Well

…after so long of not posting the only thing I can say to anyone is that, if you hope against hope and want something, maybe you’ll get it.  I have, many times.  But it maybe harder than you thought.  When you’re heart’s involved it’s worth working for.  And when you love them, they’re worth missing.

Marriage….

Big word for a girl not grown, I know.  But I just read a yahoo, top news thing, what ever it’s called, all about marriage and when to get married.  Yahoo asks, “READERS: If single, at what age, if any, do you hope you’ll marry ?”

So I, thankfully, am not married yet, nor does it look like I will be anytime soon.  No boyfriend.  Not looking for anything serious in my life.  I hope that I’ll be married before thirty.  But, God knows what He’s doing, and I’ll get married when He gives me the okky doke.

I’m young, very, and in a lot of ways I’m still a child.  Not only am I not mature enough to handle marriage from an emotional standpoint, I’m not ready mentally either.  I don’t know myself, I struggle along with life trying to find me…so OK, I know WHO I am, and I know a lot about myself, but getting to know yourself is like getting to know someone else sometimes, and I don’t think I know enough about the being named Me to place myself in a marriage.  Maybe I’m wrong, I don’t know, but I think if I were ready for marriage I wouldn’t be 17 and I’d be able to keep a stable and healthy relationship; which I’ve never had…so again, God knows what He’s doing, I can be patient.

Add to not knowing me, I’m only beginning to learn what I want in a mate.  Let’s face it, all those young unmarried folks reading this, marriage isn’t about* sex, it isn’t about being pure your first night, it isn’t like the play relationships we have in high school.  It’s about finding someone that you could spend the rest of your life with, someone you could wake up next to in the morning and stand thinking “Here’s another day with this guy” I’m either going to be giddy and excited about a life time with someone or I’m going to hate it.  I want to marry a friend, someone who I can talk to and someone who appreciates me, and that I can appreciate.  I want to know my needs will be met, not just physically (which seems to be a big deal…not being married, I dunno) but mentally, spiritually, and emotionally.  I was a creature made to be loved, I want to know with all of me that I am.  And then I want to know that I can fulfill the needs of the man I marry. I want to be THAT girl to him, worthy of his time an energy.  I want him to want to come home. For him to know that I love him.  I want a strong marriage, a partnership.

I think the problem my generation has with marriage is having a preconceived notion of what it means to be married.  Or maybe we don’t even think of the fact that we’re committing our lives to another person, what ever may come.  We’ve been conditioned to think that divorce is an answer so why worry, you can always ditch this marriage and try again later.  I’ve seen to much, in 17 years, of broken marriage to think it’s some perfect thing….that happiness comes with being married.  It’s hard, I’ve seen that.  Marriage is two people, each with their own emotional baggage and life experiences to influence their view a situation, coming together, and trusting (which is hard to do) the other with everything, come what may.

My view of the world comes from what I’ve seen,  I don’t want to be married until I’m ready.  I’d like to have a degree and my career in the Navy stable,  if God says go before that time He does, if I find myself 40 and just starting a marriage, oh well.  Divorce not being something I’m willing to do, I want to know what I’m doing.

well now I’m just ranting so I’ll stop.

~Amanda~

*Edit….OK so I understand that the physical side of marriage is important, that it’s a way to convey love for your spouse.  My main point in saying that marriage isn’t about sex is that the marriage in and of itself should never become about your physical relationship.  People have other needs to be met, and while physical intimacy is important, if that is what the foundation for your marriage is, for a while your other needs can be blocked, but 10 years down the road…what are you going to have?   A marriage where you don’t really and truly know your partner.  So my point wasn’t that sex isn’t important, just that marriage isn’t about sex.

Cruelty

     This is a word that should have never needed to exist.  There should never have been, not even one time in the entirety of history, a need for the word cruel, or vindictive, or brutal, nasty, pitiless, hurtful, atrocious, wicked, evil, unkind, mean, spiteful, vile, malicious.  No person should have had to go through something that would merit the invention of these words to describe someone else. But it happened.  Look at how many, and there are more.   Do you realize what those words existing mean?  It means that one action can have you labeled, one, one action that you may not even think of.

      What gives us the right to be cruel?  What gives us the right to practise cruelty?  I ask this because dear friends of mine have been hurt, and I don’t know how it happened, or what happened, or what was said, but I do know that there was pain involved.  And at first I didn’t think of it, but now I realize…for those friends to feel the pain they felt, they had to have experienced some type of cruelty.

      What makes us, anyone, so wonderful that they have the right to degrade someone?  What?  Race?  Color?  Nationality?  Religion?  WHAT!?!  Daily people kill themselves because someone, or people are so cruel to them that they feel that everyone in this world must feel the same way.  Daily people turn to vises to deal with the cruelty they suffer.  Why should they have to? 

     Growing up I have heard that people, more specifically kids, are cruel.  I was one of the ones made fun of in elementary school–luckily I am one of the strong ones that can learn from it, and choose, now, to ignore it.  But what kind of excuse is that to a child facing Hell on Earth?  “Oh, you might as well get used to it, People ARE Cruel…”

    Even I can be cruel, we all can be, we all have been.  Isn’t that horrible, isn’t it horrible that I can look at myself and see that black mark?  How about you, really look pass your own fictitious purity and perfection and see where you have caused pain.  Maybe you haven’t, maybe you are really one of those people that despite everything, despite anger and jealousy, and annoyance and can honestly look at someone and not treat them unkindly.  Bless you if you are.  But if you have even said one unkind word, reflect on that.  Maybe you ruined someones day. Maybe you added to the pain of a lost soul.  Maybe you are the last straw before the drugs, the alcohol, the sex, or suicide invade someones life. 

    One cruel, one malicious, one unkind word is all it takes to break a person; to take the innocence from a child, to harm a pure soul.  Do you want to be the one to say that word?  Have you been the one to say that word?

     There are many words synonomus to cruelty, and thus many words to describe cruel people.  You and I have the choice to adopt one of these adjectives, or to take a word that means kind.  Choose.

~Amanda~

Hate…

Why must we hate everyone all of the time?  I am getting sick and tired of it.  Biblically yes it is wrong, but even more than that, where does it get us?  Right now, American soldiers are dieing, in a War, and everyone keeps arguing as to why–it is because we as people hate.  Horrible things happen in this world and we blame it on everything else, but we refuse to see what is causing it.  Tell me, what is so wrong with treating a person decently?  With one kind word you could stop someone from committing suicide, or worse.  But here we are, wondering where’s ours, and we look at the lost and say, Screw You! I don’t care what’s wrong with you or how lost you are.  I mean come on!  Why are people so cruel?  And don’t give me the human nature spiel, good people couldn’t exist.  It is choice! Choice and choice alone.  Horrible people choose to be that way. Cruel people choose to be that way.

All it takes is one person to say “How are you?” with a smile on there face, and if anyone cares to look at their lives maybe they’ll see a small glimmer of hope that the world isn’t just some piece of crap that God threw into motion, and that it’s not all random happenstance. 

Just because someone is mean to you, what gives you the right to treat others with the same disrespect?

NO this is not human nature, this is earthly nature! And it’s something we can fix but choose not to.  I challenge you to spend one day where you make a conscious effort to be a beacon of light, and not say those cruel things to people, and you tell me then that it doesn’t feel better. That the world just happens to be this way, and that hate rules all.  Maybe it’s not easy, but it’s the right thing to do.

 ~Amanda~