllogism is supposed to run like this:

God wants a relationship with you.

All things that come from God are good.

Therefore, relationships are good.

Well, okay; my Philosophy professor would have a thing or two to say about how that is false, therefore unsound, but you get the idea (I don't feel like fixing it). If all kinds of relationships come from God, then all kinds of relationships are inherently good – it's human error that makes any of them abusive.

If I insist on viewing romantic relationships negatively, unwilling and unable to trust him, then how can I expect to have positive, trusting relationships anywhere else in my life?

It sounds a bit weird to me, to say that looking down on – even hating – the idea of romantic relationships would consequently poison friendly relationships and father/mother-daughter relationships, but it turns out that can happen. It makes sense given my personal relationship with God – I said in my post about Song of Songs that it's a deepest devotion, and to me that means romantic. I am the bride of Christ, after all.

So that's my self-improvement project for the time being: Learn to view romantic relationships in a positive light again.

This won't happen overnight. I'm not sure how I'm going to go about this, because I'm still not in any mood to get into another relationship. I suppose more time is the answer.

We'll see what happens.

~Sarah

A Treatise on Why Singlehood Will Trump Being in a Relationship FOREVER

Original Posting: January 2012

Disclaimer: I am aware that 1 Corinthians 7 states neither singlehood nor marriage is superior/inferior to the other. This is opinion. (Note that all further cited verses are from 1 Corinthians 7 in The Message.) More accurately, this is me being extremely biased/narrow-minded. I can have a day like this now and then if I want to.

And away we go!

1 – When you're unmarried, you're free to concentrate on simply pleasing the Master.

No hesitation in asserting that Jesus is the #1 priority. Which, there shouldn't be any hesitation anyway, regardless of your situation. But I put my ex-boyfriend first far too much (um, all the time), which is why he was my boyfriend for so long in the first place. I should have turned and run the instant he said he would have preferred that we had sex even though he said he could deal with being celibate.

Girls: If a guy says he can be celibate for you – he's lying. Boys, I can't tell you if it's similar for girls in the inverse situation because that's not an issue I've ever had to deal with personally. Sorry. Find a girl with looser morals than me and ask her instead.

2 – You take priority. Well, let me clarify that, because serving God does mean serving Him and others before you, but I need to serve myself, too! I can't serve others if I don't stop to make sure I'm okay! What I mean by this is, you dress for yourself; your makeup is for yourself. You're not fretting in front of mirrors for an extra however long before you leave wondering if this skirt is too revealing or if that eyeshadow is too bright.

3 – Sometimes I wish everyone were single like me – a simpler life in many ways!

Relationships are complicated and messy and horrible, and you're only going to end up with your feelings hurt. So really, you're better off keeping single.

4 – Marriage involves you in all the nuts and bolts of domestic life and in wanting to please your spouse, leading to so many more demands on your attention. The time and energy that married people spend in caring for and nurturing each other, the unmarried can spend in becoming whole and holy instruments of God.

Even if it does appear to be "working out," you kind of have to dedicate time to someone else who's fickle and fallible that you really should be devoting to Someone who is constant.

5 – You can't fantasize about encounters with Benedict Cumberbatch, Matt Smith, or Sean Maher (or any combination of the three, or someone else of your fancy) when you're in a relationship with someone. Well, you can, but if they find out about it, it threatens their self-esteem. Because if it comes down to run-of-the-mill local boys versus Benedict Cumberbatch, there's no question at all which one you would choose.

6 – No pressure to stay as thin as you were when you two first met. This isn't permission to let yourself go; just sayin', it's nice to be able to randomly swing up a couple pounds on week X of your cycle and know you don't have a ball-and-chain to nitpick at you for it.

7 – That said, you have more time and energy to spend on keeping yourself in shape, if you are so inclined. Instead of helping yourself look and feel better for someone else, you're helping yourself look and feel better for yourself. It's called self-improvement for a reason, right? It's not gonna stick if you're only doing it to make others like you more and not because you really want it. Like with plastic surgery.

I want you to live as free of complications as possible.

8 – No hours-long conversations with your girlfriends asking what he meant when he said "Hello" instead of "Hi."

9 – No lying awake agonizing over how he interpreted your goodnight text.

10 – No worries about Christmas/Valentines/birthday/anniversary candy he'll buy you that you know will go straight to your thighs even if he did mean well.

11 – No worries about buying Christmas/Valentines/birthday/anniversary gifts for him. This means you can put that money toward more important things. Like nail polish.

12 – You don't have to choose between a ball-and-chain and your friends (or staying in to work on a crochet project or curling up with your Bible) when deciding what to do with your Friday night.

13 – There's a certain satisfaction in knowing you have your pick of guys, and they're sitting there hoping you'll choose them, but you never will, and then you get to watch them squirm. Or you can just imagine all that if it makes you feel better about being single when all of your friends are asking why you don't have a boyfriend like something's wrong with you. I don't have many opportunities for power trips...

14 – No pressure to plan a date on a regular basis. If you decide you don't want to go out somewhere after all, you don't have to disappoint someone else. Also, no one to flake out on you.

15 – You don't have to wonder if your ball-and-chain is lying about actually having something else to do that can't be skipped just so he can get out of going to such-and-such a thing (in other words, you don't have to worry that you're the ball-and-chain).

16 – All I want is for you to be able to develop a way of life in which you can spend plenty of time together with the Master without a lot of distractions.

Relationships are a big, fat, waste of your vital life time. Period.

–

No, I'm not a feminist. Well, equal pay, please; but I don't think men should be shipped off to an island somewhere and only used for organ harvest.

It's good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband.

…

[And] celibacy is not for everyone any more than marriage is. God gives the gift of the single life to some, the gift of the married life to others.

Seriously, though, I can't see why a boyfriend would be of any practical use to me (hello, arm candy). I suppose a boyfriend can eventually evolve into a husband if it receives enough training and a lot of experience points, but I can adopt if I want kids that badly. Though I would still want for them to have an earthly father in addition to the Father, so there's just no way to remove that monkey wrench, is there...

Oh, duh; I'm already married to Jesus! And if it's God's will for me to have children, then I'll spontaneously conceive – it happened to Mary! And He's the best Daddy ever, so no worries there!

That said...

Fellas; keep trying. Just because I'm totally in love with singlehood doesn't mean I'm Ice Queen.

~Sarah

If I Were the Type to Make Resolutions...

Original Posting: January 2012

They would be as follows:

1 – Turn "Why bother?" into "Why not?"

A half-resolution I made last year was to stop putting things off until later – what was stopping me from going on a road trip (does Olympia to Portland count?), going to a live concert (Josh Groban!), learning how to do something new (knitting) right now?

This phrasing, I think, is more applicable to how I tend to approach things. I tend to not even try for certain things because I don't believe they will go anywhere – I won't be accepted to go on the JCET tour to Japan next summer (um, guess who's going to Japan for two weeks this May?!), I won't receive that scholarship, I'm not going to be picked for an interview much less for the job, he's too cute to be single. There's some persistent feeling of inadequacy that I haven't been able to grow out of, and it stops me before I even start.

I don't like asking "What have I got to lose?" when the answer is "A piece of my dignity/self-esteem." Which leads into...

2 – Learn to forgive myself for my mistakes and leave them behind me for good.

The transition to a new year is a good time to wipe everything off the board and give it a good wash. There are things I've done that I've struggled to make peace with myself about for one reason or another. Self-harm, the lies that came with it, my ex-boyfriend and all the secondary mistakes I made while I was dating him. Any time I've broken a promise and let someone down, including myself.

Not anymore. The person who made those mistakes does not exist anymore. And even if she did, she would be every bit as Forgiven as I am. It is time to finally put it all in the past where it belongs, and move on.

3 – Learn to listen to myself, and keep in touch with my emotions.

I've gotten a lot better at this in the past couple of months, but it needs to become a failsafe habit. Because I have slipped up a couple of times this break by going for the sugar when I should have asked myself why I was so frustrated at my brother and to a lesser extent my mother. Instead of taking out that frustration on eating candy (although, it was chocolate-covered fruit-flavored pieces – can you really blame me?), I should have asked what had me so irritated, why it irritated me, and what I could do about it. Since I don't have a job, much less a place I could move into, there isn't much I can do about my living situation or what food is actually in the house. And no matter how much sugar is in the house I always have the choice to resist, no matter how tempting it is. My brother is pretty much the way he is; any attempt I can make to change him is almost guaranteed to end badly for me, because he has a habit of running to hide behind Mom. Any attempt I've made in the past to get Mom to buy less candy (specifically for me, as in Easter baskets) hasn't been received well.

So it's all on me to deal with the issue, and the solution is very simple; just don't touch the junk. Yeah, it doesn't get me anywhere. But giving in to temptation doesn't get me anywhere productive, either; it only gives me a rush-and-crash followed by guilt and paranoia about fat gain. Obviously, this isn't an anxiety that I need.

4 – Get toned!

Since I'm an American, and a woman, I suppose it's practically obligatory that I put some image-related resolution here.

I'm well aware that I'm relatively skinny already. Granted, I've probably gained a few pounds since being home, but that's beside the point. I'm making no weight-related resolutions – I'm making a body composition-related resolution!

I can build strength, but I've never noticed that I can develop muscular definition. Perhaps I've managed to become slim enough now that any muscle built from this point will actually show up, but eh... We'll see how I manage with my PE class this semester... And if that turns out to feel inadequate, a friend at college has volunteered his triple-blackbelt services to whip me into shape no problem, else I die trying.

5 – Somehow, in some order – Read the Bible.

I've been picking and choosing random books/chapters to read all break, and that's all well and good. But I really would like to at least read through the whole Bible this year. I can't guarantee that I'll get everything out of it that there is to get out of it – and you're not supposed to get everything in the Bible at the first pass, anyway. It's a Living text; its meaning changes with time and with your circumstances. Song of Songs only meant anything to me last time I read it because I was trying to figure out what makes a woman beautiful. The past times I'd looked through it, it'd had very little meaning to me.

And in all things as much as possible, keep it simple.

~Sarah