learning from lifesong

i like to sing. music, it's like a PART of me. as cheesy and cliche that is it just flows out sometimes i dont' think about it and whatever comes out (even if it is incredibly horrible to listen to) is like part of my soul.
i don't like to perform in front of large groups of people. it kind of scares me so much that i shake. what's hardest is performing something that i dont' MEAN. something that i dont' relate to or feel at all. because at least when i'm singing something i mean, it 1. has a purpose for me and 2. allows me to escape into this "niche" where it's jsut stuff coming out of me and not really me controlling or thinking constantly about the timing or the dynamics or whatever .. it just HAPPENS.

i wanted to sing for lifesong because for the past few terms this event has allowed me to share my faith and express myself in one of the ways i know best. but this term, it's been quite a different experience for me. i dind't choose my own song. apparently a bunch of ppl complained about this, but i wanted to have a serving attitude. i wanted to be cooperative and not difficult. "oh i'll do whatever" i said. so two days before our first rehearsal and 6 days before DRESS rehearsal, i'm given a song. a song that i can NOT sing. it's country-- which is a genre i'm not familiar with so i can't keep time. FURTHERMORE, it's a song that i don't understand and dont' relate to at all. i tried to opt out of it but to no avail. we practiced for two hours and couldnt' get it down. i tried to get someone else to sing it. i tried to trade songs with someone. in the end, short of just walking out on the whole thing, i'm stuck with it.
lifesong. i'm thinking if i sing and it has nothign to do with me, it's no longer a LIFE song... it's jsut a song.

but i've been whining about thsi all week so i wanted to stop for a second and take a step back. here's what i realized.:
what God does is beyond ME. it is beyond my capabilities. it's beyond my understanding. it's beyond my judgements of how effective this song is in conveying any message. it's beyond my resentment of what i consider to be a lack of judgement in the song choice. yes, i can sit and complain about how i shoudlnt'be forced to sing a song that doensn't express my relationship with God... i can complain that i dont' want to invite my friends becuase i can't use this song to share with them. but after all that-- really, God knows what he's doing. and if he wants to use this song then who am i to stop him? who am i not to give him my all becuase i dont' liek the song or dwell so deeply on how MY incompetance will screw it up?
i am so small. why do i think i can push the train of the tracks?

maybe this is a lesson in faith... and in humilty?

(*grins* , and on ANOTHER note haha, i'm getting a cowboy hat this week. and maybe some boots? in kristina's words "if you can't sound good, or feel the song, at least you can LOOK good." muahaha)

reading week is the biggest load of bull ever.

weekend getaway*


1. haaaaaaaaaappy 20th jannamae! =)
2. janna&otto's 20/20 was funnnn =) ... dinner hotel limo club(Inside) *swwoooon* limo was my favourite haha i am such a dork.
3. best luck --- kat forgetting her ID and then janna saving the day by remembering that otto had her g1 :P
4. worst luck --- me not walking fast enough behind kris and her grabbing onto "my" hand only to discover that it was a random guy :|, OHHH wait-- falling down the stairs TWICE was pretty rotten luck too haha =P *bruised*
5. creeps -- the really fat random that kept coming over eww lol i love laur's "fat random guy" immitation
6. finding my inner philipino haha... "hello i am from manila by the mega mall"
7. sleeping like a hobo on the ground at indigo hahahha
8. dinner with my rooomiee @ sp-riingggg roollsss! (of course)

and of course there are pictures.

"i haven't felt like this in so many moons, you know what i mean?"

reactive. spontaneous. wreckless.

i'm not sure how healthy this is. but i'm glad to be getting away this wknd even if it's just to mississauga for barely two days. i need a change of environment.
i need to prove things to myself. thats' the only way i feel like i can cure this. this... tenseness. i don't know how to put it.

i need to learn how to trust noone but myself.

it's like the old me but new again. jumping in.

happy rubitinmyface day
in FACT, the day turned out to be happy "rose-getting/lesbian-dinnering" day! =)

1. rose-getting
miss joanna wu (thanks babe) went to the trouble of getting a bunch of us girls RED ROSES =) sweet. HAAHA the best part was that she had JT deliver them... lol we were so confused at first butthen it all made sense. we commented that it woudl have been funny if he'd delivered Auntie Sandy's (kat's mom's) rose though and she thought it was from him! lol or, as JT mentionned, if certain people's boyfriends had seen him giving their girlfriend the rose and gotten the wrong idea hahhaha poor JT


2. lesbian-dinnering
kat and i decided to go to go for viet dinner at ben tahn(sp?) tonight and we were like oh let's ask alison and emzhei to come but we called emz and she had a chem lab and alison wasnt' calling us back so on the way to the car kat's like "omg... what if people think we're lesbians?!?!?" i'm like "WHYYY would they think that and even if they did, who CARES!" and so eventually alison called us back and we went to pick her up and i told her the story in the car haha at that point, kat slid on some ice and we jolted forward a bit and i was like "OMG!!! we're gonna DIE before we get to our..." and alison cuts in and is like "our LESBIAN DINNER??" bahhahahahaha


THEN...we were driving to class and the radio guy goes "happy valentines day to those who have someone. and to all those who don't..... sorry."

also, my mom got me a white chocolate heart on a stick so that was sweet hehe =)

yessssssss --- this is what i did on valentines day. and it was much fun =) who needs poopie gross boys anyways?

UWSynchro Gets a New Member

kat and i went to go watch miss laura swim tonight at laurier and it was freakin cool!! =) well i've never watched synchro before so it was something new and crazy how together everything is and stuff ... and there was a "hot" guy sitting beside us that we discovered was only hot from the side *AHEM*

anyhow, at the end of the show, the coach was like "if anyone wants to join just go to the website blabalbla" and kat lights up, nudges me and is like "LET'S JOIN!!!!"
bahhahahaha--- kat doesn't even know how to swim.

i love it.

"deal with it"

as eric would say. or as alison would say "SUCK IT UP!!!" haha
it seems it's time again for me to do these things.
just seems like between family, school, and friends(some)... it's nonstop tension anger and conflict. i'm not going to complain about it. but gawd i wanna run. (is it *always* wrong to take the easy way out?)

strength
i've been thinking about strength recently. and i think there are many types. i think i can be "strong", and in some ways, i am. i think that jsut becuase you don't show your emotions or allow yourself to be vulnerable to others or show how things affect you, that doesn't mean you're stronger than i am. i think that i'm glad that i am generally aware of my weaknesses and i'm not afraid to show them to others -- beucase, in weakness, God is stronger. not ALL weakness is "bad" or in our control. but i do have many that are those things.

my problem? ... is actually DEALING with those "bad" weaknesses and consistently and persistently making an effort to change things in myself that hurt God or hurt others or hurt myself.

beeday
alison and i went down to toronto yesterday to celebrate miss bee's birthday =)
i like downtown alot. in the summer i would sometimes tell people i was leaving a lot earlier than i actually was and grab street meat and chill by myself with the pigeons and or a good book at indigo. =)
downtown is fun with PEOPLE too =) hehe ... it was fun just hanging out with bee alison and andrew =) .. it "works". i like when ppl fit together. we laugh. and i like bee. :)
goodtimes =)

God make me steadfast?

i don't doubt you

it's so nice to be able to say that and MEAN it entirely. even if in context it's about something of very little importance.
wow... me? trust? .. maybe.

p is for prom

hahha after ccf tonite at bubbletease alison jt jane amy johnny and kevin were talking about random things that led to the topic of PROM. hahhaa our conversation over bbt was quite entertaining in general but it was really fun to hear everyone's prom stories. i'll admit it. i'm a sucker for talking about prom... i guess becuase at mine, a silly girly dream was fulfilled and as well, it was some of the best times with my best friends.
and it's also funny, because pretty much *everyone* did the prom "drama" to a certain degree. so everyone's story is pretty good. haha

I'm BACKKKKKKKK!!!!
got a new camera. no more using a crappy slow easily dying camera!!! :D
i can take pictures of everything again!!! =)
hello new favourite thing.

why i'm not in science



hahaha visit www.nataliedee.com

i think i'm going to start my own drawing/comic page.

irony

this morning i did my informative speech for spcomm. i was actually supposed to go LAST class but i was last and we ran out of time.

my speech was about memory.

when i got into the room i realized, i forgot to bring my tape. irony number 1.
i was all panicking and frazzled which threw me off a bit. but eventually i figured out i could use someone else's tape and i was a little more calm.

so the girl who spoke before me was SOOOOO nervous. she kept pausing and forgetting things and just watching her made me super nervous as well i was almost shaking. my hands got all clammy and cold.

two wks ago, i'd forgotten to turn off my cell before class and i got a txt msg from alison during someone's speech and my phone vibrated loudly on the table. well, i'd decided to use this to start off my speech. as the "attention getter". i let my phone ring and snapped it shut saying "two weeks ago, when gerald was in the middle of his speech about stocks, i realized i'd forgotten to turn of my cellphone... i'm losing my memory!! i though to myself." and continuing on i used the example of remmebering to turn off your cellphone before class continuously through my speech to tie different points together. i even ended off the speech by thanking everyone for turning off their phones.

so the class went overtime. and five minutes after class was supposed to end ppl were still giving me feed back about my speech. someone made a comment "your attention getter was really great but i just wanted to point out that gerald dindt' speak about stocks. JEREMY did." oops. ... irony number2.

and irony number3? well it just so happened that alison called me (not knowing obviously that class had gone overtime) ... and once again, i'd forgotten to turn my phone off.

ohhh speech day blues....

when deciding which church to attend...

does your own spiritual growth come first? or does the well being of others come first?

new song
me and bee's valentine's song =)
hahha next wk shall be interestING! to say the least...

"this wait for destiny won't do..." *sigh*

flush-the-self-esteem-down-the-toilet week

someone said something not-so-nice to me on monday. not mean spiritedly. they may have even thought of it as an encouragement if i think about it hard enough and suppress my hurt well enough, but man it was like a kick in the gut. and the comment included in part something about myself and a close friend and that was like... ripping my heart out or something.

so maybe it's jsut that. maybe it;'s that eating away at me. and not having been consoled enough or something i just am believing more and more (even in anger) that it's true.
am i that unworthy? maybe.

maybe that's why i was so upset when dinner plans i thought were made were somewhatly cancelled by someone who i thought cared alot.

then tonight, at lunarfest --- OH MY GOSH--- hahahhaa... while alison and i were standing at the bar trying to get through and whatever, we spotted walter, eric man's dm from last year. On the last night eric was here we all went to kickoff and walter bought us all drinks and whatever. so alison's like "oh! maybe he'll recognize us and he'll buy us drinks!" ... SOOOO he pretty much just pushes past me not recognizing me at all and stands at the bar. what a let down. but THEN he turns to ALISON and is like "hey! your'e eric's friend right?! balbalabala" and starts reminiscing to her about last year and offering to buy her a drink which is actually for me.
SO . COMPLETELY . SHAFTED. but it's ok. i should come to expect these things if i'm gonna hang out with all the beautiful talented and smart ppl... i guess it just added a bit though to my feelings of worthlessness. even though who even cares about walter he was kind of weird last year anyways... but maybe it was jsut all that stuff it's just piling and every little thing just makes me see more and more how... ugh i am.

sorry for the depressingness. i just really needed to get that out.

REGARDLESS, lunarfest was still pretty fun =) ... andrew and haruka did an awesome awesome job!!!! and fj!!!! and there was a really sexybuffkarate guy =) chilled mainly with my giiiiirls who i went with -- that is, alice, alison, kat, and stephermie which was awesome becuase girls are so much BETTER than guys. ahha no offense guys. and ran into some highschool friends i.e. bryan and dave ... and ran into kristina and nicole tooo! =)

the best part of the night? a good friend waiting at the bar wth me for liek 20 min even though she dindt' even want a drink.. it kind of resolved things a bit for me. (i guess no matter what comment that person made on monday, our friendship is what it is. and who knows what it is? me and you. not that person. and it doesnt' matter whether or not freakin walter remembers who i am or not in the end becuase BETTER people such as you tell me that i'm worth your time and care wihtout even saying a word.)

and dj baby yu was pretty good regardless of why his name is baby yu hahaha

what goes through my head while preparing my speech for speech comm

oh my gosh my speech is tomorrow and i don't know anything
it's 12:00 already.
<...typing on msn>
today i had a big mac instead of a filet o fish! i think the sauce is made out of thousand islands dressing and tartar sauce. or relish. no, tartar sauce.
<... more typing on msn>
*look at mini martini shakers* pink silver blue red
i really wanna use my martini shakers... theyr'e jsut sitting there all shiny and pretty... and lonely.
<... more typing on msn>
dude. why is this guy online if he's not even gonna respond to his msgs. oh crap i gotta work on this thing.
<... type type type read msgs>
what DO we need to talk about for grad dinner... OH!
i can't BELIEVE i have so many freakin meetings!
i have to pick up my book from the bookstore tomorrow.
i haven't seen dev in like two weeks!
what should i wear to lunarfest?
i wanna buy something new to wear. yeah. something new.
i have no nice pants.

i REALLY have to get back to work now.

ugh.

apology

sometimes when i talk about things-- like, how i had a bad day for example-- i make myself out to be the victim. i think i protagonize myself in the stories i tell; the heroine who tries her hardest but just can't overcome those ill-fated odds.
and sometimes i might even antagonize the people i love the most. even though, in my mind, they're not the antagonist at all, i am.
i think extreme disappointment in myself often is defensively set up in my stories and rants to appear like extreme disappointment in the world and people around me.

really that's not the case.

not that i'm ALWAYS, ALWAYS wrong. and generally i even STATE blatantly that i dont' mean to antagonize ppl adn that it's actually my fault but i guess my extreme errrr emotional output covers over those efforts. because people hear the way you say things more than the actual words that you say.

i guess this is some sort of lame apology... i shall try and connect my brain to my tongue more.

(p.s. social psych is the BEST course everrrrrrrrrrr! everything is so applicable and sensical haha)

UNlearning helplessness

in socpsych we read about something called "learned helplessness"... after a person feels incompetant enough for a while or "helpless" for a while, they just kind of stop trying.
it's like they BECOME helpless becuase they're just so used to feeling that way.

here's to hoping there's a way out.
a remedy.

post winter retreat reflection

retreat was a great time of fellowship... seemed like people really connected. the games were actually fun haha there was a lot of small group time and the groups were really well made so it was a joy to be able to share and chill with these ppl more.. worship went pretty well (which i was originally really worried about bc there were some "issues")... the speaker was a cool guy who was in my smallgrp and was a pretty good speaker(lots of stories :P)...i actually LIKED my room this year =) the "early room" ppl who made me laugh even early in the mroning and latelate at night.. and saw coop faces such as CHRISTIE! :D ahem.

but ANYWAYS. winter retreat has kind of brought me to a conclusion of a few weeks journey of trying to figure some stuff out... ok not a conclusion, more liek a "game plan". i was feeling so estranged from God before ... and a 2 sundays ago at cfc the msg was about prayer and how you should pray with a clean heart because if you "cherish" sin in your heart God might not hear you. (psalm66:18). so i kind of errr realized that there were a lot of things in my life i wasnt' letting go of... and maybe that was why i was feeling so far from God.

then i had this conversation with mike about faith. how sometimes we need to take risks and jump in a DO something TRUSTING that God will work in us despite us and not to always have to be comfortable and have everything laid out exactly right for us beucase how is that trust at all then? if you don't have any risk then are you really trusting in God's ability? or jsut your own?

so i got to retreat thinking ok. i wanan DO smoething. i wanna take a chance and see what God wants to show me and how he wants to grow me and etc. ... but i was stuck. because i didn't know where to start. you can't just JUMP into oblivion. i wanted a little bit of direction as to how to know WHERE God wants me to trust him in, where he wants me to take action and stuff... i was so confused. so a bunch of ppl said things that i dont' wanna type out and then during one of the msgs the pastor was talking about this verse (romans 12 something)

Living Sacrifices
1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's
mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy
and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual[a] act of
worship. 2Do not conform any longer to the pattern of
this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your
mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what
God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

So here's my "game plan". To "offer" every part of me to God wholeheartedly and fully. i'm gonna schedule out my time so that i can be more effective. cuz i'm really lazy and usually i end up wasting away hour after hour... i'm going to do my best in school... i'm gonna work out ... and i'm going to try and give of myself as much as i can to others incl family and friends and .. i guess even ppl i dont' like. and i'm going to try to love people more. but that's a whole other story that i dont' wanna get into right now ..anyways, when i get my LIFE in check... in FOCUS... maybe THEN i'll be able to see where God wants me to be.

sorry for boring you all for so long and still being so vague but this stuff is so hard to TYPE out. it's hard for me to talk about too. becuase somehow it jsut doesnt' sound as good in words as it does in my head or hopefully in action. so here goes.

i should stop letting other people treat me like they're better than me. and i should stop believing it.

today is good.

i'm making alone look pretty. =)

had a bad day

but lately, i've just been seeing how small my life is. and even though i can sit here and cry in my room right now... a part of me knows just HOW dumb i am becuase beucase i have so much more than i should even hope for.

i just don't take disappointments that well, ya know?

good things good things:
- miss jane huang is awesome.
- parts of retreat worship practice were really really funny -- swaying and the miner song haha

(to "someone i used to love": i don't even LIKE you anymore.)

will someone make the annoying girl in my socwk220 class shut uP?

kat and i are taking a socwk220 night class on tuesdays. for the MOST part, this class is really enjoyable. the prof Jon Boyd is interesting, nice, and says useful things in his lectures. i would really really love that class if not for "the annoying girl"!!!!!!

i have no idea what her name is. she was in my socwk120 class last term. i'd always come in late in the morning and there would only be ONE seat left-- front row CENTER. she sits front row, seat next to center. and therefore, i'd always end up sitting beside her.

This girl seems to think that the prof is having a private conversation with HER. as the prof speaks she will engage in conversation with him by making random comments about the professor's anecdotes such as "oh that's so nice!" and expressing agreement by saying "mmmHMMM mHMMMM yeah yeah" whenever she has an opinion about what he says (which is always). This little habit is slightly (extremely) distracting. She also enjoys asking QUESTIONS. while class participation is a positive thing and she has a right to ask questions, she talks SOOOOO MUCH. and asks questions SOOOOO often. sometimes after the prof answers her questions she will RE-ASK the question a few minutes later complaining that she still doens't get it. mind you, it's not that she doens't understand CONCEPTS, it's that she can't comprehend why the professor would make the ethical decision he made in a counselling situation (even though he explains that it is becuase of his own moral/personal reasons/decisions). she takes up many minutes debating with the professor on unbeneficial and unresolvable issues and contributes her own (probably INCORRECT) facts. today she corrected the prof on the rate of poverty in canada.

i usually draw pictures when i am annoyed. so today after grabbing kat's arm and hyperventalating a few dozen times i drew a cartoon of her. today, during the first half of class i swear she spoke at least once a minute. so after i finished the cartoon i realized we still had the second half of class.
ahem. so i decided to time how often she speaks hahaha here are the results (each asterix represents her speaking and the numbers are the time in minutes between each speaking moment not including the time she actually takes up speaking):

* 1min17s * 1min49s * 2min11s * 0min2s * 0min54s * 0min28s * 2min7s * 2min44s * 1min12s * 1min31s * 4min39s(here's where you get an irrational hope that she may have run out of things to say or worn out her vocal chords) * 0min31s *

and this was GOOD for her! first half of class was much MUCH worse.
thankyou for allowing me to relieve my built-up tension. until NEXT tuesday....

somewhere in between

it's like i've been stuck in a rut for so long that it didnt' seem like a rut anymore. it just seemed like normal life. not to jinx it or anything but i feel like the darkness is fading out, almost unnoticeably.

what puts my days together? (for the past few weeks at least) classes with kat-- giggling and writing notes, mon&wed with alison unable to find alone time but excited to see who's next to join us for random laughs, tues&thurs with laur after history walking aloooot and realizing we both talk like NONstop, moooovies (well, we try) with kat, mo, and carsno, midnight bbt runs/morning kd with devinka, shleeeepover with jess oh and voodoo with alison jess and bobby, "dinner"/chillage with andrew, chapters with him and miss bee, randomness with alison, betty, fanny, and anna, MEALS are good for catching up, going home and SLEEPING.

i haven't been brooding about rez much. tonight when i was telling laura's roomie about why i missed rez or whatever i dindt' feel that... fervor or whatever... i dunno how to explain. of course i'm still SAD, but it's a sadness that recognizes it was in the past. and i fail to find that broken part of me anymore.. i dunno, maybe its a temporary recess, or maybe i'm all cried out. whatever it is, i feel... happy. in a not-comparing way. i'm really appreciating things right now.

and i;'m excited. i'm excited (but scared) to explore what God wants to do in me. i DO want to stretch my faith a bit... take a dive... see what happens.. i dunno. i may be stuck in loo not having adventures, and i may not be in my safest happiest place that no longer exists, but today is NEW. and it seems i got up on the right side of bed.