Occasionally I snore....Really loud.

So I am coming out of my closet.

I snore.

Hard.

I have been compared to a freight train and once, I was camping, and someone mistook me for a wild animal.

I have been compared to a chain saw.

A jet plane.

An old man.

A leaf blower. 

And my favorite, a dragon.

Many people have slept in the same room and they can all tell you, it is crazy.

I need you all to know that this is mortifying telling you all this.

But this summer is about being open and honest, and not sweating the small stuff.

So this past week I was in training for my summer adventure.

I was met at the airport in Birmingham Alabama by someone I didn't know.

Driven to a church I had never been to.

And then slept in the same room with 12 girls I had never met.

And they all heard me snore.

And some how everything is still okay.

But from what it sounds like, this is just the beginning.  

Youthworks! Check it out at Youthworks.com It's a little glimpse at what I will be experiencing this week.

 So I drove down to New Orleans, (pronounced literally any way EXCEPT New Orleeeens.) with my team on Saturday.

Emily is 21 and from Minnesota. And someone once told her she had no personality. That person was dumb.

Sarah, is 21 from Boston. And is just the biggest ray of sunshine. When she plays basketball, she runs around just like you might suspect a character on Downton Abby might run. =)

Then there is Chris. Chris is 25. I am 2 months and 7 day's older than him. And he makes my side split. I really don't know if I am going to live through the whole summer. His greatest worries for the summer is us girls getting snatched up and also getting roofied at church. 

Many people ask what our job entails and mostly we have just said Mission trips, but this training week has taught us that it is so much more than that.

We will be giving brief talks about why we serve where we serve.

We will be wrangling highschoolers all summer being in relationship with them, and teaching them how to make biscuits and gravy.

We will be sleeping in this tiny conference room in a church on an air mattress with 2 other girls all summer.

We will be working with and supporting the 3 other people on my team.

And mostly importantly we will be creating and maintaining significant relationships with the community members around us.  

This summer is going to be an adventure.

We're going to have to keep everything honest and open.

We're going to have to be a unit.

We're going to have to be gracious.

We are going to have to be patient.

And Prayerful.

We are going to have to be able to live with the metaphorical snoring of each other, and find our compromising super powers with each other. 

This summer, has high expectations for us, and tall orders.

Ones we might not be able to fill on our own.

So we're going to need some prayer.

I am going to need some encouragement.

And Someone is going to need to remind me who I am.

And who Jesus is in me.

We're talking about "The Kingdom" this summer to our youth.

And what Jesus established when he was here on earth.

In Mark 12 we learn that Jesus was asked what the most important rules were.

He say's "Love me with every part of you. And love everyone else just like you love yourself."

I keep thinking that, no matter what you believe, that is our most important human characteristis.

Love Others.

We aren't made to live alone.

We aren't made to struggle through the punches life throws at us by ourselves.

I was not made to go through this summer on my own.

That is why we are a team.

That is why we are a unit.

That is why honesty and openness is so important.

We have to keep our relationships strong so that we can have the others to lean on when we start forgetting that we are going to make it.

I once read a saying that said...

"A Friend is someone who knows your song, and sings it when you have forgotten it."

 We need each other.

When we live in isolation we might have as well given ourselves a death sentence.

Darkness brews more darkness, but the good news is darkness cannot be where Light exists.

There are so many insecurities going into this summer.

And I am just walking through each one owning them and reminding myself self to keep moving forward.

And I am so grateful I have this team of people with me to help remind me and sing my song with me.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to move forward into community with the people who live in the area and teach people through my own mistakes and hurts. 

My life might be the greatest adventure ever lived.

I would love to hear from you friends! So don't be strangers! Message me and Let me know how you are doing and I can't promise immediate response but I will keep up!

Love to you all! 

Acca-Occasionally.

Okay. So you all know that I get inspiration from strange places.

But Tonight, during Pitch Perfect 2 I almost cried.

Here's why.

This whole year I have made it my focus to be myself through my music.

Now the whole movie is about that.

The Bella's being themselves.

And I realize this is totally obvious and totally corny, but.....(there is always a but..)

The producer in the movie asked Becca....

"What makes you special??"

She couldn't answer that right away.

But of course because it's a movie and movies pretty much always have a happy ending, she eventually does figure out what makes her special.

I read an incredible article the specifically spoke to 20 somethings.

It's said, figure out what makes you special, what you stand for, what makes you shine, and go with that. Know what it is.

It's so interesting to be in a world, not understand what makes you special.

What makes you, you?

And to be totally honest. I can't put my finger on it. 

I don't see the world in black and white.

There is a ton of grey area.

I love to sing.

I am different when I sing, because no one else sings like me.

Know one else can sing the song the way I sing it.

No one has my sound.

No one has my moves.

No one has my spice.

I am different then other people, simply because I can see the bigger picture.

I see a different picture.

So why are you different?

How do you view the world?

Do you see in black and white?

I doubt it, this world is rich with vibrant color strewn in every direction. 

When you see people do you see them for the mistakes they have probably made, or do you see them for the good that lies with in them?

Do you see the world flat or round?

How do you respond to criticism?

Does it hurt your insides, or motivate you forward?

Be you.

As My friend Dr. Suess once said....

"Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive that is youer than you."

Be that person.

We need more people in the world to be themselves and make big mistakes!

We need more people to be honest with themselves and others!

We need more people to be themselves, so that the people growing up behind us have examples of what it looks like to be themselves.

So we don't have this whinny bunch of youth not understanding what it looks like to be some one not behind a computer screen. (I catch the irony, thank you.)

We need leaders

and crazy thinkers,

and inventors,

and musicians,

and artists,

and politicians,

and doctors,

and farmers,

and teachers,

and astrophysicists,

and engineers,

people, all of whom look at this world, from a million different angles.

But we need to stop seeing it as a place, that one day we get to leave, that one day, "when Jesus comes back!" everything will be better....

No!

We need to look out and see the people that live here and now, and we need to see it for it's potential!

See it for the goodness.

See it for the greatness.

See it for the individuals on this earth that are having a hard time.

And we need to look at them in the face and go....

"I'm trying to be me.   I think you should be you.  We can do this you know?"

Benedict Cumberbatch once said "We need to start living life like this is where heaven exists!"

I mean he's right!?

Jesus exists here!

We exist here!

Isn't the definition of hell the absence of God?

I need to stop living like every obstacle that comes against me will be my last!

I just want to be myself.

That's it. Nothing else.

I just want to be who I was created to be.

I just wanna be me.

Occasional Death.

The trouble with having friends is that you tend to feel all the things they do.

You hurt when they hurt.

Cry when they cry.

Love when they love.

And sometimes you don't know how to handle your own feelings and theirs at the same time.

People keep asking me if I am okay....

...How do I answer that?

I knew her.

She let me borrow a pencil once.

I always saw her at church.

Her Boyfriend and I yell at each other lovingly, telling each other to "Use your inside voice!"

I know who she hangs out with and where she works.

I know where she is from and what kind of person she was. 

And I'm very sad to see her leave.

But the reality is I'm not sad because I lost a friend.

I'm sad because my friends lost their friend.

My heart is broken because my friends are blaming themselves. And it's killing me on the inside.

My heart is broken because Her friends loved her, and now, they don't know how to continue moving forward and they all feel like they could have done something to stop her.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm good. My friends are not."

There have been so many conversations about death and it's harsh reality in the last 24 hours.

We are each confronted with it, in our own lives and then a multitude of times in other peoples lives.

We can not escape it.

So how do you tell someone, who's girlfriend is now gone, that it's part of life?

How do you help each other move forward and continue on with life?

We all have our own choices to make.

We all have our own demons and pain and hurts.

And we all face things that seem impossible.

I'm tired.

I'm tired of praying for people.

I am tired of crying for people.

I am tired of having to go through finals week with this heavy on my friends hearts and my own.

I am tired of death.

My dearest Friends.  Do not live life alone. Do not forget people love you. Please remember even when your friends are mad at you, they still love you.  

Do not forget that even in the most dark of nights, we always have the morning to look forward to and remind us that light exists, even when we can't see it. 

I am praying for peace for her family and her friends. Never ending peace. And constant reminders that there is peace even in the midst of this.

If you ever need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to ask me to listen.

Occasionally I give up.

It's the week before finals and no one was sleeping....at all.

There is so much to do.

There is so many things that I am just not going to get done.

There are so many things I feel like crying about.

But I am currently listening to Bobby McFerrin. (You know! The Don't Worry be Happy guy? Yea, he conducts Symphonies and composes all these amazing pieces of music now. I know right!?)

In one video he has the audience singing the 5 note melody over and over and over and over again.

And he is doing this amazing vocal percussion over the top of it.

And it's amazing. 

He spent 6 years developing his musical ability.

The first 2 years, were used in an attempt to not listen to any other musician besides himself, so he wouldn't sound like anyone else.

He then spent the next 4 years, becoming an all around bad ass.

I watched one of his conducting videos, and as a solo violinist goes up for a solo Bobby just sits backs, folds his hands, and listens.

He kind of smiles, but it's not the kind of smile you think of

...it's a smile of pure contentment.

It's a small corner of you mouth kind of smile.

The kind that say's I'm in love.

The kind of smile you take after you've been out in the sun all day and you take the biggest gulp of ice water you are capable of and you don't even realize you're smiling.

I get so caught up in this trap that is all the things I have to do, but I forget to breathe.

I forget to enjoy.

I forget to relish.

I forget to soak in it.

I forget I live here.

I forget to live in the moment.

I forget where I've been and where I am now.

I forget that I'm not going to remember this week specifically in 5 years, and this is just another week I have to get through.

It isn't the end of the world.

It isn't the end of my school career.

It isn't the week that will define my entire life for the rest of my life.

I'm probably not going to do well on somethings tomorrow, or the next day.

And that's okay.

I don't have to beat myself up about it.

I can just breathe, and think, "how lucky am I!?"

I get to be here right now, with all these phenomenal people, learning all these really great things.

I get so flustered and emotional, and I react first and think later.

When the reality is I am just freaking myself out.

Someone one once told me I complain too much.

They are so right.

I start complaining and getting all worked up for literally no reason.

It's hard to remember I don't have to freak out.

It's hard to remember that I love what I do.

I'm sure Bobby McFerrin got pissed all the time too.

I'm sure he got frustrated with himself.

I'm sure every single great artist I've ever heard of has been far more angry and flustered and upset than I have been.

The only difference between them and I, is that I give up way too fast.

It's so much easier to do that.

I don't know how to fix this dumb problem.

I guess I'm trying to apologize to myself for not giving me a chance.

I tell everyone else how to fix their lives.

But I freak out at my own life.

I know all the answers, but I can't make them fix my own life.

So, here's to finals week, here's to the huge possibility and reality that I am going to fail a couple things.

Here's to not giving up.

Here's to being the person, that fails and tries again.

Here's to making big mistakes, and moving on. 

Here's the the 1 yes after a million no's.

Here's to me, forgiving myself.