As I do every year, I’m preparing to do a purge of my contacts and delete the hundreds of random messages I don’t have any use for. My strategy is that if a number isn’t saved the message is deleted. Not too long ago I had an interesting exchange with a young man who happened to have one of the numbers in my phone that were never saved. He indicated that he wanted to meet me in person and said he was interested in me. Mind you, he popped up every few weeks or so and texted me regular small talk stuff. Nothing substancial or notable enough for me to save his number because it was obvious he only texted me when I got bored. Then he asked for a picture. Side note, what is it with guys always asking for a picture? You haven’t done anything to deserve a favorable answer to your inquiry and I don’t acquiesce to random demands from strangers. Needless to say, the answer is almost always no. But I digress. I ended up telling him what needed to happen in order for me to take him seriously and I may have also mentioned that I didn’t know his name and that his number had never been saved because he never earned that right. My point is that sometimes you have to clear your life of people who are just taking up space. They don’t have a vested interest in your success and don’t care about who you are as a person. Clearing can also involve deleting messages and contacts because you don’t have the time to entertain nonsense. It’s a necessary part of moving forward because you’re making room for something better.
Tag Archives: heart
Relationship fails
I admit it. I’m a hopeless romantic. There’s been plenty of times that I’ve followed acquaintances on social media and “liked” all the mushy gushy tributes to their new significant other. The declarations of love and unending devotion and professional pictures have warmed my heart. But then there’s a change. All of a sudden one or both people start posting self-empowerment posts and about leaving when you’re not being appreciated. Then slowly but surely pictures start to be deleted or taken down. Married names go back to maiden names and this is usually followed by a social media break. While it’s certainly none of my business, I feel like asking “what happened?” These individuals put their whole lives online and got people emotionally invested in their relationship. I feel to some extent that they owe us an explanation when it fails. Of course I understand the right to privacy and how emotions can be involved but it would be nice to see the same level of transparency as there was in the beginning when they were in love. I think there’s a feeling of failure that is attached to the demise of a relationship. No one wants to talk about stuff like that. I know I don’t and my relationship ended months ago–but that’s another post. But it’s disappointing when you see a seemingly good relationship bite the dust. Of course you can only see what people post and I think many times the fairy tale is faker then we would like to think.
Resigning or Quitting?
It’s interesting how much better the word(s) “resign” or “step down” sound instead of “quit.” A month ago I was in a job that I really didn’t like. I often found myself fantasizing about how I would spend my days if I wasn’t confined to my cubicle answering calls and typing stuff. I really felt that my professional skills were wasting away and that I needed to do something different. I worked from February to June without any days off other than weekends and a holiday so that I could hoard some vacation time and also plot my escape from the plantation—I mean the job. So I applied for a lot of things and started actively searching for something different. I went on vacation and realized that I had forgotten how nice it was to sleep in for a change and sleep well at night. Throughout this time period I had been interviewing for several different positions. I had a target date for leaving and was starting to mentally prepare for a change. The transition back to my cubicle was hard and I realized that I couldn’t deal with being so confined much longer. After 7 lovely days on a beach, my free spirit was wanting out ASAP. Don’t get me wrong, I typically give plenty of notice when quitting aka resigning from a job. Like at least a month or so. I’ve trained my replacements and created manuals in order to help the next person get by easier. But this was about to be an exception. All of a sudden there was a shift and I got three job offers in the period of 2 days. It was a wrap. I accepted one of the three jobs and the next day I floated into the office and sent an email saying that I resigned effective immediately. It was one of the best feelings that I’ve ever had in my life. It was like I had just been released from prison and I had a new lease on life. I don’t understand why people spend decades in jobs they hate. Life is way too short for all that. Get a plan, work the plan and get out. It’s interesting that later I discovered that most of the people I worked with on my team were being laid off. They say God works in mysterious ways.
American Sniper
Recently I watched American Sniper–a movie that I always wanted to see but also somewhat dreaded. I’ve always been pretty sensitive and I try to stick to watching comedies. This was a movie about war and its horrors. There’s so much controversy now on what to do when the national anthem is played and all of a sudden people take it personal when someone exercises their constitutional right and peacefully protests. It’s interesting to me how a lot of the most vocal people complaining aren’t military members. The movie tells the story of a sniper who saved fallen comrades. It’s a great movie but the realities of war are hard to watch. I think that everyone should travel to the American cemetery in France where you can see the graves of soldiers of all ages and backgrounds who died to liberate others. I have to admit that I didn’t expect American Sniper to end the way that it did. I went and read about the book that it was based on. It’s not a happy movie but it’s a needed one that showed to some extent how serious PTSD can be. I remember meeting an army sniper in real life. He was in his early twenties but sobbed like a baby as he told me about how he shot a little boy who looked to be about the age of his brother. It was so sad to see how tortured he felt after doing his job and following the orders of his superiors. War is a horrible thing, but I wonder if people know that it’s possible to support the troops and not stand up for the National Anthem. Actions like that should never be mandated if we’re truly “the home of the free.” Furthermore, you can support the troops and advocate for better resources without agreeing with everything the military does. But that’s just my two cents.
20 Lessons I’ve Learned Since Leaving the Church
This!!! Not everything, but mostly. I can relate to a lot.
I haven’t been to church in over a year now, and I’ve been pondering how I should address what I’ve discovered along the way. If you’ve been following my blog for a while, y…
Texting Etiquette
I was talking to someone not too long ago about texting rules and the role that texting plays in relationships. Like many millennials, I tend to prefer texting over talking on the phone unless its for an interview of some sort. I know someone who has a rule that her significant other is never allowed to text her and must always call in order to speak to her. Probably not a bad rule. Texting is a great way to be misunderstood and become (unnecessarily) offended. It’s an easy way to communicate that doesn’t require much effort and to be honest, I think that it’s made a lot of people lazy communicators. You don’t even have to type anything anymore as you can have a whole conversation with emojis. Needless to say, I know I’m not the only one who gets annoyed when you don’t get a response within a reasonable amount of time (between 1 and 3 hours). I recognize that there are people who don’t live by their phone and don’t have time to answer immediately. I remember meeting a cute guy at an event. Gave him my number, blah, blah, blah. He texted me and I texted back within a reasonable time period (about 20 minutes). However, it soon became apparent that he had a lot going on as his subsequent replies took about 6 hours or more. Any attempts at an actual conversation were futile. I can be a fairly patient person but this was a little excessive and definitely wasn’t reasonable. We ended up going out and it was interesting to see how attached he was to his phone. Often stopping in mid-sentence to respond to text messages. I wasn’t too happy. In addition to the fact that he was 20 minutes late and (literally) lived right around the corner and I drove 40 minutes and was early. Not cool.
The Single Life
This weekend I went to a young adults relationship seminar sponsored by one of the local churches. The subject was on being single. Growing up in a church environment I’ve attended hundreds of seminars on relationships, marriage, and being single. I went to this one hoping to find some real life advice/feedback or encouragement. Boy was I wrong. I realized how much I’ve changed since being a teenager. The speaker focused on being a whole person in yourself, not worrying about being married, blah, blah, blah. I’ll take some accountability and admit that I’m definitely more cynical than I was as a single person 10 years ago. I know people who are genuinely happy waiting for “the One” to manifest and I think that’s great for them. While I’ll never go out of my way to talk about how much I absolutely hate being single, I can say with confidence that it’s not my favorite thing. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become increasingly frustrated with all the “advice” coming from (self-proclaimed) religious people. There are those who promise you’ll find someone and those who say that you’ll have to learn to be content by yourself. I think that optimism is good but one must also be realistic. I prefer not spending my life waiting to do things because I want a significant other to join me. I don’t think that one should put their entire lives on hold because they are waiting on someone who very well may not even exist. As nice as it would be to have someone who is invested in me to make major decisions with, I’m not a fan of the current dating climate. I think I’m just over it. At least for a while.
Pretty much my entire life in an article
LookCatalog.comDating sucks in general, but it’s even worse when you’re the type of girl who acts like she doesn’t give a fuck when she’s secretly a soft, sensitive soul. You can’t keep up the charade forever. Well, you can, but it’s going to make your dating life much harder than it has to be. Men hurt you without even…
via Why Dating Sucks When You Act Like You Don’t Give AF But Are Secretly Sensitive — Thought Catalog
Milestones (four years)
I’ve always been a fan of the Olympics. There’s something to be said about watching people compete to be the best in the world. I remember wanting to attend the summer games when the Olympics were in Atlanta. We only lived about 3 or 4 hours away but my parents quickly vetoed that course of action. But in their defense, they DID have 4 children under the age of 7 at the time. As a homeschooler, I talked my mother into letting me write a report on the Olympics to count for school credit and I watched for hours at the 2000 Summer Games. I remember always thinking about how old I would be when the next Olympic games came around and what my life would look like. So much has changed every four years in my life up to this point. From watching the games in my living room in the middle-of-nowhere Alabama, to watching in between classes and homework as a college freshman, to watching highlights online in my Colorado apartment because I didn’t have cable as a struggling graduate student, to watching in my living room as a doctoral student in metro Atlanta. I have so much respect for all the athletes who have dedicated their life to a literal pursuit of being the best in the world in a particular sport. It takes so much focus and determination and work behind the scenes to be able to get to that point. They have pushed themselves over and over again and now are engaged in a competition where they will have the chance to prove themselves and bring home the gold to their home countries. But it’s also a reminder to me to do something interesting or reinvent myself in some way every four years. There’s too much time in that 4 year gap to not do something unique and productive. After all, they say “good” is the enemy of “great.”
Just a hassle
Recently I’ve seen a lot of social media posts about people getting engaged and also getting married. However, there is also a lot of the opposite. I saw an individual posted on social media how much it hurts to find out that you meant nothing to the other person after thinking that you meant the world to them. An author whose page I follow also posed a question asking if people are tired of dating and the overwhelming response to the post was that most people had given up on ever finding a significant romantic relationship. I wasn’t too surprised to read the responses and I found that it was easy to relate to what people were saying. While I think that’s it’s wrong to say that there are no good men/women left in the world, it would be stupid not to acknowledge how difficult it can be to “find” a normal,stable, and fairly sane person. Dating in today’s world is not as glamorous as it is in the movies and there are hundreds of unspoken rules and expectations that one is expected to just “know.” Let’s face it, it can be a hard world for a hopeless romantic. Dating can easily turn into a cycle that’s similar to fishing where you catch fish but keep throwing them back into the water because they aren’t what you’re looking for. Personally, I find it annoying when people talk about how your perfect match is “out there” and that you have a kiss a lot of frogs in order to find your prince. I don’t know if it’s really worth all that hassle.
Alisha's Angle 