Digging a little deeper

I wish I knew where to start. Giving status updates isn't very satisfying and it probably makes for rather boring reading material, so in an attempt to switch things up I'll explain a few things that have been on my mind.

The last few weeks, amid the insanity of everything that Joe and I have going on, I have had a few brief moments to stop and just think. In these moments when the world slows down, for a very short period of time, there are brief glimpses of the person I am becoming. I realized how many parts I have to play every single day, both literally and figuratively. There is the student, the teacher, the business woman, the professional, the air head and attention seeker (for Sleepy Hollow of course:), the wife, and - the culmination of all these roles - the adult (one I am still coming to terms with).

For some odd reason, since the age of 12 (my parents would probably argue 2), I have felt the need to be successful, accomplished, and most of all, independent. That doesn't sound so unreasonable. What I never really grasped is that all of these qualities I wanted were ultimately a search for one thing - validation.

In one of my religion classes at BYU, my professor told us that love is expressed by meeting the needs of another. There are nine basic needs that we can fulfill to let someone know that we love them. For anyone who is curious, they can be remembered by the acronym "Civil Wars":

• C ompetent- to feel like we are good at certain things
• I ntimacy- a need to feel close to someone
• V alidated- to feel accepted
• I ndependence- space and privacy
• L ove- we have a need for it and we have a need to give it; if we don't feel love from someone, we probably aren't doing much to show are love for that person
• W ell Understood- one of the biggest blocks to communication is the fear of being misunderstood
• A ppreciated - not just the things that I do, but the effort that is put into it as well
• R econciled with God- if we are not at one with God, it will flow into our relationships
• S ecurity, Safety

There was a disjunct between my association with independence and love. I didn't really think it was validation that I needed. Independent people don't need to be validated! I thought I knew where I wanted my life to go, and how happiness would be within my grasp. But then, various experiences convinced me otherwise. I got accepted to a school which is now teaching me that the greatest education I could ever receive isn't found in a college classroom, but serving those outside of our campus; I got a job which helped me discover capacities I never knew I had; I got a second chance to foster and develop talents I didn't know I'd ever be able to share or enjoy again; I fell in love with the most incredible man I've ever known, the only person, next to God, that I am completely dependent upon.

Then I realized, I don't have to do any of these things. These are things that I choose to do. I choose to take on these roles because they make me happy and they make me better. It is amazing to me how easy it is to forget why they make me happy when things get a little bit crazy. So, I am extremely grateful for these little moments that help me remember my life is being sculpted rather than forced in to a mold.

Welcoming September

Happy Birthday Mom! It is my lovely mother's birthday today and I am so grateful for her! She is amazing and I hope one day to be the kind of woman that she is! She is the glue of our family.

So for the last two BYU games, the Cougars have managed to come out on top, despite some sloppy plays. It is hard to watch them make stupid mistakes like fumbling the football or getting sacked, but then I guess that is part of what a team deals with in the beginning of the season while working through all the kinks. It is still fun to be at those games though. I love being a Cougar fan! We get the student all-sport passes with our friends Marian and Devin Anderson, and Marg and Matt Leduc. Marian and Devin are expecting their first in January and Marg and Matt just got back from selling security systems in Texas this past summer. It is great to have them back. They are awesome friends to watch football with.
This is the game against Northern Iowa. It was so hot during the beginning of the game (we heard it was around the mid-nineties). This was later on in the game when it finally cooled down a little bit. Haha...see how stinkin high we are? So much for trying to get tickets early!

Here is Marg and I at the game.

The other exciting news is that even though school has started once again, I found out where I get to student teach! I will be at Timberline Middle School in Alpine. I am so excited! The school is only about eight miles from where we live. I'm so excited not to have to commute very far! This semester I am in a practicum class where I will spend time at Timberline getting familiar with my mentoring teacher and the kids in the classes so that in January it will be really easy to pick up with student teaching because everything will already be familiar.
My classes this semester are pretty awesome and I think that Joe is enjoying a few of his as well. One of my favorites is my senior English course where we are studying the history of the Great American Cowboy. It is so sweet! Pretty much every Thursday we get to take field trips, and last Thursday we got to go horseback riding! It was proabably the greatest class of my college career. I was in heaven!
The last thing we should probably mention is that Joe and I are in a play. It is The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in Concert. Performances will be the first couple weeks in October. I am so happy and proud of my Joe for doing it with me. He has been a really good sport about the whole thing. It has been a great thing for us to do and enjoy together. My mother and father-in-law, and sister-in-law Liz are in it as well. There will be a Harvest Festival before the performance where there will be fun games for kids, hay rides, and food; the performance will take place later on after it gets dark. Joe and I went last year and really enjoyed it and then Carol (my mother-in-law) finally convinced us we should be in it this year. If you are interested in coming, it is in the outdoor amphitheatre across from the Timpanogos Temple, and if you go to SleepHollowshow.com you can print off coupons for tickets and see the actual times and performance dates.