Posts Tagged ‘stress’

Hey yall.
Okay so I’m back. Thanks for the withdrawal-induced lovin’. So things have been a tad rough lately, thus the “drama” and “quitting” business.
However, things are looking up. Well except for the insurmountable amount of schoolwork I am facing in the next two-ish weeks. And that whole Christmas gifts for loved ones deal, gah, some people are just SO demanding. And the fact that I like at least 8 hours of sleep every night. And my dog likes to be walked every day. And my Starbucks card is down to $6!!
Nah, it’ll be okay, honestly. The Lord has been teaching me so much about focusing on what I can do to serve the ones I love and what it means to love Him.
Last night dad and I went to see Handel’s Messiah performed. I love the words, “For unto us a Son is given” and “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” I thought about all the lives touched by this beautiful piece of music. Everyone singing the words, the musicians, the soloists, and the precious souls sitting in the audience. What do they think about these phrases and melodies hanging in the air? I really think that music is how I feel the Holy Spirit the strongest.
I can remember listening to Handel’s Messiah during the holiday season for as long as I can remember. In fact, last night I told my dad that, for some reason, while listening to the music, I kept picturing Playmobil people. Most likely this is because I was setting up my Playmobil dollhouse for Christmas while Messiah was playing in the background. Ah. I just love it! That piece of music really is the essence of Christmas.
Just some thoughts for the season. What is your favorite holiday tradition?
Thanks for sharing blog-love!

LOVE!

Tweet this!

Hey guys. I’d like to say that my hiatus was due to my concentration on my studies but it was not. Yes life is busy. duh. A lot of crazy stuff has been going on in the AT program of late. Honestly, sometimes I wish I had a hidden camera so I could turn the footage into a reality show and make MILLIONS! But that would be wrong. And bad. So I guess that’s out. Honestly all the drama has totally thrown me for a loop. I’ve come to know and view my classmates as family, as I spend more time with them than my biological family. My classmates are great sources of entertainment, laughter, intellectual stimulation and faith sharpening. So when something unexpected happens, well, it takes me a while to recover. I have to say this, forgive me, but I feel like “my peeps is on the fritz!” (name that show. ahem, C!) ha. Just when I’ve recovered from the last doozy, we’re on to the next. I’m really REALLY trying hard to stay positive because it’s honestly ALL I HAVE when it comes to coping with ALL OF THIS! When positivity is out, I GOT NOTHING. As I told my brother on Monday, I feel like I am treading water, with my head barely above the surface. The only thing keeping my head up is my attitute and new motto of “let it go.” So when a classmate comes along and starts complaining or freaking out, I go under. It’s not just that negativity breeds negativity, it’s that it obliterates my survival mechanism. As much as I wish and pray for my classmates to stay positive and to be able to let things go, I am also realistic about this. I know there will be negativity, I know there will be low spirits, but I wonder if they realize that their continued angst is drowing the rest of us. And by “rest of us” I mean “me.”
So I continue to do my best to stay upbeat, even when it gets thrown back in my face (thankfully the baked goods aren’t reduced to the same fate, ouch). It’s harder to move past the continual complaining but I’m trying. I probably should learn to deal better as I don’t really think things will get better until the program is over.
I hope this little essay didn’t portray me as the perfect nursing student who’s always positive, never complains and never EVER picks at her classmates. I mean I AM, but that wasn’t the point of this post. JUST KIDDING. NO, SERIOIUSLY. I honestly feel bad because I know I’ve most likely caused others to fall or “drown”. Which is why I’m doing my darndest to stop. In conclusion, not only am I learning EVERYTHING ABOUT NURSING EVER IN 12 MONTHS, I’m always learning to be a human. But hopefully a people-loving, Christlike human. Whew.
So that’s what I’ve got for almost 3 months under my belt. WHEN THE HECK IS THAT BREAK! SHOOT!

LOVE!

Tweet this!

So this is what that feels like.
more later. And by “later” I mean maybe tomorrow night?

LOVE!

Tweet this!

2nd edit: The anxiety has now moved to my digestive system. EEK. I am pulling it together. Plus I just got $75 worth of Starbucks giftcards and loads of chocolate. YAY!

edit: I replied to all the comments ya’ll left as a comment on the last post. Make sense? If not, click on the comments from the last post (for those of you blog-challenged).

I’ve been thinking a lot about music and it’s transporting qualities. All this thinking and transporting has made me start listing the most influential albums in my life. As excited as I am to share these with you, I’m really hoping you will reciprocate and either leave a comment or post on your own blog about your most influential albums and the stories behind them. Think of it as a last blogging hurrah (I do a lot of “last hurrahs” I’m finding) before fully immersing myself into nursing school. Plus talking about music and musical taste tells you so much about a person. Let’s get to know each other better, come on now.

1. Abbey Road by the Beatles

As I said before in another post, getting into the Beatles and Abbey Road was, perhaps, the ONLY cool thing I did before everyone else did. I don’t have psychic music abilities like my dear BFF, who totally gets into musicians like 6 months to a year before they get big. 95% of the music in my itunes/ipod is from C, whereas I’m thinking like 1% in hers is from my recommendation. Anyway. Abbey Road transports me back to when I was 12 and just learning about longing and yearning and all those desperate words of teenagedom, or tweenagedom. Remember when everything was so dramatic? When that boy found out you liked him because that other boy told him in the locker room and then the boy you liked said, “YUCK” or something to that extent, which you heard about from other boy and then promptly ran into the bathroom to cry? That VERY sentence reeks of middle school. Anyway, Abbey Road reminds me of young love. It’s so dreamlike, I loved listening to it on summer nights (especially since “Sun King” has little cricket sounds in the background) and imagining my first kiss. Listening to that album still calms me down and always makes me smile. That album was my first love. And, I believe it was the best introduction to the Beatles.
I wasn’t expecting to write so much about just one album. This may be a series. ha.

2. Twentythree places by Matt Wertz

Most of you know I have the teensiest of crushes on MW (we’re on an initials-calling basis). Most of you know that “teensiest” is a gross understatement. I can’t help it. I went to his concert in Siloam Springs and he talked about “The Sound of Music”. HELLO! How about THAT destiny! Obviously mentioning TSoM is to me what using a pick-up line is to other women. Moving past the obsession, I bought his album after that concert and listened to it ALL THE TIME. My favorite thing though, was listening to it while on a drive with Kate on the backroads of Siloam Springs. All felt right with the world on those drives. And it was.

3. Speak for Yourself by Imogen Heap

So I had a REALLY tough time when I moved to D.C. For about six months things were awful, like the most awful time of my life awful. I flew down to JBU for a wedding and homecoming and stayed with my wonderful friends Corrie and Brandon. They introduced me to Imogen and oh my, was it love at first listen. Learning her music helped me learned to love living in Virginia by myself. It will ALWAYS, ALWAYS remind me of VA in autumn. I can’t even describe to you how much I love this album. BTW I’m totally twitter friends with Imogen.

4. Thinks of Her by Andy Davis

This album represents my FAVORITE time in D.C., the time when I was with C. It reminds me of the two of us, bundled up on the metro, listening to our respective ipods yet both listening to this album. We had such wonderful adventures and explorations and wanderings and it seemed like this album was the soundtrack to that special time. It always felt appropriate to start playing this album once I was on the metro, which was a lot those days, because I didn’t have a car. Those Nashville Boys (Dave Barnes, Matt Wertz, Andy Davis) write some dang good lyrics. I hope someday someone will use words like they have written to describe their love for me. Sappy I know, but dang, they’re good.

5. Messiah by George Frideric Handel (performed by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra)

that’s not the picture of the album I have but oh well.

First of all, Christmas is NOT Christmas in our household without Handel’s Messiah. Again, they are not really words to express what this piece of music means to me. It is the most beautiful music I’ve ever experienced written about the most profound event to ever occur to mankind. Honestly, I cannot listen to it without tearing up. It’s heavenly and it’s what I imagine heaven to be like. When I read the verses this music is based on I always hear the notes in my head. It’s my favorite version of the Christmas story. I could seriously write about this forever. AHHH!

Okay, I’m done, for now. What are a couple of your favorite albums and why?

I will say that I got over the freaking out earlier this week only to be faced with some classmates at a little get-together bent on bringing my freaking-out to Defcon 5. Seriously people? I thought we were going to get to KNOW each other at this time, NOT SCARE the complete poop out of one another. I seriously almost cried at the get-together from the stress of thinking about all of the stress. You know what though? I CAN TOTALLY DO THIS! And I WILL. If all I do for the next year is study and sleep I’ll be fine. But I really do need my sleep. Please let me have sleep. Okay.

One more “free” day.

LOVE!

Tweet this!

Tweet this!