Growing Pains

"Growing up" by the Urban Dictionary definition: The feeling of childhood freedoms slipping away without any warning, the loss of unstructured time for relaxation, the necessity to work to survive. The impending journey across space and time to achieve one's dream, the feeling of hopelessness when that dream is not achieved, reflection upon one's carefree childhood, longing, regret and desire for a good retirement fund and a glass o' prune juice.
"Growing up" by the Wikipedia definition: the accumulation of changes in an organism or object over time. in humans refers to a multidimensional process of physical, psychological, and social change. Some dimensions of growing up, grow and expand over time, while others decline. Reaction time, for example, may slow with age, while knowledge of world events and wisdom may expand. Research shows that even late in life potential exists for physical, mental, and social growth and development. An important part of all human societies reflecting the biological changes that occur, but also reflecting cultural and societal conventions. Age is usually measured in full years — and months for young children. A person's birthday is often an important event. Roughly 100,000 people worldwide die each day of age-related causes.

Growing up, a very broad topic I know. I have chosen to write on this only because it is what I am currently doing. Well actually, we all are growing up whether we want to admit it or not. You never stop growing up, you will always be learning something new that forces you to grow up to some extent.
For example: my great grandmother is 102 years old. At her age you would assume that she has seen it all WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Dessert Storm, depressions, economy's rise and falls, countless births and deaths, you name it. She even worked in a school when she was young. She was a teacher for retarded(it was the proper word in the day) girls around 1930's(I am not completely sure on the dates) in Connecticut. Learning that, you would most definitely think she has learned everything possible, right? Wrong, she still admits to learning new things and growing up at her age.

My point being it is something that we can not escape and something we can not do on our own. This is something that I have come to realize in the past month. Like everyone, I have come to some hard choices that could alter the rest of my life. I have also come to the point of getting over things and moving on with life. This is what we call "growing up." Something none of us want to do and will never want to do.

That is someone I like to call Mr. Flesh. You see, Mr. Flesh is of the world and of sin, he is someone we can not trust. In fact, he is your own personal little devil on your shoulder constantly pestering you and trying to suck you into the body. Mr. Flesh is not just of the world, Mr. Flesh is the world, the critics, and the sinners. Mr. Flesh can not be your best friend. He is the person you need to part from. But how do we do that? Simple.

"Oh, the joys of those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or stand around with sinners, or join in with mockers. But they delight in the law of the Lord, meditating on it day and night."-Psalm 1:1-2, New Living Translation.

What that is saying is: yeah, the world seems like it is just the dreamland where everyone wants to be, but do not be deceived by the world. Do not seek the advice, help or comfort from the world because they are wicked. Instead follow the law, lean on God. Seek your knowledge, and your comfort on him and you will be rewarded.

This is what I have done. My Mr. Flesh refuses to grow up and to move on from my current situation but me, Naomi Miyazato desires it in my heart and that is what I will do. I have confronted myself and told my Mr. Flesh that "hey, I am going to do something that you do not want to do and you are going to hate me for it. Too bad, get over yourself." Then I set it straight with God, "I do not want to live with this, like this any longer. I need you because I can not do this alone and you are the only one who can get me through this. I am putting my 100 percent faith and trust into you and i will be obedient to your word." I know it is only going to get harder from that, Mr. Flesh is going to use everything he can against me, but now my challenge begins to take a leap of faith and get to business.

I challenge you to do the same. I have just started and I will be posting a blog later on with an update, but let us not worry about that right now. We can do this together with God. It is hard to do in the first place, but I already feel free from bondage and I am willing to risk it all to get back with God, free from my bondage. Will you do the same?

Barbecue Chips

Right now I am in my lunch period sitting in my APUSH classroom. I am eating barbecue chips and listening to worship music on Pandora Radio. It is quite the relaxing thing. My teacher is in here as well, but he minds his own and I have the room to myself pretty much. I have decided to spend my lunch period in this empty class room, Pandora, and my bible that I have on my phone. I was going to just sit in the band room and waste time, but if I want change I have to make it happen. I am making this my Jesus time.

But what I really was meaning to say is that I have come to realize that my previous blog is full of grammatical errors and I am working on revising it. I suppose that is what you get when you blog at 3am huh? Well, I apologize for all my grammatical errors in past and future blogs. I tend to post my blogs at ungodly hours of the night, so I am not fully aware of my poor English.

I am going to try to blog more.

This Is What Love Is

"Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never looses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance." -1 Corinthians 13:4-7, New Living Translation.

If you did not already know, that passage would be the Love Verse. I looked up the definition of "love" on Dictionary.com and I got: -noun 1.tender, passionate affection 2.strong personal liking 3.person toward whom love is felt -verb loved, loving 4.to have love (for). I quickly realized this was a terrible definition so I went on UrbanDictionary.com and this is what I got: the most spectacular, indescribable, deep euphoric feeling for someone. Yet another terrible definition. For those that do not understand my frustration I will explain. When you have a definition of something you are not supposed to use the word in the definition. Well, dictionary.com, you have failed. You used the word in the definition and you didn't tell me what love is. Urban dictionary is just a failure and a terrible source for definitions, but why I used it, you will see in a moment.

The love verse is the perfect definition of the word "love." The obvious reason is because it is straight from the bible and the bible is nothing but the truth and life. Secondly because it describes what love is, not what it feels like. And to make it better, it is the words of God the Father himself, who better than the one who's love is like any other, beyond all compare?

If any of you have noticed, on my Facebook I have added captions to certain pictures. Those captions say, "this is what love is." What most people do not understand about me when I say, "I love music" is because everyone says that. But that verse, the love verse, describes the love I have for my music. That is why I posted those captions on any photo of me playing an instrument or conducting. Not only is playing my instruments something I love to do, but it is my one-on-one time with God. I am able to relax, sit and worship the only man I love. So whenever you see that and read, "this is what love is" you can know that me playing those instruments is what love really is for me. That is the only thing on earth that I love. It is my way of expressing love to my Jesus.