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Heart Racing and Train Rides.

Happy Tuesday Everyone,

So I have a question for you today,

What makes your heart race?

I don't mean, you're out of shape and running up a flight of stairs type of heart pounding. I mean, what excites you? What makes you feel alive? What are you passionate about? 

Last week I had an experience I've never had before. I arrived at the mall, at 9:08 and the mall opened at 10:00. See I thought the mall opened at 9:00 and when I got there and all the stores were closed I figured nope it must open at 9:30. Wrong again. So I was almost a whole hour early for the mall. So I picked up a coffee and sat down in one of the sitting areas in the mall and just relaxed. 

It was a really cool thing to see life start to happen. First thing I saw was a group of seniors sitting drinking coffee together and talking about a golf experience they had. A little while later a young woman and a man sat down and the man was going through an interview with her. (I hope she received the job). After awhile I got bored so I got up and moved to the food court and continued to drink my coffee. I saw employees come in late, other employees come in telling stories about their weekend camping trip. And before long the mall was bustling with crowds of people and the stores were open for business. 

It got me thinking. It reminded me of slowly waking. Your morning starts out slow, maybe with a good stretch and before long your body is energized and ready to attack the day with enthusiasm. (For some this process goes much slower than for others). But this got me thinking about life on a much larger scheme than day to day waking.

Sometimes I just feel like I'm kind of sleeping through life and I need to awake and realize what goes on around me. Sometimes I find myself just going through the motions of life never fully engaging. But it's the things that make your heart race and get you excited about life that wake you up. 

So again I ask you, what is it that makes your heart race?

For me, traveling. That moment when you're sitting on the airplane about to take off and it accelerates at a very rapid rate. You're pushed against the back of your seat and although I love to fly there is still this small part of me praying that we safely take off and get in the air. That moment, for me, awakens my very being, as I prepare for my next adventure in another place, I'm full of anticipation, nerves, and excitement. In that moment I am fully alive.

Another thing that gets my heart racing is, the possibility of changing the world. The potential that is inside me, and many others to do something drastic and completely change the world. I'm serious. The dream I carry with me has the potential to not only impact the community I am in, but the country and world that surrounds it. When I get thinking about the lives that could be impacted my heart jumps, I get butterflies and everything in me wants to change the world NOW. Not in five years, not when I graduate from college, but now. 

I had this thought while I was at the mall. See I love to travel so my brain used a travel analogy. Imagine life is a train. We all have the ability to get on the train and travel to new places, experience new things and really enjoy the travel experience. OR we have the option to stay at the train station. Standing on the platform with the train doors open ready for us to get in a go, yet never taking that step. Instead fear, insecurity and uncertainty stops us. It stops from ever truly living. It stops us from experiencing the real reason we were at the train station. We aren't at the train station to watch trains come and go, we're at the train station to get on a train and go for a ride.

Like train rides,  life has it's ups and downs, the tracks can be rough. But there are also those moments where it's smooth riding, and when you look out the window at the view and you know beyond a shadow of a doubt you're right where you're supposed to be. 

See the things that excite us and get our heart racing is what directs to which train we're supposed to be on. But we can get excited about something, and still never get on the train. 

So my question now is: 

Are you sitting at the train stop or are you on your way to somewhere incredible?

The opportunity to go and do something awesome with your life is there, you just have to decide if what you hope for is greater than what you fear.

Infinite x's and o's
-A

Word Art Wednesday

Good Day all you gorgeous folk!

I'm currently on my second cup of coffee this morning. Now please stick with me. See coffee makes me SUUUUUPER hyper and makes my brain think too fast for my mouth to speak or my fingers to type. So I will try to remain calm as I write this entry but no guarantees.

Now that I have that out of the way, you're probably wondering, what is Word Art Wednesday? Well I THINK I invented. It's kind of like throw back thursday when you post something from your past. Well this is a day where I post some word art that I've created. So your next question, what is word art? Well it's what I'm calling a piece of art that I've made by combining different fonts and sizes of words to make a piece of art. It's a new hobby I'm trying out. I always see this really creative looking pieces of art that is just a fancy way to display a quote. Finally I decided I have GOT to try this. So I'm trying to develop my artsy side and work on my printing, we'll see how it turns out.

For my first Word Art I decided to go with a quote I heard that says, Are your excuses more important than your dreams? I love this quote because it is so easy to come up with an excuse of why you can't do something. But if you really want to reach your dreams you'll push past all of your excuses and work for it. This is something I'm trying to develop in my life, to put the excuses behind me and just work to achieve my dreams. Think about your own life and where you want to be, or what you want to do. What excuse are you using that is stopping you from achieving it? Push past your excuses and pursue your dreams with everything in you!

So without any further delay here is my Word Art for this Wednesday:
Infinite x's and o's
-A

#Opportunities

To all the beautiful people everywhere (yes that includes you too),

Life is full of moments, opportunities, and choices. Some believe every act is preordained by some form of high power. Some believe moments are a result of karma, others believe opportunities are coincidence. 

As I've mentioned in other posts I believe in God, I believe he is as involved in my life as I am, if not more. I truly do think he presents us with opportunities and the freedom to choose how to act out that opportunity. 

Today I was presented with a couple moments that gave me a couple choices. The first went something a little like this:

I was headed to the store to pick up a few things I pulled into the parking lot and parked my car. As I was walking into the store I saw a man in the hood of his truck. And I literally do mean IN the hood of the truck. It was clear his truck was broken down and he had climbed onto the hood of his truck and was leaned into some part of the motor attempted to fix the issue. I felt compelled to help him. Now you have to understand, I know NOTHING and I really do mean NOTHING about motors or cars or anything about fixing cars. So it seemed to me a ridiculous thought to offer my assistance so I continued on into the store and pushed the thought out of my head, as a small moment of compassion. I went about picking up what I needed in the store and finished my task. After paying for my items I headed back to my car. Well, as I left the building I saw a tow truck attaching the broken truck to itself. Something in me felt so sad. I myself have had to call and pay for my own car to be towed and I know it is no fun task. As I walked by I saw the man and whom I assume is his wife on either side of the tow truck. The wife did some sort of hand gesture to her husband and the man held up his fingers to give what I can only assume was the cost to tow the truck, seventy dollars. Somewhere deep inside me said pay for their truck to be towed. But I countered the thought by saying, I am a college student I don't have extra money to pay for their car to be towed. But I felt even stronger that I should pay for their truck to be towed. By this time I was at my car and getting into it, and I reasoned with myself I had no cash I literally can't pay for their truck to be towed. So I got in my car and started to drive away. My heart was racing and I felt, for lack of any other word, convicted. I knew I should pay for their truck, I knew that God was telling me to pay for it. But I never turned around, I never went back and payed for it. I denied myself the opportunity to demonstrate the love of God to another. 

The second opportunity happened only minutes later, I had to go to another store, I had grabbed the items I needed from that store and was waiting in line to pay for them. A young girl two people ahead of me was paying for her items and her card was declined. Something in me said pay for it. Again I was like, no this is ridiculous. The girl attempted to use her card again. It was declined again. Again I felt I should pay for her items. But for whatever reason I was afraid to say something. The girl's bank was actually attached to the store so she was going to check why her card wasn't working. The lady in front of me bought her items and then it was my turn. I had a decision to make. The young girl had left her items there so she could come back and pay for it after. So I could easily pay for her items, the cashier rang my items through and I swiped my debit card and completed paying for my items. My heart was pounding, for some reason I couldn't shake it I HAD to pay for this girls purchase. So I spoke out to the cashier, "actually" I said. "I'd like to pay for the girls items." The cashier looked a little surprised and suggested I go make sure the girl was coming back so I don't pay for something that will never get picked up. So I quickly went and checked the bank, and there sitting with the bank employee was the young girl. I let her know I was going to pay for her purchase and that I'd be right back with it if she just waited there. I went back to the cashier and said I was going to pay for the stuff. The cashier was pleasantly surprised and told me I was going to have good luck come to me. I smiled gave a little laugh and said I didn't really care if anything good came from it or not I just wanted to help. I paid for the items and brought the purchase to the young girl. The girl attempted to thank me more than I deserved and I simply wished her a good afternoon and walked out to my car and continued on with my day. 

So why share this story? Is it to make myself look good? So I can feel good about myself? 

Not at all.

To be honest, I'm more ashamed of the first story than I am pleased with the second. I was given one opportunity to demonstrate how there is a God who cares about his people so much that he would send someone to help in their time of need, and I didn't take it. Sure maybe God gave me the second opportunity to see if I was really that selfish to turn down two opportunities but I missed the first one. 

We only get one life, and sometimes we only get one opportunity to change and impact someone's life, it is so important that we do no waste those moments or walk away from them. But instead we must walk courageously into every situation trusting that God has a plan and he will take care of us so long as we are following his lead. That doesn't mean life is going to be easy, in fact Jesus told us the opposite. In John 16:33 it says "In this world you will have troubles" you WILL, not you might, not only the bad people have troubles, but everyone WILL have troubles. But we can relax about it and trust God because he has already overcome the world and in the end he wins so we just need to trust him and follow his lead every time he creates an opportunity. 

Sometimes the gesture may seem really small and insignificant like paying for that girls purchase. Sometimes it might be more significant, but the truth is you never know what the people you encounter are going through and how your one small gesture could impact them. 

Trust God in every moment, 

Love people no matter what and help me change the world. Everywhere you go help

people to see hope, feel joy and know love. 

Infinite x's and o's

-A