it's interesting how we can be kept awake and not have any idea what is keeping us up
i don't know if it's something, someone, or maybe nothing at all, but God has definitely put some thought in my mind tonight that i just can't put down. i thought it might be something with faith, so i opened up Crazy Love and read the chapter on the profile of an obsessive Christian. i thought it might be that i needed to get something off my chest, so i wrote a long email to my sister. i thought i might it might have just been as simple as forgetting to journal, so i took a few minutes to reflect on my day
but whatever it is, those didn't take care of it. i'm still here. i'm still awake, unsure of what keeps me up. i'm waking up in 4.5 hours, and definitely need to start sleeping more. maybe it's just my adjustment to college, but i've been having a lot of trouble not only sleeping enough hours, but getting good sleep. my best sleep as come when i've gone home. something about this place just doesn't give me the same quality sleep as i used to get.
why do we need sleep? why did God create us so we needed to rest? i know that, psychologically, sleep helps us prepare for the next day and allows our brain to review everything we've learned and done the previous day, but why would sleep be necessary? especially if we have to spend a third of our life in bed. God works in mysterious ways...
and that's why all i can do is get back in bed and pray.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
capturing love
So the old saying is that a picture is worth a thousand words. But what kinds of feelings and emotions is a picture worth?
Yesterday I was asked to do an impromptu photoshoot for one of my best friends and his girlfriend. And looking back at the pictures I took, there's no doubt that love is the strongest thing us humans can feel. Just by looking at the album you can tell. You can tell from their eyes, you can tell from their body language, you can tell from their laughter and beaming smiles. Love seems to reach and fulfill the very depths of emotion that nothing else can. And, as I've read in my obsession with psychology nonfiction, love is one of the few (if not the only) medium that can bypass emotions. Why else would a father and mother, in a story I read about, both dive into arctic-temperature waters to save their handicapped child? Why else would a young child agree to do a bone marrow transplant for his sister, thinking it would cost his life (something I read on GMH)?
I have to say, yesterday's photoshoot has been incredibly inspirational. I used to photograph with a mission to show people the world in a way they've never seen it before, to present the familiar in unfamiliar ways. But after last night, I'm changing that mission. I'm going to capture love to the best of my abilities. There's just something so magical about it.
For me, pictures will always be worth a countless amount of words. But the stories they tell and the feelings they create will forever be undescribable.
And that is why I must do all I can to capture them.
Yesterday I was asked to do an impromptu photoshoot for one of my best friends and his girlfriend. And looking back at the pictures I took, there's no doubt that love is the strongest thing us humans can feel. Just by looking at the album you can tell. You can tell from their eyes, you can tell from their body language, you can tell from their laughter and beaming smiles. Love seems to reach and fulfill the very depths of emotion that nothing else can. And, as I've read in my obsession with psychology nonfiction, love is one of the few (if not the only) medium that can bypass emotions. Why else would a father and mother, in a story I read about, both dive into arctic-temperature waters to save their handicapped child? Why else would a young child agree to do a bone marrow transplant for his sister, thinking it would cost his life (something I read on GMH)?
I have to say, yesterday's photoshoot has been incredibly inspirational. I used to photograph with a mission to show people the world in a way they've never seen it before, to present the familiar in unfamiliar ways. But after last night, I'm changing that mission. I'm going to capture love to the best of my abilities. There's just something so magical about it.
For me, pictures will always be worth a countless amount of words. But the stories they tell and the feelings they create will forever be undescribable.
And that is why I must do all I can to capture them.
inspired by insomnia
The human body can be quite strange sometimes, don't you think?
These past few nights I haven't been sleeping too well. Yesterday I woke up at 3am for no reason, and tonight it's 2:21am and I'm having no luck as well. Perhaps it's the stress: working 25+ hours a week plus my internship seem to be getting to me.
My latest read, Emotional Intelligence, has really gotten me thinking about a lot of different things. Combined with everything else I've read on the unconscious mind, our snap decisions, irrationality, emotions, and psychology in general, I've begun to ask myself a seemingly endless string of questions.
How would my life have been different had my upbringing been changed, even the slightest bit? How would I be different, both emotionally and physically, if my parents had stayed together? How did I go from the shy, emotional kid in first grade who cried about most everything to someone who finds himself struggling to be empathetic and connect to the emotions of others?
A few days ago I was riding my bike on the Burke Gilman. The speed limit is 15mph, I was recklessly sprinting at 23+. While I was passing a family, a 6 year old girl dashed across the road in front of me. The moment my eyes caught her motion, my body kicked into gear. It's strange how your mind will act first and ask questions later: my fingers had bolted down the handlebars and squeezed my brakes. Sensing my back wheel lock up, my reflexes put more braking into the front. While the shifting weight caused my bike to tilt forward, I had somehow jumped off my bike while it went airborne and in three or four steps I had come to a stop. The mind is so phenomenal: the same components of the mind that caused the girl to run towards the blackberries on the other side of the road allowed me to prevent what could have very well sent her to the ER. But the credit doesn't go to my unconscious mind.
It goes to God.
His magical intervention caused three occurences. 1) I adjusted my seat, though I didn't have a particular reason to. 2) I had to pass both a group of walkers and another ride, slightly slowing me down. 3) There were a few bumps in the road from tree roots, causing me to brake.
Looking back, I can't help but think what might have happened if God hadn't intervened. At the beginning of my ride that day, I prayed to God to keep my safe. And he certainly answered my prayers by teaching me a lesson I'll never forget.
These past few nights I haven't been sleeping too well. Yesterday I woke up at 3am for no reason, and tonight it's 2:21am and I'm having no luck as well. Perhaps it's the stress: working 25+ hours a week plus my internship seem to be getting to me.
My latest read, Emotional Intelligence, has really gotten me thinking about a lot of different things. Combined with everything else I've read on the unconscious mind, our snap decisions, irrationality, emotions, and psychology in general, I've begun to ask myself a seemingly endless string of questions.
How would my life have been different had my upbringing been changed, even the slightest bit? How would I be different, both emotionally and physically, if my parents had stayed together? How did I go from the shy, emotional kid in first grade who cried about most everything to someone who finds himself struggling to be empathetic and connect to the emotions of others?
A few days ago I was riding my bike on the Burke Gilman. The speed limit is 15mph, I was recklessly sprinting at 23+. While I was passing a family, a 6 year old girl dashed across the road in front of me. The moment my eyes caught her motion, my body kicked into gear. It's strange how your mind will act first and ask questions later: my fingers had bolted down the handlebars and squeezed my brakes. Sensing my back wheel lock up, my reflexes put more braking into the front. While the shifting weight caused my bike to tilt forward, I had somehow jumped off my bike while it went airborne and in three or four steps I had come to a stop. The mind is so phenomenal: the same components of the mind that caused the girl to run towards the blackberries on the other side of the road allowed me to prevent what could have very well sent her to the ER. But the credit doesn't go to my unconscious mind.
It goes to God.
His magical intervention caused three occurences. 1) I adjusted my seat, though I didn't have a particular reason to. 2) I had to pass both a group of walkers and another ride, slightly slowing me down. 3) There were a few bumps in the road from tree roots, causing me to brake.
Looking back, I can't help but think what might have happened if God hadn't intervened. At the beginning of my ride that day, I prayed to God to keep my safe. And he certainly answered my prayers by teaching me a lesson I'll never forget.
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