Camp Journal Day 1

So I'm at Eagle Lake Camp and I have been journaling every day to help myself remember my experiences/work through tough things/be more understanding of my prayers/see where God has taken me from.

I have been in the pattern of writing about the previous day in the morning whens I wake up to have my daily quite time.

Day 1: It has almost been a year since my last journal (Same book I had last summer). I arrived at ELC last night. Father I'm so thankful for the people you have placed as crew counselors. I can tell I'm going to love these people. We are just getting ready to eat breakfast then we are hiking down to the glen. I'm so excited! Last night we went to dinner together as a crew staff adn it was incredible. It had not really sunk in that I was going back to camp and I had not been excited yet. But dinner was soo good! At some point during dinner it was like all of the excitement and affirmation hit me. It was a wonderful moment. We had a great time! "God, I am so pumped"

Support letters/ADD/Bitterness

These are a few of the things I pulled out of my bucket of the fifty or so thoughts I had to write about. Maybe that is because I started the day with 4 cups of coffee......

Also I'm listening to the new The National album right now. It is incredible. So a big thanks to NPR for streaming it. And I thought the government never did anything right.

So today I'm supposed to be working on putting together a support letter for the summer. I really don't want to write a support letter or to mail it out. I didn't do it last summer and I planned on not doing it this summer but my mom kept bothering me and I felt really bad. Eventually I have just decided it is better for me to honor her and to make her happy than to hold to my reasoning for not.

Which my reason for not writing a support letter is because I feel like if you want to make a commitment to be a servant and you don't have other people you are responsible for you shouldn't be asking for handouts because "your doing something good". I just felt like "hey, I can afford this, yeah I will have to make some sacrifices but that was a big part of it right?" To sacrifice time and money to serve the Lord. Honestly one of my biggest pet pevs is high school students raising thousands of dollars to go overseas to spend 10 days site seeing and working for 2 days. I just think it might as well say "Support me so I can go have a life changing experience/ give me X thousand dollars so I can be changed"

I didn't do this so I could go have fun for a summer or push of responsibility and I know part of the reason was for me to be changed. I chose to come back to Eagle Lake because I felt like God lead me there and opened lots of doors for me to be there. I wanted to respect that and follow God's lead. I don't desire to be rich, I desire to serve my father and experience his love more fully. This is why I didn't want to send support letters and why I feel so uncomfortable doing it. But God is good and I'm honoring my mother through this.

Coffee makes me crazy.. I can't handle to much caffeine (SP? Really That is not an easy word to spell.... for me) I think the caffeine buzz is actually starting to subside though, which is good, I can finally focus a little bit.

I had breakfast with Corey this morning, that was so good to catch up. We have really struggled to stay in touch. It was actually a really hard adjustment for me because in high school I relied on Corey so much. He really discipled me in the complete sense of the word. He lived life with me, we got coffee or lunch almost weekly and I constantly went over to the k-life house to see him. I had another guy at northwestern who started to mentor me but then I transfered. Anyways I'm sending Corey my blog address soon so. (HI COREY). I will keep writing like he won't read this though. I am hopeful that if I move back to Des Moines he will start discipling me again. That would be amazing.

Well Doyle just walked in and we are going to play basketball so I have to go.... More to come later. Good talk

LOL it makes me laugh how poor of a job I do at blogging consistently. I do enjoy it and I don't know why I can't make myself sit down for ten minutes and do it......HMPH

I have to give a special shout out to Andrea, You inspire me. I love reading you blog, it really is just refreshing...... I treat it like a tv show almost. When I have not read it for a while I get excited that maybe there are like five posts for me to catch up on and then I read one if I'm really busy or I just read all of them if I'm not.

Also today for the first time I thought "I wonder if Andrea blogged this last summer, and how interesting that would be to read about her thoughts on camp if she did". So I checked and there were only a few posts but they were interesting.

It was actually kind of tough because it made my heart hurt. Funny how that works looking back on how I felt a lot of times at camp. But God gave me some amazing friendships there. Friendships that continued to grow after camp and are still growing ( Very slowly at times). These are geographically challenged friendships. Those are hard friendships, it is tough to catch each other on the phone. I have only been able to see two of my close friends from the summer since I left camp. Those experiences were very weird. First in November I saw Andrea for maybe 3 hours in Chicago, we talked and walked the streets and it was amazing but also very weird. It was this weird feeling of like "this should be normal and it seems normal that we are just hanging out again, but it's not because it has been 3 months" and we only knew each other for 2 1/2.

Then there was the hour and a half I spent with Dave in Minnesota. Crazy our parents live ten minutes from each other. How weird. I know we don't get to talk much but you people are very close to my heart. So much so that it hurts. I don't know if that makes sense to anyone else, but it does to me.

I remember so well being dropped off at the airport on august 8th, 2009. I hadn't really been that upset about camp ending or really cried much. Which was weird because I am a person that hates goodbyes and the reality was for me and most of those people that was goodbye, not see you later, it was see you never, have a good one. As cold as it is to say for a lot of the people I spent 2 1/2 months with I was ok with that. I remember the time leading up to leaving after I was a crew camper for six weeks in 2004 and the days leading up to that were brutal. I really ached when it was over. When rez ended I felt mostly numb. That was until I said goodbye to Eric and I started to realize "Wow I have become really close to this guy and I really do love him". That was the one part of that night that was hard. When he said "stay in touch. Honestly, I do not tell everyone that and I mean it" I almost started crying. It was amazing to see/feel that genuineness.

Then when we got to the airport the next day, that was really tough. We stood together at the door, we stood as a group and we prayed. We stood together as friends who developed friendships centered on Christ and it was beautiful. Then the tears started coming. Because it hurt and the was that real fear of "Maybe this is goodbye". I remember grabbing Callie's hand as we talked together toward our check in and looking back and seeing our dear friends standing together waving goodbye and I don't know what we said but we said something and we turned and ran back and that was soooo good. We ran back to our friends fighting off tears, and caring big grins, I think it was almost to say "We would turn around and stay if we actually could". It was like we just wanted to feel that moment that you always see in the movies when they guy speeds to the airport only to get there just as the love of his life is about to board the plane and say "No wait, i love you" and then she turns and runs to him and then they live happily ever after.....

I know I can't really grasp this but how fortunate are we that we get to have a "happily ever after". I know I do not understand what this means but I think it is good to wrestle with and try to understand/appreciate.

Today I have spent pretty much the entire day alone..... Okay I have only been awake for five hours. But that is a solid amount of time. I spent time going through the bible studies for this summer. Man, I can't believe I'm going back to Eagle Lake. Honestly, sometimes I get nervous about it. Sometimes I allow thoughts of "What if I don't really like it" or what if I can't connect with the people on staff, "what if I am not a good counselor", "Did a make a mistake by not taking an internship", or "What if I get there and just realize right away I made a mistake"

I know these are all lies and will not be a reality this summer. But I have had to fight with them just the same.

Father I know that I am not adequate to disciple these youth but you are more than able to speak through me and use me for them to better understand you. I pray for unity among the staff this summer father, I pray you would break our pride and bring us together through love and humility. There is a quote that is fascinating to me "It is amazing how much can be accomplished if no one cares who gets the credit." John wooden. Father help us not to care who gets the credit this summer but help us to work together and be like minded in discipling these youth for you.

Dream Job

Well it has been quite some time since I last posted. Oh well, I decided to day would be the perfect time to get back on track.

So the reason for this blog is something that has consumed a lot of my thoughts for a few weeks. This is something that started as an after thought when my roommate started working on a project about socially responsible companies and the few conversations we had about the research he was doing. Then it moved into more of a for thought when I was at coffee with a friend of mine who I have just started hanging out with this semester and he asked where I want to be in three-five-ten years. It was interesting because at that point I realized I had a decent idea but had not put lots of thought into it and wasn't really committed to it.

As our conversation continued I started to hammer it out in my head. A few days later I had another similar conversation with another friend and it was very interesting how we really saw so many things about life so similarly. Then it was a conversation with my Tommy about what it would look like to work together a few years down the road because of the possibility that he would take his mom's position at a Real Estate company. Maybe that was a pipe-dream but that got me thinking even more. Then it turned into some research I did because of a land development project and looking into low income housing which lead me down a road of reading about some companies who focus on helping to develop low income housing and that is their companies focus. This really gained more steam when I recently bought a book about companies who are responsible... The book is called The responsibility Revolution. I have enjoyed the book and last night I had another conversation about my dream job.

So what all of this has lead to is I have spent a lot of time thinking about my future and trying to find a way that my "career" isn't just this 9-5 thing completely separate from God. The more time I have spent thinking about these the closer I feel I am moving towards not my dream job but my goal job. Which is to start a Real Estate company that is for profit but not only for profit it would be a company with a mission not just a balance. I would like to start this company and have a certain % focus on helping the Low-income, affordable housing industry. I think a lot of that would be problem solving how to make better, more efficient housing more affordable. I mean I really think this is something I could be passionate about and get behind. I believe there is real purpose in going to work every day and not just thinking about making a paycheck to take home but thinking about helping those who are less fortunate than you. I believe that would make work so much more enjoyable, to have a real purpose other than just providing for your family.

I would really like to do this. I mean this is the best way I can think of using my "talents/abilities/understanding to benefit the kingdom and to take care of people. I mean how beautiful of thing would it be to know that I would be helping people have a better,cheaper, and nicer place for them and their children to live. I want to help kids grow up in a cleaner nicer environment and I would like to move into finding more ways to help with continuing education for the low-income demographic.

Anyways, I just really wanted to get those thoughts out but now I have to run to a Real Estate Club meeting.

Victory!

So I really needed a victory today and at two I got to my class room for my Sign Language class to find a closed door and a note that said there was no class today.......Victory! It was so refreshing and rejuvenating, I was in the middle of a very busy and stressful Monday and Boom no more late paper because we didn't have class today, no sitting in class for fifty minutes, an extra fifty minutes to try to be productive towards other things, and it was just a wonderful moment of disbelief that I was actually free from class.

I was reading a blog entry of mine from last fall and it is just crazy to me how long ago September feels like it was. I was just thinking about how horrible the first two months of last semester were and then it hit me that it was just last semester.

Today is the worst kind of weather. The sun never came up and it has just been gray all day. This weather honestly gets me down. That is a big reason why I need to leave Iowa. I think I am more of a California weather kind of guy, always sunny and 70. Yeah that sounds pretty good.

So now that I am positive I am going back to Eagle Lake it has been a really good motivator to be spending more time in the word and more time working on gaining a better understanding of the bible as a whole. Right now I'm reading through "How to study the bible" By John MacArthur. It is different then what I expected but I have enjoyed it for the most part. I am really excited for all of the time this summer that I will be spending in the word with campers, other counselors, and time spent alone up in the mountains.

Father I pray the staff this summer would have a deep love for each other and that would be the focus of our staff to love one another and for your love to overflow from us to each other and our campers. I also pray right now for all of the people who are making decisions right now on if they are going to be coming to Eagle Lake or doing something else this summer and that you would lead them in that decision and that they would use and enjoy this time to examine their life, their relationship with you, their priorities, and what they really want out of this short time we have here.

This moment.....and maybe others ;)

So I'm sitting in Panera right now. I really enjoy going to coffee shops and pulling out my computer and putting my headphones in. I don't enjoy Panera as much as the average local coffee shop. It is just a little to busy for me.

Sunday's are stressful days. Sunday is usually the day I start to see how much I have going on during the next week. It is also the day I plan on doing a lot but usually do not get a lot done. Sunday is usually a big cleaning, organizing, laundry-ing?, and overall just "busy" day. I like to do things that make me feel like I'm being productive as I am putting off doing school work. I think ideally I would wake up early on Sunday but I usually don't wake up till ten (Church is at ten thirty) lol, I feel like a lot of people would read this and be saying "Oh yes that makes perfect sense". But since no one is reading this I will just have to say it to myself.

Anyways I was actually pretty productive on Saturday morning and was able to do all of my laundry, cleaning, and organizing. So that was rally nice and I felt good about the rest of my weekend. Also today I am skipping the Panthers Tournament championship game to be at panera "doing things". So I call that a victory.

As far as other moments are concerned. On Friday I had an interview with a Real Estate company in Cedar Falls to discuss an internship. The interview went very well and I am 90% sure they will be offering me the internship next week. This was my number one option so I am extremely thankful.

It is amazing to me how over the past month and a half God has delivered so much. First I was contacted about going back to Eagle Lake as a crew counselor when I had already written it off, then I spent time praying asking for prayer, the conversation with my parents was terrible, then I asked for direction and prayed at warrior training and the man leading told me my parents were in authority and I should obey their decision so we prayed for God to change their hearts, then my father said that he thought it would be a good thing for me to go to Eagle Lake but he just wanted me to get an internship, so I decided to be obedient to my parents and search out an internship that would allow me to work at Eagle Lake, then there was the discussion about Tommy's wedding and the alcohol commitment, then in a happy birthday letter my parents said they were hoping I would be able to go to Eagle Lake, and now this internship which was my first choice looks like it is going to work out. How many times did I think I had closed the door on this summer and then prayed for God to open it if that was his will and he has continued to open the door. I don't think I have actually realized how incredible this whole thing has been until just now.

Thank you Father for leading me so strongly. I have such a hard time realizing your hand leading me until I look back and see how faithful you are and how obvious your work was. I pray that first and foremost your love would pour through me to these young men and women this summer. I pray that I will not spend one hour thinking that this is my love and I need to love them better or try harder, but that I would know it is your love and my job is to allow you to love me and for that love to overflow through me.

There are so many more things but I am going to take a break. Hey, 2 blogs in three days. Seriously that might just be a new record for me, it feels good.

I knew this would happen

Well I think I can say "I told you so" because I knew this would happen again where I would start a blog and then not blog forever. The worst thing about blogging is I feel like there are way to many things I want to share but they are usually fleeting thoughts so by the time I'm actually at a place where I can blog, I have thought about something else.

I really had to force myself to blog today. It would not have happened had I not been reading Andrea's blog.

Well lets see what has happened in the last month that is memorable. School has been churning along, I turned 22, the weather has been getting warm, the days are getting longer, I have had a few interviews for internships but have not been able to get things finalized yet, I'm pretty sure I'm going to spend my summer at Eagle Lake as a Crew Counselor, life has been busy with Intramural sports, the Fraternity has been keeping me busy, and I have been enjoying time spent with my roommates.

School is not worth talking about except for my Intro to American Sign language class is pretty cool, I have enjoyed learning another language, and learning about Deaf culture and history.

I am also working on a team of Real Estate students that is putting together a land development proposal in Minneapolis. I think this project will be very cool because it will give me a good chance to get a better understanding of what working for a developer would be like.

Turning 22 was good. I think I liked being 21 better but oh well. I had a pretty good time going out to dinner with some of my friends and then going out that night with a group of old roommates, current roommates, and friends. I think I was a little disappointed this year just because I felt like last year my roommates made a bigger deal out of my birthday which was really fun. I think part of that is your 21'st Birthday is a much bigger deal than your 22nd.

Weather oh my goodness. It is nice and sunny outside today and it is above freezing! I have realized a lot more this year how much the weather impacts me. I really think the winter just gets to me with all of the cold and never seeing the sun. That is honestly a big part of the reason why I want to move somewhere with better weather than Iowa. I just feel like there is more of a spring in my step (lol Get it?) and that I'm just in a better mood when the sun is out and the days are warmer and longer. Spring break you are so close, which means daylight savings time is so close!!!!

Well I have a second round interview with a life insurance company in Cedar Rapids, Ia. The opening for that internship is the fall semester, so I would have to take a semester off. Also there is a company from Kansas City coming in April and I will probably schedule and interview with them. They want someone to work summer and fall but I will see if they would be alright with me starting in August. Kansas City would be pretty cool and I know another guy who is applying for one of the two internships there.

There is also a company here in Cedar Falls that I have been trying to get in to their office to have an interview with. We have emailed and they came to our Real Estate club to talk. They seemed really excited about me interning with them but I think they have just been very busy. Which has been very frustrating for me because I'm trying to finalize summer plans and I don't want Eagle Lake to have waited this long and then have me say I can't do it. If things worked out with the company in Cedar Falls that would be the best case scenario, because I could do a part time internship as well as taking classes. Also I would be able to intern with them for a full school year.

Finally, there is a company out of Des Moines who is coming up to our Real Estate club at the end of March who wants to talk about a possible internship. Which I am thinking about asking them if they would be open to me interning from August to December in Des Moines. Which I would be alright with because I know a lot of people in Des Moines and Tommy might be back in Des Moines for a year.

This has been a hard semester for me in the Fraternity. I have thought about quitting many times. I'm torn because I don't think quitting on something is the right way to do it, especially since I am in a leadership position. But at the same time my heart just is not in it. I think mostly it is because I don't really have any close friends in the Fraternity and I have a handful of guys I enjoy spending time with in the Fraternity. I just think it was a really bad decision for me to run for a leadership position, I just do not want to put in the time and I don't really care. I would say I'm pretty burnt out with the Fraternity.

Well this has been a long blog and I need to work on consistency not length. So until next time....