Here’s Zach Hunter, a 20 years old lad i truly adore. He’s an author, the youngest slavery abolitionist at the age of 12, the founder of “Loose change to loosen chains”. I adore people who get it all figured out and strive for the good cause.

But here’s a heart-warming post written by him. Because it’s bare honest, because in our strive for perfection, sometimes we forget that it’s okay not to have it all together. We don’t have to have everything figure out to do the right things, bring value, and put a smile in God’s face.

This is how i feel most of the time.

A lot of people seem to think I have direction- that I have it figured out. I just want to be honest with you guys. Every second of every day, I question whether or not I’m doing the right thing. Whether or not I’m where I’m supposed to be; being who I’m supposed to be. Every decision. I’m assuming I’m not the only one out there who’s like this. Feeling like I’m doing the wrong thing when it should feel right. For those of you who feel this.. I’m with you. I feel like I KNOW it’s worth it. But sometimes I don’t believe it. It’s not even that I feel broken, necessarily… but just that I feel bent. Sort of crooked and cockeyed. I know that the truth will set me free and I know what I believe and where I stand. It’s just that sometimes, my own feet betray me. Is this what humanity is/feels like? Uncertainty? Question marks????? haha… Faith is tricky. But friend, I believe in you. I really do. And it is my belief in my fellow humans, and my overarching belief in a God that is love, that keeps me going. Even if I have to limp.

Freedom cannot exist in the absence of law. People living in a state of anarchy are not free. They live under the random tyranny of any warlord, gang, or predator who can overpower them. They also live within the prison of their own distrust for their fellow men. A code of clear, fairly administered laws enhances our ability to trust, and cooperate with, people we don’t know personally.

Of course, laws restrict our actions, by punishing us for engaging in illegal activities… but they also enhance our freedom, by allowing us to work more easily with each other, and trade with confidence.

- Doctor Zero

Have you ever been dumbfounded by the bias of our own view of self? The very traits you think you posses may to an extent be imaginary. 

It’s those times when you may think you’re living life to the full, freely feeling and embracing the joys and pains life has to offer, but in fact you zoned out most of your life events, you walk without feeling anything, too consumed with your own minute thoughts. Times when you think you have multiple perspectives, but in fact you have a very narrow tunnel view about the world.

Worse, you may think that you’re reflective, but most days you go about as a body without a mind, without thinking nor feeling, without being engaged with anything that happens around you. Renee Descartes wrote “We think, therefore we exist”, by this standard, you don’t even exist!

Well, today i have. For a day, my world’s shaken. For years i’ve built my existence and identity around the traits i thought i have, having it shaken makes me feel so confused, being confused makes me feel so small. Because i have this (maybe false) belief that being an adult means never being confused about the most foundational thing as mere identity. I feel like i’m falling short of handling the task of being an adult.

I take shelter of comfort in the disposition of arguably my favorite person to ever grace this earth.

“The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become – because he made us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.”- C.S Lewis  

“Nothing more natural than that kids should care about celebrity. It’s not ‘growing up too fast’, it’s proof of immaturity.”

- Alain de Botton

He can be very snarky sometimes. Tsk tsk!

You wouldn’t guess who these two lovely people are! Arguably two of my favorite people on earth strolling in New York. I feel smugly satisfied holding a beautiful secret. :)

(Source: heartisgone, via lovemisscarter)

Year-end motto: Recuérdame and Be attentive!

Dear December, don’t end just yet, i’m not done feasting on your festivity. Passing of yet another year. Many things have evolved as twelve months swift by. 

Let’s take a last glance to 2011 and decipher the shapes in the clouds of experiences, victories, and mistakes. Right now everything still seems rather fuzzy and arbitrary. But somehow we just know it all means something.

Cheers to the closure of 2011!

a-ladys-findings:

As different as we all are, laughter is one element that we all have in common. We are all incredibly different and yet we are incredibly the same. Laughter has the ability to bridge the gap and connect us. It can cross any language and cultural barrier. We are all born with a sense of humor and the ability to laugh. It is a free gift to all. Enjoy it, let it sound, give it away, brighten someone’s day. Laugh…

Well the sun is surely sinking down
But the moon is slowly rising
So this old world must still be spinning ‘round
And I still love you

So close your eyes
You can close your eyes, it’s all right
I don’t know no love songs
And I can’t sing the blues anymore
But I can sing this song
And you can sing this song
When I’m gone

It won’t be long before another day
We gonna have a good time
And no one’s gonna take that time away
You can stay as long as you like

This song makes me happy and at the same time makes me wanna roll in bed and have a good rest.

Fleeting happiness is amazing. It decorates days like twinkling lights to a Christmas tree, icing to a cake. There’s beauty that brings happiness in everyone and everything, if we pause to enjoy it. 

Although when it comes to matters of greater importance, fleeting happiness can’t suffice. True joy has to come from something of more worth and substance. Cornerstone of our joy has to be firm, unshakable and ultimately robust.

At times, temptation to replace the robust cornerstone with a pretty one can seem so innocent, the path that leads to downfall feels so right.

Love Sunday communion sharing by Manoj. He shared:

1. Don’t trust yourself so much. Hearts can be deceptive, in different ways we lie to ourselves. Do enjoy the privilege of knowing God’s instructions.
2. Don’t take ourselves too seriously.  We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

The Great Gatsby is being made into a movie (again). The casts are perfect!! Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby, Carey Mulligan as Daisy, Tobey Maguire as Nick. I can’t name better suited actors than these.

I am bursting with excitement. Here’s the first few lines from the book, to escort the mounting expectation.   

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since.

“Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.”

I can imagine Tobey Maguire’s voice narrating this.

Oooh dear, 2012 is looking good. :)

This is Jarrod Gorbel. He makes good music. :)

(Source: danatan79, via jarrodgorbel)