Yellow is the new black

What inspires you

2009-08-07T10:53:00.009-04:00

It's amazing what inspires people these days to get up and do things. I recently spoke with someone who told me cartoons inspired him to lose up to 100 pounds and get in shape! Amazing what people take to heart and what people do NOT take to heart. How great it is that as a race of people with cognisant minds that take in so much from their lives, make the decision to only prioritize certain things. We can assume so much from the simplest thing.

I love that music inspires people, I especially love that it inspires me. Whether it be to work harder, run faster, meditate/pray, get up in the morning (I have an AWESOME alarm clock for my mac), or a myriad of other things, I am always taken back to where I need to be by the simplest melody; I'm not sure how to explain it but I'm sure all you music heads understand.

So what lessons are gleaned from 'Old Macdonald' or 'The B-I-B-L-E"? What can you possibly learn from Simon and Garfunkel? The expressions of love and hatred, the extremes of human emotion all play out in music and song. However you enjoy music, in what ever mode of expression you pluck as your favorite, I'm convinced that it runs deeper than just melodies: Perhaps it's a method use by Someone greater to get you moving, a record on the turntable of life, dedicated to you by the One who knows you best. All I know is, there are reasons that certain songs have bridges that I can listen to on repeat forever, choruses that I will always roll up my windows (while driving, mind you) and sing at the top of my lungs.

So what inspires you? What makes you stop and assess yourself, what drives you to better yourself? Whatever it is, take the time to take more of it in. You might not need to sing at the top of your lungs in the middle of rush hour or hide in a tree to read your favorite book, but look beyond the joy of it and learn to understand why it's there.

It might just change you.

3 weeks later...

2008-02-19T07:52:00.000-05:00

I have to apologize for my obvious lapse in writing, the currents of life seriously cast me far out and away from any creative discoveries.

Some things I did notice and some epiphanies I had during my time away:

-I need to go back to school.

I've been kicking myself in the pants since 1998 when I chose to not continue my college education. Since then I attempted it once more in 2006 and stopped again. Resume said pants kicking. Now I had to write my assistant Dean and ask for special permission (aka kiss butt) to be let back into the school and take classes again. Please pray that things go the way that they should.

-Life is serious, I am not

Why am I just now learning this? I think my entire youth group has this concept down already, yet I'm still lolly gagging my way through life. It's been time to hike up my pants and bear down on this joy eroding virus called 'life'. Of course my joy is found in Christ and my pursuit of God's face, but how does that exactly translate into my life? I dunno and really should find the answer to that.

-I need to take care of myself

I am 20 pounds overweight at least. Why am I not taking care of myself? Why haven't I gotten a proper physical since leaving the military? Maybe I just don't care, maybe I'm just lazy. Whatever it is, it has to stop and I'm going to stop it as soon as feasibly possible. Nothing is worse than being Best-Man at your brother's wedding and feeling like a gross blob, and having that image encased in eternity through expensive wedding photography/videography, to be enjoyed for generations to come. No sir, not me. Eric, the hot version, is coming down the pipes by end of q3 2008. Expect it and mark it.

-There's not much now that separates me from anyone 20-25.

I don't know about you but there is something wrong with that. I should be, at my age and with my experience of life to this point, different. Different in mentality, in perception of reality, in life goals and decisions. But I'm not, I'm stuck in this post-high school mid-life-crisis-come-early. When what I want for my future and what I expect of myself is the same thing as what 21 year olds and college graduates desire and expect, I am crucially shorting myself of any accumulated or developed maturity and stunting my growth as a 28 year old, asian-american, God fearing man. Like an iphone is really going to solve my problems and provide me joy for the next 3 years....college freshmen are satisfied with such things? Well what the heck am I doing/thinking then as a 28 year old government professional?

There's a lot more of myself that I want to dump into this blog, but until I really get to the root of my being, the self-induced exploratory surgery of my soul is going to continue, without bearing without abandon because it's my life that is at stake, what other cause proves worthy of such inward exploration and renovation?

I hope you can join me in my journey, and help me examine things. Add things that I miss, supplement my thoughts with appropriate scripture and above all listen with a empathetic heart.

I'm not whining or complaining, I'm forcing change, using brute strength to reform my life and my mind with God as my guide and you, my brothers and sisters as my support. Even if you don't post comments, if you are praying for me in any capacity, you're impacting change and I really thank you and pray that God blesses you.

Here we go!

Inspired by freezing :X

2008-02-12T10:31:00.000-05:00

(written in a few minutes...i had to write something!)

Streetwalkers, urban dwellers
people of foreign nations
sharing spaces closer than country borders
wind chilled glances of much needed self gratification
audible illuminated figures controlled by impulses entrusted
with your safety
Can we regain our time at the end of the day by getting there?
the streets beckon with little words
soulless animations concerned for your safety
cross looks across frozen faces
invading peoples cohabiting
the spaces of the
street-dwellers.

They actually have me work.

2008-02-12T09:41:00.001-05:00

It has been a while since they have me actual work. Even though it is busy work, it is still something to do!

Its like waking up

2008-02-01T12:34:00.001-05:00

From a long nap ;)

So I've figured out...

2008-01-31T01:02:00.001-05:00

I've figured out exactly what it was that I have been missing all this time. It's not a huge discovery, it's just something that came to me when I was drinking some ice tea on the drive home from yechon tonight.

When you're a kid you dont have a care in the world. Life comes at you at its own pace and you can just be yourself and take it in as you want it because you don't know any better. As the years go by you really aren't able to fight the currents of life as nonchalantly as you used to and you end up becoming jaded and depressed. After 27 years of sifting through this garbage you come to realize how in need you are of something constant and firm; life's uncertainties and 'ohshi-' moments get to be a bit too much to handle on your own. That's why I love God so much. Psalm 62:1 says "My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him". It's not that you curl up on the lap of God per say, but that your salvation is from him and because of that assurance we can sleep at night...so to speak. I dont know about you but when I'm 99 and crusty, I want to have resolved where I'm going to be going when I take my last breath: between trying to pee at 2:30 a.m and wearing diapers, I'll have too much in my present life to start reconciling my after life.

I dont know much of what I will gain my future, in the future that God has for me; I know I will have much and as long as I make much of God, what more is there to worry about. What else can really bother me to impact me for eternity? In the end that's all that matters anyway.

I think Bono said it best: " I believe in the Kingdom Come; When all the colors will bleed into one".

I sort of bunched this post up in 3 minutes, so I didn't really think it out. I apologize in advance ;p

Tonights dish consists of...

2008-01-30T23:54:00.001-05:00

The usual. Whats your usual?

You cant see it but,

2008-01-29T18:57:00.001-05:00

Ronald is really excited.

Hey there...

2008-01-29T10:51:00.001-05:00

I am cute.

FIRST!

2008-01-29T08:10:00.000-05:00

I'm not much for blogging these days, but I find some comfort in knowing that I can write something now, read it again in 10 years, and still be just as clueless as when I originally wrote it. I think someone famous once said, 'Forge your own path; speed ahead on the stability of your own wings rather than on the contrails of those in front of you'. I thought it was pretty pseudo intelligent and lazy when I first read it (wrote it, authored it in less than 5 seconds, it's complete garbage made up by me dont believe a word I say), but I can feel the urgency in its adjuration and I find some comfort in the sincerity of the author's tone (that's because I wrote it).

By the way, you know what you're writing is complete drivel when you start off on one end of the human emotional spectrum and defect to the other end in less than 30 words and still feel as inexpressed as when you started, and more unconcluded when you finish.

Last night, two relatively new friends and I had some sushi at a local place (korean owned of course) in Vienna--hence local--and I commented twice how unappetizing the sake (salmon) looked. I wasn't really sure if I was being picky or snobby but I thought my tone to have been slightly elitist. Now I'm not one to upturn my nose at some sushi, but when the white stripes of fat in sake aren't numerous and white enough for my liking, I just feel like I have to speak out against it. Not that it would change anything, but it certainly would define the injustice in that moment and for a moment, appease the gods of unprocessed fish products (i.e-me myself and I, sans deity). The tall mocha afterwards was better than the food, the conversation: better than the coffee, and revealing a dark and dirty secret during said conversation: humiliating (yet liberating!). The coffee put a nice cap on the end of the night, though an hour or so longer in that Starbucks would have been a better for my digestion (worse for all the deep dark secrets that I might have divulged throughout the course of the night).

In retrospect, I gained a greater appreciation and respect for two new, unnamed korean friends of mine and a wider palate for second class sushi.

It was a good day.