Attitude of Gratitude

As I was praying over my food the other day, I started to wonder, "What does it mean to be thankful?" We say 'thank you' so much and for so many things, that it tends to lose its meaning.

So what does it mean to be thankful?

I think it starts with recognizing that you weren't necessarily going to get whatever is in front of you now. That plate of food, the random gift, the friendly advice - none of those were a given. The first step is not taking them for granted.

So, now that you realize you could've just as easily wound up with no food in front of you, what do you do? You say 'thank you' to whoever gave it to you. When you think about it, that's a very large 'thank you.' It wasn't just the chef or the server responsible for your food. Oh no. Next time you sit down to a meal, look at everything on your plate. A farmer somewhere grew that food and raised the livestock for your meat. Somewhere, those foods were processed and made ready for sale. A driver spent hours on the road bringing that food to your local supermarket. The stocker spent his night helping to unload everything and put it out for you, the consumer. And that's just the food! There's still the plate, the cup, the pots and pans used to cook it, the skills someone had to learn to prepare the food just right.

Realizing that so many hands and hours have gone into providing food (and that's just the example I'm using now), what do we do? Say 'thank you,' yes, but is that all? Not if we're truly thankful. If you're thankful - if you're grateful - that you've received something, then you show it. That food is a gift, and you are responsible for using the energy it gives you wisely. The food could've gone to someone else, but it didn't. It came to you.

This carries over into every facet of our existence. Nothing had to come to you. Be thankful it did!

What blessings in your life do you often overlook? How can you show your gratitude for those things? Think about it.

Schmickle

Couple things going on right now. It's the end of my last first week of spring semester, for one. And I'm going to a training seminar this weekend that should be amazing (I'm sure I'll have something to post about that later). And I'm thinking of going on a mission trip overseas this summer.

1) First Week
     The first week of class is always kind of crazy; you're getting your syllabi, you go through the introduction phase ad nauseum for each class, homework kind of kicks in but not really and what they actually give you feels ridiculous, and you're still getting yourself settled. It usually feels like a pretty long week.
     Luckily, I had two classes cancelled! Both twice-a-week classes, though, which kind of sucks because now we'll have to catch up. Oh well. My other twice-a-week class is a PE class and we didn't have to dress out or do anything both times we met; just went over ground rules and semester objectives. Oh, and I dropped one of my classes, so now I don't have anything at all on Fridays. Woo!! So, really, the second week is going to be my first "normal" week, because my schedule will actually kick in.

2) 2012 Asuncion seminar
     More information on this can be found here.

3) Mission Trip?

     I learned this past Tuesday at a campus worship service that University Ministries is organizing 3 trips overseas this summer. One to South Africa, one to Bangalore, India, and one to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. There are informational meetings for each this week; I'm going to 2 out of 3, and I spoke with someone personally about the third already. Hopefully God will speak to my heart for one in particular; I'd really like to go on another mission trip, and I know that doesn't come from myself (because I don't usually care, to be honest). So, updates on that to come, I'm sure.

Alright! Well, I'm off to my Photography class. Peace out!

Photoshop and Other Difficult Things

     I know I'm not very good at drawing and painting and such; writing and photography are more my speed. I downloaded a 30-day free trial of Photoshop the other day to try and add a little something to one of my drawings. After spending several hours toying around, being confused, watching tutorials, and so on, I FINALLY managed to accomplish what I was going for. It wound up looking terrible, but it was my first ever venture in Photoshop, so I didn't let it discourage me.
     Turns out Photoshop is fantastic for manipulating photos (go figure, right?). I've been manipulating a lot of my pictures and I've gotten some great results out of it. But when I try to be artistic with some of them, I'm completely stymied. Bringing out some colors but not touching the rest of the picture and creating effects in one spot but not others are the 2 things that vex me most so far. I should probably go finish watching the tutorials for beginners, but I just need a break from all things Photoshop for a while, haha. So I'm blogging.

     Aside from my Photoshop woes, I'm trying to develop the discipline of writing on command and actually completing what I start. One of my friends randomly gave me a writing prompt (told me to write something fun about the child version of a TV character), and I actually enjoyed writing something that hadn't come from some random, adventurous scene my mind created. So, I'm asking you my readers for prompts! What should I write about?
     That's actually a pretty good question to ask for other things, too. Prompts for photo and drawing subjects  would be appreciated, too. (I draw in abstract, though; actual people and objects don't turn out well.)

     As far as music goes, I'm still going through a bunch of music on my flash drive. It's tiring, going through all that music. (First world pains, I know.) But hopefully once I have everything in my library, I can buckle down and make new playlists. Preferably before my strength training class actually starts working out - it's much more enjoyable if I have music. The teacher's nice, but he talks a lot, and it's usually not important. (I've taken the class before. I'm taking it again because one of my roommates is taking it and it's a good way to tone up.)

Breaking News

We're not moving! Yes, folks, you heard that right, my family and I do NOT have to ever move out of this house if we don't want to. My grandfather has bought the house. Yeah. I definitely intend to ask him how much the monthly mortgage is, so I know what I'll be contributing to when I start earning an income. And as for my own questions about why he would take out a mortgage this late in life, this move just proves to me that he really does believe he won't die - my granddad believes that Jesus will return for his followers before it's his time to die. And honestly, given both his bloodlines, he could easily live until 101 so long as his cancer stays in remission. He's a healthy, active man and the family lines on both his parents' sides have had long lives. There are still thousands of unreached peoples, but if the church gets mobilized, who knows? It might actually happen! Jesus might come back before my granddad dies. Then a mortgage won't really matter, haha.

For right now, this is pretty exciting for me and my mom. We've held off on doing major changes to this house for the past several years because we thought that one day it wouldn't be ours anymore - we were just renters. But now that we're owners... well, suffice it to say that there is already a list, haha. My sister and I both want to start a garden in our backyard, so that'll be something to do over spring break, maybe. And I want to rearrange all the furniture in my room, get rid of a bunch of stuff (we're still doing the über spring cleaning), and paint my walls a different color (they've been the same lavender color since we moved in in '04; it's nice, but I'm ready for a change). And my mom is kind of an intuitive interior designer, so she's brainstorming for other rooms. All in all, this news has relieved a lot of stress and energized us.

In other news, I'm having the hardest time staying up in the mornings. I don't really have anything to do, like class, so there's not much incentive to stay awake. But I don't want to sleep until 1:30 everyday, either! Any suggestions for ways to stay up until I wake up? Other than caffeine, please. :)