changing in the dark

so today i felt so foolish. i think that this is becoming a theme, me being/feeling foolish. sorry for the seemingly pessimistic attitude, but really, sometimes, correction most of the time, foolishness works to counteract pride. and believe me, there is a heckuva of a lot of pride stored up in this one fist sized heart of mine.

went to the gym today after my night class, feeling all tough because even though i was super sore from flag football yesterday, i decided to do a light workout and get rid of some of that lactic acid stored up in my poor muscles. got to the gym and had to change into my t-shirt and shorts in the bathroom. problem was that the light to the one-roomed girl's bathroom was broken, so i had to change in the dark. finished changing and walked out into the room full of worker outers only to look down and realize my shirt was very apparently on backwards with the tag sticking out in front of me. embarrassed, i walk into the boys bathroom, which DOES have a light, to put it on correctly. walked out of the boys bathroom to see a boy sitting on the bench in front of the bathroom waiting for it to be available. i felt him staring as i walked past. i wish i coulda told him to read the sign on the girls' bathroom door--LIGHT NOT WORKING--to explain why i was in the men's restroom.

but wait, there's more. i wanted to run on one of the good treadmills and lucky me! someone just got off. there was another boy standing next to it though so i asked him if he was waiting for the treadmill. it took me 4 times to finish asking the question because for some reason i kept stuttering. he said no, and i got another weird look. started running on the treadmill and a minute later a guy tells me he has reserved it for that time. grrreat. i switch to the so-so quality treadmill (there are three kinds) but then! i see a good treadmill open again. get on it only to, again, a minute later, have a girl tell me she had reserved it. so i get off and see that the good treadmills, and the so-so treadmills are all taken. what's left is the crappy treadmill all the way on next to the wall. served me right. siigh.

but thankfully i didn't just wallow in my frustration but instead tried to see it as a lesson. don't change in the dark...it doesn't work, and i mean that in both the literal and in the "transformation" way. things always get messed up, put on backwards, inside out, upside down. you think you're doing alright and then all of a sudden you realize you've dug a bigger hole and there is no way out. you're living in your sin and surrounded by darkness. you can't seek redemption in a broken world. the only way to possibly really, truly change is to step out into the light, that light being found in Jesus. i hope that that's a correct analogy. please correct me if i'm wrong. and as to the treadmill situation, i was trying to get ahead without following the correct procedures. i wanted to get the best treadmill, but it wasn't my time. it took me getting kicked off twice to get it. i guess it kind of relates to my school work too. i desire so much to be a good designer, to come up with clever, original ideas. but if i don't put in the time, if i don't actively learn things, i'm not gonna get better. you can't really climb a ladder without the rungs. well i guess you could but it's a lot harder.

John 3:19-21

This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."


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saw this going around on tumblr. it's quite true, except sometimes i really do laugh. lol. did i just laugh? um, no.



(via larrylin)

prayer

my prayer life sucks. it's not even that i deliberately decide not to pray but that i'm not really thinking about it. i forget to talk to God, I forget the power of prayer. Why? Maybe..well maybe because i've never directly, whole heartedly given credit to God when my prayers are answered. a part of me thinks that it was my doing, that somehow i was powerful, proactive enough (ha!) to make things come about the way i wanted. but..prayers aren't about getting what you want. it's presenting your requests to God in faith that He will do what He wants accordingly. it's asking for God's will to be done. it's to listen to what HE has to say instead of listening to yourself, the voice that often speaks lies, all day.

"If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land."

2 Chronicles 7:14

_________________________
Desire


this is my desire
to honor you
is it really?
Lord with all my heart
i worship you
am i really?
my tongue speaks a word
but my heart speaks another.
selfishness, envy, lust
Desire.

why do I desire another when It says
that you are enough.
another this, another that.
when is it enough?
to fill this insatiable hole called
Desire.

i do desire you, i do.
but
i am a fool.

brevity

i have decided that my blog posts need to be shorter. simplified, but still edgy, to the point, and (hopefully) well written. clutter is one of my problems. when my room is at its worst, it is a clutterfied mess full of random junk and just...clutter. and in class a lot of the times my designs are too involved, too many ideas culminating into one thing with a bunch of concepts. stick with one tiffany, sheesh. weed out the unnecessary, clean up the over spillage. so that is my plan. simply simply simply, without losing the heart of it.

oldie but goodie

why do people say, "oldie but goodie?" it's like saying, hey this movie/music/whatever is old, but WAIT, don't write it off, because it's a goodie. as if old things need to be defended. i guess it says something about the way we think. in with the new, out with the old, but we forget that many times the new wouldn't exist if it weren't for the old. and sometimes the original really is the best. sorry for the ambiguity haha. what i really mean to talk about? TITANIC.

i rewatched this movie after years of hearing people saying it's overrated, that everyone has seen it, that it was cheesy. perhaps it is all those things, but it is still in my opinion, a good movie. i first saw it in theaters when i was 8, and by the end i was sobbing, a wet puddle of a mess. and afterwards i had to pee so bad after holding it in for 3 hours, but someone behind me had to go real bad too, so i let them go first...there was something about that movie that made something in my quiver. it struck a chord, but my eight year old self couldn't explain it. now that i'm older, i'll try. the love story is great, but what really catches me each time i watch it is the raw humanity that it captures. in the desperation, panic, and confusion that ensues after the ship hits the iceberg, you see hate, anger, selfishness, recklessness. on the opposite spectrum you see love, kindness, compassion, sadness. the whole range of complex human emotions is shown in that last hour of the movie. i ask myself, who am i most like? who would i be most like if i were on that ship, knowing i might only have one hour left to live?

would i be like Rose's fiance Cal?-- relentless in his pursuit for revenge, selfish, doing anything possible to save himself only to realize that his money is now useless. Or Captain Smith, retreating quietly to his room, given up before the fight and spending his last hour pretending to steer a ship that is unsteerable. perhaps he was remembering better days, better journeys. like Jack, selfless, in love, and always putting his beloved first? like the old couple who accepted that death was coming, and were content to die in bed, clasped in each others arms. or Rose's mother, always looking down her nose at the poor, heart frosty, holding her pride close. or molly brown, who wanted to assimilate with the rich with her "new money," and had a good heart but was not at the right time, or surrounded by the right people to be of much use. how about the orchestra on deck till the end. they knew what was going on but they chose to stay and try to calm, soothe, with music. they did both harm and good. harm because people hearing the music might suppose it meant everything was fine, and good because it provided some sense of beauty amidst the terror.

i hope i would not be that coward of a man who ordered the ship to go faster to make headlines, dismissing warnings that it might be dangerous. and when the ship was going down, he snuck onto a boat meant for women and children, hoping to go unnoticed, too ashamed and scared to own up to his faults. would i be the seaman who noticed this coward sneak on the lifeboat, take a long hard look at him, and have mercy on him? that same seaman, Will, later in the same hour shot and accidentally killed one of the crowded mob while trying to keep order. he looked at his gun in disbelief, put the own gun to his head, and commited suicide out of shame. who would i be? who would you be, in that last hour?

i think one of the scariest things was that though the ship was sinking, most people, especially the rich, did not realize it. they were blinded by their security, blinded by their wealth, by false promises. one of the third class passengers, in rushing by the orchestra said, "I know i'm in first class when I get to drown by music." the orchestra continued to play, people were drinking, being merry, sitting on their comfortable chairs. it was not until near the end, when the water started rushing to the top floor, when the ship started to obviously tip, did they realize that all the brouhaha was for real. and i bet some people grabbed their riches, their possessions, their dogs, things that ultimately did not matter. like Rose's fiance maybe they thought these things could save them, but they could not.

the titanic feels like the distant past, but it is our today. Matthew 24:36-37 "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." just like the titanic, the hour will come unexpectedly, but it will come. what will you do before that day, who will you be. will what you are doing make a difference in eternity?

Fact: Only 700 people were saved out of 2,200+ people. There were enough lifeboats to save half, but like the movie depicted, the boats were not filled.

Rose: "Fifteen-hundred people went into the sea, when Titanic sank from under us. There were twenty boats floating nearby... and only one came back. One. Six were saved from the water, myself included. Six... out of fifteen-hundred. Afterward, the seven-hundred people in the boats had nothing to do but wait... wait to die... wait to live... wait for an absolution... that would never come."

Fortunately, we have that absolution. absolution-noun: a formal release from guilt, obligation, or punishment. when Jesus died on that cross, he forgave us and wiped us clean. By his wounds we are healed. Do i fully understand this yet? No, but I believe it. Unbelievable as it sounds, I believe it.

self-portrait

on the first day of my conceptual art class, my teacher asked us to give a one sentence self-portrait. she did not mean a laundry list of characteristics, she meant one line on your identity as a person. what a loaded question..and we only had about 3 minutes to do it too, go figure. not long enough if you ask me. so there i was, wracking my brains for a witty, clever answer. i wanted to impress my teacher, first impressions going a long way and all. 1 minute, 2 minutes, 2 1/2 minutes ticked by, and i started to get nervous. i could not come up with anything remotely satisfactory. in the last ten seconds, this is what i quickly scrawled, "I am just a girl, and a girl that doesn't know much, but this I do know: Jesus Christ, my Lord loves me." and as i turned that paper in, i felt disappointed. i felt like it wasn't a good enough, clever enough answer.

since that class 2 weeks ago, i've had some time to think about why i felt what i felt. i'm not ashamed of being a Christian, not ashamed of Jesus, but i think i am afraid of being a fool. i am afraid of being looked down upon, regarded as obtuse and unintelligent. what i failed to realize then and what i'm starting to realize now is that to be a Christian is to look foolish in the eyes of the world. 1 Corinthians 1:26-31 says,

"For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.""

God chose me, foolish girl that I am, to be a witness to the world. and i'll look dumb, i really will. Christ crucified is foolishness, a stumbling block for non-believers, and i can't do anything about that. fortunately, God can. i'm learning, slowly but surely, that in the eyes of the world, i'm not that big of a deal, and that's not that big of a deal. so i am a fool, but hopefully a fool that loves God and loves my neighbor.

so i ordered one of my textbooks about 3 weeks ago and it STILL hasn't come. so i finally called usps today to see if they could tell me what happened to it. the first two times i called i got automated messages. you know, those annoying voices that say, for blah blah blah press one, for blah blah blah press 2. you get the picture. anyway, after trying two telephone numbers, getting robot voices, putting in my tracking number with no fruition, i finally got frustrated or as anne shirley would say, i was in the depths of despair (i know i know, a little too dramatic). when the robot girl asked for my tracking number yet again, i said angrily, "it's not working!." those robots are pretty smart because i think she got the picture. there was a pause, then, "please hold as we transfer you to an assistant." thank goodness for that. i talked to a real, live person, hallelujah! she figured out that the person wrote the wrong zip code, off by a digit, and it probably shipped to the wrong place. lost in translation. so many things are lost in translation, languages, rumors, directions, traditions, the Gospel. it really can be detrimental. i guess i should be thankful, it's just a book that's lost, not a person. oy vey.

i need to start taking more pictures. if only i felt like they were any good...haha.

found this sweet sweet video promoting typophile film festival. as a graphic designer, this is what i aspire to be!

Typophile Film Festival 5 Opening Titles from Brent Barson on Vimeo.

tiffany