We Define Labels...They Do Not Define Us

                YouTube is the greatest invention ever gifted to man. I, like so many, was looking at a funny video on this glorious site. As I was looking through my favorite Alx James’, hilarious YouTube extraordinaire, videos I ran across an old youtuber. He’s not old years, but he is someone I have watched since I was a confused junior high student. His name is Shane Dawson. He is also a comedian by trade.

This video caught my eye though because it was titled “I Am Bisexual.” It was not something I expected from him since all his videos were comedy based. I wondered if it was supposed to be funny, which would have aggravated me, but I decided to check it out anyway. It was a coming out video for him. He was doing something similar to what I do here. He was using it as an outlet to express his feelings, so that they were no longer inside of him. More on that in a minuet.

 In his video he mentioned being depressed. This is something I understand. There are so many more levels to depression than just being sad. A lot of the time is feeling anxious, and disliking an aspect of your personality or life. You have all of these feelings of self-hatred and self-doubt that you don’t know what to do with. They build up until you don’t know if you will survive the sadness or the fear. I just really want you to understand why this blog is important to me, and why Shane’s videos are important to him.

Now, back on topic. In the video he further describes  why he isn’t either 100% gay or 100% straight. In essence he said that we are not defined by labels. He is so right. He is SO RIGHT it hurts, and he is not the first person to say it. My best friend, who is also in the middle of the spectrum of sexuality, spoke very similar words to me over the summer. Words don’t give us meaning, but we do give them meaning. We are the ones that assign weight to labels. WE give them meaning. He chose to not let these words decide his fate. All he wanted to do was share this part of himself with the world without fear of rejection. I understand that more and more people are more accepting toward those who are not heterosexual. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t still people out there that are hurtful with labels, and they are not always understanding to diversity. He was brave to trust us with this part of his life.

The lesson I desperately hope you take away from this: we define labels. This can go two ways. Either I want you not to use labels to define other people, or I want you not to use labels to define yourself. I suffer from depression, but I am not defined by it. Shane happens to be bisexual, but he isn’t only that. He really spoke to me by saying that we aren’t what other people see in us, or even what we see in ourselves. 

Price to be Paid

                Music is one of the greatest things on the planet. It’s something that can connect people across the world. I listen to a wide spectrum of different genres. If you were to take a look at my iPod you would see anything from country to heavy metal to show tunes. Music is like air to me.  I need it to breathe. One of my favorite bands, Five Finger Death Punch, recently released an album called Got Your Six. I have been listening to it obsessively. One of the songs, Hell to Pay, really stuck out to me. At one point in the song Ivan sings, “…the hell I had to pay, everything comes at a price.”  He really speaks to my soul here.

                There are obvious things you could think of that come at a price. You go to the store, and you buy milk. To purchase the milk you had to pay the price of $1.99 or whatever it was you paid. I’m thinking of the more abstract connotations this lyrics provides. I am a devout Christian, and I do believe in the existence of a soul. I believe every human has one. The soul is a beautiful thing. It provides life to the person who it resides in. The other part to this is that there are some actions that can cost a person a part of their soul. I’m not just talking murder, rape, or any of the other God awful crimes humans commit. There are smaller things that will eventually cost you a part of your soul. I’ve seen it firsthand.  

When I left my home town I moved with my aunt. She was leaving and offered to take me with her as long as I helped her keep up pretenses. She had been lying to her boyfriend about where she lived previously, and she wanted me to help her keep up all these lies. I agreed because I had wanted nothing more than to leave Holbrook. Before I knew it the lies had spiraled out of control. I also was becoming more like my aunt. Not something to be proud of. She had convinced me that I was nothing more than what she gave me. Without her I would still be stuck in rural Arizona. She told me I was unattractive and, “that no man would ever marry me if I dressed like that (my usual jeans and band t-shirt look).” The price that I had to pay for so-called freedom was being abused by someone else. Not a smart move I’ll admit. I gave a part of my soul to follow this person. I lied to people I desperately cared about. By the end of it I realized that I didn’t like the person I was becoming. I didn’t like having a part of myself stripped away.

                The lesson here is to really consider what the price is for something. For all you smart alecks out there I am not talking about the grossly overpriced dairy products of your local store.  The price you need to consider when you take a person into your heart. If they are good for you then by all means let them in. However, I know some of you have a person in your life that does more harm than good. They make you feel insecure. They tell you lies or want you to lie for them. The price for having them there may cost you part of who you are. Consider that before it costs something you can’t get back. 

Egypt

I haven’t written in this blog since I was a senior in high school. I don’t know what possessed me to write in it again. The only explanation that I can give is that I am currently at a cross roads. My life has taken quite the turn since I was a senior. For instance in the last year alone I have been homeless twice. I know that very few people actually care what I have to say, and I’m alright with that. I just need to have somewhere to air my thoughts, or I may possibly lose my mind.

                The title of this post may be a little confusing. “Why Egypt? Is that where she was homeless?” No, children of the internet, it was not. About a month ago I was kicked out of the house I was living in. I was living in Mesa, Arizona. Once I realized I had no place to go that kept me in the city I knew that I had to return to my home town.  This thought made me nauseous. All night, while I waited for my parents to come get me, I cried. I did the only thing that made sense. I had to get spiritual healing. I called my best friend Jasmine. She reminded me of the story of Moses.

                The story of Moses tells us that a young man was adopted into the royal family. He was a prince. That is until he realized he was actually a Hebrew slave. He ran from Egypt trying to find solace in the desert. Eventually, he found a community that accepted him. He worked for years to work past the issues of his past, and he became a wonderful leader. He thought he was complete. However, God had other plans, as He usually does. He sent Moses back to Egypt…back to his adversity.

                I related to this story more than I thought I would. Jasmine reminded me that we all have pasts and hardships. She also reminded me that because of those difficulties we had grown. She told me to think of myself as She-Moses. Holbrook was my Egypt. I had fought so hard to leave this town. Then just when I thought my adult life was becoming manageable God was like, “No, child. You have much to learn. Back to Egypt with ya.” At first I was angry. I didn’t want to go back. Of course there was a lesson to be learned from it.

                My family desperately needed my help, so coming back had a purpose. I was mean to pick up the slack. The lesson for the rest of you interweb adventurers is perseverance.  There are thousands out there that have suffered some sort of adversity. You get past it, or you suppress it. Whichever. I don’t judge.  But the point is that there was some issue that needed getting past. Yet at some point in your life this issue is gonna resurface sometimes with a vengeance. You need to see past the pain or blind anger and remember that you’ve faced this before in some form.  Work through it. Then when you look back at the epic pile of suck you’ll realize that it wasn’t all bad. There was a purpose. Keep on keeping on.  

Belief

This week our teacher posed the question of, “One thing I have learned to be true during my life is…” This got me thinking about my life thus far. I have survived eighteen long years of life. That’s more than a few people have had the pleasure of living. In eighteen years I have learned a plethora of different lessons. However, throughout all the different lessons there is one truth that I still hold dear.

            My one truth is to believe. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to believe in God, but belief gives your life meaning. For me, I believe in God. I love Jesus, but I didn’t always. There was a time in my life that I hated God. I thought he was out to get me. I figured if he truly was there for me…well he’d have made sure that nothing bad ever happened to me. Then I went to one of the most WONDERFUL places on Earth. It’s a church camp called Chapel Rock. One week a year I go to Prescott, Arizona. That week I get to leave all my troubles and drama behind and really focus on God. They people there help you to learn that you don’t have to face the world alone. You will always have God. It was there that I was able to see the beauty in God.

That camp was the place I realized that God didn’t cause hardships, but He helped you through them. He is always looking over your shoulder and guiding you. After that week, I began to see the beauty in everything, and my life improved in a major way. I wasn’t so negative about everything. I started to pray almost every day.  When I talked to God I felt like I could take on the world. However, belief doesn’t always refer to God.

You can have belief in just about anything. There is a book called This I Believe. The book is a compilation of essays where people talk about a truth they have learned. There were people who talked about tipping the pizza guy, or wearing footy pajamas. Believing can be a dedication such as a dedication to a sport. My brother believes so deeply that he will be a running back for the Pittsburg Steelers that is guiding his life. He plays football every year. To stay in shape the rest of the year he plays baseball, basketball, and he wrestles. His belief in his dream has given him direction and purpose.

            The lesson this week is just to believe. Find something that you’re really passionate about and dedicate yourself to it. Now, that doesn’t mean that you should stop eating, sleeping, and going to school for this one belief. It just means that you should let this belief guide you even if that belief isn’t in God. Just try to believe in yourself, your dreams, or whatever else you are passionate about. Do this, and you will find true happiness and fulfillment.  

I Will Remember You...

 This week our English teacher asked us to write a blog about someone we met during high school that we will never forget. I thought that I would be quite simple to write this blog because I have met so many phenomenal people during my high school career. However, that just wasn’t the case. There are too many people that I don’t think I could forget. So, I decided to write about the person that changed my life while I have been in high school.
 My junior year in high school was really tough. I had a myriad of things going on, and I wasn’t sure how to juggle them all. I was in five advanced placement classes. One of them was calculus…which frankly is more than any teen should ever have to handle!  I was also in the drama club, AP club, FCCLA, National Honors Society, and chess. It was stressful, but it wasn’t just the school work that was stressful. My home life was far from easy.
 Anyone who knows my mother would agree that she has had a severely tough time the past twenty years. She was addicted to drugs, and she was an alcoholic. If an adult is intoxicated their abilities to think and rationalize are impaired. Needless to say my mother was in no condition to be caring for three children. This meant that they care of my siblings fell on me.
There was a day last year that was harder than the rest. I just wanted it all to end. I thought that maybe if I dropped out of high school then taking care of my family would be easier. Then I went to my AP English 11 class. I confided in my teacher that I was thinking about dropping out. She told me that it would be the biggest mistake I ever made. She told me her story of how she took care of her family while she was a full time student in college. Her story inspired me so much that I decided to finish high school in the top ten percent.
Today, my mother has been sober for almost a year. My brother and sister are content, and I am going to finish high school ranked number six out of 153. I owe all of this to my English teacher…who convinced me that there was no investment greater than my education. I know there are some of you that think, “Oh, she’s just sucking up to the teacher because this blog is for a grade,” but that isn’t what this was about. I was asked to write a blog about someone I met in high school I would NEVER forget. Mrs. Caffey is the reason I’m going to finish high school. She is also my inspiration to become an English teacher myself.
So, here is the lesson this week: never give in. I know its cliché, but it’s the truth. There is no reason you can’t finish anything you set your mind to.  I also want to challenge you to thank the person in your life that inspired you. Whether it’s your mother, teacher, dad, whom ever... just tell them what they did for you.
Thank you, Mrs. Caffey; for all that you have done for me.

Worry Not

 This week I decided to go back to my childhood and watch The Lion King. It’s a lovely little story about a young lion growing up to be a manly lion. At one point in the story Simba, the main lion, is having a really tough time. His father has just been murdered by his uncle, and Simba has been blamed for his murder! However, all hope is not lost! A warthog, Pumba, and a mercat, Timon, help Simba to realize that everything will be alright. They tell him, “Hakuna Matata. It means no worries.” This is a good philosophy to model your life after. It does no good to excessively worry. All it does is increase you stress level…often for no good reason. Most often it’s better to just relax. Over the last few months I have been worrying far more than is healthy.
 Graduation is an amazing time in a senior’s life. It’s a time for growth and expression. So far, mine hasn’t been. I have been so stressed about finding money for college, and I have been worrying about what is going to happen to my family when I go away to college. Needless to say my senior year hasn’t been the carefree existence it was supposed to be. Then one fine, cold winter day my grandpa pulled me aside at a family gathering. He told me not to worry so much. He also told me, “You’re a smart and strong young women. Try not to worry. I know you’ll figure it out.” That was when I decided to quit stressing about what my life will be and focus on what it is. It has improved my life so much! I have had more fun since then: hanging out with my friends, watching movies, listening to music. I’m just trying to enjoy doing “normal” kid stuff. Sure enough I figured out what to do with my life shortly after that talk with my grandpa. All the worry and stress just clouded my brain to the obvious answer. Now my senior life is more enjoyable, and I managed to get rid of that pesky stomach ache. Life is good. :)
 So, here is the lesson this week: it doesn’t help to worry. When all you focus on is what is to come
you forget about what is. This is a crucial time in our lives. Seniors I mean. We are about to start a new chapter in our lives, but before we do we have to enjoy our last few months in high school. This is the last time we will be this carefree and wild! We should enjoy it while it lasts. Worrying takes away from the joy of these months. Things will work out, and the solution is probably right there in front of you if only you would relax. It is like our English teacher says, “Choose the joy!” If we do that life will run a bit smoother.

What You Say

This week I have spent quite a bit of time in my car. One night on my way home I heard a song that got me thinking. The song is called A Million Lives by Jake Miller. The entire song is about how his words have touched the lives of his fans. He says:

I've met a million people, been a million places
Shook a million hands, seen a million faces
I've had a million lows, and a million more highs
No I haven't made a million, but I've touched a million lives

His song really makes sense to me. In the world today you just never know how your words are going to affect the people you come into contact with. I have experienced this first hand. Last summer I went to an amazing camp called Chapel Rock. It’s a church camp that I have attended for eight summers and is my favorite place to be. That summer I rediscovered God, and that’s a really big deal for me. It wasn’t just the camp that inspired me. It was my cabin counselor.
One night during cabin time, which is a time when we answer some seriously tough, emotional questions, we had to talk about why we were there that week. I spoke about how I finally wanted to have a relationship with God, but I felt like I couldn’t really trust Him. I felt that way because of the things that had happened to me as a kid. Chelsea, my counselor, looked at me and smiled. She told me that she had a similar situation, but she told me that God never gives us something we can’t handle. Then she said something that I now live by. She quoted the Bible, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:13)” It was a conversation that changed my entire perception on life and faith. Chelsea may not know it, but her words changed my life spiritually. Anything we say can change someone or inspire them.
Of course this means that we must be careful with what we say. Our words can have a positive and lasting effect on people, but I can also be negative and hurtful. It may be hard to believe, but there was a time when I was a very negative person. I hated the world and every living thing on it, and that attitude started to affect the people I love most. During one summer, my sister screamed at my brother when they were playing in the pool. She had taken the only inflatable bed from him while he was still on it. When he protested she told him, “Life sucks and then you die, Jonah!” I couldn’t believe what I had heard. My little sister, only ten years old, was as negative as I was, and I hated it. From then on I tried to be more positive, and I attempted to show my sister that life was wonderful. I also learned what an impact my words could have on others. Here is the lesson this week: watch what you say even when you think no one is listening. Your words have the potential to inspire or to destroy, so make them count and make them inspirational.

The Hardest Thing

This week I have been watching a TV show called Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It’s a show about a teen girl who has to save the world on a regular basis. In the last episode of season five, The Gift, Buffy has to give her life to save the world…again. She tells her sister, “…the hardest thing in this world-is to live in it…” I can really relate to this quote.  The world is a dark and scary place. People cheat and they lie. They even kill. It makes living here feel like a chore, but it’s not. The gift of life is a beautiful thing…even if it doesn’t always feel like it.
The last few months have been extremely hard for me. I lost my great grandmother on November 11, 2012. I was really close to her, so her death hasn’t been easy to deal with. There was a time when I felt like giving up. I felt that life was too hard, and it wasn’t worth living in the first place. For a while I was really depressed…and then I thought about how mad my great grandma would be if she knew I was having these thoughts. She would tell me how life was a wonderful gift from God, and it wasn’t something to be sad about. After this realization things got better. I came to terms with her death, and even found a form of peace. Then my stepdad came back into my life. He was staying at our house for a few days and it felt like my own personal “Hell on Earth.” I started to shut down again because it hurt too much to feel. I stopped talking to my friends. I ignored my family. I wasn’t eating. It was a terrible time in my life. That was when Buffy reminded me again of what it meant to live.
In a different episode in season three, Amends, Buffy tells her friend Angel, “It's hard, and it's painful, and it's every day.” She was talking about living, and her words are extremely accurate. Living is hard, but it’s worth it. She reminded me of that. After watching this, I started to get better. I started to live again. There are still days when I feel like it’s too much, but I don’t think I’ll ever return to that dark hole I was living in. I learned to love life again.
The lesson for this week is to live. There are good times, and there are hard times. There are going to be days when death seems like the better option. However, you can’t ever give up on life. It’s not as easy as some may think, but in the end there is nothing more rewarding. Living is the best gift we have ever been given, and we need to treat it as such. So, live. Enjoy the little things. Laugh. Cry. Just treat life like the gift it is.

Expressions

This week I got a new tattoo.

 While I find tattoos to be a beautiful form of art some of my family disagrees with me. A few of my family members disagreed with my choice to get another tattoo. They view people who have tattoos as destructive. However this situation reminded me of a Lady Gaga song called Born This Way. At one point in the song she sings, “…I’m beautiful in my way…” which I can really relate to at this point. Even though my family views my tattoos as ugly and destructive they make me feel more beautiful. Now that I have another tattoo my family feels that I am an even bigger disappointment. I don’t think that because I altered my body that makes me a failure. They want to pick and choose which parts of me they love, and that just isn’t how love works. You love someone despite their “flaws”. Which brings me to the lesson for this week: people express themselves in different ways,
but that doesn’t make them bad for doing it.
 There are a myriad of way people express themselves. A few people change the way they dress, or they change their hair. Some get tattoos. That doesn’t make them a bad person for expressing themselves in less conventional methods. Tattooing is just another form of art and expression. However, people with tattoos are often misjudged as criminals or hooligans. They are just projecting themselves to the rest of the world. Their choice of expression doesn’t make them a horrid human being, and these assumptions are extremely hurtful.
 When I got my first tattoo some of my family thought it was a really stupid decision because I was only 16 at the time. That wasn’t such a big deal. I had made decisions in the past that they had disagreed with, but one of my aunts said that I was no longer a good niece…well that hurt. I choose to express myself in a way that she didn’t like, but did that make me a bad person. In the end, I decided that it didn’t. Getting a tattoo didn’t change my core personality traits it just changed the way the back of my neck looks. I am still the same Alicia I just have something that makes me a little different. Just like Lady Gaga said, “…I’m beautiful in my way…” My tattoos don’t define who I am they just make me more beautiful.
 The lesson this week is that changing something about yourself or expressing yourself doesn’t make you a good or bad person. Dressing different, changing your hair, or getting a tattoo doesn’t change the person you are. It may portray a certain image to the world, but it doesn’t define you either. So, try not to make the decision of character based on the way a person looks. Their personality doesn’t directly coincide with the way they look.

First Impressions

This week I have been sick and out of school. When I wasn’t sleeping or coughing I was watching movies. I was watching A Cinderella Story, which is a modern day version of Cinderella, and something the main character, Sam/Cinderella, said that stuck with me. At one point in the movie she is talking with “prince charming” who claims that he has no idea who she really is, but that he knows that he has seen her before. She tells him, “Maybe you were looking but you weren’t really seeing.” That’s something many of us do. When we see a girl dressed in a promiscuous fashion, and most often we assume that she is exactly that: promiscuous. We make assumptions based on first impressions, but that isn’t right or fair.
We don’t know everything about someone when we first meet them. Heck, even after years of knowing someone you may not know everything about them.
I know that I have misjudged people in my life. My best friend, for example, was someone that I sorely misjudged. He came to Holbrook in the sixth grade, and I thought he was a snob. He came across as some jerk who thought he owned the world, or at least that was what I thought. Now that I see who he really is I know that what I thought was dead wrong. I was mistaken to assume I knew him because I talked to him for fifteen minutes. He is sweet and funny…and he is my best friend. I also know what it is like to be judged based on a first impression.
When I was in junior high I was weird. I was awkward, and I had a hard time making friends. I know that many of the kids I went to school with avoided me for this very reason. What they don’t know is what I was going through at the time. My mother was getting a divorce, and it really hurt me. I was twelve and didn’t know how to express my feelings, but that didn’t stop the other kids from making fun of me. I don’t hold it against them now because I’m older and they understand what I was dealing with. However, at the time they still took one look at me and thought I was a freak, and it hurt.
It is a knee- jerk reaction to make judgments about someone the first time we meet them. We just need to get into the practice of not acting on those assumptions. If we try to get to know them and see them for who they really are there will be less anger and fighting in the world. People wouldn’t have so many enemies because there would be better communication between us. Judgments are harsh and often wrong. Here’s the lesson: try not to act on first impressions. Don’t let them be the deciding factor on which people you’re friends with. Otherwise you might miss out on some fabulous, misunderstood weirdoes like me. :)

Easy vs. Right

This week I started to re-read the amazing Harry Potter books.  In the forth book, The Goblet of Fire, Dumbledore is addressing Harry and says, “…the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right, and what is easy…” I understand where Dumbledore is coming from when he says this. Life is complicated, and we are all faced with difficult choices.
 Each of us will have to make some very tough calls throughout life: whether or not to go to college, if we should major is education or criminal justice, or if we should go out with our friends this Saturday night. Though not all our choices are life altering that doesn’t mean that they aren’t difficult to make. For instance, I graduate in May and I am faced with the decision about college. Should I go away to college or should I stay in Holbrook. I know that either way I am going to college, but I have no idea where. It would be much easier to go away to college, and leave my family here, but is that the right decision. My family needs me, especially my mother. I’m torn. Though this isn’t the biggest choice I’ll make in my life time I am still struggling with it, and we all have trouble making these types of decisions.

The “easy way out” is often tempting because life can be so hard. It can be easier to not have to face an emotionally difficult decision in favor for a simpler one, but avoiding these issues doesn’t make them go away. After trying to take that “easy way out” you come to find it didn’t leave you where you wanted to be, but that’s how we grow. We make mistakes. We try to make life easier on ourselves. However, it often just makes doing the right thing that much harder. Yet we as humans often go back and do the right thing. Even if it takes years for us to correct our decision… we almost always do. 
Dumbledore taught me that we do have to make a choice when life gets hard, but what I also took from his words is that we will make the right choice in the end. He the upmost faith in Harry’s ability to lead and carry on even when is life took a turn for the worse. This quote couldn’t have come at a better time. I was losing my faith in people’s abilities to be good, but we all mess up at some point in our lives. However, it’s our ability to correct those mistakes that makes us remarkable. In the end most make the right choice, and are better for it. My lesson for the week is this: make the right choices. Whenever, however you do just make the right choice for you. You may not see the solution now, but it will come, and when it does you’ll know.