There is hope, calm your soul.

February. February was a peak for me. I had just come out of the hardest year of my life thus far, the hardest fall and holiday season. My grandmother passed away. The one person who I felt that I could turn to and be completely honest with, and hold on to even though he was miles away confronted me and broke my heart. February was the month that it was determined I was going to go to Arizona and spend two weeks with my other grandmother who is suffering from Alzheimer's. I was tormented from the time I said I would go, through about my first week there with panic attacks and suffocating fear.

February was a peak. I couldn't handle any more. I was holding on to the literally last strand of my rope. I had nothing but my faith in God, and even that was on its way to being choked out. 

Things have since lifted. I got a job, I got over my broken heart (about 6 months later), I'm making decisions to enrich my life. I have friends that I spend time with, I think my church hunt has come to an end, and life isn't without its challenges, but it's small potatoes compared to feel like the life is being sucked out of you, kicked out of you, pressed out of you. What Paul talks about in Second Corinthians about being hard pressed on every side, crushed, perplexed..but not destroyed - that was me. Thankfully, my life is not like that. My problems are a walk in the park at this point.

I'm very blessed. My blog title comes from a song by a band called Paper Route, I heard them at my first Anberlin concert (which I saw in February,) it's called "Calm My Soul" and when I was listening to it today, I realized that that song is the culmination of last year to this past February. And the prayer to God of calming my soul has I think, been mine for a while, though I may not realize it. But I do know that my life is settled in a state of peace now. I'm not at unrest. I fail, I definitely do. There's a situation at work that I know I've dealt with wrong and I'm hoping that the Lord will give me a chance to rectify it, because I truly don't know how.

I met with "my book club" tonight. I never thought I'd be in a book club. It's with some people from work, and we met for the first time today to talk about Frankenstein, which I hurredly finished before the meeting. The next book is "Brave New World,' which I plan to focus on a little better. I like it because I want to read more to better my intelligence, and discussing is interesting because it makes me feel kind of vulnerable in a weird way. I don't like to feel intellectually vulnerable, or intellectually inferior, which I kind of felt tonight but only because I'm silly and insecure. Anyway. It was still a good time, I'm looking forward to doing it more regularly. 

Uhg, I hate not being to hash out certain thoughts because I don't know who might read my blog and take it the wrong way. :P

I'll try anyway. Do you ever feel intimidated by someone that you admire and respect, and even are friends with on a basic level, and you want to bond with them a little more personally but you feel like they kind of think that you're lame because you're not as cool as them? I know, 100% juvenile but I cant help it. I feel that way. And I think that ultimately it's on me because I clam up and don't try to make conversation, when I could try to make better efforts. It's not like this person has told me that they hate me or think that I smell. We've actually had some legitimate times where when I thought about it, I was like, "We're definitely friends to some point, what am I being so weird about?" Maybe I just feel like I have to have a moment where a person and I have a legit heart to heart to feel like we're "friends for real." It's dumb, but oh well.

But I'm determined to try and do what I can to make it clear that I'm not trying to be stand-offish or snobby. Because when I analyze how I act around this person I see that I could be misinterpreted to be that way. But i don't want that. I'm not that person. I don't know why I'm so shy sometimes. Well, that's a lie. I do.

Also, in other news, BIG NEWS. Declaring that by faith and I'll keep you in the loop when my faith is made sight. Hashtag: If you hear me talk about it, I'll sound like a crazy person. Which maybe I am.