A whirlwind in my head part two.

Title is in reference to this post.

"It's like a whirlwind in my head...but if I concentrate, I know what people are thinking all over the world. Presidents; diplomats; scientists. I can help them understand each other." - Highlander

"Do you remember when 21 years was old?" - Phoenix, Countdown

The last time I titled a post like this, a lot of things were changing at once in my life. It was like a whirlwind in my head...and it's happening again. In a very similar way.

I'm amazed at how I can finally plant both feet firmly on the ground only to have God knock me off of them. In a good way, of course. Lots of really good things are happening. Jobs are still an uncertainty, but I'm not worried. I think I know what to do.

I am feeling a little old. Yesterday, I happened to walk in on an engagement party. I had no idea these two were getting engaged...scratch that, I knew they would get engaged but I had no idea it would happen this soon. I wasn't really ready. I remember when they were just arriving to college...little more than children to my eyes. They are still really only children to my eyes. And now, they are going to get married. It's stunning. And here I was, off at a bar having a couple drinks with a friend. Life is leaving me behind.

But the good news is that the life that has left me behind is no longer relevant. No offense to those that this comment applies to, but I think the generation of people I poured my soul into the past five and a half years have turned out not to be the people who would remain in my life. It's the younger people who I never planned to meet (hey, until I applied to grad school I was planning graduating and planning to move away) that have turned out to be the ones that have really been reliable. "So much of life has left me and gone on ahead, but what was behind me this whole time has been better than I could have imagined." There are some really special people I would have missed if I had continued to spend all my energy on the people who continue to move on and away from me. I'm not trying anymore - it's just not worth it. God put new people in my life and the old have been swept away. That's OK.

I am continuing to take my own advice and just doing the good that comes to me and trusting in God to take care of everything else. I am really not at all sure where I am going anymore. I am not sure where I stand with my friends, especially one special friend in particular, and quite frankly I don't think it matters that I know. Good things will come to me in time and I will know, I will know what to do when it arrives.

This whirlwind is a good one, I can feel it.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream for the wind at my back.

On that which can't be revealed.

A lot has happened since my last post.

To be honest, I'm not sure I can really reveal much of anything about it. It involves a lot of trust issues that I don't understand and find confusing and frustrating. I am really doing my best to accommodate this new situation in my life but everything I do seems to come out wrong.

I really thought I was done with all of this weeks ago, but I guess God had different plans. As excited as I was at the beginning of the week with the prospect of something beautiful breaking into my life, it has turned into something full of anxiety, turmoil, and lots of fear.

My greatest strength, which I believe is conflict resolution, is useless now because I can't talk about this...to the person it needs discussed with.

I am frustrated and confused but I at least know what I need to do. I need to wait. Just wait.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream of revealing it all.

That THING.

So there was once this THING that I didn't understand before.

This odd depression I noticed people about four years older than me getting. You know, they'd be leaving college. I, a freshman, never understood why they all looked so mopey. They just graduated...they're movin' on. Gettin' a career. What's wrong with that? They should be happy. And it was always only the single ones. Why the single ones?

Now I get it. That thing. It happens when everyone your age is getting married or engaged. It looks like this:

These posts always make me a little self-conscious. I like to pretend I don't care but I do. I know that people will always be quick to jump to conclusions about someone making a post about being single. I do it myself sometimes. Well, here's to posting about what I want to post about anyway. I can't stop you.

Anyway, I know I won't be forever alone and I'm not lonely. That's not the point. The point is, I'm saying something about people. About life - in all its stages. And I'm at that stage where I see everyone around me getting engaged and getting married. And it's hard to be happy for them. It really is.

It'd be a little different if I were in a relationship myself. It truly feels like I did something wrong - because I was with someone for a while, and for the most part I loved it, and almost everyone I know who was in a relationship at that time is now engaged to their significant other. It didn't end that way for me. I dealt the final blow myself.

But when I go to an awesome wedding for two people whom I both look up to so much...and all I can do is clap along with everyone else and pretend I'm not jealous...man, it just sucks. It just does. At a wedding, everyone loves you, sings your praises, eats, dances, and has a blast with you...your best friend at your side, with whom by the end of the night you will be having more than just a little fun. Heck yeah, I want that. At least I'm honest. I don't play along with a pretend utopia where I pretend I don't want what I want. Sometimes that's all I got really going for me - the balls to be honest and say it like I see it.

Balls - there's a word I seem to be using a lot today. That's what it's taken for me to put myself out there. Over. And over. And over again. None of that guarantees someone success. They can do everything right - I can do everything right. And nothing is guaranteed to come of it.

But I gain nothing from just not trying. And I try. I do. And I listen when people tell me to basically not worry about it. To pray. And I do, and and I try. But that's not how this thing works. What I want is something really good - and you can't take the desire for good from me.

My only temptation is to take the easy way out sometimes - and believe me, it's there. Always. But what I keep holding on to is this idea that I must always, always do the right thing. No matter how hard it is. Oh, and I know I fail sometimes, but that is what I always strive for in the end. I want to do what is easy so bad just to feel like my life is going somewhere I want it to for a while.

All I can do is just keep trying as hard as I can to do everything right. Be myself. Keep praying. Trust. Move on. And I do. But it just doesn't get easier.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream for ever together.

The good choice.

What is the greatest thing to be achieved in this life?

Often times, putting the needs of others over your own can be difficult. I cannot say it is the easiest thing to do to sit on your hands and do nothing so that others may live in comfort - because by acting on your own desires, you may impede theirs...either for their own hopes, or their own comforts. And that is often what I must do.

How can I call myself a friend if I don't act like a friend should? My friendship doesn't end as soon as I want more. No, I can only choose to be a good friend, and nothing more. Everything else will follow, and it will either be what I want or it will be something better:

"...We do not always have to foresee every possibility. We have only to judge whether the act is right, just, and accords with the truth and love here and now, because we "believe in the good" and are therefore convinced that, whatever consequences may follow, they will certainly be good ones, beneficial to ourselves and to society." - Thomas Merton

...And so as Merton says, I go on, doing whatever good I believe I can in my friendships. Even if it means not being as close of a friend as I would like. Even if it kinda hurts to say nothing where I would really like to.

This is why I dislike when menboys go after girls who have only recently broken off a relationship. They need time, and they're so selfish they won't give them any. I believe they call it "catching her on the rebound" and it's little more than emotional manipulation. It's disgusting.

What is the greatest thing to be achieved in this life? It is to be a virtuous person, I think. Truly virtuous...and to have that quality is worth everything. I would go as far as to say that it is better to die a good man than to live as a cheater, liar, thief, or murderer. It's to never give in to the easy path, even over the smallest thing...it's to say "never!" when evil comes and calls.

I'll never join you!

That's what that choice is. Selfish, and therefore evil. Even if it seems trivial to some people, you can never be a virtuous person if you make exceptions for even the smallest evils.

So, never. I say never.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream to do good always.

Trust issues, and the best of the best!

By human standards it would be reasonable to expect me to doubt the world around me.

I suppose I have to talk about my life a bit here. The one person in my family I was closest to died a little over 5 years ago (my mother) and many of the people I've been closest to since then have been more than a little misleading...many of them romantic interests which I've come to realize that it was a blessing things didn't work out.

Regardless, I find it hard to trust God sometimes, even when he's working wonderful things into my life. Sometimes, especially where friendships are concerned, I find it easy to panic just because of a small thing. The tiniest change in behavior for the worst in someone, even something so little as being a tad quieter than normal, can make me nervous. Even one little text message that doesn't receive a response can set me on edge. Did I say something wrong? Did they read it? Did I bother them? I've let the people who have been untrustworthy in my life ruin my trust for God, which is not acceptable...and I think now that I've realized it, I can end it. That's a promise, God!

We all have some growing up to do. I hope it doesn't sound judgmental for me to say some people have a little more growing up to do than others. I'm really bothered by the actions of people around me sometimes. There is a particular person I know who I once had a great deal of admiration for who I no longer have almost any at all. This person has/had the potential to become a beautiful person but now treats me, at least, with a great deal of disrespect. I will always love this particular person, but I no longer like them, and probably never will again.

On a nice note, though, I think the reason I have such low tolerance for their new attitude is because I have met, only a few weeks ago, a group of people whom I have quickly grown to love and admire. They are, quite simply, some of the best people I've ever met! I'm not exactly sure why things have happened the way they have, but I'm glad. So glad. This is all God's doing...everything good is, but in this case it's remarkably apparent. I have no words for how much I love them!

There was a dream that I dreamed, and that dream was that trust given was trust kept.