Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Skydiving
A couple of weekends ago i went to a place called AirKix, indoor skydiving, a huge wind tunnel where you fall into the wind and you fly. It was Awesome, really awesome. The awesomeness wasn't so much the flying though, although that was a lot of fun (although slightly terrifying!) It was how clear my mind felt whilst i was doing it, i've had this feeling before, where one moment you have all of the worries of the world on your mind and then you can only possibly think of this one thing you are doing and its like thats all your brain has room for. It really puts your priorities into perspective. It happened when dad was having the heart attack and i was doing CPR, I didn't panic like everybody else, i knew what i had to do and thats all i could focus on at that moment in time, the rest of the world narrowed into this sort of tunnel vision almost. It happens everytime i have an important exam (not quite so useful in a driving exam where you need to be aware of all of your surroundings!) the adrenaline is pumping and your mind is perfectly clear, only bringing to the forfront the information you actually need at that point in time, if somebody had asked me what the capital of Australia was during that moment i wouldn't have been able to answer you. Although being able to see the bigger picture is important sometimes so you can do the right thing at the right time, sometimes you just don't need to know it, you don't need to worry about things you can't change right now and its much more useful to you to focus on the things that you are doing right now. I guess things are like that with God, we don't know the bigger picture, he doesn't give us that insight because it would be just too overwhelming for us to cope with, we get the here and now to focus on.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
How did you get here?
Last week JD said hi, we spoke about Liam and he asked if i ever felt like one conversation could push someone over the edge into atheism forever. I feel like this with every conversation i have, i truly believe most people around me are one push from the eternal void of atheism, never to return. God trusts us not to make that push though otherwise we wouldn't be having the conversation, He has prepared us for this situation in every step we have taken up until this point. I started wondering how He had affected things and was actually quite shocked at how much He had prepared me for where i am today. Hilary and I used to play this game 'if ..... hadnt happened who would i be now?' where one person names an event in the others life and you have to figure out what the wave of difference would have been as a result of this, this post is pretty much me playing this game with God.
I am a second child, (yes God was planning stuff before i was even born) as such from the moment i was born i looked up to my older sister and wanted to copy what she did, as i got older i wanted to prove myself and beat what she could do. Amy started gooing to Sunday School when she was around nine, I dont know why she started going, my parents didnt take her, maybe one of her friends invited her along. She kept going every week until she moved to university. The rest of us were jealous and wanted to go to, eventally our parents caved in and let us all go, i hated it and soon started begging my parents to let me stay at home. On Sunday mornings we had to go to church parade with the brownies, we sat in a dank dark thousand year old church in out little brownie uniforms and marched a flag up the aisle, sang hymns which mostly we just said 'blah blah' to and tried to stay awake so Brown Owl didnt give us a sharp poke in the ribs, our dad would pick us up from church and take us to Sunday school, my class was a combination of two school year groups, i was the youngest of the five kids in my class, everyone elses parents were part of the Salvation Army Corps, i really didnt feel like i fit in, i didnt know any of the things that these kids had been brought up doing, i'd never had to find a passage in the Bible before, i didnt know that it wasnt really appropriate to wear my mums 'Brown Ale' apron when we did our easter play, i gave up, they were, and are, nice people, but it wasnt designed to let outsiders in. God had opened my eyes to the concept of church but made me realise this wasnt really how it should be done. I had been told God existed, so i believed it, i had no reason to question it, my parents didnt tell me otherwise.
From this brief period onwards i had no connection to the church, i'd left Sunday school, brownies and Guides and so had Sundays free. In secondary school God introduced me to a girl names Susy, she is a Christian, the only Christian in our class, we thought she was wierd but she ended up taken me on as a friend, Susy has influenced the type of Christian i have become and taught me some lessons along the way.
When we were 14 we had to choose which GSCEs we would study for, its actually quite a life directing point when you think about it, choosing your direction of study at such a young age, i chose the subjects i was interested in and Sociology (because Amy had studied it). Sociology was oversubscirbed. They gave me Religious studies instead. I was crushed, i was horrible at RS. When i started the course the next year though we had a young enthusiastic teacher called Miss Gill, we started studying philosophy and she made it interesting, i was hooked, i aced the GSCE and started the A level course in the subject, we started learning about Plato and Aquinas and i started debating against my classmates (if you dont know me well enough, i am quite a shy person, last century i was a million times more so, i wouldnt say boo to a goose let alone argue with someone about philosophy) and strangely my views werent always against God. I started wondering about philosophy and praying, i didnt think it would make any difference but it wouldnt cost me anything. Studying about philosophical ideas, from all perspectives and about all the different religions really drew me closer to God, i really dont think i would have accepted Him if i hadnt, because i simply dont make that sort of decision if i dont know enough about it and dont know all the information available. Many people think teaching children about all religions as well as the scientific theories is wrong and Christian children should go to Christian schools were they are only taught the 'Truths' but i strongly disagree, why segregate the few Christian children away from those in need of saving, maybe it will strengthen their ideas, whilst making them ignorant of the rest of the world, but whose salvation has it cost?
The later God directions you are probably familar with so i will be quick, if Dad hadnt have died i would have been content with England, i wouldnt have studied abroad, i wouldnt have met Jon and i wouldnt have started going to Church again, i wouldnt be saved and i would be encouraging Liam towards atheism when we discuss God, which is quite often, he is very curious. I only had one moment where i felt the Sunday school confusion when i went to Church this time round, one of the first times i met Kami she asked, in the middle of prayer if i remember rightly, "were you brought up in the church?" Now i sort of understand the question now but i really wasnt sure what she meant at the time or what was the 'correct' answer. What does being brought up in the church mean? I nodded because i figured id been to church a few times when i was eight and she seemed disappointed, i later found out she wasnt brought up in the church, i went away thinking ' .... was i brought up in the church?' My parents have never believed in God and never came to church or imposed any kind of belief system on us but somehow i did end up there. So Kami, i think to better answer your question -
i wasnt brought up in the church but i was brought up in God, my Father made sure of that
I am a second child, (yes God was planning stuff before i was even born) as such from the moment i was born i looked up to my older sister and wanted to copy what she did, as i got older i wanted to prove myself and beat what she could do. Amy started gooing to Sunday School when she was around nine, I dont know why she started going, my parents didnt take her, maybe one of her friends invited her along. She kept going every week until she moved to university. The rest of us were jealous and wanted to go to, eventally our parents caved in and let us all go, i hated it and soon started begging my parents to let me stay at home. On Sunday mornings we had to go to church parade with the brownies, we sat in a dank dark thousand year old church in out little brownie uniforms and marched a flag up the aisle, sang hymns which mostly we just said 'blah blah' to and tried to stay awake so Brown Owl didnt give us a sharp poke in the ribs, our dad would pick us up from church and take us to Sunday school, my class was a combination of two school year groups, i was the youngest of the five kids in my class, everyone elses parents were part of the Salvation Army Corps, i really didnt feel like i fit in, i didnt know any of the things that these kids had been brought up doing, i'd never had to find a passage in the Bible before, i didnt know that it wasnt really appropriate to wear my mums 'Brown Ale' apron when we did our easter play, i gave up, they were, and are, nice people, but it wasnt designed to let outsiders in. God had opened my eyes to the concept of church but made me realise this wasnt really how it should be done. I had been told God existed, so i believed it, i had no reason to question it, my parents didnt tell me otherwise.
From this brief period onwards i had no connection to the church, i'd left Sunday school, brownies and Guides and so had Sundays free. In secondary school God introduced me to a girl names Susy, she is a Christian, the only Christian in our class, we thought she was wierd but she ended up taken me on as a friend, Susy has influenced the type of Christian i have become and taught me some lessons along the way.
When we were 14 we had to choose which GSCEs we would study for, its actually quite a life directing point when you think about it, choosing your direction of study at such a young age, i chose the subjects i was interested in and Sociology (because Amy had studied it). Sociology was oversubscirbed. They gave me Religious studies instead. I was crushed, i was horrible at RS. When i started the course the next year though we had a young enthusiastic teacher called Miss Gill, we started studying philosophy and she made it interesting, i was hooked, i aced the GSCE and started the A level course in the subject, we started learning about Plato and Aquinas and i started debating against my classmates (if you dont know me well enough, i am quite a shy person, last century i was a million times more so, i wouldnt say boo to a goose let alone argue with someone about philosophy) and strangely my views werent always against God. I started wondering about philosophy and praying, i didnt think it would make any difference but it wouldnt cost me anything. Studying about philosophical ideas, from all perspectives and about all the different religions really drew me closer to God, i really dont think i would have accepted Him if i hadnt, because i simply dont make that sort of decision if i dont know enough about it and dont know all the information available. Many people think teaching children about all religions as well as the scientific theories is wrong and Christian children should go to Christian schools were they are only taught the 'Truths' but i strongly disagree, why segregate the few Christian children away from those in need of saving, maybe it will strengthen their ideas, whilst making them ignorant of the rest of the world, but whose salvation has it cost?
The later God directions you are probably familar with so i will be quick, if Dad hadnt have died i would have been content with England, i wouldnt have studied abroad, i wouldnt have met Jon and i wouldnt have started going to Church again, i wouldnt be saved and i would be encouraging Liam towards atheism when we discuss God, which is quite often, he is very curious. I only had one moment where i felt the Sunday school confusion when i went to Church this time round, one of the first times i met Kami she asked, in the middle of prayer if i remember rightly, "were you brought up in the church?" Now i sort of understand the question now but i really wasnt sure what she meant at the time or what was the 'correct' answer. What does being brought up in the church mean? I nodded because i figured id been to church a few times when i was eight and she seemed disappointed, i later found out she wasnt brought up in the church, i went away thinking ' .... was i brought up in the church?' My parents have never believed in God and never came to church or imposed any kind of belief system on us but somehow i did end up there. So Kami, i think to better answer your question -
i wasnt brought up in the church but i was brought up in God, my Father made sure of that
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
My little miracle
I find it hard to trust God, no thats not true, i would trust Him completely of i knew for sure it was actually Him and not just me hoping things would go a certain way. But im starting to notice the difference when i see it. Heres my little miracle, proof that trusting in God, even when it seems ridiculous, is the best thing to do. Back in September i applied to become a csv, ive blogged about it before so i wont repeat myself, and was offered a placement in Luton, everything about it seemed fine but there was something inside me that was saying i had to turn i down, my head was saying it was a great thing to do and i seemed like a God thing - helping the needy, but something was wrong and although my head said it was just me being nervous of things i knew i wasnt that, i prayed a lot about it and asked God why i was too much of a wuss to go through with it, i asked others what they thought, and in the end i turned it down, expecting not to be offered another placement and not being able to give any reason why i had done so which would sound in the least bit sane, in a christian culture its easier to simply say "God isnt in this" but you sound like a fruit loop saying that here, people want a real reason. Well i did get offered another place and it felt right immediately, i knew i would love it even though the thought scared the hell out of me. This is where i am still, all of these months later, still loving every second, more than most of my friends say about their jobs. There was always this doubt in my mind that i had just chickened out the first time though, that God would have had great plans for me there too. Yesterday my housemates were talking about one of their friends, a csv too, at a placement in Luton, who has had such a hard time of it as are her housemates, she explained the situation and after asking a few confirmatory questions i realised that was my original placement, i realised how miserable i would be right now if i hadnt listened to God and how He always knows whats best for us. This morning (after starting work at 10pm last night im due to finish work at 10 pm this evening, getting only one and a half hours of broken sleep after getting nomes into bed at one and getting us both up for uni a couple of hours later) i walked into nomes' room, she peaked out of the covers with a look that said 'four hours sleep wasnt enough!' and gave me the kind of grin that makes everything worthwhile, i dont believe its possible to be sad when there is a grin this wonderful out there. So trust in Him because that is how great His best can be.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
God's work
I'm so thankful that God has such a marvellous way of working everything out, especially when it seems like there is no way that it could possibly work out.
I got into Cardiff! i can't remember if i blogged before on the millions of reasons why i almost certainly wouldnt get offered a place but there were many, mainly because i fluffed up the interview and then it just seemed like everything was going against me and it was becoming less and less likely - for example they didnt recieve the reference that Naomi sent off for me and so a replacement one wasnt emailed back to the uni until 11.45pm on Monday night (the day of the deadline). I'd pretty much given up hope that they would even consider my application anymore and was wondering what on earth i'd do now. This may all seem a little dramatic if you consider that i applied to four other universities too but it wasn't until i sent off the applications that i actually crunched the numbers on how much all of this would cost and realised that i really couldnt afford to go to a university in England, there are differences with how the funding is set up and the basics of it are that to do a nursing degree in Wales you get a bursary to live off of that isnt calculated on how much you or your parents earn, if you do a nursing degree in England it is calculated on how much you earn to determine how much you would need to be able to survive. The diplomas in England are calculated in the same way as the welsh degree programmes but since the government are now saying in five years time all nurses will need to have the degree, it seems pointless entering the diploma programme just to be set back in years to come. Originally i assumed this small difference wouldnt make any difference to me, im 24 and at 25 you are counted as a mature student so finances would be calculated from my earnings anyway but of course it is calculated from the age you are when you start the course ... what is more ridiculous is a 'means tested' bursary would be calculated on my mums earnings, even though i have lived by my own means for the past four years, because three of these were at university apparently that doesnt count, you have to have lived for 36 months on your own means, apparently whilst at university i was living off of the government. This is a really ridiculous system because my mum hasnt been able to help support me for like five years, and even if she had i wouldnt have let her give me any money! I paid my own tuition fees and my own rent and used my scholarship money to support myself but the government doesnt take this into consideration, so 'means-tested' means calculating my mothers means from last year, which were higher than usual because she started working full time, and she was getting my dads pension to support Eliot, so basically i'd be classed as a middle range earning student that means the bursary wouldnt be enough to live off of because the government would expect my mum to help with things like rent.
Anyway long rant short this meant that if i went to one of the three English universities i had applied for i would have been too poor to afford food. This is why there was such a high volume of applications to welsh universities for the course and how there ended up being a short list of 900 people at the interview. Plus the fact that Cardiff is one of the best universities in the UK of course.
And of course the most wonderful thing about going there being that i'll be so close to the Elliotts, totally not the reason i chose the uni but a fantastic added bonus. God must have big plans for all of this if He is bringing this all together so nicely, i just can't imagine what they are.
And the other added bonus is that now i can go to Barry and Heathers wedding in September in Cyprus, i'd originally told my mum that i wouldnt be able to go because the uni start dates for english unis are too early but Cardiff starts a week after the wedding, i really dont know why i worry so much that things wont work out when its obvious that God has it all under control.
Now i guess the only things that need to get sorted are finding a car that is within my means (i.e. almost free) so i can drive to placements and wont have to live in the city centre and finding a place to live that isnt horrendously expensive and ideally not in the dorms (because coming home after a 24 hour shift to a student flat full of drunk flat mates who only have an hour of classes at 4pm the next day doesnt seem ideal) but how that is going to be possible when i dont know of any other students in Cardiff and cant afford to rent a place by myself is going to interesting to see how it all works out, but of course i know it will somehow.
Awesomeness!!
I got into Cardiff! i can't remember if i blogged before on the millions of reasons why i almost certainly wouldnt get offered a place but there were many, mainly because i fluffed up the interview and then it just seemed like everything was going against me and it was becoming less and less likely - for example they didnt recieve the reference that Naomi sent off for me and so a replacement one wasnt emailed back to the uni until 11.45pm on Monday night (the day of the deadline). I'd pretty much given up hope that they would even consider my application anymore and was wondering what on earth i'd do now. This may all seem a little dramatic if you consider that i applied to four other universities too but it wasn't until i sent off the applications that i actually crunched the numbers on how much all of this would cost and realised that i really couldnt afford to go to a university in England, there are differences with how the funding is set up and the basics of it are that to do a nursing degree in Wales you get a bursary to live off of that isnt calculated on how much you or your parents earn, if you do a nursing degree in England it is calculated on how much you earn to determine how much you would need to be able to survive. The diplomas in England are calculated in the same way as the welsh degree programmes but since the government are now saying in five years time all nurses will need to have the degree, it seems pointless entering the diploma programme just to be set back in years to come. Originally i assumed this small difference wouldnt make any difference to me, im 24 and at 25 you are counted as a mature student so finances would be calculated from my earnings anyway but of course it is calculated from the age you are when you start the course ... what is more ridiculous is a 'means tested' bursary would be calculated on my mums earnings, even though i have lived by my own means for the past four years, because three of these were at university apparently that doesnt count, you have to have lived for 36 months on your own means, apparently whilst at university i was living off of the government. This is a really ridiculous system because my mum hasnt been able to help support me for like five years, and even if she had i wouldnt have let her give me any money! I paid my own tuition fees and my own rent and used my scholarship money to support myself but the government doesnt take this into consideration, so 'means-tested' means calculating my mothers means from last year, which were higher than usual because she started working full time, and she was getting my dads pension to support Eliot, so basically i'd be classed as a middle range earning student that means the bursary wouldnt be enough to live off of because the government would expect my mum to help with things like rent.
Anyway long rant short this meant that if i went to one of the three English universities i had applied for i would have been too poor to afford food. This is why there was such a high volume of applications to welsh universities for the course and how there ended up being a short list of 900 people at the interview. Plus the fact that Cardiff is one of the best universities in the UK of course.
And of course the most wonderful thing about going there being that i'll be so close to the Elliotts, totally not the reason i chose the uni but a fantastic added bonus. God must have big plans for all of this if He is bringing this all together so nicely, i just can't imagine what they are.
And the other added bonus is that now i can go to Barry and Heathers wedding in September in Cyprus, i'd originally told my mum that i wouldnt be able to go because the uni start dates for english unis are too early but Cardiff starts a week after the wedding, i really dont know why i worry so much that things wont work out when its obvious that God has it all under control.
Now i guess the only things that need to get sorted are finding a car that is within my means (i.e. almost free) so i can drive to placements and wont have to live in the city centre and finding a place to live that isnt horrendously expensive and ideally not in the dorms (because coming home after a 24 hour shift to a student flat full of drunk flat mates who only have an hour of classes at 4pm the next day doesnt seem ideal) but how that is going to be possible when i dont know of any other students in Cardiff and cant afford to rent a place by myself is going to interesting to see how it all works out, but of course i know it will somehow.
Awesomeness!!
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Money ....
Money is a worry, of course it is, i earn £74 a week and that has to last me, it would be shocking if it wasnt a worry i guess. I would very much like to be out of debt though, there are things i would really like to start saving for and putting money into but its just not really happening at the moment, as soon as i think im about sorted with it and know how its going and where its heading something comes up that puts me a million steps back. Its not depressing, its just something i need to be wary of.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
I'm not sure about this Jesus guy
I was speaking to my friend into the early hours of this morning (I'm exhausted now) about a whole set of random things, after a while God came up, it has before and i hope it will again. She said, she wasnt religious but she felt like there is a God and that she had a relationship with Him but she didnt want to go to church because she felt like when she had gone there before they had just been trying to impose their beliefs on to her and she didnt agree with what they were saying, she felt in a way that the church had pushed her further away from having a relationship with God than it had drawn her into one. I almost cried. Now i have to bear in mind here that she was talking about the churches around her town in Germany, but its not a disimilar story from an English persons perspective. Before we started talking about something else she told me that she was a little bit shocked that i hadnt tried to impose my views on to her and just listened to her views and then gave mine without any agenda, i guess i wasnt surprised that she was shocked but i wish i could have been. The most interesting thing that came up was this, she (and i seem to be hearing this a lot) felt certain there was some kind of God, the concept of 'God' and what His motives were she wasnt really sure about (but then its God - how can we ever even pretend to fully comprehend that stuff?) but she didnt really believe in Jesus. This is interesting if you think about it. We are quite able to believe in a power so much greater than us that CREATED a world, a diety above and beyond our imagination quite by definition, we can easily accept the power and as such the punishment that is associated with such a thing. Yet its so hard to believe in Jesus - who, although God, was around in human form (how is it so hard to believe in a 'human' that actually existed?!) and more so that He was the one who brought the saving bit of the story - His the one that made it all good, that saved us all, to not believe in this part of the story is tradegy itself! Its believing that we deserve to be punished and that we will never be good enough without believeing that there is something done to make the world right at the end of the day, something that saves us from all the rubbishness! I wonder if this is because we dont think we are worthy of the saving part, whether we find it hard to believe because we simply think we actually are too bad to be saved and from that point of view nothing will bring us back. Whats more tragic is that she isnt alone in this viewpoint, its actually quite common, where i am and in this point in time at least. People 'feel' Gods presence and when this happens its impossible to deny that He exists so they hold this concept yet they arent getting the full story ......
Friday, February 5, 2010
Grandfather in Heaven
I've been reading some things by C.S. Lewis, I think i only just understand it, but thats how you learn, he made an interesting point about what we want from God,
When talking about Gods love he suggested that perhaps what we feel we want is love that is more like kindness, a love that wants us to have a good time and doesnt want us to get hurt and would prefer that than to have to teach us lessons that might cause some pain or suffering on our behalf even if its to teach us and model us into what we need to become. We are looking for a Grandfather in Heaven instead of a Father in Heaven, because a Grandfather wants you to have fun and enjoy yourself, but it isnt his job to model you into the person you need to be, he is there for the good times but hands you back at the end of the day, you Father punishes you when you are bad because it will make you better in the long run, He made you and He has a vested interest in making you into a good person, that kind of Love is more than kindness its deeper than that its kindness plus something, maybe its all the types of love put together.
When talking about Gods love he suggested that perhaps what we feel we want is love that is more like kindness, a love that wants us to have a good time and doesnt want us to get hurt and would prefer that than to have to teach us lessons that might cause some pain or suffering on our behalf even if its to teach us and model us into what we need to become. We are looking for a Grandfather in Heaven instead of a Father in Heaven, because a Grandfather wants you to have fun and enjoy yourself, but it isnt his job to model you into the person you need to be, he is there for the good times but hands you back at the end of the day, you Father punishes you when you are bad because it will make you better in the long run, He made you and He has a vested interest in making you into a good person, that kind of Love is more than kindness its deeper than that its kindness plus something, maybe its all the types of love put together.
Friday, January 15, 2010
No TV, No Laptop, No Mobile
It turns out i may have had some idols, well ... let me explain,
I dont mean idols like 'statues of a god that i give offerings to' and i dont mean idols like humans that i worship or think are pretty awesome and follow around all day wanting their signature on a piece of paper. I mean idol in the sense of something that you couldnt give up and that you didnt really need (not like food) and that most probably gets in the way of you and God.
I have a lot of random writing on my bag ... its supposed to be there, it came like that, that was its design, it supposed to look cool, anyway you cant really figure out what half of it says because its kinda all over the place but one bit says something about being in a peaceful place with no tv no laptop no mobile, which does seem kinda peaceful, for a short period of time a least. However i didnt realise those things were my idols and that i really should spend time without them to really get 'inner peace', i doubt this was the purpose of the bag its just a coincidence but its strange that that should be written on there in a kinda cool way.
Anyway, it seems you dont realise these things for what they are until you dont have them anymore and you realise what a strong hold they have over your life and your actions, how much of a hold they have over your day, what your do and the time you waste on them. Before Christmas my laptop broke down, now this is quite inconvient because i do actually need it for some stuff, not least to talk with everybody who is either not in the same country as me at the moment or not specifically in this town which is pretty much my whole list of friends and family, also things like internet banking get kinda difficult when you cant get onto the internet! I do realise however that i screw about on the computer a lot and i really dont need to be on here as much as i am when i have the accessibility to do so. Its been a bit of a struggle not being able to check my emails and facebook 20 times a day but it turns out i can survive without it! I think the addiction is passing.
Just after Christmas O2 were mucking about with my phone contract, it had been up for renewal and i wanted to switch to pay as you go but keep my number .... help centres in India do not make this an easy process and once the old sim card was finally disconnected so was the new one, so i had no phone either, this isnt so much of a biggy because i rarely use my phone but you realise how much you use it for other things as soon as you dont have it, i dont have a watch or an alarm clock because i have a phone .... i dont have anybodies phone numbers written down or memorized because i have a phone, ditto addresses. Now i have the thing sorted out, i think, and i have the line working again but i've just stopped using it really - obviously its useful for the clock and stuff but who am i texting? I think the £10 credit i have on there will last quite a long time now.
No TV, im used to this one, i havent had a tv in quite a few years now, however i did have DVDs and iplayers, well i have 2 DVDs now but watching them on a communal DVD player is an interesting concept and i have no laptop so no iplayer, we have a communal tv and i realise that i dont really need to watch anything that on it, the addiction to watching random rubbish was broken a while back, seeing endless reruns of friends and two and a half men is just a time filler, there are a few programmes that i would like to watch but we never watch them and they are the kind of thing i would catch up with on the iplayer if i could, so there doesnt seem like a lot of point watching tv.
Which brings me to a interesting question - what do you do with your day?
I dont have uni work anymore, my friends are scattered all over the place
It seems like (not in a depressing way) i now have a lot more time on my hands, preoccupying yourself all day with the internet and stuff is just a time filler, it keeps you busy and passes your time, but what are you willing this time away for?
Dont get me wrong, this isnt a depressing thing, its a good thing and in a weird way im glad its happened because its freed me in some way from the holds of ... monotony, i just thought it was an interesting thing, a kind of flash back to what it would have been like back in the day before these things were invented. Now you read more, you socialise with the people around you - in the real world not a virtual one, you open your eyes to the world around you, see nature, see what needs to be done, you work still, you make a list of the things you need to do everyday and you actually have time to get them done and at the end of the day you steal someone elses computer and catch up on all the things you have missed and realise the less you use the internet, the less you need it.
I dont mean idols like 'statues of a god that i give offerings to' and i dont mean idols like humans that i worship or think are pretty awesome and follow around all day wanting their signature on a piece of paper. I mean idol in the sense of something that you couldnt give up and that you didnt really need (not like food) and that most probably gets in the way of you and God.
I have a lot of random writing on my bag ... its supposed to be there, it came like that, that was its design, it supposed to look cool, anyway you cant really figure out what half of it says because its kinda all over the place but one bit says something about being in a peaceful place with no tv no laptop no mobile, which does seem kinda peaceful, for a short period of time a least. However i didnt realise those things were my idols and that i really should spend time without them to really get 'inner peace', i doubt this was the purpose of the bag its just a coincidence but its strange that that should be written on there in a kinda cool way.
Anyway, it seems you dont realise these things for what they are until you dont have them anymore and you realise what a strong hold they have over your life and your actions, how much of a hold they have over your day, what your do and the time you waste on them. Before Christmas my laptop broke down, now this is quite inconvient because i do actually need it for some stuff, not least to talk with everybody who is either not in the same country as me at the moment or not specifically in this town which is pretty much my whole list of friends and family, also things like internet banking get kinda difficult when you cant get onto the internet! I do realise however that i screw about on the computer a lot and i really dont need to be on here as much as i am when i have the accessibility to do so. Its been a bit of a struggle not being able to check my emails and facebook 20 times a day but it turns out i can survive without it! I think the addiction is passing.
Just after Christmas O2 were mucking about with my phone contract, it had been up for renewal and i wanted to switch to pay as you go but keep my number .... help centres in India do not make this an easy process and once the old sim card was finally disconnected so was the new one, so i had no phone either, this isnt so much of a biggy because i rarely use my phone but you realise how much you use it for other things as soon as you dont have it, i dont have a watch or an alarm clock because i have a phone .... i dont have anybodies phone numbers written down or memorized because i have a phone, ditto addresses. Now i have the thing sorted out, i think, and i have the line working again but i've just stopped using it really - obviously its useful for the clock and stuff but who am i texting? I think the £10 credit i have on there will last quite a long time now.
No TV, im used to this one, i havent had a tv in quite a few years now, however i did have DVDs and iplayers, well i have 2 DVDs now but watching them on a communal DVD player is an interesting concept and i have no laptop so no iplayer, we have a communal tv and i realise that i dont really need to watch anything that on it, the addiction to watching random rubbish was broken a while back, seeing endless reruns of friends and two and a half men is just a time filler, there are a few programmes that i would like to watch but we never watch them and they are the kind of thing i would catch up with on the iplayer if i could, so there doesnt seem like a lot of point watching tv.
Which brings me to a interesting question - what do you do with your day?
I dont have uni work anymore, my friends are scattered all over the place
It seems like (not in a depressing way) i now have a lot more time on my hands, preoccupying yourself all day with the internet and stuff is just a time filler, it keeps you busy and passes your time, but what are you willing this time away for?
Dont get me wrong, this isnt a depressing thing, its a good thing and in a weird way im glad its happened because its freed me in some way from the holds of ... monotony, i just thought it was an interesting thing, a kind of flash back to what it would have been like back in the day before these things were invented. Now you read more, you socialise with the people around you - in the real world not a virtual one, you open your eyes to the world around you, see nature, see what needs to be done, you work still, you make a list of the things you need to do everyday and you actually have time to get them done and at the end of the day you steal someone elses computer and catch up on all the things you have missed and realise the less you use the internet, the less you need it.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Trumpets
I'm reading Sophie's World again, well not 'again' in the sense that i've ever actually finished the book in the past but more in the sense that i've started it a ton of times and haven't reached the end yet because -
a. I'm a slow reader, and
b. Philosophy, in my opinion, can only be read in small portions because you need time to reflect on what you have read so that your brain doesn't explode, and lets face it this book is thousands of years of philosophical thought compacted down into 400 pages so there is a lot to take in!
I'm about half way through, past socrates, descartes, aristole, plato, they've just given the very brief low down on Jesus and then Alberto Knox said something about the trumpets sounding and war cries and i realised that i'd never understood that before, when i read about trumpets in the Bible i think ... cool music - celebrations and worship, it never even crossed my mind to think 'trumpets sounding signalling troops going into battle, a way of telling everyone to attack' How strange that is, now he also points out that Jesus had a cool way of changing the meaning of these old fashioned phrases and perhaps thats something He did there but its still kinda weird that i didn't put two and two together. But anyway now i'm trying to think of situations were that phrase is used and maybe i didn't get the right meaning the first time round, like 'praise Him with the sounding of the trumpet, praise Him with harp and lyre' i figured that was just like ... play music and worship Him, but is it supposed to be 'go fight for His name'?
Any insights?
a. I'm a slow reader, and
b. Philosophy, in my opinion, can only be read in small portions because you need time to reflect on what you have read so that your brain doesn't explode, and lets face it this book is thousands of years of philosophical thought compacted down into 400 pages so there is a lot to take in!
I'm about half way through, past socrates, descartes, aristole, plato, they've just given the very brief low down on Jesus and then Alberto Knox said something about the trumpets sounding and war cries and i realised that i'd never understood that before, when i read about trumpets in the Bible i think ... cool music - celebrations and worship, it never even crossed my mind to think 'trumpets sounding signalling troops going into battle, a way of telling everyone to attack' How strange that is, now he also points out that Jesus had a cool way of changing the meaning of these old fashioned phrases and perhaps thats something He did there but its still kinda weird that i didn't put two and two together. But anyway now i'm trying to think of situations were that phrase is used and maybe i didn't get the right meaning the first time round, like 'praise Him with the sounding of the trumpet, praise Him with harp and lyre' i figured that was just like ... play music and worship Him, but is it supposed to be 'go fight for His name'?
Any insights?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)