flowers and such

We are so lucky for the beauty all around us now. And just think, heaven is so much more beautiful!! I can't even grasp it. Have a wonderful day my friends.

thoughts on social networking and missing out on life

ironically, the first thing I read this morning

Social networking is so senseless. We spend so much time perfecting our image online to make sure we appear exactly how we want others to see us. I've always been a slave to the internet. I can't break this habit and even though I know it leaves me wanting more, feeling hopeless and useless, and makes me constantly compare myself to others, I can't seem to shake it. I wish I had the power to delete my facebook, twitter, blog, pinterest, or instagram. but I can't. It's got a strong hold on me, and I realize this might be holding me back. Isn't it crazy how something that was supposed to push us forward into the age of technology is actually pushing us back. I've felt as though the amount of real moments and meaningful relationships are far less but seem to be far more only because we can tweak exactly how we want to appear. All of this focus on our own image leaves us selfish. Selfishness leaves us empty. When we are empty, we have no love to share with others. This poison is threatening to kill us. It's time to put the phone down, log off of the internet, and tune into our lives. Because death is a little more serious than a crashing computer, and you can't recover your life as you'd recover lost files. I just wish I could tell this to myself.

Ok that rant was a little harsh... but let me explain to you dearest readers why I've attacked this subject with such fire at this particular moment (ironically on a social networking site..). First off, last night before going to sleep I felt so sad. I felt like I fell in a deep pit and that no one liked me. I felt discontent. empty. selfish. not good enough. Gentle tears lulled me to sleep. 

I fell into a deep sleep and had a strange, strange dream. You see, I dreamed that I had fungus growing from my legs, and every time I would break them off, they'd grow back. I read up and studied so I could try to diagnose and cure myself, and when that had no luck, I finally decided to go to the doctor. The doctors of my dream were perplexed by my situation. They told me that these everlasting fungi were either an indication that I had cancer or they were protecting me from getting cancer.  Either killing me or saving me, but they could not tell. I woke up feeling so strange and perplexed. I immediately told my mom, among others about the dream and thought about it all day today. Could this represent a negative energy in my life? a bad habit? Something that I think is good and wonderful in my life but is actually killing me slowly? now that's something to think about, which I did... all day today at work.

ella and I with our magical hats

Then I came home from work and mom and I decided to go shopping with Ella. She wanted to buy absolutely everything in the store. So mom assigned me to distract her from the fluffly pink tiarras and pretty dolls in the toy aisle. We soon made marshall's our jungle, finding magic potions and slaying dragons all while making sure to not wake the chair lions and pillow sharks present in the store. It was absolutely so much fun, and ella enjoyed it so much she forgot about the toys she had thought she couldn't live without only minutes before. People in the store looked at us with wonder at why we were pretending inanimate objects were fully functioning and life-like, but it was even more fun to make them wonder at our own wonder.

Now that got me thinking. I didn't have my phone with me for that moment. If I had had access to the internet, to facebook, instagram, texting, anything... how much would I have missed? how much of life have I already missed? 

this saddens me dear readers, and is the reason why I frown at my addiction. 

thoughts of a young adventurer

I saw this flower in my neighborhood. crazyyyy! looks like something straight out of a child's imagination

I remember lying in bed as a child just letting my thoughts wander like an American hitchhiking through Europe. I so vividly remember just lying there in bed, my sister fast asleep in the bed next to me, and feeling terrible  for "lying" to my mother about being asleep (I confessed to  her later... I was deathly afraid of authority and followed rules to a tee as a child. I can just imagine my mother laughing at her 5 year old confessing such a thing) 

I would think about all sorts of things. I would think about all the impossibly improbable "what-if's". On many occasions, I convinced myself that there were alien men sneaking outside my window with secret guns that could tell if people were in a house with their special breath detecting devices. I would hold my breath until the aliens were surely gone after their guns failed to detect my existence. 

I would also imagine myself locked in a cage of angels whenever I was scared of kidnappers, monsters, or whatever creatures my imagination would brew up (that all coincidentally lived under my bed). 

Most of all, I remember one thought that has continued to perplex me throughout my life. As a young child, I would sit and wonder about this one thought for hours. Now let me enlighten you to this thought dear readers. So here it is, my unadulterated innocent contemplations as a young child...

So in life, we all have options... soooo many options. For instance, if you don't like playing baseball, you can play basketball. If you don't like wearing the color blue, you can wear pink. If you don't like peas, you can eat carrots. But then it occurred to me, that in this world all we can do is live and then die. There is no other option. You must do it in that order too. There is no other option besides this life and then once we are done living, to expire with death. This thought perplexed me because we can't even imagine doing something besides live and then die (and then hopefully go on to heaven) simply because no other option exists. I used to think about this as I was lying in bed and wonder how no one else could be concerned with this concept. From what I could see, everyone had accepted this fact and never was even concerned with the smallness of our existence. We were nothing. How could we place such importance on such a transitional existence. But then again, how could we not, when we have no other option?

So now you see dear readers why I had to lie to my mother about being asleep. I had way too much thinking to do.

a quote & a smile

"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all" -Helen Keller