Apologetic Innocence

I've sat staring at this dang cursor blinking at me for at least 5 minutes trying to formulate my thoughts enough to start. All I can think of is how ridiculous this thought is:

I am ashamed to be innocent. 

Have we as a society really gotten to a point where girls who keep their clothes ON are the ones who feel bad? Like something is wrong with us because we have a little self-respect and aren't just going to give ourselves to whomever? I realized today that I try to make excuses for myself, and I try to be something I'm not, to fit in. Ordinarily I wouldn't condone it at all, but on this matter, I have an innate desire to misrepresent myself.

Nothing bugs me more than when people think I'm "naive" or "goody two-shoes." So obviously I set out to prove them wrong and in doing so have let them take something I can never get back. Yet, I keep giving and giving, trying so hard to be just one in the crowd. Who the heck wants to be one in the crowd? This giving of myself doesn't come naturally because I'm not ready, and still, I find myself trying to pry my innocence off while it clings to me. 

Why should I have to apologize for living a better life? What's wrong with not knowing everything they are talking about, or having experienced everything they have? I'll get to someday and it will be so much sweeter when the time is right. I'm not going to rush to grow up, and you can't make me feel bad for that. 

So, no more apologizing, no more blending. I can be innocent if I want to and everyone can just deal with it. In 10 years, we'll see who made the right choice. 

An Interesting Note on the Power of Prayer

The other day I was reading in my Wellness textbook  a chapter about how Spirituality relates to health. In a small five-paragraph section about prayer, they mentioned that prayer benefits even those who do not know they are being prayed for. In a study, a group of people around the country prayed for 192 coronary care patients at a certain hospital, but didn't pray for 201 other people in the unit. No one knew they were being prayed for, but the patients that were prayed for had significantly fewer complications than those who weren't.

That's a lot to think about. Is there someone you should be praying for?

And we begin...with some words.

Today, I was inspired to begin a blog. I want to start a blog that doesn't focus on the petty things I tend to find myself drawn to, but one where I can honestly pontificate to myself and I suppose others if anyone reads it. This is my senior year of high school and is proving itself to be very stressful. Who knew it would be so hard to pick where I will spend some of the most formative years of my life? Therefore, I will probably use this to keep you all up to date on my latest thoughts and shenanigans regarding the future, but also I think I would like to post little random thoughts I have about society, God, and the ideas I am learning about (plus I'm sure this will prove itself an excellent procrastinating tool...in fact, it already is, but Statistics homework can wait).

Tonight at youth group the message was all about words. The influence that other people's words have on you and the influence your words have on others. I realized through the sermon that other people's words don't affect me in the long term. I remember instances where I have been upset by something somebody has said, but when asked to present the worst thing anyone has said about me, I drew a blank. I'm going to take this as a good thing, that negative comments seem to mostly bounce off me, although I am positive I haven't received the verbal abuse many others have. What I'm trying to get at though is that, words don't really affect me and I've really never thought about how my words affect others. With this thought in mind, I aim to pay much more attention to the words I use this week. 

Words are such a funny thing. So small and easy to use, yet so powerful. The idea that someone can change my mood, or the tone of my day or week with a little movement of their teeth and tongues is weird. I guess I've always aimed to not let people influence me, I largely believe in my own ability to make my own day. I have the power to be positive and it's strange to me when I realize that not everyone thinks that way. Most of my friends don't think that way. The idea that I can set the tone for somebody else throws me for a loop every single time. People are so dang complicated.

Welcome to my journey of figuring that out.