Keep your head up, let your hair down

6 months.  That's half a year. 182 days. 4368 hours. 262080 minutes. 15724800 seconds of so many fleeting moments, most of which I can't even remember.  It's amazing how time passes and we just keep going, going, going. 4368 hours ago I never would have thought I would be where I am today, sitting in an office at Carnegie Mellon University--a top University in our country. Really?! 182 days ago I would not have thought I would be making a daily commute into a city, I have looked at for years, but only begun to know.  The more I think about it, the more life amazes me with the way it works--so unpredictable, so out of control.

My commute into Oakland is one of my favorite times of my M-T-W days of the week.  I feel energized as I'm sipping my home-made drip coffee, my music is blaring and usually the sun in beating down on my car as it is still in transit to it's noon peak in the sky.  During that 45 minute span of time, it feels like my mind is racing from thought to thought, idea to idea.  Sometimes I wish I had a recorder in my car so I could just have a session of 'word vomit' and see what comes out of it.  I'm convinced I would create some profound quote or perhaps even write a song that would be some fantastic hit, but alas, I have no recorder so the thoughts just stay in my crazy mind and are eventually lost once I get into my windowless, ac-less office.  Something I have discovered and I hold onto during my commute each morning, is the power of a song.  I have a few songs that I play daily in a specific order because they just make me SO HAPPY!

So what I leave you with today is this:  when all else fails, put a smile of your face, listen to a good song and remember, there is always 'rainbows after rain'.

Have a good day :)

Spring Cleaning

I find myself waiting for life-changing movements, where mountains have been moved for me to write in this blog.  It's funny how I feel like most of what I think about or ponder is really nonsense and nothing that anyone would have any interest in reading.  Lately, however, I have had a bit of an epiphany that I have moved a mountain lately---a really big, heavy, cumbersome mountain.  This mountain was more than just a relationship in my life that had taken a different form, but a series of little pebbles of pain, happiness, joy, excitement, disappointment, pride, satisfaction, exhaustion and so many other adjectives.  This mountain has changed me.

The way I think about it is I just went through an adult version of puberty.  Now, I didn't have the mood swings or the body changes that the standard psychotic teen will experience, but rather I started to see the world differently, through broader eyes, clearer eyes.  I am beginning to look at myself in the mirror and understand the person I see and like the person I see.  It's a person with a story, a past, and a future and goals.  I haven't necessarily "found myself" because does anyone ever really find themselves?

I think that's something we all will battle until the day we pass, but I can safely say that we each have a definition, a never ending definition.  It's a ever-changing definition that we had onto and modify with each day, each new experience, each new love, new heartbreak, new achievement, new disappointment, new challenge, new interest.

Lately, I have had the opportunity to think about self-discovery as I am trying to develop a professional development curriculum for the undergraduate students in the College of Business here at Kent.  When students begin their college experience there are those who know exactly who they want to become when they finish their 4 yeas and they do in fact follow through. Then there are those who have an idea and may change a few times, but they still maintain a sense of focus and direction.  Finally, there are those students who come in the "deer in headlights" look on their faces and the "I think I just shit my pants" look when they are asked the question "what do you want to do with your life?"  It's those students that inspire me.  I love a good conversation with a student who has NO CLUE what they want to do with their life, or better yet who they are to begin with.  This is where I came up with this idea of your own "definition."  I have been trying to start this trend of encouraging students to begin writing their own definition.  Who were they in high school? What did they do? Is their family important to them? Or maybe they have no family?  These are all questions that I found myself encouraging my students to ask themselves.

So I leave you with this.  What's your definition?  Who are you? If you found your name in the dictionary, what would it say? It can be really fun to think about or it can make you see that there are parts of you that you have not yet discovered....a new path that has yet to be traveled.

Revelations.

Since classes are over and I'm allowed to think about anything I want again, I've of course been thinking.  Something I realized yesterday as I was at a wedding discussing life with old friends, was that I don't really have a "place" right now.  For the first time in my life I'm really "in between."  I'm from Pittsburgh, I went to Denison, and now I live in Kent, but I don't necessarily feel connected to any of these places.  I will always have ties to each location that are each special in their own ways, but I do not feel there is a place for me to plant my roots just yet.  As unsettling as this feels at times, it's also comforting.  It really makes me feel like I have the world at my fingertips and I can do anything and go anywhere.  It's the beauty of being young and free I suppose.
As I mentioned, I was at a wedding yesterday.  It was both beautiful and eye-opening.  I am old.  I don't say that in the sense of "I'm so old, wah, wah, wah" but the sort of old where you are on the dance floor and the "young kids" are doing dances that you either don't recognize or they simply are appalling.  It was funny, really.  Seven- year old little kids were dancing the dougie better than the original dougie-er's themselves!  The other eye-opening factor of that evening was the fact that two of my good friends from college are now married.  They are Mr. & Mrs. Husband and wife!  It's a surreal experience that I never expected to affect me so much.  It really made me see some new things in life that are so beautiful, like real love and the bond of marriage.  I have never seen two people more perfect for each other than Tony and Elizabeth.  I'm glad their wedding was my first "friends wedding."  It's going to be tough to beat...
Revelations. They are constantly happening and always coming to light.  Every day I have a new revelation about something that I did not know before.  The other day I was thinking about people and how each person has their story.  It's a very cliche thought these days, but it really struck me that we truly are each our own person.  We fight our own battles and are only as strong as we are made to be.  A book I'm reading described people as being "soft."  I've always wondered why I'm so sensitive and why different things in life affect me the way they do--like the wedding I attended.  This book helped me realize that I'm just soft.  That's all it is.  There's nothing wrong with me and I don't need to change, but I just need to remember that each person is fighting their own battles in their own ways and for me, it may be harder because I'm soft.  I need to remember, though, that being soft means I have strengths that others do not possess as well.  It is a compromising relationship with life, really.  Depending on how you look at it, you can embrace it or become frustrated and reject it.  I've decided to embrace it.  I'm starting with seeing the good in each experience and realizing that I'm fighting my own battles, no one else's.
Revelations is the last book of the New Testament, I think I shall read it.  Maybe it will enlighten my thoughts and where my mind is currently lounging nicely....I hope you have a revelation today.  It's both uplifting and rejuvenating.

hugs.