A Goal is Born

Couldn't help but write this down in my statistics notebook in my very finest looping cursive after hearing it in  New Testament class:


Real leadership is communicating a person's worth and potential so well that they are inspired to see it in themselves.


...Because it's so true.  As a communications major, this struck me as a worthy goal: to communicate people's worth and potential.  And to do it effectively.  


My mind is brimming with the faces of people who have done this for me, who have not just instructed me or pulled me along, but who have filled me with the desire to be excellent. 


If I could do the same, what could be more fulfilling?

If I can't be Kate

Can I just wear her dress?

Image Via

Alright, sweet.

Chasing Bliss II

Remember this?
*  *  *

Today a well-coiffed, bespectacled young man asked me what I was studying.

I replied, "Public relations, with minors in nonprofit management and. . . music."

I guess I'm used to people raising their eyebrows and nodding (probably in manners-driven approval and usually, ironically, most fervently at the music part), because his retort fired me up just a bit.

"Well," he said (partially joking), "You're definitely not following the money."
Which is probably true.

"You know," I said, "I really believe that if you are passionate about something and good at what you do, the money will follow."

And I do believe that. And something I'm beginning to believe even more is that if you are passionate and proficient and always looking outward, the money begins to matter even less.

It's about chasing your bliss, eh?

And in that vein of thought, I would like to note that this blog post was brought to you two questions into my statistics homework. At least I'm identifying what isn't on my bliss list.

*  *  *

Love at Second Sight

We've got fifty good years left to spend out in the garden, I don't care to beg your pardon, we should live until we die.

Brilliant

"A master at the art of living makes no distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing.  He, himself always knows he is doing both."

Possibilities

You know your dreams are turning into obsessions when you stay up half of the night whizzing through city streets via Google Maps.  I was imagining the cafes I'd step into, the metro entrance I'd take, the spots in the historical district I'd meander through. Is Street View not a wonder?  It's just feeding my arguably overly-romanticized city ideal.  Provo can be so bland.  I like a little adrenalin running through my veins, a bit of wonder and exhilaration filling my stomach as I click my heels and shuffle in my pencil skirt. Something the city feeds me.

 Recognize this one?  It's not NYC.  Hint: I've spent a night here already.  By myself. Surrounded by strangers. But I'm not divulging until the possibility becomes a stronger hope and then maybe. . .

And even if the details don't process and check out, it was good to be filled with hope for just a moment, right?   Even the possibility of a possibility is enough to put a spring in my step this week. Just let me down easy.

Sparkle

I'm really coveting this dress.  Like, really.  So much so that I might have done this:

Just to, you know, see if it worked with my skin tones and stuff. Now all I need is a place to wear it to (ending a sentence with a preposition. . . acceptable just this once?). And $338. Plus these.

Oh and if that one doesn't work out, I'm cool with this too. 

Half Moons

Her sparkly brown Emma Watson eyes transform into half moons as her face lifts into another freckles-and-nose-crinkling smile.


I wasn't expecting this. 


Not the half moons or the ready smile, but the secret behind them.


Secret sorrow, 
Sparks our neural fibers,
Ashes penetrating the temporal lobe
Never fall deep enough to undo the memory of
Mental fire


Secret tallies of the invisible battle
Of shame and loss, trial and error
Intricately etched between each rib
A visceral reminder with each breath
If only In were not so intertwined with Out
Without.


I just didn't expect to learn her secret so matter-of-factly, so simply, it was so. . . different from the girl I had seen. The one who flicked her cascading brunette waves and had every male in the room quasi-hypnotized.

 I saw her pictures from the month it happened. The half moons were still there and if anything, she was glowing. It wasn't just her face, but her.  Her kind smile emanating from her innocent, open face.  I couldn't and still can't find any darkness about her.


I'm sorry?  That's the best I could do?

Nobody prepares you for the moment when someone says "My dad died of cancer a few months back."

"I'm sorry," that trite phrase, stale on my lips. A nervous sigh. Trying to muster the right amount of empathy in my eyes, without bordering on pity.  She must have seen and heard it a million times before.

And that's what humbled me.  No self pity, no gushing, no anger or annoyance.  A soft, sad smile and then a brighter one, moving forward.

Her eyes transforming from half moons to crescents.

Resilient

Images via

Sitting in church today, the thought crossed my mind: I am resilient.  It sat there in my brain, neither accepted nor rejected, just floating.  Hymns were sung, speakers spoke, and before I knew it, the thought had moved in. And I liked it there.  And I kept it. 

Because, you know, resilience - if you think of it in terms of the Gold Rush, then you'd be pretty depressed right now because the last nugget of gold would be gone. But the good thing is, with innovation, there isn't a last nugget. Every new thing creates two new questions and two new opportunities.
--Jeff Bezos


And you, you are resilient too.  We were made to break, re-shape and ultimately heal. 

The Crisp Gala is Key

 My soul is made up of music and words and crisp gala apples.

On my perfect day off, you'd find me sitting in a corner cafe in Georgetown with a blushing gala in one hand and a purse-sized copy of Jane Eyre in the other. 

 I'd be so busy inhaling the words of Charlotte Bronte that I wouldn't notice I was almost running late for my date at the National Symphony. 

Shoving my glasses back up the bridge of my nose and re-wrapping my hair into a gigantic bun on the top of my head, I'd leap onto my bike and whiz through the cobblestone streets.

Of course, I'd make it just in the nick of time. And as luck would have it (it is my perfect day after all). . . 

They'd be playing Corelli.

Pieces of a Long Weekend

Watching this lovely movie at one in the morning with my roomie and reflecting on Summers and Autumns.

Cruising through this 1,045 page novel, and enjoying it. 

Getting the sounds of Tyrone Wells stuck in my head in preparation for his upcoming concert--with Joe Brooks!  Tickets here.

Dancing the night away (literally, we were on our feet for a solid 4 hours) at The Loft.

Seeing my first violin student hold up the violin like a pro.

Training for this baby.

Reading this beautiful blog post by my favorite Wily Brunette:  these are the ways you love yourself. (to forgive).

"The only way to know the story is to go out and write it. live your way into it. ferociously. begin to live and work and fight and love with an unparalleled ferocity. let fear dictate nothing. unfurl your chest, you have all the armor you'll ever need. see with wide eyes and don't forget to laugh."

Running Phenomenon

Before the morning run:
I'm going to run a half marathon, dang it!  Where's that training schedule?

During the run:
What on earth would possess me to run a half marathon?  13.1094 miles of torture is the most unappealing thing I can think of.   Pain. Sweat. Lungs on the verge of collapsing.  Stomach twisting nauseatingly. 

After the run:
 I should go look up dates and see if I'll be in town for the big race!


Seriously though, if I'm around in July (fingers still tightly crossed for D.C.  but I have about a 4% chance of getting the position), I would LOVE to do the Bryce Canyon 1/2 . I think I'd love it.  I tell myself that I would.

. . . I'd probably love it after it was over.

But really, who wouldn't want to run through this as the morning sun rises in the east?

Image via

Mantra

Via Pinterest.

P.S. Peach herbal tea is divine.

"My darling girl,

When are you going to realize that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage."

--Alice Hoffman
 
Taken from Wily Brunette

Follow Your Bliss

“Follow your bliss.

If you do follow your bliss,
you put yourself on a kind of track
that has been there all the while waiting for you,
and the life you ought to be living
is the one you are living.
When you can see that,
you begin to meet people
who are in the field of your bliss,
and they open the doors to you.
I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid,
and doors will open
where you didn't know they were going to be.
If you follow your bliss,
doors will open for you that wouldn't have opened for anyone else.”

― Joseph Campbell