Failure

So, last night's Salt topic was on discouragement. (Unfortunately, things were complicated and the message didn't get recorded--I know, sad day) Anyway, there was talk about how many people have gone through depressions, and it reminded me of something I realized a couple months ago. In my past, I would go through depressions. I never attempted suicide, but there was a lot of times where I considered it. My reason for never going through with it was because I was afraid of how people would treat me if I failed. I wasn't afraid of succeeding, I was afraid of the consequences of failure.

In other news, last night was the first Salt or Veritas that I wasn't on the schedule in 2 months, and I was still there from the beginning of setup until the end of teardown. I need to take better advantage of my days off.

In still other news, I started actually listening to my audio bible. I got it in October, but I hadn't really taken advantage of it before. So on Sunday, I started listening to it, and I've been listening to it every time I'm going somewhere, or when I'm studying in the library at school. So far, I'm 2/3 of the way through Deuteronomy, and it'll end up taking about a month to listen to it all the way through. So if you see me with my earbuds in, I'm probably listening to some NIV Old Testament awesomeness.

Injury Update

It's been nearly 5 months since the injury mentioned in this post, so a little reminder. I dropped a heavy weight on my toe, and it bled and hurt a lot. Anyway, lately I found out that the toenail is cracked. I kinda started picking at it, so it's nearly separated from my toe. If I wanted, I could give it one good tug and it would be off, but then the sensitive part under the nail would be exposed--and it's half the length of the nail that would be gone. Unfortunately, now I want to pick at it and try to pull it off. It bugs me that it's loose. Yay for mild OCD. So I either have to wear socks and shoes everywhere or learn to restrain myself. I hate socks. They won't stay up, and I don't like the restricted feel. If I want socks to stay up, I need to buy sock garters, but they're somewhat expensive.

Vernal Respite

Tomorrow is the official end of my first actual Spring Break since I started this blog, and I think I'm more tired coming out than I was going in. But I'm probably just sleepy because I'm bored--and maybe a little frustrated. I spent most of the week just hanging out in the IC. On Thursday, my dad came out to bring me to Des Moines to hang out. We spent a couple days just chilling at home, watching TV and talking.

On Saturday, we went to his church, the Lutheran Church of Hope. It looked to have seating for about 3,000, and has 3 services each week. After that, we came back to Iowa City, so I could be up early and set up for Veritas.

When I got back to my apartment, I decided to check my mail. There was a letter from the U of I Admissions Office. Unfortunately, it wasn't an acceptance letter--it was a letter stating that they'd hold their decision until getting a transcript that included the classes I'm taking now. This means that I won't be accepted until May at the earliest. This creates a not-so-insignificant list of problems, including:

1. I almost have to sign up for classes at Kirkwood to cover all my bases
2. I can't sign up for classes at Iowa until after all the freshmen, which means I might not be able to get into the classes I need to, so it could force me to take another semester--beyond everything I already have to do due to the transfer process
3. I'm not sure what's going to happen with financial aid--I can't seem to find any deadlines on when I need to be signed up, except for the FAFSA, which I've already done

So yeah, I'm currently experiencing a trial of my patience and anger. We'll have to wait and see how things turn out.

Beautiful Things

Recently, I was talking about sports, and I realized that moving to Iowa City has helped me with my rage. While in Iowa City, you can't easily root for the Cyclones or against the Hawkeyes. These are things I learned to do from a very young age. So, I've mellowed out when it comes to these teams to avoid strife. This has even spread to professional sports. I can watch my teams play without getting very excited or angry--and with how well my teams (the Dallas Cowboys and the Colorado Avalanche, if you were curious) did this year, that's a good thing. I once broke my TV remote in half during a game. I can't remember which team it was--but I think it was the Cowboys--or if it was because the refs were "cheating" them or because they were just playing horribly. And if you think the team doing well calms me down, it doesn't. Once, while my baseball team (the Chicago White Sox) was destroying the other team--something like 9-0 in the 3rd--and one of the outfielders dropped a fly ball, I shouted at him. My teams were never allowed to lose. They had to blow out their opponents every time--at least the ones they were supposed to beat, I was semi-realistic.

This, and everything else that God has done in my life have made "Beautiful Things" by Gungor really hit home.

(Side note: I bought this album because of the song "The Earth is Yours", and I like two of the other songs better--so far--"People of God" and of course, "Beautiful Things")

Now for something completely different. Now I know this isn't very timely anymore, but all the people who bought gold, worrying that the global economy would crash are idiots. (Sorry if any of you are in this group) Gold is not going to hold its value if the global economy crashes. All it is is a shiny rock that is malleable and ductile. It's also ridiculously heavy and soft--pure gold can be molded by hand. Gold's value will not come back for a while. The things that will hold their value in the beginning are necessary goods and services. For example, milk, bread, fuel, shelter, medicine and water would become a few of the things with actual value. We would be reduced to a barter system for a while--or to a society where you only have what you can get by lying, cheating, or stealing--and luxuries like gold would not gain any value until other things had stabilized. So the lesson here is, if you really believe paper money will go the way of the Dodo, then sell off all you gold and jewels, and stock up on fuel and water--or buy some cattle.

Sorry about all that, that rant comes back sometimes.

Technology is ridiculous

The past couple days, I've been realizing how crazy technology is. With only my iPod, no internet connection, I have access to 7 different Bible translations (ESV--which I have two of--NIV, NASB, KJV, NKJV, HCSB, and the Message--the last one for kicks). I also have a Mirriam-Webster Dictionary, and translators from English to 6 different languages--Spanish, German, French, Italian, Russian, and Czech (though those last two use the Cyrillic alphabet, so I can't read them unless I study that). Then there's about a day of music, and an audio version of the NIV--which is almost 3 days of audio by itself. Then there's the useless games, a level, a decibel meter--which peaks out around 90--a clock, and all the apps that need the internet. All this in a device that's smaller than a wallet. Yet tech-savvy people in this country look at my iPod and say that its storage capacity is small. It's "only" the 8GB version, the smallest that is currently sold by Apple, with 32GB and 64GB versions available.

This was thrown into sharp relief when I read Gabe's blog this morning. He shared a video of a tribe that was absolutely ecstatic to get the New Testament translated into their language for the first time. We have easy access to the Bible, any time we want it, and can even choose (and argue) between which version we want to read on any particular day, but we just shrug it off as normal. Why can't we have the same enthusiasm for God's Word?