Bad days can end well.

Despite everything that has been going on, somehow everything became okay today. I'm still a bit nervous for things, but so far, so good.

I reconciled three friendships today. That in itself is enough reason to celebrate!

I've never felt this at peace before. It's truly amazing! I'm so excited for the next steps that life has for me!

My neighbour who I have been fighting with for a while smiled at me.

Yep, brief post, but I had to share the joy!

I love perfect peace. I know things are going to get tough, but for now, things are good.

Why I'm making this decision.

Alright folks, here it is. I'm kind of too chicken to admit this to most people in person. Through the internet, it's easier to deal with the emotion. This is terribly personal, but I feel that an explanation is required. Now it might make more sense to people as of lately as to why I've been so upset.

I have decided to leave the Latter-day Saint faith. I've chosen to make this very brief, not stating all my views, because I simply don't want to. However, here is the basis.

I started seriously questioning (I've always been questioning) about two months ago when I found out that a group I'm closely associated with split up over religion. I found it preposterous and ridiculous! It scared me because it was proving my friend who said that religion starts a lot of dumb fights, right. Then I experimented with things like praying that specific things would be proven correct to me, and they were, even though they were completely wrong. There were keys that were supposed to remain the same and they're consistently changing! Even the Book of Mormon has been redone a few times. Even though in the beginning it was just for grammar errors, some of the meaning has been changed too. I can't believe in the kind of God that they believe in, one who is so judgmental. I may be only human, but even if someone is mean to me 1000 times I can't help but love them. I can't stand the exclusion of the church. So many people have their families lost to them because of it. They're disowned, fight all the time, basically just can't be accepted as human beings. People are so set on BEING RIGHT that we forget that people are the most important things we have here. I'm not angry toward the church, not yet, but I don't agree with a lot of their beliefs. I've also noticed that the LDS church is VERY similar to other churches, either with little or no change whatsoever.

Anyway, to conclude, I've done a lot of soul searching and I've discovered that I don't believe it's true. I do believe in a God of some kind, but I don't believe what they believe. It's been the toughest decision I've ever had to make, because it's all I know. The only reason why I've even thought about staying is because I don't want my friends of the LDS faith to think less of me. I KNOW that there's going to be judgments, and that's going to hurt like hell. I'm still me, I just don't believe what they do. In fact, I'm more me now than I ever have been. It feels like the right decision. I've tried to force myself to believe it. I've kept on reading my scriptures, praying, and have felt nothing. Not unless if I force myself to. It's great if other people find happiness in it, but I don't. All I see is pain. My friend put it as, I've been outside of the bubble, and so therefore it's hard to go back to the oblivious bubble.

My beliefs are agnostic right now. I believe in natural healing, because I've seen it work. I believe that there is a God. I don't want to go into another religion, though. I believe that if anyone, the natives had it right. I want to center my life on peace, open-mindedness, health, beauty and love. When I discovered that the only things really reigning me into the church were the fear of possibly an unhappy afterlife and my friends, I realized it was time to leave. I want to leave while I'm still not angry towards the church.

I know that this is going to take a lot of re-core building. The church has been my fundamental base for as long as I can remember besides the period when I had left the church for six months. I care about people, but people isn't enough to keep me in a religion. If I'm not true to myself what else is there left?

This song describes perfectly how I feel,

Best day of life!

I can't help but record the best day I've had in a long time.

Anyway,

My friend gave me an idea for a job. She needed people to work, I need money. Perfect match!

We hold signs. For five hours. The first couple of shifts were long and tedious. Today, and yesterday, however were different.

I danced with my sign. BOY did I dance! I've never had so many honks, smiles (with me giving embarrassing ones back), etc. A guy even asked for a picture with me and my sign.

Yep, I'm happy. Excersized and got paid for it, smiles, people... pictures! All makes for a great day.

A weird quirk.

I discovered something today. I hate starting conversations. People don't believe me when I say that I'm shy, but I am. I feel like if I start a conversation then I'm interfering with a person's life (which at times, I'm sure I am). Then again, if I never start conversations.. what if somebody's the same way I am? What if they're always waiting for initiation? *sigh* It's a vicious cycle. I'm just so afraid! What if the person wishes you were gone or something? I don't know. Just a thought I had. There are times when I'll want to talk to someone.. but I won't make the effort, and then I wonder why they never talk to me.

Man this is a pointless rant.

Sorry to have wasted your time.

P.S. I think there's going to be a couple of changes this next little while... :)

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Karen became a sap tonight.

Star, at this point I can say that I would almost willingly love to give my guitar to you for an entire month. (Man, I know I'll get quoted on this). It's terrible. I don't mind losing our bet! Anyway, love has been in the air with a number of my friends. Tonight I became kind of a sap. Mm... yes. I have just put myself on the fryer. But yes, what makes love so appealing? I don't get it. Or maybe I do and just don't want to because it's not currently happening (and if it was then Star would be a very happy person). Hmmmm.... I'll stop this rant now. Baha! Sorry if I just wasted your time. This just doesn't happen very often, or ever.

A Travelling Heart

One thing I've really been feeling guilty about is traveling. Why you ask? Because I do it a lot. The past four years I've been to at least twelve different places, and have lived in 6. Maybe it's the fact that I wasn't allowed to travel outside of the country, that I tried to do it in the country so much. Who knows? But that was my realize of freedom. I could be rebellious and travel all I wanted inside of the country.

Now, I finally understand people who do travel. Out of all the addictions out there, traveling is one of the easiest to fall in love with, hardest to resist, and (in my opinion) most worthwhile. There are things that I've learned while traveling that I never would've learned otherwise.

So why do I feel guilty then? It's easy to make travel look like it's a way of running away or not dealing with problems. That was one of the original reasons why I signed up for the government funded program, Katimavik. I didn't want to deal with home anymore. I also figured I wouldn't get homesick because I had been away from home a couple of times before and never did. I forgot to keep in mind that back then I was living with family. First week I was away from Katimavik, I was so homesick that every day I dreamed about going home. It's hard when you're living with total strangers. You don't have a connection already, but it's definitely not hard to make one once you're forced into the situation.Instead of being able to run away and be a completely new person, I realized that at the end of the day.. the only thing still familiar to me was me, and that I had to deal with the things that bug me. Katimavik was honestly one of the best experiences of my life.

I've been thinking about travel because I found a job away from here. Away from where I live, and quite honestly, I'm sad to leave. When I left for Katimavik I missed my friends a good deal more than I ever thought that I would. However, would I take back the experience? Absolutely not. I learned more than I ever thought possible.

I love leaving because there's so much to learn about other places! One day I hope to travel to India, Africa, Russia and Ireland, or maybe China? Who knows! For now I'm satisfied with traveling in my own country.

..and I'm happy to admit, I have the travel bug, it's the best bug I've ever had!

I - MISS - READING!

You're probably reading the title and thinking 'well, why can't you just pick up a book then?' because I'm afraid of it. Yes, the stupidest thing ever, that I'm afraid of picking up a book. Why? Because I know that I will be sucked into a world that doesn't seem possible right now. Places where people become something, places where broken hearts get healed, places where villains are set straight and peace can be made...

I know that this world does exist, and for seconds in my life I feel that I know why God has put certain things in my path, bur right now I don't understand. I JUST DON'T.

I need reading. If for nothing else but the hope that other people have come out of these types of situations.. to learn things... to feel free again. Funny that reading gives me a sense of freedom, but it definitely does. For whatever reasons, reading helps to make sense of life. It's easier to figure out problems, it's easier to live.

Now to just get the motivation to read.

Because this blog is named "... then move forward.", and I feel as though I've hit a dead end. I keep on trying to get out of the dead end, and going back into it.

Arg...

Can life EVER go according to plan?

Instead of the "...then move forward." blog this should be "Karen's rant blog." There were good intentions for this thing, but nothing seems to go according to plan. So I'm apologizing for the rants.

Apology, because life just can never go according to plan.

This is where the T word has become the most appropriate it's ever been.

Shallow woman?

I discovered tonight that I'm kind of shallow. A friend on there has been irking me because I keep on writing about how terrible I feel because of how big I feel, and she keeps on saying how yes, it's a good thing to be at a healthy weight, but that looks aren't everything. I keep on getting agitated by this point, but she made me realize something. In order for me to be truly happy with myself, physical really does seem to be all that matters.

Am I shallow? Perhaps not. Over the past few years I've discovered that outward and inward beauty are connected. I guess I simply won't be completely happy with myself until I look something like this:



Shallow woman?

I'm feeling the same way as the title of this song.

Why is it that whenever you decide to change your life around that everything that everything crumbles? Why is it that God forgets our mistakes but we remember them? Oh how much easier life would be if I could forget them.