We change our minds. As humans that's what we do, we change. We grow older, we want different things. It's hard to accept that what we had wanted so bad before we may not want anymore. We feel like we owe it to ourselves to just do what we had wanted to do so bad. But that's not the case. And it's the most awful feeling ever. This is something I have been struggling with for weeks. Do I accept this new summer job that I've been praying to have the opportunity to do for months and months, or do I open up my summer to the possibilities that God may have in store? It's taken so much prayer and thought and I still can't seem to make up my mind, but then at the same time I feel as if I've made my decision. I'm making plans for summer that I couldn't if I decided to take this job.

God calls us to live a radical life. A life that shows His love to others. So here I am, possibly passing up the opportunity to do just that. Am I a bad Christian because I'm not taking this opportunity? Or am I listening to what He's telling me? What if it's just my thoughts that are telling me these things?

A couple months ago, something my youth pastor said really stuck with me, if you're not at peace with a decision then it's God telling you that you haven't made the right choice. Ever since then, I've taken that into my own life, every time I had to make a choice that didn't feel right, I would go towards the one that felt better. And I still do that, I truly believe what he said.

So this is what I'm doing, I'm going to follow what I believe God is telling me through prayer and the kind words I'm receiving from people around me.

Late Night Thoughts: Why I Quit Retail

Remember the post I had a couple weeks ago about being nice to retail employees? Well, I told a couple fibs. At that point, I really hated my job. When I first started, I really, really enjoyed it, but that night I was completely full of hatred for my job and what I was doing.

So I quit.

I didn't quit quit. But I put in my two weeks. Why? Because I had grown unhappy. I'd grown tired of the work, of the terribly rude people, of the constant sharp pain in my heels or the numbness in them that occurred frequently. Retail is brutal. I don't care what anyone tells you. Maybe that don't work at a place where there's a constant rush of young girls wanting to play dress up or mothers that just can't keep their kids under control.

I've been working retail for a little over a year. It's been tough. I've come home crying many times from people being absolutely horrible to me. Why? I don't know, maybe it was because we didn't have a certain dress in a certain size and she would have to drive to another store to get it on time. Maybe it was because I didn't say the right thing at the right time. I was so sick of the constant breakdowns before every shift. Mentally, I'm done. Physically, I've been done for a long time, my brain finally caught up. I become ill every single time I work.

This is just the beginning of my eighteenth year of life. I want it to be full of life, love and laughter. I don't want to dread the days, I want to enjoy every single one of them. And I've been doing that a lot lately: dreading. The moment I turned in that letter of resignation, I became a happier person. Retail has made me a mad, mean, angry person. And that's not someone I want to be. That's someone I never have been.

I love my new job at a daycare center. And I'm so excited for this new journey.

Late Night Thoughts: Why Life After High School Isn't All Sunflowers & Daisies

(Photo: weheartit.com)

I've been out of High School for almost four months now.

They tell you that you're going to have so much freedom to do whatever you want. You can do and be whatever. But what they don't tell you is the confusion you feel, the loss of friends that occur, the feeling of inadequacy to do anything, the frequent mental breakdowns, and the constant reminder that you're almost a full-on adult.

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of pros too. Sleeping in until noon, not having homework, not dealing with the pressures High School brings - all of that is great, but I just feel different. In a sense, I feel a bit lazy. Here I am, day in day out not doing much of anything. Well, except work. That's all I do anymore. Not quite, but it sure feels that way. All I can say is I'm definitely not cut out for 40 hour weeks, mentally and physically. 30 hour ones bring enough pain and mental breakdowns.

Not being in High School is one heck of a change, and taking a semester off of school is an even bigger one. I'm working like crazy, I'm volunteering, I'm trying to juggle so many things at once. There was a day that I didn't see my little sister for an entire day, and another where I didn't see my mom for almost two. Never before has that happened.

Last Sunday night after church, my drive home brought on a flood of emotions that I didn't expect. I was just tired. Tired of working. Tired of driving all the time. Tired of not seeing my family. I came home and my parents were sitting around a fire, so I joined them for the first time in months. And I just started sobbing. It was a heavy, shoulders-move-up-and-down kind of sob. Something I hadn't done in a long time. I just poured out all my problems to them, everything that I had been feeling over the past couple weeks. The pain that was constantly in my heel from working so much (I'm as flat footed as they come), the mental exhaustion, the feeling of having absolutely no one in my life anymore. They told me to cut down my hours, take a week of to refresh and regroup. To find myself again. And I'm crazy excited to have those six days off.

Now, I don't want to sound crazy negative because that's just not me - or at least I try not to be very often. It's pretty cool that I'm not in school anymore and I accomplished something major. There's just so much more to graduating than that.

There's this Bible verse that I used quite often throughout my graduation party, it's Proverbs 16:3, “Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.” Right now, I feel like there's just so many "What If" scenarios playing out in my head. My biggest one being What if it's hard to find a job for the career I want? Then what? I just spent thousands of dollars to do something I can't even do.

So I'm learning to trust. To trust that everything is going to be okay, that even if I don't feel like I'm doing much of anything right now, it's going to add up to something.

Psalm 20:4  “May He give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed.”