Love Languages (2)

Wait......again?

You may be wondering why I am doing another one of these posts, and you'd be completely just in that. I made a post about this back in May of last year, but that was over 6 months ago, and I think that I am entitled to make another one every once in awhile. Besides, I find it to be pretty stinking interesting, and I like learning about myself, so why not? =]

I covered a lot of the five love languages idea in part 1. So, the challenge here is to talk about the same subject in a different way. In part 2, I'm going to talk about my order of love languages and then delve a little bit into how I interact with others and the applicability of the whole thing.

With that, here we go!

1 - Words of Affirmation (Score: 11)

Words of Affirmation is definitely number 1 on my list. The quickest way to build me up is to say something nice about me, and the quickest way to tear me down is to say something unkind. I can be pretty sensitive sometimes, and I find that I can be down on myself because of this. In recent times, I have begun to realize exactly how important words are to me—if someone I admire or care for says something nice about me, this is 95% likely to define my day (and in some cases, my week.)

Words of affirmation I might give:

   • Compliment appearance (mostly guys, I'm tired of my chivalry being misinterpreted =P )

   • Tell someone that they are doing a good job.
   • Check in with someone who seems sad.
   • Offer some word of encouragement
   • Compliment someone's character

Words of affirmation I love to receive:

   • Compliment appearance/voice/humor/anything pretty much (goes a loooong way)
   • Compliment me on a task that I spent a lot of time on
   • Give me an encouraging word
   • Compliment character or decision

Avoid:

   • Harsh words
   • Excessive mocking
   • Unsing non-honoring language (Using non-honoring language makes me feel agitated)

2 - Physical Touch (Score: 9)

Ahhhh, this is a bit of a weird one to explain. This is really, really important to those that are close to me, but if you aren't close to me it feels like an invasion of my space. So, those that just come up and give me hugs all the time, it can get a little old. I just don't even know how to process it. I have a family member that always likes to give me hugs, and sometimes it's really, really nice. On the flip side, I tend to enjoy being free, and the limitation caused by all these hugs can get a bit old. And by a bit, I mean a lot. So, the hard part is finding a balance.

Physical touch I might give:

   • Hugs
   • High fives
   • Pats on the back
   • Handshakes (not very filling, but it's better than nothing)

Physical touch I love to receive:

   • Hugs (from those I admire or care for)
   • High fives
   • Pats on the back
   • Hand holding (obviously not with just anyone... =P)

Avoid:

   • Long hugs (if I don't need it)
   • Letting go of a hug (if I need it)
   • Sudden hugs

3 - Quality Time (Score: 7)

Used to be my first, but now it's my third. I looked back through a letter that I wrote a long time ago about quality time, and I noticed that most of my items that were about "Quality Time" were actually either Physical Touch or Words of Affirmation oriented. Looking back, I know why the quality time that I did receive was not as filling as it should have been. 

Quality time I might give:

   • Doing something meaningful with other people

   • Eating a meal together

   • Car rides with friends

   • Playing games with friends

Quality time I like to receive:

   • Doing something meaningful with people I admire or care for

   • Playing games with friends

4 - Gifts (Score: 2)

Always has been one of my lowest. It's about giving and receiving gifts. For me (and others in my family) it's not as much about the quantity as the quality. For instance, receiving something that was mentioned in passing would be more meaningful than receiving a bunch of random books or something. What's important is that the gift says: "Hey, I was thinking of you, so I got you this gift." What matters most is the heart from which it was given.

Because it's so low, I can't even think of gifts that I would give or receive. I'll write it up how I'd assume people with this love language would feel, (and as always) feel free to offer comments/constructive criticisms below.

Gifts that someone with this love language might like to give:

   • Something meaningful to the receiver

   • A home made thing that had time and effort put into it

Gifts that someone with this love language might like to receive:

   • Something meaningful to the receiver

   • A home made thing that had time and effort put into it

Avoid:

   • Last minute gifts

   • Meaningless gifts

5 - Acts of Service (Score: 1)

My absolute lowest. My mom's absolute highest. Obviously, this doesn't get me into any trouble whatsoever. =P Acts of Service is about making the load lighter, and going out of the way to do so. If a chore is to sweep the stairs, then sweeping the rooms adjacent to those would make anyone with this love language feel loved. As you may be able to tell, I learned a lot of this stuff through my mother, but some of it I have learned through a close friend of mine. He and my mom have demonstrated a lot of this language, and I've tried to pay attention. So, I think I have a better grasp of this than I do with gifts, and I might actually be pretty close to right on a lot of these.

Acts of Service that someone with this love language may like to do:

   • Take on (and complete) a large task

   • Use their skills in a group to do something that they are good at

   • Do a simple task for someone

Acts of Service that someone with this love language may like to receive:

   • Get food or drink for his person

   • Assistance with a task

   • Clear understanding of a job

   • The act of having a need anticipated and completed before this person can worry about it

Avoid:

   • Leaving this person with lots of extra work to do

   • Giving tasks without guidelines

   • Procrastination (on even your own tasks!)

Annnnnnnd, that's it!

For further reading on the love languages, check out this forum post. 

If you want to take the love languages assessment, follow this link.

Hope that you folks enjoyed it. I had a lot of fun writing it, (even if it took me 3+ hours and a nap to finish). I feel that it was worth it, and hopefully you did too. Feel free to leave your love languages in the comments below if you want! It'd be cool to know those. =)

Bye bye!

(This) Last Week

Recap
Well, if you read my post at the beginning of the week, you'd know that I was having a bit of a rough time. For a while, that's how it was. I was just kinda drifting along, and I didn't really give a flying cow pie about what happened to me or with my life. The underlying tone of my last post was a slight:
"WHAT THE HECK, GOD?"

That wasn't all of my thoughts, but those are the most obvious. Underneath that there was a layer like this:
"God, if you love me, why are you letting me go through this?"

Since Monday
After that last post, God immediately started showing up. Either I started doing more fun things, or God totally helped change my perspective. I mean I suppose I did some pretty awesome stuff, but the way that I feel is much better than I have felt in, I dunno, a year? So, it's weird to say the least. Like, to go around and enjoy life, for the beautiful and occasionally slightly messed up place it is. I'm not forcing myself to do fun stuff every once in awhile like I had to sometimes before, I want to go out and do this crazy stuff. I started filming a Vlog today while at my school and I'm goofing around everywhere I go. I'm still a little outta whack emotionally as I'm trying to adjust to who I am now, and how I want to live my life, but hey, aren't we all learning this?

I'm concentrating on worrying less what people think about me and more about what I think about me. More what God thinks about me. This is definitely changing my behavior. I think I'm on the up and up right now. Life isn't some crapfest, it's God's greatest gift to me.

Honestly
I'm not some cool hotshot. I'm not some suffering child, walking on coals everywhere I go. I'm not the all star, and I'm not a selfish jerk. I'm not the greatest person ever but I'm certainly not the worst. Though I might have had some of these traits at some point in my past, I refuse to believe that that's all that I am.

I'm not just some negative trait.
I'm not a mistake I've made.

I'm just me.

And I'm okay with that.

Favorite Things of 2013

Silly Little Intro
So, a friend of mine made a post on his blog about his favorite things of 2013 and I figured that I'd go ahead and make a similar blog post.

2013 was a weird year for me. Lots of stuff happened. I battled depression during the later part of it, but there were many super-fun crazy-awesome times also. So with that, here we go, some of my favorite things of 2013.

Favorite Things of Twenty Thirteen

Entertainment

Favorite Movie That I Really Shouldn't Have Loved As Much As I Did: Pacific Rim
Pacific Rim may appear to be nothing more than a dumb action movie with sub-par acting, but when you examine closer, you learn that it actually is a dumb action movie with sub-par acting, but it is still amazing. The story is okay, a lot of the movie feels forced, but the setting seems very realized, and the action is a lot of fun. It's not a movie for everyone, but it is a movie for your inner child to enjoy. The effects were great, and the sound of each punch was great. Definitely made me feel like I was watching my action figures come alive. A pure joy to watch.

Favorite Surprisingly Decent Movie: Lone Ranger
Lone Ranger got way too much hate from the critics. It wasn't the most amazing movie that I've seen, and in fact wasn't the best film of the summer of 2013, but I still liked it. Why? Well, the story had some fun twists, the bad guys were significantly creepy, the action scenes were undeniably fun, Johnny Depp was great, and so was Armie Hammer. I liked the movie a lot more than I thought I would, and I really had a good time.

Favorite Sequel That I Thought Would Be Terrible: Despicable Me 2
A lot like the first. You've got the minions, the hilarious Gru and the three kids. Each one of these elements are used better than the first, maybe with the exception of Gru. Like the first, there's lots of character development, some funny moments, and random bits of screaming. The villain is hilarious, and the story was good, even if the twist was obvious. Great animated movie, that I liked almost as much as the first.

Favorite Movie Of The Year Period: The Desolation of Smaug
Forget that it's based off of a book. Peter Jackson is just about as faithful to the book as the Narnia movies were to their books, but it just works. For some reason, I was sitting there, buying every twist that Jackson threw in there. Martin Freeman was spectacular as Bilbo, and the subtlety of some of his performance was amazing. I loved every second he was on screen. They also started explaining the Necromancer stuff from the Appendices and the Silmarilion, and that was done much better than the first. One of my favorite thing about the Fellowship of the Ring was the diversity of the cultures shown, and this movie did the same exact thing. I loved the distinctive cultures of Lake-Town, the Lonely Mountain, Mirkwood Elven Halls, everything. Well acted, brilliantly shown and fun, this movie was a whooping good time.

Favorite TV show: Revolution (Season 2)
Yeah, a big surprise! With season 1, episdoes 1-10 were awful, and 11-20 were barely tolerable. I came back about number 14 because my brother made me and I finished up that season. I reluctantly started the second season hoping it to be good, and it certainly is great. All of the acting is up a notch (in some cases several) better than before, the stories make more sense, the action is better and there appears to be a strong overarching plot that's just starting to come into the picture. Everything that was bad about the first season is perfect with the second. This isn't my favorite show of all time, but it is still really good. My advice is to skip season 1 though. You'll only be behind on a bit, and frankly the terrible-ness that is most of season 1 isn't worth it.

Stuff That I Did

My summer especially was filled with adventure. But there were about 4 things (other than my relationship with my girlfriend (not going to go into that here, read my old posts... :P )) that were super duper awesome. Here are some of the important events of 2013, and a bit about 'em, not in order of occurrence, but instead in order of I have no idea, don't ask me why.

Improvapalooza Improv. Competition

Left to Right
Me, Grant, Miguel, Larissa, Austin

A competition of improvy-awesomeness. Back in December of 2012, us five auditioned for an improv team. In June of 2013 we went over to Chicago and competed with 13 other teams and took third place. It was a grand old time, and lots of fun for everyone. This next year, I'm on a team again, and we're heading all the way to Portland (woohoo, 30 minute drive!), and though there isn't going to be super crazy site seeing, it'll still be a good time. I'm excited to go and compete once more with Grant and Austin, though we'll miss Miguel's constant shenaniganry and Larissa's silliness this year.

Beauty and the Beast Crew Chief(ing)
In JTAG's winter session, Portland put on Beauty and the Beast. Larissa convinced me to do Crew Chief, so I figured that it wouldn't be that hard and gave it a go. I was not anticipating almost having a nervous breakdown the night before opening, or developing the deep relationships that I did with the crew. I've only been involved in three shows, but this one was my favorite by far. It was a great time for me to deepen my relationships with my friends involved, and it was such a fun time of my life.

Steam Powered Giraffe Concert

Okay. I like SPG, this is true. I enjoy their music, and I like their writing style. So, I went with some friends to go see them in April, and I had a blast. It was a ton of fun, and we even hung out at Larissa's sister's house on the way back. They sounded fantastic live, even though most of the band was super sick at the time of the show. All of the show was great, and I would definitely go see them again.



BSA Camp Fire Mountain
If you asked my why I was involved in Scouts and I didn't answer: Friends, Camping, Friends, and fun then I was either lying or delusional. I barely earned my Eagle, and mostly because I felt like it was something that I owed to myself, not something that I necessarily wanted to do. But Fire Mountain was a real treat. The staff weren't putting on a show like Baldwin, and the area was beautiful. The Troop fit really well together, I got to do improv, and I got a job offer because of how I acted. It was a huge growing time for me, where I let a lot of things go that didn't matter, and I deepened my relationship with Christ. It was really hard at times, but I came out of it so strong and free, and loving life. High point of the year? Summer Camp Fire Mountain.

2014
Well, there we go. Only took me lots of hours to write, but I think it was worth it. There's the high points of my year, all put together in a post. This last year had a lot of stuff in it that was pretty depressing. I will not lie and say that I loved everything about 2013, but it is nice to look back at all of the good times that I did have. It was a time of growth, and I'm excited for 2014 to be different. I went through probably the hardest thing for me, so I'm pretty sure that next year won't be worse. Even if it is, bring it on. God is my strength now, and I'm not going to be pushed around with him helping me.

To infinity and beyond! =D

Board Games For Boring Days (3)—Fiasco

A Deviation
All of the past board games that I've reviewed are board games. This one will not be, but I figured that I'd include it in the board games name, because it's in that vein of games (played with friends, not a video game, etc.) So, without further ado, I present to you the Indie RPG known as...

Fiasco

It's a game of story building, betrayal and unexpected events. It's a bit difficult to explain, so I'll simply use that which is supplied on by Bully Pulpit (the publisher) on their site.

"Fiasco is inspired by cinematic tales of small time capers gone disastrously wrong – inspired by films like Blood Simple, Fargo, The Way of the Gun, Burn After Reading, and A Simple Plan. You’ll play ordinary people with powerful ambition and poor impulse control. There will be big dreams and flawed execution. It won’t go well for them, to put it mildly, and in the end it will probably all go south in a glorious heap of jealousy, murder, and recrimination. Lives and reputations will be lost, painful wisdom will be gained, and if you are really lucky, your guy just might end up back where he started."

So, what do you need to play it? Fortunately, not much:

•3-5 players
•4 dice per person, 2 light and 2 dark (light for good resolutions, dark for bad)
•A Fiasco Playset {free ones are offered on the site}
•A copy of the Fiasco Tilt Table and the Fiasco Aftermath Table {Gotta buy the book or PDF for this one}
•Something to write with and on (the game suggests index cards and pencils)
•90 minutes - 3 Hours

Things start out normally, but quickly get out of hand. It's a game of escalating stakes, shifty characters and strong motivation. Everything may not be related at the beginning, but by the end everyone is usually in a huge entangled web of events, from which they can neither escape each other or their fates.


Pros:
•Deep character development
•You can drag others down with you, to create hilariously tense moments
•A story is crafted in the time it takes to watch one unfold in a movie
•Requires lots of thinking
•Game progression is escalated and controlled by the players
•Easily changed to fit the players {There aren't imagination police, so why not?}
•Game doesn't slow down after the start of act 1
•Allows room for beautiful nuances
•Twistedly lighthearted

Cons:
•It only works if everyone is invested in it
•Can be derailed if someone just argues their way through everything
•Requires lots of consensus... lots.
•Best if the players are comfortable with each other, because some of the subject matter is heavy
•There is no winner. Everyone loses to some degree. (Not exactly a con, just something to note)
•Starting act 1 on the first game can feel intimidating

Final Thoughts:
Dude. Great game if you have awesome friends. Get the gang together, and play the heck out of this game! It's a fun time for all!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I've also included some story from my first game. This is as I remember it, and some of the details are a bit fuzzy. If something wasn't right, well then, whoopsie. :P

It's setup so that people can just scroll by if they want, but if you'd like to read it, you should! It all started very normally, I was a community worker who just happened to drive a van full of weed in a small rural town...

Dehumanization of the Loved

A Quick Intro
This will involve a bit of a dive into my brain, just so you know. I was originally going to write about wisdom (maybe a future blog post) but I couldn't stop thinking about a certain quote. Recently I have gotten to the point of being myself again. I'm not depressed anymore, I mess around with people, and I generally just do stuff because its fun, not because I think I should.

Well, I read this quote yesterday, and I thought a lot of thoughts when I did.

“But remember, there are two ways to dehumanize someone: by dismissing them, and by idolizing them.” - David Wong

 I read that, and instantly I said, yeah, I agree with that. Then, I started to put the pieces together.

"by idolizing them"
Whoa. Boy.
Everyone has had that moment of being caught doing something they weren't supposed to do. Whether that was cheating, lying to someone's face and having them find out, or eating that cookie that you weren't supposed to, you've experienced this in some shape or form.

Well, this happens to me quite often. Especially with some of my close friends who can tell right away when something is up and call me on it.

I went on for months while I was in my relationship doing a lot of things wrong. I tried to never rock the boat, just took everything easy and made sure to follow the relationship outline of churchiness. People might look at that and think that I had a good plan in store, and I was being careful for both of our benefits.

Well, if I was honest with myself then I would have said something different.

She got the lead roles, was popular, funny, quirky and pretty, and yet she noticed me. Imagine being a fan at a concert and asking the lead singer if you can be up on stage with them. Now, picture them reaching down, grabbing your hand, and pulling you onstage. Imagine after that you joining that band and playing with them. That's essentially how I felt.

I was astonished that she would step off of her pedestal and talk to me, be my friend and be my girlfriend.

Here's the problem:
The pedestal was only in my mind.

She is a pretty normal person. I wouldn't say like everyone else, but she's not a goddess or an angel or something. I put her in that high place. I made her into what she was in my mind. You know what, I even showed how great of a boyfriend I could be (about 2 months before starting this relationship) when I quit video games! That's pretty noble, right?

Pfffttttt.

That was my excuse then, but I know better now. I was only getting rid of one god and putting another in its place. I was idolizing my girlfriend, plain and simple.

I put pictures of her on my phone as my background. Adorable, right?
Not really. That was just another way that I could worship her. Because of this idolization I lived in constant fear of of losing her.

Almost everything that I did then was for one of three reasons:
a. Because I worshiped her
b. Because I feared losing her, (because I worshiped her)
c. Because I genuinely had good intentions.

Unfortunately, it was most often for reason a or b. Looking back, it's hard to even believe that I had done what I did. I completely worshiped her. I treated the ground that she walked on as heavenly. I idolized her.

"by dismissing them"
There are some days where I feel that all of Tumblr has united itself against me—I go on Tumblr and everything relates to my life. Sometimes this is by some really deep quote. Other times, it's a picture of Bilbo.

Well last night, it was obviously the really deep quote, because I was drowned in thought (Oh gosh, I did a pun).

If you don't know my brain (thankfully most of you do not) then you should know that I have been doing some stuff lately that's not very helpful to a very damaged friendship. I have been completely ignoring one of my (previously) closest friends.
When she spoke, I took it to mean the worst that it could.
If she did something kind, I pondered at what's really going on.
If something super normal happens, I looked at it suspiciously.

These are all rather clever ways of dismissing her completely. I can be a nice guy sometimes, but sometimes I have the meanest of intentions.

This, on the other hand, is one of those times where I end up doing something mean because I failed to think through what I was doing before I did it. This attitude of "Act first, think later" is one of the things that I wish that I could change about myself—often in fact.

Anyway, back on point. I completely dismissed her. I dismissed her good intentions, and I dismissed her from my view of life completely. Gone, gone, gone.

This same person went from being my idol to being the dirt that I walked on, almost overnight. After the break up, I went through months of withdrawal. It's like the layers that I had plastered on myself were getting peeled off slowly, each one showing the mold and scars of the one below. And each layer hurt more than the last, and each layer had new gunk to pry off, and new surfaces to clean.

dehumanize someone

"deprive of positive human qualities."

Dehumanizing someone is the equivalent of stripping someone of their humanity. We are all human, and we are all to be loving towards one another. I not only went on one side of the extreme, but I immediately jumped to the opposite side.

But this person was completely un-human to me. Its only been recently that I have realized exactly how blessed I was to have her with me for that time.

I often wonder about turning back time. And I've asked myself:
"If I could go back in time, would I choose to skip that relationship?"
Well now I know my answer.

Not a chance.

And I'm sad that it has taken me this long to come to realize that. I'm sad that I can only now view her as the person that she is. I'm so grieved by this, because I have missed out on the opportunity to an amazing friendship.

God loves me, and he'll give me someone to cherish. And I will not make the same mistake again. I am still sad that I have done this, but there is no time machine to fix this.

Everyone has problems, and people are not it.

Love those that you are blessed with, but do not make them into something that they are not.
-Joshua

Recovery

Recovery Isn't Instant
No duh.
I still have nightmares from my breakup months ago. I still have this struggle and sadness within me. But it's not about the breakup, in fact, at all. It goes a lot deeper than that. I would say that I'm over my breakup, but I think that the idea of "getting over it" is over-rated, because every negative thing should be a learning experience—I don't want to view circumventing God as "getting over it", (but that's a different post for a different day.) I have battled the demons of "I screwed up the relationship" and "it's just a break" and "my ex is a total jerk" but there is something else inside that is stronger than those.

All of my life, I've been afraid of people leaving me. I've been afraid of family dying (especially parents), friends suddenly dying, and of my parent's divorcing.

So, a lot of my life has been lived in fear. Even if it is less so now, I still live some of my life in fear.



Back to my point
When I was in a romantic relationship I lived with this fear that she would leave me. I wasn't ever really sure why, and I wasn't sure why her leaving did what it did to me. But just the other day on the way home from I blurted out something that made me realize why this struggle is so intense, vibrant and real for me.

I am the type of person that goes for attention, but not in a way that pushes people away. People don't like to listen to complaining, so I don't complain. I act crazy and silly, and I talk a lot.

But people mistake the quantity of my words for the quality of who I am.

Few people take the time to really get to know me. I think that I suck the energy out of a lot of people (Sorry introverts! :P ) but some people overcome that and get to know, well, you know, me.

Austin, Benjamin, Caleb, Ellen, Faith, Gabriel, Grant, Jeremy, Joe, Kendrick, Marla, Michael, Mrs. Peters, Tessa, and my ex girlfriend all took the time to get to know me on a more personal level.

I may have missed a few, but those are the main ones, especially of late.

But only Jeremy, Tessa and my ex girlfriend had/took the time to know me inside and out, to know what makes me tick and how I think. It's amazing, having someone that knows what you're thinking without needing to say anything. Just explain through a hug. Just explain by asking for a chance to talk. Just explain by a facial expression.

It was wonderful to be that completely known by them.

So what I'm saying is...
I'm having a hard time typing this because I'm shaking all over. I'm having a hard time forming these words, because the pain that lives inside of me—that which I have ignored—is ugly. It's a monster. A snake head.

It wasn't hard for me to acknowledged that there are other fish in the sea. It isn't hard for me to let go of the reasons behind the breakup. It isn't (too) hard for me to forgive now.

But the reason why the sadness has existed and festered is because I fed it lies and kept its' strength up.

I told it that my girlfriend broke up with me because she saw who I was.
I told it that the reason why she broke up was that I wasn't good enough.
I told it that people don't get to know me as deeply as others because I lack depth.

Each of those were twisted truths, not blatant lies.
My girlfriend was my girlfriend because of who I was, and she broke up because of who I wasn't.
She broke up with me because we both were on the wrong track, I did the best that I knew how to.
People can be mean, but I am surrounded by good people. That list of people that took the time to know me has grown since initially writing the list. People love me.

And most importantly, God loves me.

God will never leave me.
Regardless of what I've done.
Regardless of who I am.
Regardless of the lies that I tell myself.
Regardless of my ex.
Regardless of how I feel about God.

I am loved despite what I've done.
I am loved because of who I am.
God has given me his truth, and that will set me free.
I don't have all of the answers, and I cannot understand everything.
God has made the choice to love me, unconditionally, uncontrollably and without limits.

In Conclusion
I am not yet recovered. I don't think it will come anytime soon, because my nights are still filled with grief, and my days are grey-scaled and have lost their vibrancy. Even though I am still sad, I've made a lot of progress. And when I look at where I've come from and who I am today, I feel so much better.

God has great amazing plans for me. He's told me that I will be a pillar, and I am ready to stand tall.

My Life Sometimes

I don't know what I'm doing, so here's some bleh, God. Please change that bleh or change my opinion.

-Josh

Pride and Arrogance

Arrogance, and pride are huge issues today! You see them, running throughout politics, throughout the media, throughout everywhere around you. It's such a sad world that we live in, with all of these arrogant and prideful people mucking about! If only someone with some sense would just step up to the plate!

Alright, as you can tell, I've got quite a bit of feeling involved in this. I am going to be looking at this partially sarcastically, but partially to let everyone know that this is a serious issue in the church.

Arrogant (ar·ro·gant)

   -having or revealing an exaggerated sense of one's own importance or abilities.

Pride /prīd/

   -a feeling or deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one's own achievements, the achievements of those with whom one is closely associated, or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired.

I promise you, I'm preaching to myself also. With that in mind, let's dive in!

More Myers Briggs Stuff!

Part 2
Waaaay back in January I made a post about MBTI called: Myers Briggs Type Indicator in which I gave some details on the MBTI. Well, here I want to take an opportunity to dive a little bit more into the type indicator, and how you can determine your type fairly easily. This is also useful in determining what type a friend or relative may have. This will not always be right, because people act like who they aren't on occasion, and some people aren't comfortable being who they are. So keep that in mind.

Also, this will be for some different post, but Myers Briggs categorizes people too easily. As always, I would recommend going off of percentages rather than giving someone a four letter type. And know that you can always end up changing types, or finding out that some of your life is a bit of a facade, as I learned back when I switched from J to P.

Anyway, feel free to look at this list of both types to get a rough idea of what type you are and what percent you are of that type. Don't worry about what side of the list it's on, just write down a little mark somewhere to alert you of your choice. Maybe copy and paste this in a word processing program and put a little asterisk next to your choice. Don't worry about contradicting yourself sometimes (for instance, I like parties, but smaller groups.) For laughs and giggles, I've marked an asterisk next to my choices on this list. Whatever your choice is, remember to have fun! This isn't serious, it's just a way to better get an idea about why you do what you do. :)

{UPDATE: I retook this test on 1/13/14 and those answers are astericks surrounded by }

Enough talking, on to...
The Glorious List of "Gloriousness"

Things

Things of this world, are passing away...

That's the resounding anthem of the slightly cheesy 90's hip hop song "Things of This World" by dcTalk. The song's point is about how much we value the stupid (and important) things in life so much more than we should. It's way too easy to do. I mean, look at the following questions. How many of them fit in with your recent thoughts or feelings?

I love my friends.

I love my dog.

I love that movie that I watched the other day.

I love being crew chief.

I love the leadership position that I hold in my theater group.