I Can Feel The Static

I wear clothing like costumes. What I'm wearing reflects the particular persona I want to take on on that day, in that minute, that moment. If I'm upset about what I'm wearing, it's not because I'm self conscious about what someone's thinking. I mean, I really don't give a frick. I'm upset because I'm wearing someone else, and not what I'm feeling. I never managed to teach myself to "fake it" (which sounds like it'd make me genuine, but really it means I'm moody), so wearing the wrong thing can certainly be a frustrating thing. On that note, I'm getting up from my desk and changing out of this adorable dress and into my slouchy, lazy Nike shorts and a t-shirt.

All Safe and Sound

Being indispensable. That, my tired and worn brothers and sisters, is what we're all worried about. Hot damn. No wonder we're all a mess with our mirrors and grades and socializing beyond human capacity. We want to be wanted and missed and needed. We want to know that if we were to disappear, it would matter.

Well. On that note, you should probably tell the people that are indispensable to you that they are indispensable to you. A lot of people don't know that about themselves. Isn't that sad?

Oh, and chances are, you're a lot more indispensable than you think.

Have a freakin' unforgettable day.

Do the Panic

I was going through my messages to Ellee and found this one. It made me smile, so I thought I'd post it. It was written in the last month or so of school.

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Sweet Ellee, Sweet Ellee!

How I love you so much. 

Oh Ellee, Sweet Ellee. Gosh, I'm growing up. I spent so much time running, hurling forward and now it's that time where I pause and step back. Turn around, take a glance, what will I miss? Slowly my steps are faltering, I'm second guessing my pace. Maybe I should sit back and enjoy this a little more.

It's funny how God has people work in my life. Just as you helped me adjust to being here, in this red-coated, Mustang-loving, strange little nook, you're helping me leave it, move on and enter a whole new stage of being.

I can't decide who I want to be in college, if I had to decide now. I think a little more of me, give or take a few things. I'll take myself less seriously, but trust my gut more. I want to give out love the way an unhygienic 4-year-old passes out germs. I want to cook more, judge less and be able to sing. I know, I know, it's not for me to know or decide. But I can't help but wonder, who will Lana be in a year?

Gah here I am again. These questions, no answers. All that I know is that every decision I make now affects Lana in a year. So, that makes me wonder, what are my decisions like now? Maybe I shouldn't've talked so angrily to my mom, to Holly, to the lady at Kroger... But I'm happy for my studying, my loving, my helping. Gosh, I've got a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Good grief, who knows what's going on, I'M SUCH A PERMANENT MESS.

Love,

Lana

"In this way, Mr. K will challenge the world"

I have this habit of trying to fit myself into a "type." We all do it, I know. In fact, that's something we learned about in Psychology a few days ago... but that's a whole something else. Anyway, "Types." Right. Most of the time I trick myself into believing that I do fall into a category, that I do make sense as a person, but then, on occasion, reality comes for a visit and points it finger at me and says, "drop the charade, man. You're full of contradictions and absurdities." So, let's just think about that for a sec. We all don't fit into a stereotype. All human beings. That just sounds like chaos to me. In my mind, I see the 6 billion people of the earth all dancing and screaming and talking at the same time. Ha. Can you imagine? Anyway... Moving on. What I'm getting at is every time I realize (again) that I don't nor do I need to fit into a mold, I get a little happier because I can embrace what I actually love instead of forcing myself to try and love something my type would love. Get it? Whatever. Neither do I. Kind of.

To illustrate what the heck I'm talking about, I decided to include some of the wonderful contradictions that make up the mess you know as "Lana" or "Lama" or "that hot mess" or"who is that girl talking to herself?" Mk. Judge away.

What I watch.

What I listen to.

What I read.

What I eat.

Who I grace with my friendship.

(BAHA)

Recognize contradictions like these within yourself? We are all more alike then we let on.

Off to Nashville with Colorful, Wonderful Claire

I know I promised a post about Paris but this is sadly not it. However, I am jetting off to Nashville, Tennessee to meet up with Claire and her mother for a weekend! After hanging out there, we'll be going to Missouri and then Arkansas where I will finally get to see a piece of Claire's past. I am so excited!

A random thought I had today (it's nothing special. Pretty obvious. Just one of those things that I needed to realize on my own):

We have a choice in very little. We don't have a choice in the obvious- who we are, where we come from and what our families are like- but, we also don't have choice in things like what we like, what our passions are and who we fall in love with. (Here comes an even more obvious thought.) We do, however, have a choice in what we embrace about ourselves. Last year, my junior year, I finally chose to openly enjoy the things that I love and I became much happier and made friends in the process. I hope I never get shy about what I like now that I know what it is that makes ME happy. I also hope that I never happen upon people who make me afraid to embrace the things that I love. So far, I haven't. And I am so blessed for that, for all of you!

Broken Humanness

Broken humanness, in other people... I love it; I think it's beautiful and honest and meant to be loved.

In myself I hate it. It's like another person, constantly betraying me
and everything I stand for.

Washing Machine Thoughts

is it bad to like the image you've created for yourself more than who you really are

or are we all just the image we've created for ourselves

"Love yourself." The most hypocritical cliche, but only in sad way.

I find I'm very passionate about other people loving themselves which is sad because I don't know if I love myself. I am like the hypocrite pastor you hear about in the newspaper, advertising fidelity when in reality he is doing what he condemns. That is not to say that I do not believe in loving yourself; I am included in the group I am trying to persuade. I try and I fail and I can never just seem to let go of the belief that I am forever broken and beyond fixing and capable of nothing worthwhile. What does this mean? Why am I this way? I think I know but knowing that does not change much, as knowing the answers rarely does change anything in the end.

This seemingly failed endeavor of trying to love myself, if that even makes sense, all began this summer when I realized how big of a problem it was that I didn't love myself. I felt like I could never completely love others until I loved myself. Just thinking about past experiences really made that clear to me but as I go on in life it comes up as a problem more and more as I begin to notice things that I didn't before. Would I have been mean to that person if I wasn't so insecure about myself? Would I have made that remark if I didn't care so much what they thought? What I have let him treat me that way if I respected myself more? It makes me sound shallow and makes me sound insecure but, to be perfectly honest, we all do it in some form or fashion; we change our behavior because we don't completely love ourselves, I mean.

More than that, I should love myself before I dive into any situation, be it a new position, a relationship or even a new pair of shoes. If I go into it loving myself, not only will I be more peaceful during the whole song and dance but also, I won't be able to be hurt unnecessarily. If I try out for something while loving myself, I will be okay if I don't get it and my happiness or satisfaction will not depend on whatever it is I want. Same with relationships and physical changes. There is a difference between trying to lose ten pounds because I think that it would make me look prettier and trying to lose ten pounds because it will finally bring me satisfaction in how I look. If it is the latter, how soon will it be until I will only love myself after losing another ten pounds?

Loving yourself is not being self-absorbed or self-righteous. Actually, I believe it to be the opposite. Both Kayla and Mrs. Stewart told me, although I'm sure they phrased it better, that loving yourself means being comfortable with who you are enough to be able to serve others and not be concerned with what's is wrong with you. I believed it the minute I heard it because it made perfect sense to me but as I've gotten older and Time has passed, I've found it to be true more and more. To expand on that, not only is it about losing yourself in what you're doing, but what I didn't realize at the time was the sort of peace one feels when they reach that level of comfort and love with themselves. Being able to enjoy an experience without that voice in your head telling you what you're doing wrong is a wonderful thing, and I think those that have reached that level of comfort, even if it was only once, would agree with me.

Additionally, people don't realize how pretty confidence or loving yourself is. I am not talking about arrogance or being cocky; I am talking about people who love themselves enough to be comfortable doing their own thing and won't judge you for doing yours. I'll be the first to say that when I feel insecure I sometimes will bring others down with me, and although I rarely verbalize it, it shows in my attitude, facial expressions or decisions. Being around people who love themselves is comfortable because I can be myself and know they won't criticize me for whatever it is people judge unnecessarily (clothes or hair style, for example); why would they judge me? I are not embarrassing them and they respect my weirdness because it's who I am, just like they are just who they are. And that is attractive in another person, knowing you can be yourself around them. One of my favorite Rob Bell quotes goes as follows because I feel like it gives me a fantastic point of view that I would have never seen on my own,

"The other day my five year old son asked my wife, 'Mom, what does sexy mean?'

She thought about it for a second and then replied, 'sexy is when it feels good to be in your own skin. Your own body feels right, it feels comfortable. Sexy is when you love being you.'

Because it all starts with being sexy on the inside."

I know it's not all black and white but for the most part it's true, confidence is attractive and it is generally nicer to be around people who aren't concerned that what they're doing isn't good enough than those that do.

I guess I don't love myself any less than the people around me but that does not mean I will cease to try and get people, including myself, to love themselves. In my dreams, it will become a fad and I will give in to peer pressure and love myself, but thinking rationally, I think it will take a little more than that for self-love and self-apprecation to become a more popular thing. I guess the only thing I can do is believe that I am loved, which I am, and try and figure out why. There's not a quick fix or an 8-step solution but I know it starts and ends with love, as most good and beautiful things do, and bringing myself down is not the correct way for me to start loving myself... Hopefully one day I will stop being concerned with what my hair is doing or what my friends would say and just give what I'm doing my all without fear.

Beauty and Vanity

A couple of weeks ago I did this thing. I decided to stop wearing anything more than a T-shirt and jeans and in addition, I stopped wearing any make-up.

What makes me laugh when I look back is how people responded. The people who I told were rather appalled; I mean, come on, voluntarily not wearing make-up or dressing up to school? To some, not everyone, the idea is one never to be considered. Then... there are the people who didn't know. Their responses were, although full of concern, a little bit stressful. I got comments like, "what happened to your eyes?" and, "are you okay? You look really different," or "did you not sleep at all?" These were stressful because, to be honest, taking these two things away was difficult. Which begs the question, why did I do this to myself?

Well, I did it because I felt I was becoming increasingly vain and dependent on appearance to win people over. I realized that I counted on make-up to feel pretty. Not only is that bad but I'd feel the amount I had on wasn't enough so then put more and more on as time went on. Just like any other dependency on something that will not satisfy, this was going somewhere I didn't want to follow. For the make-up part, I had to stop until I found myself just as pretty without it; only then would putting make-up on not be an unhealthy habit. As for the not "dressing up" part of the week, that had to do more with how other people felt about me. I use clothing as a form of expression and to show my individuality... this is not a bad thing. The problem was that as time went on the question that I subconsciously asked myself when putting things on went from, "what is this saying?" to "what will people think of this and think of me?" We live in a world where it is impossible to please everyone or to make everyone like you, so to start caring about what everyone thought would lead only to dissatisfaction and unhappiness and thus, take away the fun I find in "dressing up." So... I stopped "dressing up" until I understood that the clothes I wear can make a statement, yes, but I am the one that allows that and that the statement applies to... so, I can make said statement without "dressing up." Haha. Yeah, that probably doesn't make sense.

What I got out of it was more than I asked for, in a good way. I learned about myself and my self-image and what I wanted out of my appearance. Haha my notes and journal entries from that week are really interesting to me and full of epiphanies but what I realized as I read over them was that the epiphanies were all things people had told me multiple times, I just never heard them. We can be told something a thousand times but until we learn, come to believe or realize it for ourselves we will never hear them. One thing however, a thought that crossed my mind on Day 3, I had never been told before... which actually makes me sad. All the notes of that day consist of this one statement, "thanking God for the way I look... That just sounds like the weirdest thing." Well yeah, it sounds cocky and it sounds like I think of myself as divinely beautiful. Which, for someone who has battled with persistent self-image problems, is just not true. But that's not the point. We are all pretty; we don't have a choice and it's not an opinion. Made in the image of God, made in the image of beauty. So we're all beautiful? Okay... that's a lot to take in. But being thankful for how I look as an individual... scary, a legitimate thing to be thankful for and it doesn't make sense to me. But I guess that the beauty of it... to me anyway. haha cheesy