Christmas thoughts

Wow, so it's been over a year since my last post, which was horribly discouraging by the way, but I am happy to report that I am in a much better state of mind and spirit. A year and a half has gone by- three semesters of classes, one summer, and almost two Christmases. As always, life is a journey... I wouldn't even know where to start if I were to try and recap all that's happened in that time. So I'm going to breeze right over all that and just blog to right now.

This morning I got up and decided to read the newspaper... that's right, you heard me! Weird. However, don't be too excited- I still spent most of my time in the light, rather unimportant sections: I read about the current east bay top atheletes, blitzed through the last-minutse Christmas shopping ads, and then went on to read the A-Z changes that have characterized our decade. I also read about a candlelight vigil held for some American hikers held captive in Iran since summer... sad. Can you imagine? Thinking you were on the adventure of a lifetime, and then being held prisoner- adventure? Oh yeah. Not one you'd want to have, though.

Reading the newspaper or watching the news always brings me back to the startling realization that my life is not everyone's life. This seems simple enough, but it's so easy for me to forget how different everyone's life is. Being in college puts me in a bubble-like setting, in which most everyone is in a very similar place as I. Everyone is wealthy, at least wealthy enough to be in college, which already puts them in the top 1% of the world, most everyone is young and learning how to be away from home, and most everyone is confused about where they want to go after they get done there. So the biggest stress in the world to me right now is thinking about what is going to happen to my life once I'm out of this socially constructed college environment. I believe that most anyone who is out of college or working and never been to college would laugh at my "problems," and then tell me something real.

The prospect of being done with school is exciting to me if I can get past the worried notion I have that I may just get out and fall on my face because I maybe haven't learned what I was supposed to in four years of undergrad. Whatever... hundreds of thousands of students have done it before me, and some have done better than others, but everyone can do well enough for themselves if they don't set up unrealistic or too specific expectations. What do I want? It's not like I want a yacht, or to be the CEO of some huge corporation, or even to live in a fancy-pants house? I just want to contribute something important to this world in which I live, and to feel fulfilled in doing so.

I guess I look forward to a time in my life when I'm not so uncertain about the future- will that ever come to be? Ha. Probably not. The best thing I can do is laugh about it. Hahahaha!

What's important right now? I am sitting in front of my christmas tree, decorated splendidly and brightly, reminding me of the reason that we took the time to put it up: Christmas, celebrating the birth of our beautiful savior. All my worries and all things else pale in importance next to Him. Who knew that a little baby would save the world? Jesus is who I should be focused on right now. And I think that's his intent: for us to focus on him rather than ourselves and our own worries. Didn't he say worrying was fleeting? I think he grew up a little bit before he started spewing wisdom... don't think he popped out of the womb and spoke words. Although... I would venture to guess that anyone who got to meet him in his state of infancy would not have been worried about a whole lot else in that moment.

Bless our savior this season, who is above all of of our worries.

Merry Christmas and Love.