Lay 'em down

I was watching Pay it Forward the other day. You know, with Haley Joel Osment, Helen Hunt and Kevin Spacey? I love that movie. Haley Joel Osment was way adorable-er as a little kid.

Anyway. You know the part where Kevin Spacey finally shows Helen Hunt the scars on his chest? I've always thought that part, when he tells the story of how he got the scars, is really disturbing and sad, but for some reason, this time it was particularly soul-crushing. I just started thinking: not only did he have to go through the physical and emotional pain that gave him those scars, but now, for the rest of his life, he'll have those reminders. He can never block out or forget what happened to him. And I think what was making me so sad is that I have scars like that. No, they're not as severe and they aren't physical, but I have scars. We all do.

We all (or most of us anyway) have been through things that have caused us pain and sorrow. It can be mild or severe, but we've all felt it. And what's worse is that once we've experienced this pain and gotten through it, it's not over. Our wounds start to heal, and after a while, they scab over, but what do we do? We pick at the scabs. We just want to get rid of the ugly scab without thinking about how we're prolonging our pain. It might not even hurt at first, but sooner or later, it'll start to bleed again. And the cycle repeats. We don't give ourselves the chance to heal, and then, even once we do heal, that scar will always be there, reminding us of the pain we once felt. I have to wonder, what's worse? Is it the initial, stinging pain of a new wound or the dull but constant, lasting pain we experience every time we look at our scars and remember how we got them?

I'm not even 20 years old. I've hardly experienced any life, and already I have scars. I can only imagine how many I'll have 40 years from now when I've lived more life than I'll have left. But I guess that's just how life works, isn't it? And hopefully I'll have enough happy memories and good experiences that my scars will be outshone.

This is depressing, I know. Sorry.

Pandora

No. This is not about Avatar.

Ok, so, this is something I've been thinking about for a while.

It's a question...or a challenge...or a game. It doesn't matter, but here:

Say you have to "meet" someone you don't know without ever seeing/speaking to that person. You have to figure out a way to make him/her get to know you as well as you possibly can without ever making direct contact. Here's how you do it:

• Choose 4 things that you want to show your...new friend. These should be things that you own already. So, you can't use anything that you've created specifically for this purpose i.e. no letters or collages.
• Choose things that exemplify you as a person, things that mean a lot to you and that you think show who you are.
• You can use items such as pictures or journals, but it's not recommended just because it's not very creative.

What would you choose?

I've had a lot of time to think about this, so I'll give you mine.

1. My Postsecret wall

First of all, if you don't know what Postsecret is, check it out: http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

People from all over the world anonymously mail in their secrets. Every Sunday, new ones are posted on that website, and every Sunday, I go to the site and choose my favorites then print them out and tape them to a wall in my room. I started doing this last year but started over last semester, and I currently have about...30 - 40 of them on my wall.

This wall is probably my favorite part of my room, and I love all of my secrets. I always choose secrets that either 1. I identify with, 2. I want to be inspired by or 3. I think are just amusing, and so I think this would be a good way to get a pretty good feel for what I'm like.

2. My Itunes playlists

When I put music on my computer or my Ipod, I like to organize it into playlists. I have playlists of my favorite artists and my favorite shows, but I also have a lot of playlists that I've put together or from cds that others have given me (including funny/clever/strange names that I've created for these playlists). These playlists are probably the best way to sum up my rather eclectic taste in music, and music is an important part of my life and part of what makes me me.

3. My closet

There are at least three things you can learn from looking at my closet:

1. I'm not very organized.

2. I have a color. If you know me, you probably can picture it. My friends just refer to it as "the Jessie color." It's blue-ish.

3. I have a very particular style, or rather styles. I think for most people, you can tell a lot from what kind of clothes they wear. Everyone has a "look" and it seems to me that it usually coincides pretty well with personality.

4. My handwriting

I would choose something like my class notes or something I've doodled on, something that would show my handwriting but not give a really clear example of the things I like to write about. The reason I'd choose this is because my handwriting is something I really like and that I'm really proud of. That probably makes me kind of a dork, but I don't care. I really enjoy writing and seeing my handwriting on paper. And I definitely think it says something about me. For instance, my sister told me recently (on two separate occasions) that she thinks my handwriting would qualify me to work at the Disney Store and also that my handwriting makes me seem like the type of person who would sing the voices for the Disney Princesses. And then of course, there's all that handwriting analysis stuff, but that's not really part of my decision.

Anyway. Those are mine.

I think it's an interesting question. It makes you think a lot about what defines you and what makes you who you are. At least that's what it makes me think about.

Anyway, you should try it on yourself. It's kind of fun :)

I wanna feel weightless, and that should be enough

Sometimes, I think life would be a lot easier if we were just on our own. If we didn't have to worry about other people like our friends, our family and all those around us. If we didn't have to worry about what they might think or say or what they think we should do or what they expect of us.

You know how on the Sims, there's an option to turn on or off Free Will? Well, there is. You can either let them move around as they want and do things on their own or make it so that they'll only do what you tell them to do. Sometimes, I wish life was like that. But...not exactly. I wish that there were some switch we could flip that would turn off other people's ability to judge us, to care about what we do and say. So that with certain things or at certain times in our lives, we could be on our own. We could do just what we want or say just what we want and not have to worry about how it will affect other people or what they'll think of it.

I don't mean that I want to be able to like...murder people or become a raging slut or do hard drugs. I just want to be able to make my own decisions, sometimes, without having to take others' opinions into account, you know, especially with big life decisions like, what do I want my major to be, or should I transfer, or should I drop out of college, or should I make a huge career change? (Which is not to say that I've thought about doing any of these things; I'm just trying to make a point). I spend so much time and energy listening to, thinking about, worrying about what other people will think about my actions and my choices, that by the time I've processed it all and am able to spit out an opinion, a decision, I sometimes can't tell if it's really mine or someone else's. If, for once, I could just ignore everything that everyone tells me and everyone's opinions and everything that everyone else wants me to do, then maybe I could actually figure out what I want to do.

I don't really wish I were on my own. I don't. I'm happy that there are people in my life who care about me enough to want to help me, that there are people who just want what's best for me. The problem is, I don't always know what's best for me. And I just want to have a chance to figure it out.

Resolutions

Look.

It seems like most of the time, all we do is complain about things. I want this, I want that...I wish I could this, I wish I could that.

Well you know what? Sometimes, you have to work for the things you want.

Quit whining about it and just go out and make it happen. Put yourself out there and do the best you can. Maybe you'll get it, and maybe you won't, but at least at the end of the day, you can rest easy knowing you did everything you could and that you are where you are because you chose it. You made it that way.

Yeah, sometimes good things come to those who wait and those who wait don't have to do anything. But I think for the most part, that's just a saying that was made up to teach patience. I think generally, if you want something, the best way to get it is to go after it. To say: yes, I want this. I'm going to make it happen.

Or, to acknowledge that it's not really that important and that you can live without it and forget about it. Move on.

Because maybe it's really not that important to you and you decide it's not worth it.

And on the other hand, even if it is important to you, if you're not willing to work for it, if you don't care enough to try, then maybe you don't deserve it.

If you just stay where you are and wait for things to happen, you'll never get anywhere.

Don't sit around waiting for your life to come to you. Take the first step. Go out and live it.