Think Tank

I am so ungrateful sometimes. I go to a great university where I am challenged to think. I am forced to think about everything I have ever believed in my life. If there is only one thing I learn while I am here, I want it to be how to always think for myself. Growing up, I tended to be a shy person who didn't want to stand out at all. Now, I realize how valuable it is to believe what you believe and know WHY. I was talking to someone about sweatshop labor, because she was writing a paper about it and I was helping to edit it. I was asking her about it and trying to think about it, and she said, "I don't really think about this stuff. I don't really know about it." And I was thinking, you're writing a freaking paper on it. How can you act like you don't really care? How can you say you don't think about it?

I don't want that to be me.

I can talk a good talk, but if I don't do anything, what's the point? I'm not trying to point at his girl and say, "Look at her. She doesn't care." I just realized that I do the very same thing. I talk about social justice, but I don't think about who makes my clothes. It's not some happy little factory. It could be a worker who lives on a dollar a day. But do I care? I only think about me. What's convenient, what the best deal is. What I like. Me me me me. I can talk forever about action but never actually act.

I was watching some tv with my friend Rachel tonight, and this show came on called True Beauty. I can say that this show disgusts me. Our society is so twisted. To pick a person who is shallow and consumed with themselves and call them America's most beautiful person makes me so sad. It's just frustrating. If that's what beauty is, then I must be blind.

I guess the point of all this is that I have been thinking a lot this semester. I realize that I have accepted ideas and things when I had no idea what they really mean or why I believe in them. I just want to be my own person, and be confident in that. I want to know God more too. I want to know him so much that my complete identity is in him. Not in school, or friends, myself, or my own mind. In him. I still rely too much on myself, and I want to depend solely on him.

What kind of news is this?

Today in Public Speaking, my professor was talking about being up to date on current events. I fully agree with this. I feel like many people of my generation are completely clueless about what goes on in the world, and they only care about what they read in a magazine or watch on mtv. No one thinks for themselves anymore. Anyway, I realized that I don't watch the news enough, so I turned it on tonight. And what do I see? Clips of an angry woman from youtube, a Nascar driver crying because he won some race, and an over-analysis of an upcoming Arkansas Razorbacks basketball game. Great, they just revealed that they will be talking about Barbie Doll's 50th anniversary. Really? I think I just lost brain cells watching this. From now on, I will watch CNN or visit the New York Times online.

Lil Wayne helps me study

I have so many different things going on in my mind right now. I was studying for my intercultural communications exam, but I was listening to rap to keep me going, which is kind of contradictory, because I was studying all of these nice things about how to communicate with people and angry men were rhyming in my ear. I should stop listening to rap. But it gets me into a rhythm.

I feel insecure sometimes. I analyze way too much. I am an ISFJ personality, so this is to be expected. I think about what I say SO much after I say it, which is stupid because I can't do anything about it anymore. It's over. I think I am suffering from the spotlight effect. This is a concept I am learning about in public speaking. It's when you feel like more people notice things about you than they actually do. We are our own worst critics. I am definitely my own worst critic. I'm working on it though.

I would rather write papers than study for a test.

Spring break DILEMMA.....

What am I going to do for spring break? This is the question that is currently plaguing Rachel, Alyssa, and me. It really shouldn't be the main thing on my mind, but I can't help it. It's my last spring break as a college student, and I need to do something exciting. I wanted to go to London and visit Grace at Oxford, but let's get real here. I can't afford a 1000 dollar plane ticket, not to mention all the money I would spend once I got there. If anyone has any ideas that are cheap yet exciting, let me know. I don't want to spend spring break in oklahoma.