Friending the Future: Making New Years Resolutions Stick

New Years is a time the present self and future self become entrusting friends in an interdependent relationship– the present self determines a beneficinary goal for the future self, and then trusts the future self to follow through. Sounds simple.

The great thing about New Years is that it is the one time in the year that encourages a mass number of people to slow down, reflect, and then speed up again with a new of set goals. But, promises are only great if they are kept. As February and March roll around, eventually the present self typically becomes distracted with everyday life: when it comes to New Years resolutions– it unfortunately lets the future self down.

I don’t know about you, but I have a hard time sticking with my long list of resolutions. I write down a list of goals, but never look at the paper again.  How can I ensure the “resolution” pact from January is still implemented next December? I started to look for ways to stay disciplined in sticking with resoultuions. Here are a few tips I found:

1. “Make only 1-3 manageable goals.” When I made New Years resolution lists, I found myself  covering half a page to an entire page of paper with dreams. On Jan 1st, I wrote down everything I wanted to change. Trying to do them all spread my focus thin. I clearly “bit off more than I could chew,” and rather than getting all of my goals done, I ended up with too many projects left unattended. It was a little discouraging. Instead of creating long list of everything you want in the new year, only focus on one or two life changes.

2. “Speak your dreams into existence”– Be picky with your words. Notice your words, and notice your thoughts. When you say words, it helps move thoughts into action. If you constantly speak your dreams, they become more of your conscious reality.

3. “Share your goals with others”– 2 years ago,  I started to tell people that I was going to travel Asia in 2012. I stated it as a fact when telling close people. Simply telling others helped hold me accountable to my dreams. People would ask me how my planning was going, and it constantly reminded me about my trip to Asia. The more I shared, the more determined I was to make it happen. This year, I have already prepared myself to take that journey. Next stop–India.

4. “Celebrate even the smallest successes”– Often times, achieving a goal can take a long time. It is easy to get discouraged if your only measure of success is the final product. It may take months or even years to see all your hard work paying off. Along the way, we can easily overlook the necessary steps we took to achieve the goal. We must make sure we are conscious of those steps and celebrate when they go well. Every morning, just take a cup of gratitude before you continue the journey towards your goal. It can make all the difference and help sustain endurance.

5. “Just admit to yourself from the beginning—slipping up once in a while should be highly expected—but giving up is not an option.” —Sometimes we set goals with absolutes: “I am NEVER going to….” or “I will ALWAYS……”  The problem with this is that once we invade that absolute and inevitably slip, we become discouraged. We feel that we already failed to achieve our goal, and we can give up all together. But once we allow ourselves room for expected mistakes, we are more graceful with ourself. Just start again. Training your habits is like training a dog. Just keep doing it. Period.

Happy New Year!

Winters Within

(Written in February 2011)

It’s been a long cold winter in Chicago. The snow piled along the side of the icy roads has been blackened by uninvited pollution that continues to dominate the city. There are no signs of blooming plants or even pieces of earth. Dirty snow and concrete seem like the only things that reside along the streets of this large town. It is clear to every Chicagoan: the natural ground is nowhere in sight.

As I struggled to walk over piles of ice and snow earlier today, I realized that the reason why I hate winter so much is not only because it is unbearably freezing, but also because it reminds me of my own occasional winters that blizzard inside of me. I realized that sometimes, I, too, feel hidden under a pile of  black snow, stacked along the side of the road. It is a great big pile of frozen rain that could have helped me grow if only it fell upon me as water. But instead of feeling nourished, I felt covered –sometimes suffocated–from my own past, fears, and pressures blowing into my life at an unbearable wind-speed. I felt buried, confused, and unsure of what I wanted. So now, here I am, trying to shovel myself out again one scoop at a time.

Like you and everyone else, I am just trying to get closer to my true self…a self that inevitably lives, trying to thrive, amongst the ever-changing weather of this world: myself. I’m a lot closer to it than I was before, but there’s still a lot to learn. However, I know it is somewhere under this pile of stuff that falls from society. I know it has to be something unique. I tell myself the wise truth, and I hope to believe it. I say: “the outside world and all the experiences in it should never take away the true essence of who I am. Rather they should shape it, and always for the better.”Well there is no question that I have been shaping as a person (even transforming). But the question is:

To what? What else am I needing?

Many of us can easily miss the point of our own lives if  we live without questioning or deeper thinking. Although there are many benefits to our culture and society, they can also lead us to feel disconnected from our individuality and deepest needs. In a way, it can be like snow blinding us from who we really are. You may have noticed: many people often spend their lives thinking things and doing things without consciously knowing why. Most people don’t want to feel marginalized from outside recognition or acceptance.  So, they live their daily lives striving for predefined “success;” following the calendar of “what age should be doing what;” and blending in with everyone else in hopes to eventually find themselves. Some move forward, without stepping back periodically to critically ponder why they are moving in the first place. They look outside to never quite discover what’s actually within.

Maybe we are chasing fulfillment in all the wrong places.

In today’s world, it is easy to lack meaningful purpose (despite our “successes”). We may walk the correct path, and still feel like something is missing. Perhaps, we shallowly do these things as a response to learning “what is and what should be.” Our purpose is often defined by some outside judment or expectation, and not our own selves. We follow the crowd to avoid walking alone, but ironically we can easily loose ourselves within it and end up feeling more alone than ever. We grow closer to becoming a person the world expects (even manufactures), and further away from our true authentic selves.  We conform without realizing, and we see each day as another opportunity to check off one of society’s many prerequisites for greatness. We often strive for greatness, rather than realize it within ourselves. As a result, we live in the illusion that we are never really enough, and we feel we have to constantly prove ourselves worthy of love–which I believe is the only thing we deeply seek.

Like many of us, I can also get lost in these things, and I sometimes loose sight of my actual roots. As I continue to grow by accumulating more experiences, taking great opportunities, meeting interesting people,  and maintaining a general positive outlook, there are moments I still find myself slightly unsatisfied. I realized there is a deeper need unmet because it has been covered by everything else that consumes me. I quickly found myself reevaluating my goals and desires. Was this what I wanted? Or was this what others wanted for me? There’s a fine line between my own organic thoughts and the thoughts given to me, but I knew I had to distinguish the two. Perhaps open questions are more important than finite answers. I figured that maybe these questions will help me gain an even better understanding of (and appreciation for)  the person I am trying to grow into.

Despite any pile that conceals me,  I’ve come to realize that I actually grow from the same ground as everyone else…love. When I mention LOVE, I do not mean a specific type of love like romantic, friendly, family, or even worldly love. Rather I am referring to  a general umbrella of love: the genuine internalization that all is worthy and wonderful. Love is the foundational soil of all human desires and needs, but since it lies deep within (or since the concept is misunderstood as “naive simplicity”), it can be hard to see and understand from the surface.  It is especially difficult to find when winters like this invade the human mind. Nonetheless, (consciously or not) we all search for love desperately, hoping to find it on surface avenues titled “money, success, power, relationships, popularity, prestige, legacy, religion, stores, and beauty.”  The funny thing is, love is beneath all of these streets. The desire for love is within: it always has been, and it always will. It is the reason why we seek approval and success, and it is also the reason we fear relationships, risks, potential rejections, mistakes, or disasters. It is the underlying reason for all actions in all people, but ironically it is not always manifested in every act. It’s certainly not always consciously recognized as our deepest need.

The problem is it is easy to think that we live life to try to “find something” or “fulfill something that isn’t there… yet.” But I am starting to realize the opposite: we should live life to practice what we already have. If love is our need, then perhaps we should start to realize and personify love, rather than look for it elsewhere.  Life isn’t just about finding ourselves, it’s about being ourselves to be best of our ability. (The hardest part is probably the first step: identifying and believing in what we have). Nonetheless, if you study the life of any spiritual leader– from any religion or spiritual path– you will see the pattern of practicing love. Regardless of affiliation, each one has emphasized the constant theme of love… even when faced with the most challenging circumstances. Religious or not, I truly believe there is profound truth to this “simplified” message: fulfillment comes to those who have mastered this concept.  Both you and I know this is far from easy.

Like we do with greatness, we mistakenly chase after love, rather than become it. As our true roots continue to grow deeper in search of love, our personas continue to grow upward, above the surface. This gives the illusion that we are far away from where we started. We may grow from love, but sometimes we focus too much on who we seem to be on the surface, that we forget about who we are. We want to be happy and we forget that love is the primary ingredient for genuine happiness. We fail to realize that we already have this (within us): we have the capability to become love (including greatness and happiness) personified. It’s not about depending on others or life events to convince ourselves that we are in fact worthy. If we deeply understand and believe the truth about our nature, then we can develop even stronger roots that keeps us grounded despite unpredictable weather. What we do and who we grow into should simply reflect who we actually are on the inside.

Now as I face the end of winter, I am reminded that I too need to remember my roots. After reviewing “things I wanted, but realized I didn’t want,” I began to combine my goals into one simple purpose: I live to love. When I loose sight of everything else, I have to consciously remind myself to 1) realize that love already exist within me; 2) learn more about its nature from every experience;  3) practice it in every opportunity; and 4) grow into a fuller version of it (be it). If love (i.e. learning about it, doing what I love, and extending it to the world) is my guide, then I figure the rest of life will eventually follow. Perhaps if I aim to be genuinely loving at all times (as much as I can) toward myself, others, and the world, then I will feel connected to the only thing I desperately look for. Potentials can become realities, and we are the only ones who can make those transformations. After all, love is already within us, but it’s up to us to strengthen its visibility. Inspired by a few spiritual teachers, I started to adopt this as an ongoing life practice. With consciousness and discipline, I really think we all have the ability to address our need at the root.

Whether we are covered by snow or by the illusions of society, we can easily hide under it all. Ironically, it is only when we are closer to our true selves, that we begin to realize we already have what we set out to find. We have love now, and we’ve had it all along because it’s a fundamental part of who we are. I believe that underlying love (defined as our starting point, our driving force, and our life goal) is a universal truth that drives all human beings in a multi-facited, confusing, and sometimes vicious cycle. It is the beginning and the end, yet we can easily feel lost (and even damaged) along the way.  If we don’t consciously recognize our own worth and great capacities (separate from society), then how can we use our lives to best contribute to society? We become self seeking when our actions are driven by the desperate search for love, rather than the extension of it. Through this, no one truly benefits, and we wonder (once again): what is missing?

With this in mind, I am starting to recognize that any confusions or reservations I may have are just like piles of snow covering the ground. They are piles of illusions covering me. It isn’t really me and it doesn’t have to determine all I do. Until people stop pretending and start becoming what naturally are, they will continue to feel buried. So when it comes to my life, I need to remain aware. We can no longer be blinded by the past and our environment, which we cannot control, and which dares to control us. We must be conscious of our soil: of ourselves at all times. For once we understand our nature of love, our lives can be more aligned with our main need.

I guess we are all just beings of love, seeking love, in a loveless world of chaotic facades. And honestly, I too have been one of them. Together, we are souls buried under piles of polarized experiences, messages, and feelings that come from life, and still hinder us from truly living. I think we need to invite more people to grab shovels and dig.

Maybe then we will find something real.

What You Learn When You Barely Teach

A day in the mind of a six year old is far too complicated for any twenty something year old first year teacher to initially understand.  Entering a room full of them is similar to entering a new place where the people speak a different language that you learned a long time ago, but can no longer remember. High pitched childhood laughter, whining, tantrums, fighting, pencil poking, and the famous saying-“I gotta use it” (a phrase that refers to the bathroom) remains an essential part of their everyday communication.  It is finally March, and their 6 minute attention spans, their inability to keep erasers on brand new pencils, and their strange need to sit on their heads rather than their bottoms are only a few traits that I just started getting used to. The other parts of them, such as their aggressive fights and their continuous anger towards one another are traits that I have been trying to alter. These kids can get   “off the chain” (as they say).  Therefore, I not only needed to teach their young minds to read and write, but I also needed to teach them how basically function in this world. Little did I realize, they had even more lessons to teach me.  As a seven month teacher and a recent college graduate, I have come to the surprising realization that lessons taught by inner city six year olds are far more challenging than any class taught in college.

I joined Teach for America to teach, but I quickly discovered that teaching alone was only a small portion of my job. I didn’t anticipate that I also needed to transform into a manager, a psychologist, a social worker, a police officer, a community organizer, an event planner, a curriculum planner, a nurse, a janitor, a waitress, and even a temporary parent at any given moment of the day. It’s exhausting, but I had to conceal any frustration whenever I was in front of my class. I was always on stage, and unfortunately they could read me better than they could read books. In the end, they didn’t care if I was tired; they demanded my undivided attention all the time.

Clearly, this job is never boring and light years away from easy. Frankly, it is by far the most challenging thing I have ever experienced, and I still am trying to teach myself how to do it effectively. Teaching is the kind of profession that you can love and hate at the exact same time.  While you may find yourself celebrating that one student has finally mastered a concept you have been explaining for the last week, you may also find yourself sprinting across the classroom because a different student has abruptly landed his tiny fist into another tearful bleeding face. These kinds of events can happen (and do happen) simultaneously, and you have to be constantly aware and quick to respond to anything. Teaching mandates a lot of thought, articulation, consistency, and patience (a lot more than I originally brought to the job).

I find it almost impossible to be the patient teacher that they require all the time. Although I wanted to, I couldn’t give my attention to every student’s individual need at every moment of the day, and I didn’t always have the answers to every question.   My students were constantly suffering from the frustration of a broken pencil, the trauma of a mean word from their classmate, or an ongoing problem at home or on the streets. Some of their problems (like subsequent broken pencils) were easy to solve. Other problems (like the ones that they carried inside or the ones they observed and experienced in their communities) were extremely difficult, and I didn’t always know how to adequately address them.

Since the beginning of the year, I wanted to build my classroom into a representation of the greater world that I hoped to see. I wanted an environment of endless learning for every child, and I wanted people to work together peacefully. I wanted my kids to come to school feeling safe and empowered. I desperately wanted to make an impact, but I wanted all of these things to be easier done than said. As you can imagine, they were not. 

To be completely honest, shortly after meeting my students, my dreams were tainted with the harsh realities of inner city circumstances. My kids were growing up already encouraged by their families and communities to verbally and physically fight for respect, rather than earn it. They were learning that knowing how to fight will benefit them more than knowing how to read. In their hoods, it could save their lives.  They were constantly on the defense, watching their backs (even when I felt my classroom was a safe place for them).  Unfortunately some of my students have already accumulated more struggles than inspirations.  No matter what I wanted to believe about these elementary students, the manifestations of the vicious cycles of black inner city history/racism (i.e. poverty, structural inequities, and violence) were already a part of their lives. I couldn’t ignore it. It was affecting my students in my classroom everyday. Although my kids were very young, they were not clean slates. I wish I could change their worlds, but I felt that the “peaceful world” I wanted to teach already contradicted all they knew. I had to not only work with their different personalities, but I also had to work with (and sometimes against) everything else they carried.

I did my best. I tried to fill their school day with engaging activities so they wouldn’t have time to be angry at each other or themselves. I also spent some time teaching them social skills and how to problem solve differently. Unfortunately, some of their anger continued to be a daily disruption in my classroom despite my efforts. I could only begin to understand what was going on in their young lives and not so little hearts that caused them to be so angry. Throughout the year, I have surprisingly witnessed these young kids engage in verbal fights, physical fights, and throw tiny chairs across the classroom. Sometimes I felt alone in the battle to change their worlds. How do you change students when even their parents were more concerned with their child winning a fight than being in a fight? I feared the problems were escalating.

Naturaly, I began to wonder if I was actually guiding them correctly or doing something wrong.  I started to second guess my competence as their teacher and the competence of some of my extremely challenging students. At times, I found myself disciplining them more than teaching them. In fact, I caught myself turning into my worst nightmare: a burnt out teacher.  By winter, I still didn’t have the answers to my daily struggles, and (like many inner city teachers) I too was tempted to give up.

After countless failures, I began to realize they didn’t want or need my control. People (big and small) can be challenging to handle and impossible to change, especially when change is forced upon them. As their leader, I initially wanted to dictate every aspect of their negative behavior so that they could best learn. Ironically, I quickly found that the more I tried forcing control onto them, the more I failed teaching them. Leaders can only be in real control when their followers want to follow. My students had to want to listen and learn from me. Simply being a “teacher” does not mean that my students have internalized me as their teacher. I had to earn their young trust and respect in order to begin making a profound difference in their lives. I had to join their team before I could lead them and ultimately teach. My vision could not become theirs unless my students and their families were on board with the idea.

Clearly, the last thing they wanted was dictation. Rather, they wanted only the most basic and fundamental human need: love (and a lot of it). Unfortunately some of these little kids have already been deprived of it for various reasons. They learned that you should only be nice to some people, not all. Therefore, I couldn’t stay mad at them for things they didn’t know.  I needed to take a different approach: I needed to always demonstrate (not just verbally express) what I wanted them to do. I needed to make my love much more apparent to each one of them (even during the times they were difficult to love and impossible to understand). I needed to convince them that I was never against them. In fact, I wanted to learn their culture, speak it, and communicate a new expression of power: education.  Not only did they need to believe that I sincerely loved them, but also that I could teach them something valuable.

Getting them on board with me as their teacher was difficult, yet essential to effective teaching. This seemed basic, but I learned that it was a lot harder to implement. First, I needed to convince them to want my respect. Then I needed to teach them that my respect required proof of learning, rather than proof of aggression. I needed to convey to them that my classroom was different than their communities, and I wanted them to feel proud to be members of both.

I realized that they needed genuine respect and recognition in order to feel proud of themselves. They needed pride in themselves in order to want to learn. They needed to want to learn in order to change. All of this needed hope (regardless of the disturbing statistics about inner city education), relentless pursuit, and time.

After a long cold winter, glimpses of change have finally started coming alive in my students and in me.  Their behavior and my assessment data proved to me that they are in fact learning.  Some of them have even made a year and a half worth of academic progress. It feels good to finally start seeing the growth of the tiny seeds that I mindfully planted in my classroom early September. Since the moment I stepped into my classroom, I desperately wanted to grow their young minds and hearts. Although I had good intentions, I was initially nurturing my intentions with too much control and force, which resulted in disorder. True, my classroom needed some control and structure, but my students also needed more love, understanding, and relentless patience before they could begin to grow and learn.

Unlike friends and lovers, I couldn’t choose my students. I had love all of them regardless of their behavior, history, or attitude. I had to help them discover their own strengths (even if some were more difficult to find).  I had to also desperately find any signs of strength in myself in order to maintain sanity as a teacher. As a result, my students have been teaching me more about love and perseverance than I could ever expect or adequately explain.

The school year of 2009-2010 has undoubtedly been a long and rough road so far. Teaching has challenged every initial perception of myself, my students, and my beliefs regarding the achievement gap. Other corps members weren’t kidding when they said, “Your first year in TFA can tear you apart in ways you have never previously experienced.”  It can make you hit rock bottom,  force you to pick up the pieces, and then lead you to a common crossroad: 1) you can leave or 2) you can begin rebuilding yourself differently.   I may have contemplated the first option more than once, but I luckily chose the second: I chose to rebuild my skills so that I WILL teach these kids more than they need to know and ultimately learn from them.

Figuring out my students and how to reach each one of them is a challenging course within itself. However, this experience is not like any course I have ever taken: their lessons contain deeper content than I can adequately explain.  Clearly, I am still learning, and I am doing all I can to make sure they are too.

After all, wasn’t I supposed to be the teacher?

Something New

Over a month ago. I would say that the last few months of my life has been marked by unfamiliarity. True, I was busy almost every minute of the day, I was constantly meeting new people, and I had an entire new city under my feet and an unfamiliar roof over my head. However, I felt far from comfort. Despite my efforts to avoid every sharp turn on these new roads, I was all over the place. In reality, I was accumulating more sharp turns than smooth life transitions.  I longed for full control of situations, but realized the unfortunate reality of human limitations. As a confused and (sometimes) lost driver, I came to the conclusion that I needed to improve my skills of navigating new roads and grow from (rather than avoid) my inevitable transitional challenges.  

An unknown author once said, “Life is 10% what happens and 90% how you respond.”I know it sounds cliché, but I have to admit that sometimes a cheesy inspirational quote like this could completely shift my mind to the right direction. Accordingly, I embraced its message and remembered that although I couldn’t control the unfamiliar world around me, I could control my outlook towards it. After all, I knew that time would eventually replace this feeling of an unfamiliar life with a feeling of home.  

So, I reminded myself that I was in Chicago for three reasons: 1) I heard it was a great place to live 2) I would learn to be a teacher so that I could give back to the world by educating and inspiring those who remain disadvantaged from it and 3) I wanted to learn something new (anything new). As a result, I decided to no longer focus on the unfamiliarity of my life, but rather refocus on my passion for education and learning. Chicago granted me an opportunity to change myself and my students. I realized that (as a teacher) I had the priviledge to influence and nourish the minds of the future generation. At that point, changing the world (even if it’s the world of a child) didn’t seem like an impossible task. With a slight up-shift to optimism, I hoped that I would ultimately quickly transform Chicago into my home, these unfamiliar people into my friends, and myself into a teacher. I had a whole new world to meet.

2 weeks ago.  I met my new world on the second floor of the Village Leadership Academy on South Wells St. My classroom had a medium-sized white board, a yellow wall,  huge corner windows, piled boxes, tiny chairs, and empty tables.  I had a little less than a few weeks to get it ready for the 23 kids I would be teaching this year.  As I walked around my classroom, I tried to envision the little faces looking up at me. I tried to imagine the teacher (the woman) that I needed to be for them.  

Suddenly I realized, life threw me on a different platform: adulthood. This was definitely a domain that I have only “partly” encountered prior to now. However, I knew that my new job demanded I grow up fast, whether or not I felt entirely ready. 23 young kids and hundreds of lesson plans were about to crowd my responsibilities. Clearly, I didn’t have room to slack off nor time to be distracted. I had new concerns and 24 lives to think about (including my own). Any old negative thoughts could no longer consume my mind. I needed more energy than ever to be successful.  

However, success had a whole new meaning for me. Rather than focusing on me, success rightfully refocused on them: my students. As a teacher, I had to be successful for someone else; my success had to be their success. My life would be devoted to investing my students in learning, evoking their curiosity and critical thought, introducing them to the glory of discovery, boosting their confidence, and ultimately building their young minds and hearts.  

I realized that teaching gave me the greatest opportunity to help inner city children become future leaders of this world. With that in mind, I wanted my kids (no matter how young) to understand the importance of building knowledge, promoting peace, and acting with justice. I wanted them to know that their intelligence is malleable and that our world is too: it can always get better with our efforts.  I wanted them to understand that they were in school to turn their intellectual/personal potentials into actual characteristics and their goals into actual realities. I wanted them know that once they built knowledge, it could never be taken away from them. I had a lot to teach them, and i decide to start  my first lesson on my blank white wall, which surrounded the white board. On that wall, I pasted letters that wrote: “We build our minds. We build our hearts. We can build a better world.”  As I turned and faced the rest of my classroom, I faced the overwhelming, yet empowering truth:  this was only the beginning of shaping their thinking/setting a solid foundation of who they will become. And in my eyes, they WILL be leaders. 

Today.  It’s a new feeling: I have yet to meet my students, but I already feel attached to them. I’ve been spending hours everyday preparing for their arrival and anticipating our first “hello.”  Although part of me is terrified of failing to give them the education they deserve, I am trying to learn everything I can about teaching to make sure that they reach success. I know I may sound confident, but I honestly don’t know exactly what I am doing, how this year will go, or what other “unfamiliars” I will encounter. Maybe, in the end, my previous trials of feeling lost and finding direction actually served a useful purpose: I am finally learning how to run on faith, navigate new roads, and use both of these lessons to move forward in life. After all, I realize this skill is now more important than ever.

I have 23 students in the back seat, and we start our journey tomorrow.

One Last Thought Before I Go

“This entry is dedicated to all the people who have made an impact in my life these last 4 years. Thank you.”

Spring: It’s a new beginning of rebirth. Sunshine and happiness should be the themes of my days, but for some reason the spring time hadn’t made it to my life yet. My life was still a winter wonderland of disorganization in desperate need of new beginnings. There were countless piles of stuff to defenestrate, and I didn’t even know where to start. Sometimes I wish I could buy a mental vacuum or a spray can of mental pledge to wipe all the dust of frustrations and stress that cluttered the corners of my mind. This spring was the perfect time for me to do some spring cleaning and reorganizing of my life. With graduation just around the corner, I clearly needed reflection and new perspectives.

Someone once told me that the state of your room often reflects the state of your mind. Quite frankly, the state of my room was a mess. So the other day, I spent hours cleaning every inch of my room and bathroom. I scrubbed the shower, wiped the doors and sliding windows, and even reorganized my bookshelf alphabetically. Although my mind was still cluttered with dust of old thoughts and piles of deadlines, I hoped that the act of cleaning my room would somehow filter organization into my life as well. At some point, it did. With a 409 bottle in my hand, I thought about everything that crowded my mind and reflected on the good/bad memories and thoughts that scattered its surfaces.

I guess all transitions create some type of disorganization in people’s lives. Uncertainty, anxiety, excitement, sadness, confusion, insecurity, and confidence all crowd within us simultaneously. They often contradict one another and polarize our feelings in ways that confuse us even more. This confusion became extremely evident the other night when I was out to dinner with a friend. He asked me the popular question: “are you excited to graduate?”  I’ve been asked this question many times before, but for some reason, at that moment, I really thought hard about my answer. Initially, I wanted to say my usual “yes” that everyone expects. After all, graduation means no more papers, no more thesis, no more exams, no more bureaucratic university bull shit, and no more academic pressure to reach high percentages that inadequately reflect actual knowledge and ability. But at the same time, I couldn’t ignore the fact that graduation also meant an ending to a life that I spent four years carefully constructing; a life that I grew to love.

I miss Tucson already, and I haven’t even left. I’m overwhelmed with goodbyes, accumulating as many memories a month can hold, drinking my last college cocktails, attending my last college parties,  finishing my last undergraduate tests and papers, preparing to move to a brand new city (which I know little about), and ultimately leaving behind a place I learned to cherish.

In less than a month, along with all the other graduates, I will be packing up 4 years of memories, old picture frames, used textbooks, and a TON of class notes and articles that I never wanted throw away (because I thought the information would come in handy one day. Just to let you know…that day has yet to come). This Tucson chapter is clearly closing much faster than I’m prepared for, and soon I will start a new chapter in Chicago. Although a day will always contain 24 hours, it seems that each day has less hours than the previous one.  My life is accumulating days faster than lessons, but I am trying to grasp everything and keep up.

Despite the fact that time moves faster than I’d like, there is no denying that time has allowed me to create an intricate tapestry of lifetime friendships, unforgettable memories, and life-changing lessons. I have worked hard and partied hard. I have laughed till I cried and have cried because I missed laughing.  I have learned lessons and taught lessons. Some lessons, I never understood.  I have grown with those around me, and yet I am still at the beginning of my growth. I have come a long way, but I have such a long way to go. I am standing at the beginning, yet I am terrified of the end. Sound familiar? You probably share this story too.

Anyways, I am sharing all of these thoughts  with you because (at some point) YOU have been an important influence in my life. I realize that a lot of the stuff I have stored in my mind was stuff I made with you: stuff that is too precious to ever throw away. Therefore,  I want the people in my life to know that they have inspired my life and the lives of many others. They have contributed to the complexity of my being by eliciting the thoughts in my mind, shaping the curves of my heart, and introducing experiences I needed to live through.  Without you, I could not be me. Without meeting you, I would have never learned the distinct things you shared with me during these past years.

Most of us are facing the confusion and excitement of transition (of change). Some of us fight it, and some of us can’t wait to ride with it. Regardless of our personal relationship with change,  its existence is a guaranteed fact that will subsequently enhance our lives with more people, more experiences, and more opportunities. However, I want you to keep in mind that this coming change does not change the impact you had on me (whether or not we always stay in touch). In a way, change may have introduced you to me, but it can never remove you from me entirely.

My friend, Feruza, once told me, “God places people in your life that you need, not necessarily people that you want.” It is absolutely true!  At every given point, every person in your life (despite how long they remain in your life) can help you get to where you need to be. Think about it: people need to reject you before you notice that some people accept you. People need to hurt you before others can help you. People need to betray you before you can find stability within yourself. People need to make you insecure before you can challenge your self-view. People need to break your heart before you can rebuild it even stronger. People need to disagree with you before you can confirm or change your own beliefs. People need to make you angry before you can learn forgiveness. Ultimately, we are the sum of these people (regardless of whether we liked them or not).

I guess what I am trying to say is: I am a sum of all the things YOU brought to my life, and I am going to miss you when we part our ways. I love you all and I really hope the best for everyone. Thank you so much for being a part of me; for being a person that I needed, wanted, and loved.

Oh yeah, and about that spring cleaning… aside for a couple of negative boxes, I didn’t end up throwing anything away. I realize that everything is exactly where it should be.

The Problem with Love

I have finally realized that the problem with love is that most people don’t know what the hell it is, and yet they use the word openly. They say “I love you” when they cannot stop thinking of the other person, when their heart races in their presence, and when they can’t stop smiling from the thought of them. All they want is to be near that person all the time…forever and ever. They want the “unexplainable feeling to last forever,” and they promise to do anything to make it last. But I have come to the conclusion that this fairytale idea manifested in every beginning, every movie and every song is nothing more than a recipe for heartbreak and countless failed relationships.

In a way, we stay in a relationship when love’s show is entertaining. But once it gets boring, we leave and throw away our ticket stubs. We don’t see the point in staying because there is nothing interesting to entertain us anymore. We hop from theater to theater in hopes of finding the perfect show or movie that never ends, that always makes us laugh, and that always gives us that loving feeling…forever and ever. But once we reach intermission, we may suddenly find ourselves “falling out of love” …giving us the cue to leave once again.  In the end, we are in relationships for our own pleasure, not the other person’s pleasure. We are in love to feel love for ourselves, rather than give love. Sooner or later, the truth unfolds: no matter what we tell the other person and how much we express “our love” and “our deep concern for their well being and true happiness,” we are really only in love with the show and not them. We may have felt love, but in terms of truly loving…we haven’t even started.

So what is the secret to everlasting love? Why do so many people have problems with love? What is the secret ingredient to loves that last a lifetime versus loves that end? The secret is the actual meaning of love, which is too often overlooked.

The popular misconception: love is romance, candlelight, and passionate kisses under starry skies has a limited life course of its own. Most everyone eventually finds out that this conception never lasts for eternity, and they often face disappointment once it ends. In fact, the real timeless tale of true love is sparsely bounded in books, sung in songs, and recorded on film. Rather, the understanding of true love is whispered to only some hearts after countless teardrops, unhappily ever afters, and so called “faded feelings.”

At one point or another, before or after marriage, most of us eventually learn that love is more than a feeling. Instead, love is a verb: a choice and action freely made. It exists with or without the exciting feeling. It exist whether or not “it is the right time.” It exists despite the person’s imperfections and despite waves of boredom that inevitably occur. I am not saying feelings are not a component of love. They almost always accompany love, especially in the beggining. I am just saying that feelings, alone, do not define love, and yet we define love through our identified feelings. Ironically, it is only when the “feeling fades,” that true love can prove to exist or not.

In fact, surpassing the exciting feelings is the greatest opportunity to truly love and grow: to actively care, to actively stay with the other person, to actively sacrifice, and to actively be there for the other person through thick and thin. Even when it seems we have “fallen out of love,” true love withstands the test of time, the bumpy roads, and the inevitable faded excitement. It remains seated long after the show.

But isn’t that settling?

Hold that thought… I may not physically see you from this page, but I know what you are thinking. Yup, I thought exactly like you: you want the excitement! You believe that there is someone out there just for you that will always excite you! You want thrills and romance! And you refuse settle for anything otherwise! Because if you do, you are not loving yourself, and you are not finding your soulmate! The ONE! You are not living the fairytale that is written just for you! The fairytale written by the invisible pen called hope.

You ask, “Wait! what is the problem with wanting these things?”

Well, let me ask you: what’s the problem with love?

You may have to read this again in order to discover.