Not feeling good enough

I recently got hooked on Transformers so I was looking into Megan Fox and Shia LaBeouf when I came across something that's really really disheartening.

These are before and after pictures of Megan Fox, international super star, mega sex symbol. And even though there are at least 5 years difference between these pictures, there are significant changes only possible by plastic surgery (see lips and nose for proof).

This is disheartening for several reasons. The first is that the media portrays these women to be the ideal beauty (Fox was voted 2009 sexiest women alive by FHM). They pound these images in young girls' heads that this is what they need to look like. They need to be this perfect looking. And on top of that, you find out that the celebrity that your daughter is idolizing and trying to look like has actually had thousands of dollars pour into plastic surgery. This isn't even how the celebrity really looks--this is how they have created themselves to look. Yet sometimes people kill themselves to look like this idea because only then will they feel beautiful and precious and wonderful and worthy of being loved.

And on top of this, it's disheartening because the celebrities have to put themselves through all this surgery to look like that. Even the prettiest people in the world have days where they don't feel pretty. Even the prettiest people in the world have aspects about their bodies that they don't like. Even the prettiest people in the world sometimes don't feel good enough, worthy of love. People are hurting on both ends, on both sides.

The world is a terrible, cold place. With expectations and pressures and stress and desires and darkness. It tells young women we need to look a certain way and if we don't, we must kill ourselves to look that way. We must not eat, we must take diet pills, we must do plastic surgery, we must do whatever we can to be the ideal beauty so that we can be loved, we can be worshipped, we can be adored.

It's sad. It's heartbreakingly, devastatingly sad. The world is not a perfect place so then why are we trying to be?

Taking care of me

I haven't really been taking care of myself for the last couple of months. I like to put others before myself. I think it's a biblical trait we all must learn. I use to be really self-involved growing up. I can't really tell you much about other people, only about myself if you ask me about high school. However, I am getting to the point where I do so much for other people that I am just burnt out and exhausted by the end of the day, week and sometime even month.

So in order to fully take care of "me," I've devised some activities that I enjoy and are strictly "me-time" and don't involve watching too much TV or too many movies: 1.) the gym. I love working out and being active 2.) reading. I am really starting to enjoy the refresh and the peace of reading.

I'm trying to teach myself about boundaries. Boundaries in saying no and in saying yes. Boundaries in what I do with my time. What I do for who. Emotional boundaries. Who I invest it. Who I spend the most time with.

When I was going to counseling I had to go through and do the onion exercise with my shrink.

See the onion. It has rings and each ring is suppose to represent a lever of closeness to you, the center. And depending on what ring a person is on, then you spend time with that person. I have such a hard time figuring out where to invest my time. I like people. A lot. I like to hang out with people. A lot. And most of the time it doesn't really matter who they. I like to use my phone. A lot. I like to text and email. A lot. I'm learning what to do and how to keep your close friends close and not expend myself over everyone.

I'm also learning a lot about Christ-centered community and about how much it is worth it.

Recent Photography

Just shot the Langston @ APU football game last night for College Fanz Sports Network. And just finished editing Karla and Daniel's engagement photos from two weekends ago. Check both out on my photography blog. Thanks!

Trying to find compassion

These are the two most beautiful, most wonderful kids in my life right now. My cousins. I love them so much--though it kind helps that they are the absolutely cutest, most adorable kids you will find. They are also huge brats sometimes. But it's really easy to forgive them and have compassion for them not just because they are my blood but because I love them. I love the joy and the passion and the love that they bring to my life and I just love little children to.

It got me to thinking though. Why is it so hard for us to have compassion for everyone? Why is it hard for us to forgive everyone and love everyone? Why is it so hard for me to find compassion right now?

I know that God is teaching me how to love like he does. How to have eyes and ears and hands and arms like his. But it's a struggle against my flesh. I asked God for a greater capacity to love. I asked God to help me love like he does, but yet I find myself struggling to...aching, fighting to.

I thought that when I asked God to help me love more that I would feel it inside of me. I would feel my heart increase. I would feel it widen and deepen and broaden, but it feels like such a stretching process to get to a place of love for others in general. like something i have to consciously think about on a daily basis.

I ask myself, if I can't love an enemy how can I love the poor? The broken? The forgotten? The outcast? 

I'm going to gush a little more

So I'm going to gush about my best friend a little more publicly now. God has blessed me with some amazing, incredibly friends! It's just hard to see it sometimes when they all live impossibly (well not really now days) but they live pretty far, you know? I woke up this morning to a beautiful, wonderful long devotional from my best friend in my email inbox.

And it made me cry, I probably would have sobbed if I was at a coffee shop...the thing about our friendship has never really been what we have in common (though we have a lot) and it's never really been about the activities that we're doing (even though most of the time in college they were together), we just support each other. We've been through hell together in the last four years--anyone who knows us knows that. And we just clicked instantly, miraculously--it was all God and it's always been God.

I can't begin to tell you how amazing God-driven friendships are. Or how much I've fought it for so long. I use to think that God was this separate compartment in my life, necessary for when things got tough (and they were tough a lot; it makes sense why now) and I use to think that maybe he didn't really care about the people he put around me and he didn't really care about my life. But I've really in the last two years begun to see his power and his goodness and his strength and his love for me.

I previously mentioned that I've had a lot of friends. I get bored easily. I don't like commitment. I'm afraid of closeness. Those were all excuses I had for bailing when things got tough or when the other person bailed cause they were sick of me. But with her, I had to teach myself to stay put, to just be, to stick it through and it is by far was the best things I've ever done with my life (And I've done a lot of stuff with my life so believe me on that one!).

But I haven't really felt like we were best friends until this year, which is weird because we lived 3,000 miles away from each, saw each other 3 times, and probably talked on the phone once a week, if not once every two weeks. One could argue that distances makes the heart grow fonder and maybe it's true, but more so I think that God is just working in us so much that now we can really, truly be best friends. There's this bond between our hearts AND our souls that I know is only possible between two truly God-fearing Christ followers.

I can't tell you how sweet it is, how wonderful it is. It's not perfect, by far. We still fight a lot because Satan does exist and he will try to come between us. There's still insecurity and doubt because of the enemy. There's still fear and trust issues because the devil doesn't want God-driven relationships. But the truth of the matter comes down to it--there's no fear in perfect love, God's perfect love for us and our perfect love for him.

My best friend is amazing

My best friend is amazing (though clearly not pictured here.) This is probably the most contradictory set of best friends possible: Blair and Serena of Gossip Girl. Regardless though, mine is pretty amazing. All of mine are, actually. I'm beginning to realize you have to be fairly selective with who you chose to give this honor. 

I wasn't very good at it for a long time. I was lonely for a long long time because of many, many issues from my family and being home schooled and bad experiences with basketball teams. Many things happened to me that gave me this low self-esteem and low self-worth and brought on a perpetual feeling of not feeling good enough. So I kinda gave the title out without thinking and still do at times. I would just kind of throw it out there if we hung out a lot or if we just happened to have a few deep conversations. But I'm learning that's not what makes a good friend.

I have three really amazing, really awesome best friends. They don't just support me or hang out with me, but they fight with me and for me, they guide me and they let me guide them, they lead me but walk beside me when necessary, they pray for me and with me whenever I need it. It's been a pretty rough road to get here, to say the least. I've had every sort of teammate, roommate, friend possible--I've had the good, the bad and the ugly. But that's part of life. Life is figuring out who your friends are and who will be along for the journey.

And my bestest best friend, knows me better than I know myself; in a way I can't really describe. I use to think that was just a cliche or an ideal that you hoped for, but now I realize it comes with true friendship, true intimacy, true vulnerability. There's so much about friendship that I didn't really understand until today: the beauty and the wonderfulness of God-given, God-driven relationships with two active faith followers. And the truth that comes in true friendship, harsh truth, loving truth--it's a beautiful and rare honesty that comes in true TRUE friendship.

I've been dealing with some stressful, heavy stuff lately and my best friend is currently working in Africa for God knows how long. But thankfully technology has made it almost a seamless transition (minus the 8 hour time difference, thank you day light savings). But today when I was talking to her on the phone, it just became so evident and clear what a best friend is--someone who doesn't just agree with you and doesn't just argue with you because they can. They don't assume they know you. They don't insist they know you. They know you because they love you, they value you, they care for you, they pray for you. And so they correct you, sympathize with you, guide you, love you in a way that's clearly from God and clearly God-given. And it blows my mind. God blows my mind. True friendship blows my mind. 

So I'm learning about boundaries in relationships. Not to always give. Not to always take on. Not to hang out with whoever wants to hang out. You have to have boundaries. You have to be able to say no. You have to be able to say you draw the line at some place, that not everyone can be your best friend and you can't give every part of yourself to everyone.

And I'm learning to be content. I'm learning to see the amazing-ness in the friends that I have and to understand that near or far, wherever they are, they are in my heart. Once-in-a-lifetime-friends only come once in a lifetime after all. And to invest in the friends I have close to me already: better to have 10 minutes with one close friend then one day with 10 friends.

And it doesn't mean that I don't immerse myself in the community around me because that is God-given too. It just means I ration out my time, my love, my care, my self to the people around me, remembering the close friends I have and the close friends I'm making...but making sure not everyone is a close friend. It's okay to have friends and acquaintances--you just don't have to invest evenly in everyone. And I'm sure not giving out that title for a long time, if ever again. That's for sure.

Neo

I feel like Neo in the Matrix. Either when all the bullets are coming at him or when he has all the tubes in him. I can't really decide.

Which then reminds me of Mr. Zambrano's Friday test analogy of the duck. I feel like the duck: calm on the surface, kicking swiftly to stay afloat underneath.