2012 in Hindsight

So, about a year ago, I wrote a blog post about goals and things I hoped to do for the 2012 year. That year has come and passed, so let's see how I graded out.

2012 Goals:

Make no lower than a B in all of my classes.

-I didn't do too badly in the spring, missed with a B- in microbio lab and a C+ in my microbio class because I did quite terribly on the last test. The A in my second semester of Polish was nice though since it was 5 hours of credit. 

-Summer was meh. Got a B- in evolution, B+ in o-chem lab, and C+ in Vertebrate Physiology. That first session was pretty killer since I was in all three of those at that point.

-Fall was not that great either. I made 3 C's unfortunately, but I managed to pull off an A in my 3rd and last semester of Polish! Two of those C's could easily have been D's or F's, so it was definitely better than it could have been. And the other C was originally a C- that I bumped up a bit by taking the final. I probably could have done a lot better had I not been working part-time. It was tough balancing both work and school. More on that below. I pulled off a B+ in my immunology lab as well, but unfortunately it was only 1 hour of credit for oh so much more work.

Get a job.

-I was an after-school teacher with Side by Side Kids for first graders at J.J. Pickle Elementary this past fall! Oh man. I don't think I'm meant to work with little kids in large groups. They have such short attention spans. It was quite challenging and tiring most of the time, but there was definitely a lot of growth during my time there. And I wasn't going crazy the whole time. The people I worked with were pretty great, and the kids were really endearing and there were many great moments with them despite their affinity for trouble. It was also nice having a bit of money to spend on things every now and then such as computer upgrades, and I finally had a little bit of money to buy some nice presents for some special people! Also, I was really excited about being able to tithe my income and give back to various places and organizations that have helped me grow spiritually over the past few years.

Spend time studying.

-I did a fairly good job with this, I think. At least, I spent a heck of a lot more time at coffee shops than I ever have previously.  I also did a heck of a lot more note re-writing in the fall which I think helped a lot. I think I would have done a lot better grade-wise had I not been working, but I guess that's the trade off there. I still have a lot more work to do as far as my level of focus while I'm studying, but it's progress.

Monthly (at least) confession.

- I think I've been pretty good with this one. I don't know if I ever let it go much longer than a month between confessions. It's nice having the UCC and St. Austin's nearby. Also, the Cathedral has confession an hour before mass during the weekdays. Pretty legit. I tried to stick with this one especially through the fall since I was giving the Reconciliation talk on Awakening. I plan to stick with this one for life. One thing I need to be better about is making sure I prepare with a more thorough examination of conscience though.

Spend more time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament.
-I haven't really improved that much in this area. Still did weekly adoration as usual, but I didn't go out of my way that often to go to the Blessed Sacrament Chapel or anything. Maybe I can work that in more this upcoming semester since I only have 10 hours of classes. And with Awakening, I'm sure I'll need it haha.

Be more involved with Schoenstatt and my life group.

-I think this went alright in the spring. However, most of my life group graduated in May, so that kind of fell away after that. I haven't really been too involved in SUM this fall aside from helping out with music at adoration, but I still hang around the guys a lot. Also, the remaining members of my life group seem to be plenty busy themselves. With the graduated guys, Harry spent the night at my apartment once this semester though when he was in town, and we grabbed dinner another time he was here for work. That was nice. John calls every now and then to check in. It's always good to hear his voice. And his laugh. We even got lunch when I was driving through Round Rock on my way home, so that was really nice as well. 

-It's really cool seeing all of the guys in Schoenstatt that are younger than me and how they've grown over the past year or so that I've known them.

Prioritize/Balance life.

- Ha.Work screwed up that plan. It added a new thing to the plate while reducing my time for both studying and a social life. oh well.

Move on.

-well... more on that later.

Hope to do:

Read more.

- I kind of did this! Didn't really get too much done in the spring, but throughout the fall semester, I managed to read 1984 in my spare time. I just read through a cool little book about the Latin (Extraordinary Form) mass (They have this form of the mass at 3:30pm on Sundays at St. Mary's Cathedral if you want to check it out sometime, but it might confuse you). Also, I had started reading The Hobbit last January apparently, but I restarted it again over this break and have made it further than when I had previously stopped! The Lamb's Supper is next on the list.

Get back in the choir.

- lol. no. I'm ok with that though.

Dress better.

- This kind of went away once summer came around. I'm not going to wear jeans when it's 90+ degrees outside. I dress up when it's called for though!

Get better at socializing.

- I think I'm better at this. I still don't really do well with small talk though. Mingling with kids at STRONG retreats still makes me nervous though. Talking with the little kids at work is fun though.

Not worry about having a girlfriend.

- You're probably laughing right now. It's ok. I did too. 

-This was a tough one, no doubt. I struggled with this a lot. I don't know if I can adequately explain what happened anyways, but basically, I got a second chance to re-cultivate a friendship that had not been properly rooted before, chance to re-center our relationship on Whom we could not center it upon before, an opportunity to ask God to help me to love this person in the way that He's calling me.

-Things look good so far. Much better than good. We're actually happy now.We build each other's soul up rather than causing destruction. We're far from perfect, but our compasses are better calibrated to get us back on track when we veer off.

- Still lots of time before anything cray-cray though. Lots of discerning left to be done. Lots of events to occur, and God likes to play funny games sometimes. Not much to do besides trust and pray, right?

Fiat voluntas Tua, sicut in caelo et in terra.

And now, it's 3:11A.M. I think I'm gonna go to bed, but I plan on posting my goals/predictions for this 2013 year.

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Kind of, but not really, new post. =p

So, as most of you know, there's this retreat called Longhorn Awakening that goes on every semester here at UT. It's pretty cool. I gave a talk on this most recent one about reconciliation. A good number of you have read/heard this already. Some of you haven't. The later part will probably give a lot of good insight as to why I love the Church and Catholicism so much. It's also written in the way I was giving the talk, and I was much too lazy/busy with other things to actually change it. I've been thinking about posting it on here for the past few weeks, so...here you go! I apologize for the length. It was probably around half an hour long on the retreat... sorry bailey. =p
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Alright guys and gals. I’d like to start off with a question. What’s your favorite thing about being Catholic?  *gets answers* Well, my favorite thing about being Catholic is that within the Church we have been given the best tools we need in order to get ourselves to heaven....The Sacraments!

This starts off with baptism which most of us probably experienced as babies. It’s so awesome though because it is in baptism that we are cleansed of the stain of original sin and that we become an official member of the Church and a part of the Body of Christ. I always really love witnessing baptisms. I mean, you have cute babies (though the older people getting baptized are just as exciting), the cleansing of a soul, happy family members, and a new brother or sister in Christ! What’s not to love and be excited about?

Another gift that we’ve been given through the Church is the Eucharist. Pretty much the most amazing thing in the history of ever. In the Eucharist we have the true presence of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the humble form of bread and wine. And we, unworthy as we are, get to receive Him into our bodies! We get to be tabernacles for the one who was crucified to save us from our own sin. Our bodies become literal temples for the Lord, and He enters under our roofs to heal our souls.

The Eucharist is often referred to as the “source and summit of our faith”, and the reason for that is because it’s Jesus. Literally. And if Jesus is the source and summit of our faith, why shouldn’t we strive to make the Eucharist the source and summit of our LIFE?

This makes going to mass, daily or as frequently as possible, essential to our spiritual development. And go to adoration whenever you have the opportunity. Or at least go visit Jesus in the tabernacle. An awesome American Archbishop from the 60’s, the Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, one of my Catholic heroes/favorite people ever, used to dedicate one hour every single day to spend in the presence of the blessed sacrament. And he stuck with that from his ordination throughout his life. He’s without a doubt one of the greatest role models for American Catholics in the past century and is an amazing example of how being in the presence of the Eucharist can mold you into a saint.

Now, baptism, the Eucharist, and all of the other sacraments are amazing and show you God’s grace in their own unique ways, but the one I’m going to focus on today is reconciliation. Otherwise, we’d be here for at least a few hours. But yeah, reconciliation. The topic of my talk haha.

For most of my life, I’d probably only go to confession when my family went to the big penance services before Christmas or Easter, but probably close to never on my own.
Reconciliation. Why do we need it?

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Well first and foremost, it’s because we are sinners. As human beings, we have concupiscence, which is fancy Catholic terminology meaning “a natural inclination to sin”. Though the stain of original sin is washed away at baptism, we can still leave the marks on our souls through the sins we commit through our choices. And temptations are everywhere you look in the world. On TV, the internet, 6th street, weekends in West Campus.... The devil is real and is fighting with God for our souls. It is our job to be aware of this and to do our part in striving for perfection and heaven daily. This is where confession comes in.

So why do we confess to a priest when you can just confess directly to God?  Well, in the gospel of John, chapter 20, we hear Jesus say to His apostles

“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”

Here, we see Jesus giving the apostles the authority to bind and loose sins. The apostles passed this on to the Church and Her bishops,  which then conferred it to the priests as well. It’s important to remember that it’s not the priest who is forgiving your sins, but it is God Himself forgiving your sins. The priest only acts as an instrument to be used by God in this sacrament.

Another reason that we don’t just confess “directly to God” is that our sins not only cause damage to ourselves and our relationship with God, but they also damage our relationship with the rest of the Body of Christ, our brothers and sisters. Just as our good works build up the rest of the Church, so do our sins break it down. In reconciliation, the priest acts not just on behalf of Christ, but also as a representative of the Church, and it is through this sacrament that we are restored to a healthy relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Some of you out there might be afraid or get anxious at the idea of confessing your sins to a priest, but it’s important to remember that the priest is there because he wants to help us get to heaven. That’s his job and it is a very integral part of his vocation. Just as it is the duty of each spouse in a marriage to get the other to heaven, it is the duty of the priest to get his bride, the Church (that’s us!), to heaven. That’s a pretty big and awesome responsibility, and if any of you young men out there are called to the priesthood, it’s essential that you remember that you have that responsibility to your people.
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What do we need for the forgiveness of sins? At the very least, we should have what the Church calls “attrition” which is, simply put, the fear of going to hell. Like I said earlier, the devil is real, and hell is most definitely real. The idea that the devil and hell don’t exist are some of the biggest lies that the devil will feed you in order to lead you to sin.


So, what is hell? Hell is the absence of the love of God. It is complete isolation and solitude. And it is very important to know that it is not God that sends us there, but rather we send ourselves there by turning away from and rejecting God’s love through our sins, actions that separate us from the love of God. God never wants us to be apart from Him and His love. He loves us so much that He gave us the gift of free will.

We have free will because love cannot be forced; it has to come from one’s own desire to give his or her love to another. God desires our love. God is jealous for our love, all of it, but in order for that love to be real, we have to choose to love freely. And our actions should reflect that love we have for God. Our actions are what prove our love for God.  As Fulton Sheen once said: “Ours is a free universe of character and soul making. Almighty.God has placed into our hands the power to make us saints or devils. It is up to us.”

So with attrition: When you realize that hell is real, that the devil is real and is vying for your soul, it’s a pretty simple level to get to. It should quite literally scare the hell out of you.

While a fear of hell is very important to have, (St. Ignatius meditated on it daily), the ideal level you want to be at is to have contrition, which means having sorrow for having offended God because you love Him so gosh darn much that any action of yours that might do harm to Him causes you to feel terrible. True contrition is not always easy to achieve, so it is very important that we continue to cultivate our relationship with Christ by going to confession and receiving Him in the Eucharist at mass frequently and spending time with Him in adoration in order to get ourselves to that higher level. By cultivating this relationship, we grow in love for God, and this love can help us conquer any fears we have about going to confession and will allow us to rise above just that level of attrition.

After remorse, one more thing we should do before going to confession is run through an examination of conscience. This is just a reflection on how you’ve lived your life since your last confession. I personally like praying to Mary and the the Holy Spirit beforehand for the guidance and strength to make a good, thorough, and contrite confession.

After examination, there’s the actual confession of sins to the priest and absolution of sins!

In the traditional act of contrition which we can say near the end of confession, some of the last lines are the promises “to amend my life/sin no more” and to “avoid the near occasion of sin/whatever leads me to sin”.

So, in confession, we promise to do our best to avoid sinning, but as I said earlier, we have concupiscence, a natural inclination to sin, as human beings, so chances are fairly high that we will sin again at some point in the future. However, we can’t fall into the trap of despair. It’s like in Batman Begins when everything looks like it’s falling apart and that the bad guys have won and all hope is lost. Batman’s talking to Alfred and says:


Bruce Wayne: I wanted to save Gotham. I've failed.
Alfred: Why do we fall, sir? So that we can learn to pick ourselves up.
Bruce: You still haven't given up on me?
Alfred: Never.

Terrible accent aside, you see, Bruce almost gave up on trying to save the city, but Alfred’s faith in him and reminding him of his purpose allowed him to keep fighting for his ideals. To keep fighting for a city that had been judged as so deep in sin that it was beyond saving.

And we see it in the bible with the apostles. Judas Iscariot, who after betraying Jesus with a kiss, found himself thinking that he beyond salvation and was met with a rather unpleasant fate. Interestingly, Peter had denied knowing Jesus three times in the same night during Christ’s passion.

What was main difference between them? They both betrayed the one they had loved and called master. Judas sunk into the trap of despair, thinking he could never be forgiven for his crime. Peter, on the other hand, returned to Christ’s side, trusted that he would be used as an instrument of the Lord, built up the Church with the other apostles, and eventually was crucified upside down because of his faith.

Despair is one of the only things God cannot forgive since you close yourself off to the possibility of being forgiven, and by despairing, you underestimate the depth and power of God’s love and mercy. Again, like with going to hell, it is not God cutting off His mercy from you, it’s you cutting yourself off from His mercy.

Let’s look at avoiding the near occasion of sin. How do we do that? Well, prayers are always awesome. We can pray the Our Father, which Jesus Himself gave to us. It ends with “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil”. There’s also the St. Michael prayer that Bailey and Evan introduced earlier, and it’s pretty freaking epic. In the prayer, we ask St. Michael to defend us in battle because getting to heaven is definitely a battle against the devil. We can also ask for Mary’s intercession. The Church often refers to her as the “New Eve” who, by cooperating in God’s plan of salvation, crushes the head of the serpent, aka satan. The rosary is an amazing weapon against the forces of evil, and if you can get a tag team of an archangel and the mother of God fighting for you, the devil will have a hard time getting through.

You can also do practical things like surrounding yourself with holy images and symbols, avoiding the near occasion of sin by not trying to push your limits, receiving the sacraments of Eucharist and confession, going to mass daily/often as possible, going to adoration/spending time with Jesus, reading the bible (get know Jesus in both word and flesh), getting an accountability buddy if it’s a habitual sin, and by PRAYING.


So what do we get out of reconciliation?
We get absolution, aka the remission of our sins. We are restored to a state of grace. So, it’s like in mass when we say, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.” before receiving communion...

Though we might not ever become fully “worthy” while we’re still here on earth, when we walk out of that confessional, we’re as close we can probably ever get. We’re restored to a right relationship with God and with the other members of the Church.

So, I really love this sacrament of reconciliation if you couldn’t tell. Like a lot. But that love wasn’t always there and is something that had to grow over time. I’m going to share a bit of how that came about in my life.
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So, if we rewind a bit. To the beginning of my junior year of high school. I was pretty much your stereotypical nerdy asian kid. I didn’t have too many female friends, but before that year began, I made it one of my goals to get a girlfriend. Alas, that didn’t exactly work out, but I did make a lot of good female friends. And by the time senior year came around, I even ended up going to prom with the girl I liked. That was quite a victory for me at the time.

Fast forward four years to junior year of college. After many years of thinking that I was doomed to an eternity in the “friend zone”, I started growing closer to a girl that I was kind of sort of friends with,  and after a lot of awkwardness... we eventually started dating. Neither of us had ever had a significant other before, so we were new to this whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing.

Now, all of you out there, especially guys. If you’re going to be dating someone, you need to know how to protect them. That’s one of your responsibilities. To protect their heart. Protect their soul. Dating is for discerning whether God is calling us to marry that person, and if you’re going to get married someday, you are tasked with the responsibility of getting that person to heaven. Men, especially, we have to be aware of this and take charge of this responsibility. Just like Christ loved the Church and gave His life for Her, so must husbands sacrifice whatever it takes to get their wives to heaven.

So. I’d never had a girlfriend before, and I had no idea how to protect another person’s heart.

Why? Because I had no idea how to protect my own heart.

There’s a disease out there in the world right now that’s affecting a lot of people. What is it? It’s an addiction to pornography. And up until a year and a half ago, I was part of that.


It started when I was in 6th grade, and I stumbled upon some email that linked me to a site. I was so young, and had no idea just how much damage might come from that. And from that moment on... everything just kind of spiraled downhill.

After my first confession, it wasn’t till about 9th grade when I eventually went again. That makes about six years between my first and second reconciliations. And that feeling after my second confession was probably the best I’d ever felt for those six years. I felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of my chest, but I still didn’t really go to confession except maybe once every year or so. And unfortunately, I was still addicted to pornography. Although, I did try giving it up every Lent following, all of those efforts failed...

You know what’s really sad about pornography? It’s that it’s portrayed as “normal” and “ok” by the world and the media today. You see it in TV shows all of the time as a source of comedy, or you have organizations telling you that masturbation is ok and even “healthy”. All of this is leading souls astray.

You see, pornography takes a beautiful creation of God, one of your sisters or brothers, and portrays them basically as a piece of meat. It brainwashes and corrupts men.

It takes the men who are supposed to be protecting their sisters and basically turns them into ravenous wolves who only see a piece of meat waiting to be devoured. Pornography takes sex, which is supposed to be a beautiful, sacred reflection of God’s love for us in the Eucharist, and turns it into a utilitarian act of self-gratification.

Wait, what? Sex is a reflection of the Eucharist? What does that even mean.

Well you see, we are the bride of Christ, the Church, and Christ enters into us when we receive Him at communion. Sex is supposed to reflect that union. Just as husbands and wives become one flesh in marriage, so do we become one flesh with Christ. Pornography takes that beautiful image of the love of God and distorts and degrades it to an act of lust.

So, going back to the story. About 5 months into our relationship, I told her about my problems with pornography, and it absolutely destroyed her. I felt helpless and like I couldn’t do anything to make things better. Not that I didn’t try, but it seemed like the whole situation was so much bigger than anything I could take on by myself. Which is because it was. I also felt like the biggest piece of you know what because I had hurt the person I cared about the most.

After I told her though, after seeing how much it hurt her, I decided to stop looking at it right then and there and that I was going to stick through with it. I stopped because that feeling of hurting the person I thought I loved more than anyone in the world was the worst feeling ever.
So much of the trust she had in me was lost and deservedly so. A couple of terrible months ensued. Though as far as my addiction went, I did ok. I strove to grow in chastity because I didn’t want to hurt her like that again. The temptation was definitely still there, but I was like, “No. I love her.” I mean, I didn’t know how to properly love her at the time, but I fought through it.


Summer came around, and she went out of the country for a month or so. It was so hard not having her around, but I used that time to drown myself in prayer. I was in Austin for classes that summer, so when my class would get out at 11, I’d go straight to the UCC to the blessed sacrament chapel, prayed a rosary (that summer is when I finally got my mysteries straight), and then I’d go from the blessed sacrament chapel to daily mass. I knew that I couldn’t get through that on my own, so I was grasping wherever I could for any help I could get. During this time, the Blessed Mother was a source of great strength for me. I was asking her to help me learn how to properly pursue her immaculate heart so that I could properly pursue the broken heart of my girlfriend.

My main motivation for all of this was still my girlfriend though. I was leaning on God for strength which was great, but it was my love for her that was preventing me to give into temptation. However, God is a jealous God, and He wants to be the one we love the most in our lives. So of course, He gave me that opportunity.

My girlfriend came back from vacation towards the end of the summer. I thought things were going alright. Then, on July 15, the day after the midnight premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, she broke up with me. And I...I fell apart. It felt like my whole world had pretty much collapsed around me. Like everything I had worked on and prayed for throughout the summer had been done for nothing. It was almost like God had let me down. I was like, seriously?

I had lost the main reason for not looking at pornography. And I felt helpless. I felt a bit of that feeling of despair, the tool the devil uses to get us when we’re weak.

However, I was like “aw, hell no!” I did not just go through all of that just to fall back to where I had been or even worse. And it was HARD not having my girlfriend in my life, but I knew what I had to do. What I should have been doing all along. What I needed was a right relationship with God where He was the one I loved above everything and everyone else in my life, and where my love for Him is where my motivation for a chaste life came from.

That first month after the break up was the hardest. Some weeks I would go to confession on Saturday and have to come right back the following Monday or Tuesday. But every time I fell, I went straight back to reconciliation as soon as possible. Why do we fall? So that we can learn to pick ourselves back up. I would go to daily mass daily, reconciliation as soon as I needed it or earlier, I would pray rosaries, spend time in the blessed sacrament chapel, pray to St. Michael (I memorized his prayer fairly early in my struggles), or whatever it was that I thought might help me in my struggles. It was a period of extreme spiritual growth for me though I still had a lot more growing to do throughout the year. And still will for the rest of my life, but it was then that I finally realized my calling to be a saint. I’d heard that throughout my life, especially my time in college, but it wasn’t until I had to strive so much for my sanctity that it finally hit me. As Archbishop Fulton Sheen once said, “Unless there is a Good Friday in your life, there can be no Easter Sunday.”  


This call to sanctity is for all of us in the Church. We’re called to be saints. We’re called, even with our imperfections, to strive for holiness. To strive for perfection. To strive to be like Christ in the world, and to help others achieve this as well. The Church has given us the tools to achieve this in the sacraments. To quote a prayer from the mass of the Sacred Heart of Jesus:

“For raised up high on the Cross,
he gave himself up for us with a wonderful love
and poured out blood and water from his pierced side,
the wellspring of the Church’s Sacraments,
so that, won over to the open heart of the Savior,
all might draw water joyfully from the springs of salvation.”

That the wound on Jesus’s side is referred to as the wellspring of of the Church’s sacraments is just beautiful imagery. And it is from this spring of salvation, the spring of blood and water that only came about from Christ’s passion and death, that we are transformed into the saints of today’s world. There are many challenges in our strivings. Many things to be afraid of, but with God’s love and our reciprocation of that love back to Him, we can overcome anything. We can be attentive to His will. We can die to self and be born in Him. He’s calling each and every one of us to be saints. The question is, will you answer it?  

Weekly Learnings #2

So, after the fun experience of thinking I'd lost my backpack last weekend (where all my notes were), I'm here to update and actually keep up with my idea of posting more. =)

Cool facts from classes:

-Microbio: Bacterial spores can last for like 10-20 thousand years. Talk about a long hibernation. In lab, we did gram staining of bacteria to determine whether they were positive or negative. I learned I'm not very good with making slide mounts haha. And crap. I forgot to check my plates today. Whoops.

-Linguistics: The "p" sounds you make in the words "pit"and "spit" are actually different. Actually, if you record yourself saying the word "spit" and delete the part where you're saying the "s" part of the word, you'll hear yourself saying "bit". Cool, huh?

-Polish: We're learning about the genitive case which in Polish is "dopełniacz". In Polish, it's used when you're negating a direct object and also with possessives. We covered negation early in the week and have moved on the possessives the last few days (though I missed today). With possessive, you don't have to worry about word order like you do in English. ex: If you wanted to say my "dad's sister" you could say either "taty siostra" or siostra taty". The endings tell you what case the words are in, so the order isn't important. However, in English, if you were to say "sister dad's", that wouldn't mean anything.

-Architecture: We've been learning about the twelve different elements of form by looking at different buildings and seeing how they elicit these elements. A cool thing our professor does is show us paintings and parallel those same elements to the buildings. I really enjoyed the stories about the Manet paintings we saw, "Olympia" and "Luncheon on the Grass". These paintings took old classic paintings and redid them from a different angle. One that exposed the upper class families and led to lots of controversy and uproar. It's one thing to appreciate a work of art for its beauty, but to learn the history behind it makes is so much more meaningful.

-UTeach: I got to meet my 7th graders today! It was a bit intimidating for about 10 minutes or so, but they're all pretty cool kids! It's such a different environment that when I was in 7th grade. They were all working on assignments in pairs, and half of the kids had headphones on while working. Each group had a laptop and this kind of clicker thing that the teacher used to validate their progress on the assignment.

I got to meet just about all of them as I was going around, seeing what they were up to, and introducing myself. I was quite out of my comfort zone, but as time passed, I got more comfortable with them and vice versa.

They're all pretty cool kids. Robert was listening to The Beatles when I first came by and had lots of dubstep playing afterwards. Chloe wants to be a lawyer when she's older, and Jane wants to be a nurse. They're both trying to get into the Ann Richards Charter school that's only for girls. It's weird because after you apply, there's a lottery that they use to select people. Also, apparently an all boys charter school is in the works, or the Ann Richards school might be sued since it's not a private school. Kai was born in Georgia ( he wore a UGA shirt today), but loves UT and has been to football games here. We also learned from Rikki (my teach partner) that Kai means "ocean" in Japanese and "chicken" in Thai. Levi had a Miami Heat D. Wade shirt on, but it was ok since he was born in Miami. He likes to listen to Drake and Lil Wayne. Also, this one kid, Vladyslav, still had a pretty high voice. It was cute. And there were these two kids of in the corner, Jesse and Ronald who didn't get much done the whole time. I went over every now and then to check their progress.

But yeah, they were cool kids. Some of them were talking about playing Beatles songs backwards to hear hidden messages. I also learned that catfish whiskers have small barbs that can sting. Also, the school had a poster in the hallway where kids sided either on Team Peeta or Team Gale. I thoroughly enjoyed that. I'm excited about this. =)

I also learned some things about myself this week!

-Running isn't really that hard. Making yourself run is. Running buddies ftw.

-I have cool friends. When I was freaking out about losing my backpack, I got so much help from people as far as borrowing books, notes, (even a camera), etc went. Even the sympathy was nice haha.

-I think I've made the decision to not even think about dating and stuff like that for this semester and probably through the summer as well. That's just not really something I need to worry about this semester. I can pour my energy and time into other areas of my life that are in more need right now. I'm gonna focus on my faith, friendships, and school this semester. So yeah, no dating till after July 31st. Let's go with that. Not that I've ever been much of a "dater", but you know. Also, my youth minister met his wife during a time he did a similar thing. Maybe I'll be as lucky? *crosses fingers*

-Back to the running thing. I've lost 10 lbs in just about two weeks. It's pretty awesome. I'm keeping track of what I eat on http://www.loseit.com/ , and it's been pretty helpful. And I learned that I can run two miles. I just never knew how to pace myself to be able to do so before.

Hopefully that should be enough for you to read for the week. =p

Uczmy Się!

Today in Polish class, we were watching this video that's titled "Uczmy Się Polskiego!" which translate's to "Let's learn Polish!" There was a dumb little song that went with it. It was highly entertaining when the teacher made us all sing along with the video and then on our own. I'm quite bummed that there's not a video of it online for me to share with y'all.

Anyways, let's get to the point of this post. I think my future career path may be that of a teacher. And I was thinking the other day, I'm taking some pretty cool classes this semester: intro to the study of language, architecture and society, second semester of Polish, UTeach, and microbiology (+lab). There's a lot of cool and diverse things I'll be learning this semester. I figure I should try to enjoy going to class and learning if I'm going to hopefully be teaching students myself one day.

So for this semester, my plan is to post a list of cool things I've learned in all of my classes for each week. It'll get me to be proactive in both my education and my blogging! Double win.

Some examples off of the top of my head from this past week:

-There are 10 times as many microbes in/on our body than our own cells. There is a bacteria with the genus name "Thiomargarita". We also had a mini geography lesson on where Bangladesh and the Bay of Bengal are.

-an apron was actually called "a napron" back in the day, but it gradually changed to "an apron" over time. I explained this to my roommates as we were watching Adventure Time. In the episode, the ice king shaved his beard, and when he told a princess he was "an ice king", she misheard him as saying "I'm a nice king!" Then hilarity and ridiculousness ensued as per usual on that show.

-in architecture, we learned that "Gnomes are working in the garden" at the "Beasley House" =p

-and in Polish, we've been learning to order things from restaurants and coffee shops. There is also a new girl who's pretty much fluent and is showing all of us up. Jaka szkoda!

But yeah. You people who still check this thing will have things to read (hopefully) weekly! Yay!

Peace out homies. (I obviously don't know how to end this post.)

2012

Hola. So I actually started writing an entry on New Year's Eve. Then I tried to finish it about two days ago. Both attempts failed miserably. So I figured I'd just start with a new entry! Also, forgive my poor grammar in this post. I've been lacking in practice, and just capitalizing the beginning of sentences is not something I'm quite used to any more haha.

Anyways. So it's a new year. Last year... well last year was a doozy. I was planning to go over it a bit in my previous attempts at this post, but I got nowhere. So let's skip that. Focus on this next year.

2012. A fresh new start. Moving forward. For real this time.

Some of my goals this year:

Make no lower than a B in all of my classes.

I came reasonably close to this last semester, but I made a C+ in a class I definitely could have done better in. I will get my GPA above a 3.0 (thank you engineering).

Get a job.

I'm actually going to apply for this tutoring job I think. Get some money and also grow in the area I think I might actually want to make a career out of (O.o)! But first, I need to actually create a resume and then figure out what the heck a cover letter is. =p So if anyone's an expert in either of those areas, I might need some help haha.

Spend time studying.

I did a pretty good job at this last semester actually. With some of my classes. Not the one I got a C+ in haha. But I can do better. And I'll have even less distractions this semester hopefully.

Monthly (at least) confession.

I got fairly good about this last semester as well. But I could definitely go more often, still. And maybe be more scrupulous about keeping track of my sins.

Spend more time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament.

I mean, sure I go to daily mass. Sure I go to adoration for an hour every week. But if I'm going to be studying at the ucc, might as well take advantage of having Jesus right downstairs. Maybe I'll even show up to some of the holy hours FOCUS does haha. I mean, if Mike can do it... =p

Be more involved with Schoenstatt and my life group.

There's so much to say here, but I can't seem to find a good way to phrase it. Important though.

Prioritize/Balance life.

Gosh it's hard balancing studying time, spiritual time, and social time. The latter two have definitely taken priority the past few years, but I've been learning how to integrate the first one better.

Move on.

Some things on my hope to do list:

Read more.

Textbooks included since I hardly ever read those haha. But besides that, I'd love to be able to set aside some time maybe even once a week to read something for fun, and I have lots of spiritual reading I could definitely do for my own growth.

So far this break, I've re-read HP: SS & CoS, I've read the Hunger Games trilogy, and I'm currently reading The Hobbit! Good start that can hopefully not die off once school starts haha.

Get back in the choir.

I started off last semester pretty well on this front, and singing with the youth choir back home reminded me how much I missed it.

Dress better.

I'm going to attempt to stop wearing athletic shorts and a t-shirt 4 days a week. I still probably will probably once a week, but I'll try to cut down on it. I did buy two new pairs of jeans over the break and am going clothes shopping sometime before school starts, so that's a start! However, once it starts getting over 90, the cargo shorts will be quite commonplace. =p

Get better at socializing.

I'm awkward. Not as terribly as I was in middle school/high school, but I'm still not the greatest at making conversation. But shoot, if I want to become a teacher, I'm gonna have to work on that. A lot. So yeah, like at STRONG retreats, I'm going to make a more conscious effort to mingle at the beginning with the kids. And hopefully do a better job at talking with my kids in my UTeach class. They're supposed to be middle school kids though, so that's kind of frightening haha. Hopefully, if I get that tutoring gig, that will help me develop my one-on-one skills and stuff.

Not worry about having a girlfriend.

Dude. You're 21. Finding your future spouse isn't of the utmost importance right now. Even if all of your high school friends seem to be getting engaged and married and stuff. Your grades might need to have more priority. And you need to keep working on your own soul. Are you even ready to take care of another person's heart right now? If something comes along, then great, but if not, no te preocupes.

Besides, there's still that whole priesthood thing too. Even if you think you know what you want, God might have bigger things planned. Trust Him. If only sensible side of me was at the forefront of my mind all of the time...

Anyways, yeah. 2012. Bring it.

One of these days...

I'm going to blog about something happy and non-angsty. One of these days.

Strength and Love

I am weak. I am nothing on my own, and I am reminded of that quite often.

However, menacing obstacles that I thought I'd never overcome in my life, I've been able to conquer when I've gained strength out of my love for someone.

But when that person has been kind of cut out of your life (even if only temporarily), it's hard to find that strength to keep up the fight (because some battles are never really finished). And I don't trust myself enough to try and lean on my own strength because I know where that's gotten me in the past. I am weak and nothing on my own.

I can't be strong for myself. I've wondered if that's because I don't really have a lot of love for myself. I mean, I don't really consider myself much of an important person, and I usually put my desires behind those of others. Maybe if I loved myself more, it'd be easier to be stronger for myself ("You'll never share real love...until you love yourself...I should know")? I don't hate myself or anything...but I don't really know how much I love myself. That's a weird thing to think about anyways. And a bit self-centered. Anyways.

Where I was trying to get to before I went on tangents... is that I need to obviously keep growing in my love for God. I need to make Him my best friend. To tell Him everything that's on my mind and that's troubling me. And to make sure to thank Him for all the little joys in life. He needs to be my top priority relationship.

And I need to TRUST. Blindly trust that whatever has happened in my life is part of His will even though I might not be the biggest fan of it right now. And move forward, from where He's placed me instead of where I was expecting to be placed. And trust that He'll take care of me and those I love. I need to take after the Blessed Mother and become His handmaiden. Let it be done to me according to thy word.

By growing in love of and by trusting in God, I can gain that strength I so dearly lack on my own.
"I have the strength for everything through Him who empowers me."-Phil 4:13

"...let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us and persevere in running the race that lies before us while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith."-Hebrews 12: 1-2

(sorry this post didn't really flow well or come together. but it's kinda late and I'm tired. >_<)