If you sit by the river long enough...

I don't believe anything is happenstance. I know that the word itself has its place, and I even use it from time to time. But, I just don't believe that anything happens randomly without a purpose, no matter how great or small. I believe that God loves us enough to give us the free will to do as we please, but also longs for a relationship with us in return for His unconditional love for us. This is based on everything I've ever read in the Bible, and based on what He has spoken to my heart over the years during and after meditation and prayer.

I have watched two different prime time shows this year that both used a famous quote from an old Japanese proverb attributed to Sun Tzu: "If you sit by the river long enough, you will see the body of your enemy float by". The first time I heard it was on "The Mentalist", a show starring Simon Baker. Everyone who knows me realizes that I'm obsessed with this show...okay, AND Simon Baker. :-) The second time I heard this quote was on last weeks episode of "Flash Forward". (In unrelated news, the star character of the show is played by Joseph Fiennes; if you don't know how to pronounce his name, just take a good look at him, and that's how it's pronounced - FINE. My gosh.) Sometimes I think that if I wasn't so into my husband (in EVERY way) he would leave me due to these silly, albeit excessive celebrity obsessions. :-)

After hearing the quote for the second time in less than two weeks, I spent a few moments lingering on how exactly this quote may be relevant in my own life. You could just note the context that was used in both shows to get a good idea of the quote itself actually means: the people that are out to get you will eventually meet their own demise, so to speak, and you will usually hear a secondhand account of it how it all went down.

Last night, I spent about an hour on the phone with a really good friend of mine that I used to work with. She still works for the company that I was laid off from, and she gives me updates about things from time to time. I am increasingly disappointed in some of the things that were confirmed for me. One of life's hard lessons is that there are some people that you simply CANNOT trust; my gut usually makes me aware of this, but one of my inherent "flaws" is that I always try to find the good in people, even those that don't deserve it. I sometimes go as far as befriending some of them. But most of the time, untrustworthy people will ALWAYS be just that. That's just the way it is, and can only begin to enjoy our life more when we accept this and adjust ourselves accordingly.

I'm not sitting on the dock with a pair of binoculars waiting on bodies to float by, but I get the feeling that in due time, I might see a couple that I wasn't expecting. Too bad...

"I won't be IGNORED!"

Remember that classic line from Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction"? Any woman watching that scene could relate to that line. Even if you aren't a home-wrecking, man-stealing, psychopath, one thing ALL women can relate to is how much we HATE being ignored.

A good friend of mine told me something a while back that I'll never forget. She said, "Some people are miserable enough to go out of their way to make you feel left out and ignored." At the time I thought she was expressing the sentiment of someone who was extremely paranoid. But as time moved forward, I began to clearly see what she meant.

Ever get the feeling that someone is INTENTIONALLY ignoring you? You go out of your way to get to know them, only to be rebuffed with silence? You make yourself available to them repeatedly but get no response from them? Your first thought may be, "Oh they're just busy and will reach out when they have time." Except, you soon notice that they reach out to others pretty regularly...just not you. :-) Ever felt this way?

What does it mean? Maybe they already have enough friends, and just aren't interested in making anymore. Maybe they find your particular personality annoying. That's possible. Maybe they think you're being fake, because NO ONE can be THAT genuinely nice! Or maybe they are envious of you. You and your encouraging smiles actually remind them of how unhappy they are. Who knows!

That's the overall point I am getting to. Who knows, and who CARES? I don't think we should love people any less because they don't jump for joy when we come around. Maybe if we try to be more understanding of the fact that they are at a period in their life right now where they are just not that into you. They definitely have that right, and it should be respected. If we genuinely care about them, wouldn't we focus more on praying for them than analyzing why they aren't reacting to us a certain way in the flesh?

Sometimes being ignored is a good thing. Maybe it's not meant for you to be caught up in whatever drama they may have going on. And maybe it's meant for you to stay strong and far enough away from their situation to provide the best type of assistance possible...the fervent prayers of a strong believer. Being ignored doesn't seem so bad when you think of it this way, does it? :-)

Beyond Myself

What's with the random, new blog template design? What does "beyond myself" refer to? Both are valid questions.

I'm trying to come up with a nice Spring design that I'm happy with for my blog. So far, I've been completely unsuccessful. I usually only have about 1 hour to myself during the week, and even less than that on the weekends, sadly. Okay, I'm exaggerating about the weekends, but still. The graphic at the top of my blog is one that I found online. It reminds me of my childhood. It reminds me of the area my late aunt Gwen lived in when my sister and I were very young, and would visit her. I really get nostalgic when I think about being at her house as a little child. She used to have a pretty dog named Lassie. She had very nice neighbors...the Landers family. There was a girl my age who my sister and I played with a lot. She was so sweet and very pretty. I ran into her back in the summer of 1994, I believe. Wow, it's amazing where my brain will go when I let it wander with restraints.

Beyond Myself refers to my state of mind right now. Today I had my FILL of selfishness and superficiality. It was a little much. When I look back 3 years, I remember that I wasn't as concerned about my physical appearance as I am now. I've always been extremely vain, but never this overly concerned about my physical appearance. I was a much happier, low-key person then. I just enjoyed my life and appreciated the things that mattered: my husband, my family, my friends, my church family, my service to God. I look back at pictures of me right before and after I had my son, and even right after having my daughter. I look so much happier and my smile looks a lot less forced and "posey". I want to go back to those times. Or maybe it's simply my attitude that needs adjusting. Either way I definitely need to get on a path that takes me away from this overly self-involved person I've become over the past three years.

Please forgive the quickly thrown together blog template design. Maybe the next time I get a week off from work, I'll have some play time to put together a really nice web design. I know, not likely, huh?

Privacy is becoming a thing of the past...

This tech-savvy world that we live in is pretty cool. I'll be the first to admit this. One of the more interesting things to me about this age we're living in is how readily available information is. I'm not even referring to everyday things such as searching for "World War II" or browsing youtube.com for your favorite video. I'm talking about the fact that with the click of a button, you can pretty much find out ANYTHING you want about someone.

Let's go even further. We have Facebook.com, which is by far the BEST online social networking site of all times. Even CNN utilizes it while reporting news stories! At its inception, Facebook seemed completely unique and much "safer" than Myspace. Privacy options within Facebook are more detailed; in fact, the default privacy settings are always pretty high, which means you have to intentionally make yourself available to be found.

If you're heavy into Facebook, then you know that it has become almost a brand new animal over the past 24 months. External applications can be built by developers and hooked into the Facebook API and used by any "Facebookers" that want to install them. One such application is the "Compare People" application developed by Ivko Maksimovic.

Compare People allows you to rate your friends. Upon running the application, you will be asked 20 questions. EX: "Who is smarter?", "Who would you rather sleep with?", "Who is more punctual?" With each question, two of your friends Facebook profile pictures are randomly selected and displayed on the screen. You click on the picture of the friend that you would like to select as an answer to the question. So if, say, my boss has Facebook and has added me to his friend list, he can run the Compare People application and get a question that says "Who is prettier?". My profile picture could be one of his choices. If he selects me as "prettiest", my "social rankings" will change within the Compare People application. I happen to have the app installed; here is a list of my current social rankings:




Seems pretty slick (from a programmer's point of view) and pretty harmless (if you've already graduated from high school/college or are over the age of 25, at least). The good news is that even though you can check your social rankings, you can never actually find out who voted for or against you for any given category. Even though the anonymity is comforting, there is a caveat. Also available within the social rankings list are specific details of who you won and lost against! You may be thinking NO BIGGIE since you still don't know WHO voted for or against you. Not so fast. Take a look at specific details of who I won and lost against in the category "Who is Prettier?":



Notice, the person I lost against is anonymous. This probably means 1 of 2 things: either they don't have the Compare App installed, or they installed it and later changed their privacy settings so that they will not be shown in the Compare App or listed in the Social Rankings. That's fine, but here's why it still kind of sucks. Look at the image directly above again. The two individuals that I won against happen to be my co-workers. Both of their profile names and pictures are displayed (I removed their names and whited-out their faces) which means they have the Compare App installed. I only have a small amount of co-workers listed as Facebook friends, and an even smaller number who installed the Compare People app! Like 6 or 7 tops. So it's not difficult to narrow down who probably voted. Doesn't seem so cool anymore does it?

I'm not trying to make something out of nothing. Just wanted to point out that we still have to be socially responsible and sometimes pick things apart a little bit deeper on our own to discover what we're making available. Happy Facebooking! :-)

Real Life Drama: Update

Remember the situation that the kids and I were involved in a few weeks ago? I am not exaggerating when I say that every other day or so since then I have been receiving phone calls and emails asking me if I'm okay; even as recently as today. There have been no less than 30 individuals overall who have approached me about this situation that they saw on the local news. This afternoon I found it interesting to reflect on how my friends and family reacted after seeing or finding out about this news story:

1) Most of the people who called to check on me actually waited at least a few days before contacting me. They all said the exact same thing: they figured that so much was going on and I probably didn't want to be bothered. They guessed that I would just want to spend time with my family. Most of them sounded really shaken, even though they already knew I was okay by the time I spoke with them. Their genuine concern really meant a lot.

2) A few people contacted me the same evening or the very next morning! These individuals are not people that I'm in intimately close relationships with (i.e. My VP, a few of my managers, friends from middle/high school, etc...) It was so thoughtful for them to get in touch with me immediately, even though I'm not in close personal relationships with them.

3) A few of my friends didn't know about it until I brought it up to them. Some of them responded in anger that they missed out on the opportunity to be there for me during the situation. That meant a whole lot as well. Seriously, it feels wonderful and is very comforting to know that people care.

My favorite of all, though, is my hairstylist. I spoke with him over the phone today; here's a snippet of the conversation:

Stylist: "Girl, did I see you on the news a few weeks ago?"

Me: "YES!! OMG, drama right??"

Stylist: "Girl yes! But I was happy for you."

Me: "Oh, thanks!"

Stylist: "Yes, your hair was looking fierce that night!"

ROFL!!! I LOVE my stylist. :-)

Super excited!

Today is already slated to be an extra awesome day. One of my good friends is coming up to CNN to have lunch with me! I haven't seen him in almost 2 years, and right now I feel like a kid on summer vacation! He and I have so much catching up to do, and we usually spend the whole time we're together laughing about everything going on around us. :-) I'm always in a much lighter mood after I've been around him.

My husband and I call 2007 the "Year of Reconnecting". There are a lot of people that we lost touch with after we got married, and ESPECIALLY after the kiddies came along. Our whole life went down a new path.

Well, now that so much time has gone by, I realize the emptiness of being apart from some of these people, and I have decided to make a huge effort to have them in my life and to be a part of theirs. I am excited about the present and future of renewed fun, bonding, and adventures!