Over the past six months, I've learned a great deal. I've grown incredibly, mainly because I've realized I have so much farther to go.
I've learned how to lead, I've learned how to love (and no, I don't mean 'like a brother' - insert cheesy grin here). I've learned pain, I've learned how to pray; I've learned who God really is. I've learned what miracles are. I've learned that not everyone who has an IQ below 110 are idiots. Well, they might seem that way, but intelligence comes in different ways. I've learned responsibility, I've learned emotion, I've learned how to be a girl (though I haven't quite graduated to the love of shoe shopping). I've learned that all are fallible, I've learned about my own pride, I've learned about my flaws and my glories.
Dear Reader, I'm not going to presume to know more about your life than you do. I'm not going to expect you to learn from this; however, if you do, glory be to God. I shall simply recount . . .
I've learned how to lead. I've taught a drama class for junior high and high school over the past few months, and I've realized that confidence creates the person. People will give you respect if you believe you deserve that respect. Also, most people are very insecure, emotional creatures. Any occasional slip-up might send a child into tears (that happened once). Let on you don't know what you're doing and they'll take advantage of that. Be in control. Be the one who is the all-wise god of the world, and if you pretend it no one will know otherwise. If you need to take control, forget being humble. It's all a mind trick.
I've learned how to love. Well, I won't go that far. I am very careful not to call things love. I met a young male of my species (who is far more unique and incredible than any one of your romantic interests, I would bet my soul on it. You just y-mail me and I will slaughter you with tales of his incredibleness. The child is a great deal more intelligent than I am) who has taken my heart. And he is attracted to me just as much, if not more, than I am to him.
But my point with this one is that it is indeed possible to be in love and to be wise about it. We have vowed never to be alone together, not to hold hands again, no matter how nice the first tentative hand-holding was. We are trying to develop friendship, to grow closer without the romance, so that if, possibly, anything does happen in the future, it will be sound and long-lasting. This is a wonderful alternative to dating. I highly recommend it.
Pain . . . Comes from fearing that you aren't good enough for that boy, and fearing it's just a matter of time before he realizes it too.
How to pray, who God is, and miracles . . . I've learned God is not some lofty, mystical being who maybe, maybe not will answer prayers, who looks down on us as pathetic little beings hardly worth his attention. No, I've seen His love for us, His desire for us; I've seen Him work in astounding, direct ways. I was wrong about Him. And He's given me the grace to see that.
Dumb people aren't really dumb. Just because you can't write like Kathleen Dexter or calculate equations like Bertrand Russel doesn't mean that you're an idiot. People can be incredible in ways of emotion, in ways of love, in ways of wisdom that book-smart people like us can't even comprehend. (Now don't start thinking I'm going to lighten up on all the idiots in the BBS, because I'm not. It just means I realize you can be great in things other than common sense.)
I've learned that responsibility is doing things you really don't want to do.
I've learned emotion isn't all bad. And neither is being feminine. Emotion is healthy, it is a natural reaction, and it should be treated with respect. Even if logic does take precedence, it still isn't a thing of inane retardation to be ignored. And I have been being a girl lately. I've started sewing, and wearing dresses, and actually getting excited over hairstyles. Yes, this is a monumental point for me, to realize that being a Vulcan isn't actually healthy.
I've learned that I'm not as great as I thought I was. No, I'm not lowering myself down a few notches; I'm simply raising the standard of what I should be. I may have a ridiculous IQ, but I'm prone to arrogance, to failure, to blind acceptance no matter how hard I profess to abhor that. I have been wrong in places where I never knew I was capable of being wrong. There is a vast, glorious field ahead of me, ahead of all . . . of knowledge, of growth.
Don't, please, don't limit yourselves. Don't blindly accept anything. At all. Ever. Question yourself until it drives you insane. No, even past that I questioned myself 'till I went only a little insane and I still turned out wrong in so many vital areas. Don't stop at insanity. Instead, question yourself until you're about ready to scrape your brains out with a wire hanger through your nose.
Love life. Joy is the best thing anyone could possibly possess. People simply go about pursuing it the wrong ways. The key to acquiring joy, then, is love (note here I refer to real love; not romantic affection or simple attachment). I used to think that love is somehow tied to the fundamental physics of the universe, and that belief is ever stronger now. There is something very strange about love, something very unlike anything else. Those who claim magic doesn't exist are idiots. Love is magic. And to love a being whose absolute nature is love, that is the truest, most vivid bliss that ever existed.
