Hey Kari
Great write up, thank you.
You are 19. A great age!
If I were you, I would get yourself a rucksack (pink is a nice colour!
), buy a plane ticket and travel.
Get yourself out of this vortex. You will realise there is a whole world of wonderful peoples, ideas and philosophies.
You will get to understand that all this minority SDA baggage you have grown up with, is such a marginal view.
Education is such a wonderful liberator. I donât just mean academic, but social interactions and culture.
Meet and interact with different cultures, push the boundaries of your understanding.
You will soon come to see, that this religious myopic, exclusive view of Godâs will, is simply the product of insecure people (mostly patriarchal men). A people who need to claim their own infallible interpretation of Godâs will. A people who thrive on a seige mentality, so they can wallow in external conflict and so avoid having to actually question themselves.
One day, on this life journey of yours, you will look back and realise you no longer have any fear or guilt. You will be free.
In finishing, I dedicate this (very famous) poem to you (forgive the old English). I think it fits and will continue to fit some of your experiences. It is the one I read to my son on his dedication. It is one I hope you find inspiration from on your journey through life.
Ifâ
BY RUDYARD Kipling - âIfâ
Ifâ
IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, donât deal in lies,
Or being hated, donât give way to hating,
And yet donât look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth youâve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: âHold on!â
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
â Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty secondsâ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything thatâs in it,
And - which is more - youâll be a Man (Woman) , my son (daughter) !
