Because I Have Been Given Much

ok, sorry, I found another really great music video and had to share :)

"Forget Me Not"

Hello! Today has been such a great day! You know those days where you feel rejuvenated and you get peace and quiet to do the things that make you feel so fulfilled and happy? Well, today was one of those days. I read this talk and it is so wonderful. I have heard it before and even read it a few times I think, but today it really touched me. Here is a picture from google about the forget me nots President Uchtdorf was speaking about... What a beautiful flower. You have to read/watch the talk to get it, but I'll probably put a picture of this flower on my wall now :) Anyway, what stuck out to me is that I am an extremely goal oriented person. I LOVE making goals, I love the plan of action of how to achieve them and I adore the feeling of knowing I reached the goal. Almost every Sunday I make new goals for how I can be better the next week. Today as I sat and thought about how I could be better I got a little sad thinking I make the same goals almost every week and I improve a little but I always have to make the same goal!!! WHY DON'T I EVER LEARN?!?!? But this talk comforted me and helped me to see that while yes, goals are good and important, I need to love who I am at every step along the way and recognize that while I am not good, I am still a good person who is trying very hard, and though I may fail quite a bit, I never truly fail because I am constantly learning. Anyway, I know that we are children of God and through him we can become perfect but need to remember along the way that if the Supreme Creator of the Universe can love us with our imperfections, we should be able to love ourselves. Hope you're having an amazing Sunday!!

This song is cool but not really feeling the jacket... but the scenery kinda reminds me of our hike in St. George so I had to have it playing :)

So we drove to St. George on Friday then got there around 11. We were soooo tired, but we couldn't go to sleep before we took some embarrassing pictures...

Then the next day we woke up incredibly early...not. The next day we slept in until our heart's content, then we went on a fun hike!!

The next night we went to Vegas. I had never been there. Not going to lie, I really dislike Vegas and never ever want to go back, but it's a good thing I had good company because that made it still fun :)

In Vegas we watched the water show...

and went to Hard Rock Cafe...

The next day we went to church and then took a nice nature walk up to dixie rock which I can't find the pictures from  and came home early Monday morning. It was such a nice weekend and so great to have a break from school. I came back ready to immerse myself in school again. Wahoo!!

Side note, completely unrelated...guess... does a boy or a girl sing this song?



Wrong. It's a girl. I was SHOCKED!!! I have thought this was a boy for how many years?!! This is one of my favorite songs (along with the rest), and props to her for having a good voice and singing though!!

randomness

Hello!!! I have been a terrible blogger, but oh well :) This post is going to be a little of everything because I have lots of random, worthless things on my mind that I feel the need to put on the world wide web so I can stop thinking about them :) This week are two of my midterms!! WOOT WOOT!!!!! Come on, cheer with me ;) so it'll be a pretty crazy week and what am I doing? Blogging... oops. It's ok though because this can be my outlet so then I can be rejuvenated to study right? ;) I usually don't like these very much, but this one made me laugh inside a lot and described me quite a bit I feel like...

So, this past week was full of giggles and laughs due to our road trip to St. George! It was so much fun- recap and pictures to come (because I know you were dying to see them of course)

Here are some of the songs I've been loving lately. Enjoy!
This first song is just really pretty and kinda soothing in a way- strange- I know.

This next one kinda relates back to my post on the American Dream and lots of my other posts about dreams :) I am a firm believer in plunging head first into anything you hope for whether it be scholastically, love, an incredible career, etc. My Nana (grandma) used to always say to my Father, "what's the worst that can happen?" I've tried to live by that- after getting hurt quite a bit I felt like I shut down for a while and decided to not hope for things too out of the ordinary to protect my heart and lately I had a very heart-breaking experience, but it made me so happy, because I realized I had learned to hope to again, and the worst that can happen is our hopes don't come true, we are hurt, grow stronger, and find something way better farther down the road than what we had hoped for. So, in reality, the worst, really isn't all that bad :)




This next one I just love and think it's cute :) sorry, there's a swear word in it and the music video is a little strange...



I have always loved this song and looked up the music video for it today and it almost ruined the song for me- I wasn't sure whether to be frightened or laugh- so don't ask me now why I'm showing it to you, but I sure hope he was kidding...Anywho, the song is still really pretty

Is it dead?

This is one of my favorite semesters of school I have ever had! Life is so great right now I can't even believe it, but yesterday I was in one of my classes and we talked about something that is one of my passions...the American Dream. First off, let me just establish my major is American Studies, so obviously I have some pretty strong opinions on these subjects ;) "The American Dream" is something that is quite often discussed and something I have always loved, however, oftentimes when it is discussed, I feel like people scoff and say that the American Dream is a myth. In my class yesterday the class basically came to a consensus that the American Dream is dead. I disagreed and explained my reasoning, but no one sided with me, but that wasn't what bothered me, what bothered me was trying to figure out is it just me? Am I naive? Is it dead? And here is what I decided...

First, to analyze this, we have to establish what the American Dream is in our minds- since I'm the one doing the talking here, I think I'll establish what it is to me ;) To me the American Dream is the possibility that if you are willing to work hard, you can rise in your station, that you do not have to be what your parents or grandparents were whether that is monetarily or emotionally, it is the belief and the hope that we can change. After a lot of thinking I decided, if this kind of thinking is naive, I will take it and I hope to be "naive" forever, because if I ever lose this hope that I can be/do whatever I want if I am willing to put in the work , then what is the point of work?

Above are some of my heroes. The first picture is of my family way back when, and I don't have a picture of my Dad's parents on my computer so, I just showed the product of them- my family! :) and the second picture is of my Mom's parents. These people in large, are a huge reason why I am so adamant about the American Dream. My Dad's parents (first picture representation), were alive in the Depression. He fought in World War II and she took a job spotting fighter planes on the beach, they had nothing, but worked their way to the top. The second picture, my Mom's parents are amazing as well. My Grandpa was born in a log cabin, literally and decided he wanted church and education in his life, so he became active in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and went to school. He married the love of his life, provided for an ever-growing family while a student in college, then he went and received his masters. Right when he was born, someone could have looked at him and predicted where his life might go and predicted that he would never get an education, etc. however, they would be wrong, because he was willing to fight for this dream.

I shared that story in class and my teacher said, well does anyone have an example of the opposite? I thought about it, and decided I know lots of people who work really hard and choose to have a good attitude despite all the things that happen to them and therefore, they are happy, yet I know many who try and then bad things happen to them , so they give up and decide to be miserable, therefore, obviously, happiness is a myth- correct? Of course not, that is absurd. I need to clarify that I know many people work extremely hard to rise in their station of life and are not able to because of unfortunate circumstances- I do not wish to downplay that or claim that they just did not work hard enough, because I do not believe that at all, the people I am addressing are the ones that say we will never get there, therefore we will not try and the American Dream is Dead. Is it dead because it's impossible or is it dead because notions of hope and hard work are dead inside of us? We live in a day in age when if we have to walk a block, we are really upset about it and if we have to cook something on the stove which may take ten minutes rather than 2 in the microwave- we are so upset. I think maybe the American Dream is dead because we no longer know how to work like our grandparents and we have allowed media and cynicism to turn us into a pessimistic people who have no hope. I believe, however, if we are willing to work and hope- we can be/do whatever we want that God sees fit for us in our lives and that, to me is the American Dream and is most definitely not dead.