Don't Mold me Media

Looking through the magazines I see pictures of the famous in their famous clothes. On top of the picture the words That's Hot, Not, or Hot labels them. My fingers trace the font and I cannot understand who as they right to decide what I wear. Why do the magazines try to shape us into what they want so they can keep on making money? I am in aw. Who I'm i dressing for?Either I am impressing someone or I am making myself feel better by the clothes I wear. I'm not a doll to dress up for anyone. I like my clothes and my "style". I don't dress for anybody but I do keep my style "under control" for God. I started to move from The People magazine to the tattoo magazine. My eyes shifted from page to page. Some of the colors were incredible and breath taking while others made it possible for me to just look for half a second. People covered themselves with these pieces of art for what? I have no idea and a part of me doesn't really care. But then I see a girl posing and showing off her sleeve tattoo, the classic joker from Batman. I laugh. I really just laugh because why in the world would you want to put that on your beautiful skin when its beautiful already? A lot of people know that I want a tattoo. My reasons are good I think. It's not out of rebellion or out of my way to show myself off but because I want to. I want to show off God. My tattoo is going to be on the side of my abdomen. The words...Unconditional Love...written in cursive or maybe in my mom's handwriting. I have had this idea in my head since Sophomore year of high school. I'm not going impress anyone. I'm not going post it all over my facebook when I get it. I am not going to take pictures of it and then post it on facebook. The words are natural and are already imprinted in me, it's just that you cannot visually see it. I am unconditionally loved by Abba, my God. The amazing thing is, so is everybody else. I want it to be a conversation starter. I want it to remind me that I need to be a christian on the outside too. I'm not going to be a poser in a magazine, letting other people dress me and then getting judged if I'm hot or not. I am me. I am Brenna. The tattoo is already there, you just can't see it yet. This is me. I will only let God mold me.

Leaving High School Behind...You're in College

Here I am finally sitting down to write again. It is January 11 and I do not understand how this time has gone by so fast. I feel like I was just sitting in my room thanking the Lord for Christmas break. Some know what happened during my break and others don't. I seem to face the imaginable when ever I start to change or I change my location. I'm trying my best now to react calmly about the situations at hand and try to handle them with God. Lately I have been finding a new me. Coming here, Calvin, has changed me. I am not the same at all. My art that I create has changed....some weird mature twist is added onto it. I come to calvin and I sit on the "weird" side of the dining hall because I am sick of being judged by people my age. I am now used to having friends that are older than me because we relate better. Now the so called freshman seem to irritate me. They were once perfect in High school and now they come here and party their brains out. I sit in my classes and actually enjoy the books they give us to read but I hear the freshman complain about it. Readers, I know I am a freshman too...don't get me wrong. I am tired of girl fights and boys who take complete advantage of my friends. I'm tired of walking on egg shells around people I do not click very well with. I'm sick of people not being open minded to the other's culture. I'm tired of shit-faced kids not taking advantage of the school they are attending. To be honest sometimes I feel like my friends think I am that immature person. I am just like the rest. I hate that. I hate the all the pretty faces, the ones who say that this year they will not drink any soda for their new years resolution. Why can't it be about prayer, or being nicer, or opening up, or supporting a starving kid for once, or giving your all. This blog is most likely an angry one but I'm tired of this world. We say we are all christians at this school called Calvin but when I sit on the "cool" side of the dining hall I feel everyone's eyes on me and my friends. I feel judged. When I sit on the "weird" side I see people who don't care. Some I can tell are christians and others have just lived life....they were their plaid and band T-shirts without a care of what the pretty people think. I'm not a pretty person. I do not spend hours on my hair. Making sure that I apply my "face" each morning. I do not pretend to be nice. I do not act like I am better than you. I have my bad habits I have my pit falls. But you're in college now, it's time to grow up. High School is called High School and college is called college for a reason. I'm done playing games.

What happene to being focused?

What do we call the last two weeks of school right before Christmas break? The week before finals...where it is impossible to get up for class. You come to the library to study and you cannot help but look out the window into a complete trance. No real thoughts enter your mind...just wonders. The snow falls at radical speeds. It moves in ways that show how the wind dances with it. When step out the snow only plunges at your face in reaction to you disrupting the dance with the wind. Your homework lays at your feet or in you backpack untouched. Distraction is at play. Whispers of home tempt you to cry. So gazing at the snowy performance distracts you. Friends are around trying to convey that they too are doing homework. But they cannot fool you...
Music buzzing in your ears drowning out every one else that seems to be working in the library. What happened to be focused? The music you choose is either poetic where you have to listen to the words or where it makes you want to dance. I try to stay focus but here I am sitting right in front of the window while writing a blog. My music speaks to me silently with poetic words that I cannot keep from listening to. My tummy rumbles and I can't think of anything else but food and my plane ride home. The last two weeks of school are most likely the toughest weeks I will face in my college career. My friends are all ready to take that plane ride home. I am completely lost in my thoughts and homework has stopped trying to get my attention.

Save Me Abba

my heart does not know the correct beat on which to pump the blood through out my body. I have forgotten how to direct it or even how to make suggestions. What made the void will never return. Nothing like it will take it's place. Something greater must be done. Speechless I am left to everyone. With this weight on my back, my knees buckle to the floor. My strength is not enough. It will never be enough. The day that I finally let myself stop trying to be in control will be the day where I am finally me again. My heart screams for help while my mind scurries around to find tactics to solve my heart's problem on it's own. I am lost at words. No manuals help me here. No words of advice are given to fill the cup. This task is on me. I know of what acquires of me. The simple words of "here I am simply as I am...I give myself to You" is THE hardest thing to do. My heart does not leak, it gushes. I am filled with anger. I am filled with pain. I am pathetic. I am wretched. I know my disease. I am my disease. A disease cannot cure itself. A disease is a disease. Sometimes I wonder if my mom did not die, would it be easier to rely on God? Or in fact would it be harder?

Where have I gone. I came to a place knowing my story, knowing my name, knowing who I was, knowing where I came from, knowing how to call for help...This place as left me knowing nothing. Who am I?

I am on the path of adding more to me. I thought I settled to a place where I knew but I only settled to a place knowing not even half of me. Save me Abba.

I AM BACK

When it happened I felt destruction. I felt an overwhelming feeling that wasn't going to leave any time soon. I was left alone in the desert. Months later I felt liberated. I am free. I am free. I do not have to prove myself anymore. I am allowed to fail time and time again without being looked at like an unworthy person. I am allowed to be in a funk without being looked at as someone who is immature. I am allowed to be me. I do not have to impress anymore. I am me. I am not bowing down to my idol no more. I am me. My lungs take deep breaths in and out finally. No more suffocation for my throat and lungs. No rope tied around my arms and no tape around my mouth. I am not a figure to be controlled. I have a will, a free-will. I will fly and I am flying again. No one can bound me like that again expect for myself. The chains are gone and I am set free. I saw it at first as a complete heart splitting event but now I view this as a complete liberation. My God My God here am I. I am yours. I am here to do your will. I am here to be in prayer for myself and others. I am ever thankful for your creation that gives you praise and adoration. I bow down. I bow down. I bow down in complete silence. My tears fall. My tears fall not for the hurt and pain but for my joy, hope, and love that I receive from you. I fish for help...but what I do not realise is that you are and were always there to begin with. I am surrounded by your presence. I am not my own but I am yours. My Lord, I let you romance me. You the creator of love. You are the one who invented love. Why am I so reluctant to let you show your love notes to me. I was gone. I left your house. But my God I am back. I AM BACK.

I love Him

I have been away from home for 3 months next week. I can't believe my ears when I think about it or even say it out loud. Some know the first reason why I chose Calvin and others don't. The reason was at the time of getting accepted I was in a funk, a pit. School was horrible. Friends at school were distant towards me since I shut down after my Mom's death. Life at home wasn't any better. I wanted to get away to get out of Escondido and live. To breath fresh air. So I made the choice to go. By the end of senior year I finally reached normal. I finally found those friends who stood by me even if I shut them out. I felt the air in my lungs, my lungs expanded to their fullest. My face had I smile. Of course I still hit some road blocks but my faith was strong and I felt invisible. At that moment I didn't want to leave. I found life and I was then going to leave life. I found contentment. I found my strength. God was seeking me and still is but I was seeking Him.

I left for college. I had no idea what to expect. First few weeks were crazy with homework and new faces. Everyone was a new face. Has I started to make friends and make my life here I think I forgot to something with me. Something beyond important. I forgot to pack God in my equation. What was...what am I thinking? God is my hope for tomorrow. He is the glue in my heart and mind. He is the one who brings me peace and joy when I am in sorrow. He is always there no matter where I put him. Now just putting that into action instead of thought is were I am at.

This is something new for me because I have no lost my faith or haven't lost God. I lost myself. Now it is time to get to know God even deeper for me to begin to know myself again. I'm weary but I have faith and I trust in God that I will be filled with joy.

I love Him

Wrinkles and Age-Spots

I love Tuesdays right when 2:45 gets hit by the hands on the clock. Two things happen; my boring class ends and I get to see all the elderly people walk through the halls of the Hiemenga Hall building. I do not know exactly why they are there on Tuesdays but I have a little hunch. I think they all take classes or workshops or seminars of some kind. When the clock hits 2:45pm I walk up the stairs to first floor since my class is the basement and I go directly to the restroom. I always have to go to the bathroom after that class...haha. On my walk there all of the elderly talk about the lecture they went to while holding a folder in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. That hallway that has the restroom and coffee/cookie bar smells of Grandma's, Grandpa's, old friends, and black coffee with sugar. I never miss the chance to look at their faces or the clothes they were. I love to see who they are even though I can only tell on the outside. How old are they really? What have they seen that I haven't yet? What do we have in common? Are those wrinkles a gift from stress or the bright sun in the summer? Which ones lost their wife or husband? I wonder what their stories are, the battles they fought. As I get out of my class of learning so do they. I'm captivated by them. I know they have stories of defeat and love. I know they once were something so grand. I know they had to achieve something. But maybe not. Maybe their stories are thin. I'm not sure. I am curious to find out what defeats I will face and what love I will feel. I am in complete Aw that I one day will be walking around in my old age passing the younger crowd. They will look at me and see all my wrinkles and age-spots. I will be not under a microscope like I am now to my peers but I will be put on a pedestal for a split second in the mind of the younger ones. If that is the future I cannot sit here and complain about life. I cannot sit still when adventure is at my hands. I cannot be dull or angry at things that don't matter next week. When I am old I better have a story that backs up my wrinkles and age-spots.