I had a dream the other night...

I had a dream the other night that I was walking in a garden. This garden was laid out on either side of a stone path and no matter how hard I tried, I kept trampling the flowers. I would straighten and water them and watch the plants grow for a time but in the end they would all die. It seemed like years of hard work that all amounted to nothing. 

Suddenly a hand reached out to me and offered help over to a new path. As I walked it, it didn't matter what I did to the flowers. I could step, kick, or pull at them and still they refused to be destroyed. Instead of being maddening it seemed entirely comforting. I had worked so hard on my little garden and yet nothing I did helped the little plants grow. Here I was in a place where I didn't have to work; everything was already done and nothing I did would stop it from happening.

Now bear with me as this is how my mind associates things. I'm at a time of my life where I'm working through several aspects of my life. Relationships, getting ready to graduate college, finding internships and a job, balancing friends and work; it's all overwhelming at times. However I always find myself giving the same advice to others and not really doing all that well at following it myself. It usually starts with God has a plan. We can kick and scream and fight but it's already been laid out. We can see it as frustrating or choose to see it as comforting because no matter how far we fall, the plan is there. He sees and knows everything and in my weakest state, He has a plan.

So my garden dream was a comfort in these days of wandering. It reminds me that anything I touch will wilt and fall away because thus far, everything has. However God is a gardener and everything He touches will flourish and grow even more beautiful than I can ever imagine. It's in His hands so why worry?

Be anxious for nothing

Going from school to home is always a weird time of transitioning from me. I attend school eighteen hours away so I save trips home for Christmas and summer. This means that I spend four months at a time essentially on my own and deciding what I want to do with my days. While at school, my nights are usually fairly eventful. I like night drives, studying at coffee shops, and hanging out with friends until the wee hours. Here's where the transitioning comes in. Being at home means a lot of nights spent with my family at home. Not that I mind this at all! It's just strange to go from picking up and leaving to go to the lake at midnight to Psych marathons.

To be honest it makes me quite antsy. Camp starts in a few weeks and I know this means long nights with drives and friends and my man next to me but right now it's odd. I have to keep reminding myself to be still. I need to remember how little time my parents have spent with me over the last three years I have been away at school. On my ring finger I wear a ring with the words "Be anxious for nothing Phil 4:6-7". It's my constant reminder to stay in the moment. Long nights will come.

So if you struggle with not living in the moment as much as I do, let this be your reminder. Be anxious for nothing. Whether it be your friends are all up and getting married or everyone you know has graduated and left you behind; you're time will come. Right now you are exactly where you need to be. You won't get these days back.

Welcome Summer

I'm positive I am not the first person and will not be the last to say this, but college absolutely drains all of my time. Of course I work, go out with friends, and take time to live but many parts of my life get pushed to the back burner during the school months. One of these just so happens to unfortunately be music. This means that during the summer I spend a lot of my time just catching back up on new music, CD releases, and exploring the hidden parts of Youtube.

One of my best friends, Baylen, and I are both music junkies and have had an ongoing music swap since freshman year. I don't like to admit it but he gives me pretty great artists to listen to. Tonight I was feeling the restlessness of not going on a late night drive since being at school. Almost as if he could sense it, he sent me Cherry by Luna Shadows. Everything about it is so lovely and exactly what I needed for my anxiousness. I then got curious about the Youtube channel it's on and found Swim by Valley. Now spoiler alert: it has been a very long time since a song has made me laugh out loud. This isn't a funny song in the slightest, it just made me that happy. If you are looking for some extra songs for your summer playlist then I recommend these two songs and the Youtube channel "IndieAir". If you are looking for stars out, windows down, your love sitting in the passenger seat then get ready to be pleasantly surprised. Let summer commence.

35 days

Ah the sweet smell of the semester winding down- or picking up? As it gets to the end I can never quite tell whether it slows down or speeds up. As of today there are 35 days remaining of my junior year of college and I have to say that some days I am ready and others I close my eyes and just hold on tight.

Being in a place for too long makes me antsy. During the school year I work at my school's rock wall and sitting in the small place 18 hours a week can drive me insane on slow nights. Working in the rock wall is kind of like life for me. When things are the same day after day, I'm ready to move. I have to stand up and walk away for a little bit. The end of the semester is very much like this. I'm getting tired of sitting behind a desk and studying for something new every night. I'm ready for late nights at camp with my man in the car next to me. I need late night drives and swimming pools and no anxiety from impending tests.

There's 35 days remaining of this semester and even though I am very much burnt out; I want to make it worth something. I don't want to count down the days until the weekend or the summer. I want to study hard while I can and pass the exams coming up with ease.

So here's to 35 days and not counting I suppose.

Locking the Door

Being a college student, I live in a dorm room on campus. I am surrounded by a variety of different ladies who I interact with on an everyday basis. My dorm in particular is set up in a suite style where there are two room and a bathroom conjoining them. I live by myself this semester and therefore have half of the suite to myself. Stay with me here because I promise there is a point to my ramblings. This morning I was in a hurry and when leaving the bathroom I forgot to press in the lock. I don't lock the door because I distrust my suite mates, but more because it is a habit I have picked up because of freshman year prank wars. Now, I've lived in the same exact room for five semesters and I pretty much have locking the door down. Lately however I've noticed that when I walk past it a few minutes later, it's unlocked. I can pretty much attribute this to the fact that even though it's mostly an unconscious act, I get so caught up in whatever else I'm doing in the moment that it just slips by.

Today this moment of realization of the door being unlocked occurred again. I left the bathroom, got dressed, walked by and stared it the door for a few seconds before re-locking it. It got me thinking. How many other areas in my life am I just working on auto-pilot through? How many friends, family members, and class mates are surrounding me that I've forgotten to pay particular attention to under the assumption that I already have? 

It's such a little moment in my day that actually hit pretty hard. I think about all the times where I've read a text without responding or even opened a snapchat and swore to reply later. However what's going on with the person on the other side? Maybe what seems like a small part of my day is so much larger in comparison for them. Perhaps while I'm just going through the motions, there's someone I'm interacting with that I'm doing as good as a job with as I had thought I was. That's pretty upsetting. 

So take the second to slow down and lock the door in your life. For me it's sending the text without reason to or sitting down and writing the letters I never got to. Or even as simply as recognizing the students around me as much as I did freshmen year. 

Lock the door and open opportunities that you wouldn't have if you were running on auto-pilot.