hi. i didn't know it would be this hard.

:: it's been my first week of school and my (almost) second week living here at BYU....away from family, friends and anything familiar
:: i love it, i really do, honestly, truly, I'll-spit-in-your-hand-and-shake-on-it-cross-my-heart-hope-to-die
:: but i didn't know it would be this hard
:: how to explain this without sounding dumb....#thestruggleisreal
::forgive me, it's 11:33 at night and i'm watching this Korean drama while writing this blog post and i have to keep switching back and forth because they actually speak Korean in this show so i have to read the subtitles because i'm not cool enough to speak Korean fluently
:: the biggest thing is familiarity 
:: i miss my family--the only people who really know my true authentic, vulnerable self and still love me anyway
:: i miss my wonderful online school with all my virtual, but real, friends 
:: friends.... what a wonderful, lovely word.... 
:: to me, friendship is so much more than the "oh-you-look-cute-today-where-did-you-get-your-shoes-did-that-boy-talk-to-you-yet" kind of friendship
:: not to brag or anything, but my friends from this wonderful online school of mine are genuine, authentic friends who can laugh and cry and tease and make each others' lives completely miserable sometimes and totally make each others' days at other times and we just all belong
:: belonging..... i miss that too
:: i've never felt so out of place and so completely..... lost
:: oh and lonely.... 
::SO IF YOU'RE IN THE AREA YOU HAVE TO COME VISIT THIS POOR LONELY PATHETIC EXCUSE OF A COLLEGE STUDENT
:: bring ice cream
:: i am just so sick of introducing myself over and over again to people i'm hoping might be a potential best friend but then turns out i'll probably just never see them again but i still do the same old speech thing over and over again because i am still clinging onto that hope that maybe someone out there in this universe named Y is looking for a potential soulmate like me
:: "hi my name is Kimberly, i'm majoring in sociology with an emphasis in social work/counseling, i'm from tremonton, utah and you probably don't know where that is and i'm a freshman."
:: gah, i just really miss my family and my friends
:: like, today.... in my one class..... we had to answer two questions....
:: would you consider kissing on a first date?
:: and, beards or no beards on a guy? 
:: IF YOU KNOW ME THEN YOU WOULD GET WHY I THOUGHT IT WAS HILARIOUS
:: i literally looked around the room (even though it was a pointless thing to do) to see if anyone would laugh with me.... 
:: and then i realized...duhhhhh nobody knows me or my history -_-
:: i almost turned to the girl standing next to me to explain my entire inside joke....and i realized again that hello....nobody cares here.... 
::so yeah anyway
:: i really do love college and i'm staying on top of my mounds of homework and i'm eating healthy and burning SO MANY calories walking around to my classes because this campus is big and i'm not used to walking to my classes anyway #burgerprobs
 :: stay in touch, mkay? 

why I need to embrace being authentic

Note: This post is somewhat religious, so if you don't like religious posts...then you probably shouldn't read this. Also, this post is my epiphany for my life. It doesn't have to apply to yours if you don't want it to.

SOMETIMES I HAVE THE COOLEST EPIPHANIES AND I ASTOUND MYSELF.

I seriously have a love-to-write-in-all-caps-when-I'm-excited problem. Sorry. Not really.

ANYWAY.

I have a confession to make. Tonight, while Mom was reading out loud and while I was supposed to be listening, I may have been slightly zoning out (like all teenagers do at some point in their lifetime) and I may have been flipping through The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown.

Pause for this announcement: IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THAT BOOK YOU NEED TO.

And as I was aimlessly flipping through the pages, I glanced at a line, did a double-take and got slammed in the face with an epiphany. If it had been a baseball, I'd be dead with a crushed face.

Pause for this moment of guilt: As I'm writing this....I'm wondering if I should feel bad that I was only half-paying attention to Mom....or if I should just be extremely awed at this whole thing... #thestruggleisreal

Why do epiphanies have to come at the most inconvenient times? -_-  SORRY MOM.

Now to the important stuff.

The line:

"To feel shame is to be human."

-Brene Brown

The epiphany:

"To be authentic (your true self) is to be god-like."

-Kimberly's slightly zoned-out brain

The random stuff that comes after the initial epiphany:

According to Brene Brown, shame is all about who we are. It's that voice inside our heads telling us that we're too flawed and imperfect and therefore unworthy of love and belonging. Shame is fueled by the fear that we're not good enough and that we'll never be good enough. It's something we all feel and all experience. In her words again, "To feel shame is to be human."

Who wants us to be as human as possible? Who wants us to feel shame? That's right. Satan. 

If he can get us to hate ourselves, to feel unworthy of love, peace and belonging, then he has succeeded in chaining us down. He's turned us against ourselves. And when we're at war with ourselves, we aren't capable of progression. Which is exactly what he wants. Ten points to Slytherin.

However, when we are authentic, when we love ourselves and feel worthy of other people's love, we are embracing the divine nature we were born with. Remember, we are children of the Most High God. Heavenly Father created us. To feel shame about ourselves is to feel shame about God's handiwork. When we embrace our true selves, we are embracing the beauty that came from God's hand. When we feel worthy of love, we are able to progress...to become the person we wanted to become when we felt shame. Embracing authenticity actually gives us the ability to progress.

And when we are at peace with ourselves, we can be at peace with others. Once we stop feeling shame and we stop worrying about our poor, miserable selves, our hearts and minds are cleared to be able to recognize and focus on the true worth of others. (Note: Comparing ourselves to other people and believing they are more special than we are is not recognizing their true worth.) And when we truly see, love and accept other people as we do ourselves, we are seeing them like God sees them. We are being god-like.

Isn't that our quest in life? Isn't our goal to become like Him?

We won't be able to do that if we keep acting like humans. We need to start acting like gods. 

Let's start by embracing our divine nature, by being at peace with our true selves and by being authentic without shame.

masterminds

The difference between Satan's plan and Heavenly Father's plan of salvation is that instead of merely being pawns in the chess game of life, we are the masterminds of our own game. We get to make the calls. We get to suffer the consequences. We are responsible for every single move we make. 

I could just go marry Santino Fontana..kay, bye.

So I may have just found the ENTIRE recording of the 2014 Pioneer Day Concert: A Summer Celebration of Song through stalkerish means- and I may just be watching that right now and pshhhhhhh... I'm toooootally not fangirling. Totally am. Like, this makes me so incredibly happy. And also....MoTab singing DISNEY SONGS. Yeah. Fangirling a THOUSAND times over right now.  

sometimes I like to talk like a gangsta

You were born to light up the world.  So um yeah.  Think about that and then think about how we are literally created from the elements of dead star explosions.  Like, we're alive because some star went supernovae out in the universe somewhere. So yeah.  Now go back to the first sentence.  You were born to light up the world.  Now connect the dots.  Form a "crazy thought constellation" as I now like to call it.  It's kind of like.... wonderfully ironic.  We're born to light up the world and we're created from stardust.  What now. And then like, the light of Christ, people.  It's all in us.  So we're more than just stars.  We're lights of Christ.  Which is why we're born to light up the world.  Right?  And we're stars..... okay okay, I keep repeating myself but it just hit me and IT'S A COOL THOUGHT OKAY. #sorrynotsorry #hatersgonnahate But it's like, so legit when you think about it that way.  Deep thoughts, bro.  Deep thoughts.  I'm pretty sure my mind was blown or went explosive-happy on me or something.  The heck.  I'm talking all mystical now.  But seriously, isn't it a wonderfully amazing connection?  Now go drink a tall glass of starlight and get out into the world and shine it up, yo. 

-written January 14, 2014

cause even the stars they burn, some even fall to the earth

::so I'm sitting here with this egg white/lime/honey mask on my face typing this blog post because last night one of my bffs told me to try it and my skin is in desperate need of pampering and so I did some more internet research on it (because that's what I do...some weird instinct of mine...research ALL the things!) and decided to try it
::my constant fear is that someone will knock on the door/ring the doorbell and because I'm the only one at home....I'll have to answer it... LOOKING LIKE THIS.
::also I'm pretty sure I have honey on my arms and hands which is probably gonna make this entire desk and keyboard super sticky
::I really really really hate fourteen hour workdays with a forty minute car-drive to my next job being my only break
::and when they're not fourteen hour workdays, they're eleven or twelve hour work days which isn't much better
::I miss finals week
::that was a piece of yummy cake compared to this
::mmmm speaking of cake... *stands up to go get something yummy*
::*Kimberly's shoulder angel intervenes* SIT BACK DOWN YOU'RE ON A DIET
::oh yeah... heh... I'm getting fat and I hate it
::but the only times I have to exercise on most days is either at 5:30am or 9:45pm and both those times I am just utterly. exhausted.
::maybe I should just suck it up and do it because I do NOT want to go to college this out of shape
::I'm counting down the days
::it's Tuesday, August 26th at exactly 2pm because you totally wanted to know that fact -_-
::kay so my two favorite songs this summer contradict each other
::what's up with that?
::I live on a perpetually low tank of gas
::or maybe it's just a perpetually low tank of feelings
::welcome to my walls, they're built to keep emotionally-damaging people out while I fit my life's puzzle pieces back together
::I just can't be vulnerable at the moment
::I get the feeling, though, that if I did Walls with the people I do NOT want to do Walls with, a lot of things would snap into place
::and I know there's this thing going around where it's like all the blog posts are "BE VULNERABLE" and "TAKE RISKS" and "JUMP OFF THE CLIFF INTO THE SWIRLING EMOTIONAL WHIRLWIND AND TAKE A CHANCE" and I'll probably write a blog post like that sometime
::but right now... I just can't.
::I literally do not have the energy to confront all of that
::I already broke down once this summer and it was awful
::no one was supposed to really know that so keep that on the low-down, kay? thanks a billion
::idk, just remember that everyone is broken somewhere inside even if they look happy and it seems like life's going for them and all that
::I mean, we're all human and we've all experienced pain and bad hair days
::so I should probably go wash this face mask off now...otherwise I'll  forget and start doing my secretary work which I'm supposed to be doing right now but I just couldn't bring myself to start and then get out of my pajamas and go to my other job with it still on
::the horror o.O
::bye now

[untitled one act play]

(The McGuire's Great Room, present day Bothwell. KIMBERLY is sprawled on her back in the middle of the room next to DADDY who is kneeling. Various other family members are in the room. The McGuire's have just finished family prayer.)

KIMBERLY: (moaning dramatically to DADDY) Daaaaaaaad, I'm at the age where everyone older than me has a very strong opinion about what I should do with my life which they always feel obligated to tell me and it always just so happens that their advice is against whatever I want to do. And I hate it!! It's like, people, thanks, but no thanks...can't you just be, like, supportive of what I want to do for once and not tell me that what I want to do is stupid and not profitable and is an all-around bad idea? (heavy sigh)

DADDY: (shifts to look down at KIMBERLY) ...mmmmmm....so you hate their advice? (stares down solemnly at KIMBERLY, but with a twinkle in his eye) Well, you know, I was just thinking this morning about how everything you're doing is a bad idea. (KIMBERLY audibly gasps) Yes, an awfully bad idea. And I think you should skip out on college and go be a hippie and live on the beach in a big van with.....a bunch of ex-convicts with tattoos! That's my advice.

KIMBERLY gasps in dramatic horror and slaps DADDY*

THE END

*on the knee