And I continue to be weird.

I might regret this later, but this is my life right now...vlogging about stuff that doesn't matter.

Reminiscing.

Lately I have been reflecting back on missions trips from my past and what an experience each of them was. The devastation in Japan has me thinking about it even more now because of the help needed there, and I have been super annoyed with anyone that has made it about them somehow/made jokes about it. I’ve just been feeling lately that I want to get out and do something different. Something away from here, out of my comfort zone, but something that will allow me to meet great people and build great relationships. I have been a bit discouraged as the job I am working on taking looks like it will be a part time thing so I am already looking at other options. I am going to the Biola career fair in a few weeks and will check out my options around here. I really want to avoid working 2 part time jobs and just be committed to one thing. I have been praying for insight, patience, and perseverance lately that I will just find what God has for me and will follow through with whatever he puts on my heart. Reflecting on the good parts of my past has been comforting this weekend.

click here to see the full post with photos.

Get money, get paid.

So for anyone that has been under a rock this past week, I am almost EMPLOYED.

Literally the first interview after the job at the church fell through. The job will be working with people, preschoolers to old people, that have learning disabilities or are advanced and want to reach their potential. We would teach them how to learn, but not specific subjects like tutoring. It’s called brain training and it’s really taking off here. This is the website if you are curious and it explains it a lot better than I do. Unfortunately it costs a butt load and a lot of people can’t afford it, but hopefully it will be able to reach more. Students that go through the program improve their IQ by 15 points and improve their social skills as well. Students are assigned to different trainers (I would be a trainer) for a minimum of 12 weeks. We will do a lot of games and mental activities and things during that time that help them. In the interview we had to do crazy tests so they could make sure we had the capabilities to implement all these activites.

The interview was so long and I ended up getting interviewed at 10:00PM (reminder: bring book to future interviews). First they gave us a paper with b’s, d’s, p’s, q’s and told us really quickly one time that we had to circle one, triangle another, underline another, and cross out another. MIND NUMBING. We had 2 minutes to do the whole page and most people didn’t even hear the directions right. Then I went in a room with a lady who told me I had to replace certain sounds with different ones and finally she would say a word and I would have to say it backwards. CRAZY. I got all of them right except when she said FINE and I said ‘NIF’ and it should have been KNIFE because of the long “I” sound…OH MY BAD. Then next I went in a room with a girl who set up a metronome and I had to clap every other beat while telling her about myself. Then I had to clap every 3rd beat. I honestly don’t think I would have been able to do that without having played violin because I had to use one at my violin lesson every week, back in the day. HATE THAT THING. Then she pulled out a sheet of words that said different colors, but the colors of the word were different than the word. So the word ‘yellow’ would be blue. So I had to say the color the word was while clapping every other beat, every third beat, and then while the lady was distracting me. Then the final part of that was clapping every other beat and saying the color of the first word, the word of the next word, the color of the next word, the word of the next word, all while she was distracting me. AHHHHHHH!!!! They want to see that you can focus your attention on one thing. It was crazy and I thought for sure I got something wrong after all of it (it felt like an eye exam after awhile) but she said I got everything right. Then the last part was the interview with the boss lady who was super nice. She ended up being a pastor’s wife and completely understood my previous situation with the church. I was so relieved and felt God’s hand over that situation, as I was worried about how to explain that I was in process of getting hired at a church but it didn’t work out. To someone non-familiar with the church, that would just sound like “oh, she did something wrong and wasn’t good enough to get hired” but she understood the process so I was so thankful for that. She asked me a few tough questions (I am so bad at answering interview questions on the spot) but it went well obviously. So that’s it! It’s crazy and it’s in Orange so that commute sucks but I might move that way come June, depending on if the job is solid enough. I have to move out of Long Beach come the end of May anyways so I have to start thinking about it. I HATE MOVING. I need to hire someone to move for me next time because it sucked.

I went to training this past weekend and will observe sessions this week. We do all the brain activities in training and it is HARD. You have to be fast, you have to be correct, and you have to multi task. And we all take turns demonstrating the activities in front of the group. IT SUCKS but everyone supports each other when we mess up as we are all learning. I have made a friend too, she goes to Biola of course and we laugh our way through training together. Anyways, training lasts all through March with the certification test taking place at the beginning of April. It sucks that I have to wait that long to start working but that would be the case with any job I went and interviewed for right now. Prayers are appreciated that I will do my best and that I will pass the certification test, and that if I do get hired the hours are solid and the job is great. So far everything is looking good and I am super stoked.

God is good. I love thinking about how he had me looking at the church job for 2 months to stall me, so that I could be able to take this job opening and that maybe this is where I am supposed to be. Maybe later on I will get promoted or be able to take this program to the public schools. Maybe this training will be a factor in a future job I get. I don’t know what the future holds, but I know everything happens for a reason.

Twitter Crap.

For my recent post, click here, because I am too lazy to post every picture and commentary over again.

What’s on your playlist?

I have been on this health kick lately. I went shopping recently and had a bad experience trying clothes on at Forever 21…It was hard to fit into some stuff and I was angry. I figure I have absolutely no life so I might as well try to better myself. I just wanna see what happens and maybe ‘get fit’ in the process. I have noticed that my headaches do not appear when I exercise, which the doctors always told me, but I refused to believe it haha. I am also changing my diet because I have some food allergies and want to put good things into my body. It has been so, so, so, so, so, so hard. I love food, especially fatty food. And I am always hungry. Always. BUT I have found some awesome recipes that are awesome and found that, with a little effort, it is not all that bad. My favorite recipe so far is apple braised chicken. It’s super moist and the baked apples are great flavor.

The key to motivating myself to work out is changing up my workouts, rewards (like jogging to Coffee Bean for an iced coffee), and AN AWESOME UPBEAT PLAYLIST. On my workout playlist right now is:

Britney Spears - “Toy Soldier”, “Hot As Ice”, and “Circus”

-Cobra Starship with Leighton Meester (aka my favorite Gossip Girl character, Blair Waldorf) -“Good Girls Go Bad”

-DJ Khaled - “All I Do is Win”

-Edward Maya - “Stereo Love”

-Glee - “Dog Days Are Over” (I like to run to their version more than Florence’s…go figure).

-Jay Sean and Nicki Minaj - 2012

-Ke$ha - “Blow” (she sucks but I need those beats)

-Ludacris with Sum41 - “Get Back” (my. favorite. rap. song)

-Nicki Minaj - “Super Bass”

-The Pretty Reckless - “Make Me Wanna Die”

-Eminem and Rihanna - “Love The Way You Lie” (something about the raw emotion and anger motivates me haha, I always skip it on the radio though)

-Usher - “More”

-Timbaland and Katy Perry - “If We Ever Meet Again”

-Lady Gaga - “Monster”

What’s on your playlist?

I am usually a happy girl

But it’s been really hard lately. I have been dreading writing this post. I didn’t get the job that I thought was pretty much set in stone. It hit me out of nowhere. All the people that supervised my teaching said great things about my performance…except one guy. And that was it. It was over. My uncle felt that God wanted a unanimous decision to hire me and he did not have one.

Of course I know that God has something better for me and that this all happened for a reason. But I still can’t wrap my head around why I spent 2 months preparing for a job that I thought I had. I wasted so much time, all while my finances continued to drain. What did God have me learn through that? That I should try my best, get excited about something, and then get blind sided? Talking through it with family just killed me even more. It took me all day to tell my mom because I knew I would only be able to utter one sentence before I broke down. It hurts so badly when you disappoint yourself, but when you disappoint others too because everyone thinks you could’ve done something better.

And now this whole other aspect has been developing this week. The fact that I literally felt that this is what God had for me. How could I have felt so sure? It made me doubt not only my abilities, but my relationship with God. Do I even hear Him? I thought I had spent time with Him and all the signs pointed to this job. It’s like I don’t even know anymore.

And on top of all of this, I have become so lonely here. My roommate is gone all day at school and work and I just sit around job hunting. All my friends are scattered. La Mirada, Visalia, Minnesota, Oregon, Paramount, and beyond. And I have to pay money to see them (either driving or flying) and it’s starting to stress me out.

I called my mom again today and she went into this rant about how I don’t dress appropriately and how that might’ve been a factor in me not getting the job. Really? I haven’t lived with you for 5 years and you are going to tell me I dress like a slut? I worked in an office for THREE YEARS, and then student taught. I know how to adhere to a professional expectation. And why would you even give me another thing to doubt myself on?

AND THEN FREAKING FACEBOOK APPARENTLY DECIDES TO SHUT DOWN MESSAGING SO I CAN’T EVEN MESSAGE MY FRIENDS. We’ve had this thread going since graduation and I refuse to start a new one because all of our thoughts, struggles, emotions, and laughs have been in that thread. SO THANKS FOR THAT FACEBOOK.

The best news is that I get to return to my friends at my old church, which is one of the initial reasons I did not want to pursue this job. I was upset about leaving so was very happy to return, despite the reasons why.

I think I am just scared of getting stuck working somewhere like Wal Mart for years. And I am scared that I just don’t have what it takes after this whole experience.

Ok, this is the only emo post I will be writing about this. Prayers always appreciated.

Over a year of waiting.

and I got my tweet back from Kelly. Others got dozens, but I was always unlucky. I finally picked the right question and asked her “which Friends character is your favorite and which one do you resemble the most?” and I got this:

So that is 2 OF MY FAVORITE THINGS COMBINED. Friends and Kelly. AND 2 TWEETS FROM EDEN ESPINOSA ON MONDAY. WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!?!

Guess that means my luck is changing and I’ll finally win a meet and greet after 8 YEARS.

For those of you thinking “oh a tweet from Kelly on the internet, stupid, she doesn’t even know who you are” stop raining on my parade. This is some hardcore dedication paying off! Haha.

I needed this. As materialistic as it is, I needed this.