Chasing Shadows

August 29, 2014

Me and a friend of mine at my university sat down together to have a nice catching up conversation during lunch time. Needless to say, my frosted flakes were quite soggy due to my lack of attention for them. Haha, my oh my was this conversation much needed, and far too profound to not record on to my blog.

The most genuine and meaningful relationships to me are the ones that allow myself to profoundly connect with the other person on an intellectual, real, cognitive correlation; to be in tuned with the other person while connecting our personal levels of intuition and discernment based upon personal circumstances. 

This friend means so much to me, and I have so much respect for this person and the things that this person has gone through.

We talked about the heaviest moments in our lives that reached to the point where I was almost in tears listening to my friend's stories.

The amount of darkness, frustration and anger that was felt to our religion was mutually understood.

For the first time, my friend felt ashamed for the circumstances that she was born in. She felt ashamed to be as privileged while there is a completely dark world full of rape, failed police systems, and abuse. Ashamed for being a woman who can't physically help any of these circumstances, and ashamed for being the ethnicity that she is.

It even got me to feel the same way. It makes me feel terrible to see how I am able to attend a 41,000 dollar private university with my intellect going somewhere; while somewhere in this world, there is a woman who is just as smart, just as capable- but is unable to go anywhere with it.

It's not fair that my brother's life was saved with high-tech medical attention while families are losing each other from terrible diseases without even a chance to fight.

Summer 2014

I can't answer the question, "why do bad things happen"

I parked in the middle of some parking lot near my house, rested my head on the steering wheel, and cried my eyes out. I cried as hard as I could, and I prayed to God to somehow reassure those who are lost and confused. I prayed for Him to show me that He is real, and that my salvation was not for nothing. I sat there for a long time, gasping in between my sobs and turned the radio on to Christian worship.

I stood still and listened, silently coughing tiny sobs and let the tears roll down my flushed cheeks as the radio went on about this loving God who is always faithful.

But then I remembered, my salvation did happen on a specific day, but it was not the end of the hard times I would have to go through in life.

I was looking for answers so fast that I was so distraught to not see them in an immediate response. 

There is spiritual holiness, and worldly wickedness. When there is good, there is evil. When there is no evil, how would we know what is good? When there is only good, how will we learn to be genuinely grateful and appreciative? God has these detrimental experiences for us so we can learn; to feel. To allow us to be angry over something. To allow us to wish empathy and love for others.

Even though these events are absolutely not part of our human desires, we tend to get angry with the things that the world can't give to us.

And this world is wicked: there is death, there is rape, robbery, diseases. This world is not our permanent home, but the world that we will grow, struggle, and learn in.

-Reyna Michelle

"As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” John 9:1-5

"Why, O Lord, do you stand far away? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble? In arrogance the wicked hotly pursue the poor; let them be caught in the schemes that they have devised. For the wicked boasts of the desires of his soul, and the one greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lord. In the pride of his face the wicked does not seek him; all his thoughts are, “There is no God.” His ways prosper at all times; your judgments are on high, out of his sight; as for all his foes, he puffs at them." Psalm 10:1-5

~~~~~

"If the first and lowest operation of pain shatters the illusion that all is well, the second shatters the illusion that what we have, whether good or bad in itself, is our own and enough for us. Everyone has noticed how hard it is to turn our thoughts to God when everything is going well with us. We ‘have all we want’ is a terrible saying when ‘all’ does not include God. We find God an interruption. As St Augustine says somewhere, ‘God wants to give us something, but cannot, because our hands are full—there’s nowhere for Him to put it.’ Or as a friend of mine said, ‘We regard God as an airman regards his parachute; it’s there for emergencies but he hopes he’ll never have to use it.’ Now God, who has made us, knows what we are and that our happiness lies in Him. Yet we will not seek it in Him as long as he leaves us any other resort where it can even plausibly be looked for. While what we call ‘our own life’ remains agreeable we will not surrender it to Him. What then can God do in our interests but make ‘our own life’ less agreeable to us, and take away the plausible source of false happiness?" -C.S Lewis

Happily Me

The answer to the question, "who am I" seems like one that is inevitably insolvable.

The human brain is said to have finished development in our mid-twenties, which means that our cognition for decision making, as well as personality, is still in the continuation of it's works. I am a nineteen year old young woman who is attending college; who also happens to hold a strong-willed personality on her shoulders. I guess in the traces of human development (which I will be taking this coming fall semester from the psychological and neurotic point of view), a person develops his or her personality and temperament from the time he or she is a toddler. So, it's not a matter of a person changing up until he or she is twenty, rather, he or she matures more in to the traits that he or she has always had.

My name is Carmela Michelle Martinez.

I was born in the year 1995; the prime time of the immense escalate of the video game industry. Brilliant classics were continued to be chucked and thrown at our faces with mind-blowing entertainment and excitement. We had the Dreamcast, original Playstation, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo 64.

Spiro the Dragon ~ Crash ~ Banjo and Kazooie ~ Resident Evil ~ Silent Hill ~Diddy Kong Racing ~ 007 - EVERYTHING. Including, my favorite, the Legend of Zelda.

Oh it was a grand time, indeed.

I grew up with two older brothers who were absolutely engulfed in the world of video games, and I was also six years old when I played my first Legend of Zelda game that changed my life.

Warm Springs Elementary School was the school that showed me to not be who I am. I was bullied, physically pushed, and ostracized by my peers. The girls my age wanted to play dolls, but all I really cared about were the new Nintendo hand-held consoles that were being released. I wanted to read and explore more of the things that I wondered about; always seeking answers to questions no one else really cared about. I remember quoting one of my favorite books, and the girls looked at me with such distaste, that I felt like garbage. It was as if I wasn't supposed to think the things that I did, and that if I shared any of my thoughts, it was wrong.

I continued in Junior High at a different city, and went on with my 4.0 streak with ease. It was in high school where the events of elementary school finally caught up to me.

Long story short, I was NOT bullied in high school, even though for whatever reason, everyone thinks I was. The teachers did suck, and the curriculum was bogus enough for me to not take seriously. Plus, I was even more depressed with not being myself, that I grew this repulsive form of self-hatred.

Why am I telling this story? Because it's part of the journey that I had to go through to learn and find out who I am, as well as how the decisions that I made in the course of my life led me up to where I am today.

Today, I am Reyna Michelle Martinez. The video-game, comic book loving, derpy, dorky and nerdy girl who loves reading, writing and expressing her thoughts out loud. Who also just so happens to love makeup, fashion and girly things. (Yes, the two CAN go together)

No more suppressing. No more hiding.

In the summer of 2014, a cousin that I grew up with had passed away. He was only 20 years old and had lived his life by the lesson that a lot of us learned on the day of his passing. To be yourself.

Yeah, the cliche movies tell us this all of the time. But really, he didn't care. He loved being himself, and lived his life without us remembering the harsh reality of the condition of his heart.

I can't explain the brilliance of my cousin. Really, you would have had to know him to understand; and frankly, I am so glad that I do. I'm also glad that I was able to speak and share the wonderful memories and lessons that he brought to us during his life at his funeral.

I was bullied for being myself. But who cares? I HATED who I was pretending to be. Now that I am nineteen, I love being so expressive of my geekyness. I love who I am. I don't give a rat's ass if someone hates me for being myself- and that's just it! If ANYONE out there hates you for being yourself, THEY are the one with the problem. We were born to be unique and significantly individualized in our own way.

I promise you, that now that I let myself be me, I have never felt more content in life. I have also met the most AMAZING people who mean the whole world to me because they know and love who I truly am.

Read books, make videos, start a blog! Whatever it may be, you are gifted in what you love. Whether it may be thinking, research, talking, dancing, singing.

My cousin was born with an unhealthy heart. But his WHOLE LIFE was dedicated to what he loved: video games. He was always on top of the newest releases, the newest updates- you name it. And he sure as hell didn't care what anyone else thought of that; while there are healthy people who hide what they love to do because of the fear of being wrongfully judged by other people.

I love to blog, I love to express my thoughts, I love to read, I love to research, and I love to help people. & I will do just that!

Doubt has killed more dreams than failure ever has

Yours Truly,

Reyna Michelle

{Adorkable Thoughts} Counting Sheep

Hello, dorks!

As I have mentioned before, I have been working on a little psychology section for my blog...and well, here's the first post!

I decided to go easy on this one; sleep is all a part of psychology 101. Am I right? I am no psychologist, and I am certainly no doctor. But this blog segment is called AdorkableTHOUGHTS, and not AdorkableFACTS for just that reason.

So! Here's the run down. I saw this picture on the internet:

Some of these little "Did you know" psychology posts are essentially wrong. But, whether the source of this picture is reliable or not, this content does hold a bit of truth; and here's why!

As we have all learned in our general psychology class, that we are mostly required to take, our brain has these things called pons. The signals of REM sleep starts from here, and ends up in the region of the brain called the thalamus. But why am I telling you that? You obviously learned this in a general psych course.

Point of Relevancy So Far: The thalamus has a few jobs (like sleep). But it's primary function is mainly sensory and movements.

OH! And the whole"acting out your dreams" disorder is actually called RBD (REM Behavioral Disorder) Sorry, I forgot to mention that in the beginning..

So here, our little pons are shouting out these sleep signals throughout different regions of our brain, and not just the thalamus. Here's the cool part: the pons then shout out this signal to our neurons that are associated with our spinal cord. Thus, causing a temporary paralysis.

Anything that is involved with interrupting this process is generally the outcome of someone with RBD.

And RBD is not the only sleeping disorder; we all know about the popular ones like insomnia or narcolepsy.

Well, that's it for this post! Whether it was "omg Reyna DUH. I learned this in class the other day" or "Oh cool..."

This is it.
I will be doing more posts like these sometime in the future as well! But maybe not so basic. I wanted to take it easy on my first go ^_^

Until next time,

Reyna Michelle

Back on Campus: Move In Day Anticipation

This is Hope Hall

Hope Hall is going to be my new home for the next 9 or so months. I will be living on the north side, second floor, Anchored.

I am beyond excited to be able to spend this next chapter in my life in one of the most nice and beautiful dorms on campus.

Oh yeah, and Hope is actually co-ed! Woo! Living in an all girl's dorm was really not as bad as everyone thinks it is. However! I am still really stoked!!

I want to take this blog post and rewind to exactly a year ago in this time period. It was approaching the beginning of the fall semester and I was seeing all of these advertisements for college move-in day; the stores, television, billboards...it was EVERYWHERE.

The more I saw "College Move-In Day" stuff, the more depressed I became.

I started taking college classes when I was 16 years old. I physically graduated and finished my high school experience on the grounds of a community college campus. I graduated with High Honor Roll from high school while simultaneously making the Dean's List for my college classes. When I saw that the rest of my classmates and friends were all moving away to college, I was heart broken. It was a very hard time in my life, and it was most necessary for me to make the most devastating decision to stay home for a semester and transfer into a university in the middle of the year.

The Fall semester of 2013 was really the hardest time in my life. I will not go into extreme detail, but it was definitely very, very hard.

My brother was diagnosed with cancer, my family went through a very tough financial crisis that almost left us without a home, my grandmother passed away from cancer, and the depression that was physically eating away at my brain took a stronger hold of my being. It was the first time in my life where suicide became a very considerable option. I WILL NOT underplay how serious suicide is. I have lost those who were close to me from this, and I have had very close friends of mine who are survivors of this terrible and horrific tragedy.

I went to my awesome adult doctor (pshh, I am passed the pediatrician business), and she suggested therapy. Ironically enough, since therapy is my future career choice, I found that it really didn't work out too much for me. Yes, I do learn a lot from it, but I'm more fascinated about the methods and techniques rather than bettering myself. Yeahh I'm weird.

At the time, I have been STRONGLY against taking anti-depressives for myself. But as my brain was only decaying more and more, I really had no other choice than to finally give in. (the medication actually started in the summer of 2014)

I felt like a failure. All of my friends were moving away to beautiful universities and I was still stuck at the same community college that I went to since I was 16. I felt not good enough. I felt like I was too stupid and unworthy of reaching high opportunities. I felt like a loser who was just...stuck.

~~~

Nevertheless, I made it. I did it. In January of 2014, I transferred to Biola University. The school that has brought me so much happiness, knowledge and joy. At Biola, I have met THE MOST amazing people, and I have been able to happily grow and blossom there.

It is now Fall 2014, and unlike Fall 2013, I will be returning to Biola University. I will be able to leave. Now, when I see back-to-school ads, I get excited. I laugh and jump around the notebook isle in Target, while I sing about how I can't wait to go back.

As I type this, I'm actually beaming with excitement. I can't wait to be back in a classroom while I stake notes and intently listen to a profound lecture.

It's only a matter of time. But for now, I will spend all of the time that I can with family and friends.

Until next time, 

Reyna Michelle