Perspective

I got an email from a friend tonight and it made me reminence about the past and that turned into thinking about my life and what I'm grateful for.

I have a lot of things I'm grateful for. I also have a lot of things that are unappreciated. There are many things that make my life wonderful. There are many things that make my life hell. I can focus on the negative things too easily, I could list two or three dozens things right off the top of my head. I try to focus of good things, but am not always good at it. Its harder to sit down and think of why your life is great, and what specifically makes it great. I realize that no matter how bad life can get, its always wonderful. Despite however loudly I complain about living in Utah, I do like the state, or part of it at least. The mountains surrounding me are very nice. I have had so many opportunities over my lifetime, I've been very lucky growing up, being able to experience and participate in so many things. It is an amazing world we live in. Take out all the people and the world is beautiful (just kidding). Whenever I'm having a bad day, or am conflicted, I can think of the wonder the world is and I get all the peace I need knowing that God made it all.

Now, this one is about friends. Not only past friends, but present friends too, and lets throw future friends in there as well. For some weird reason, one of the ways God blesses me is by sending the most amazing people that walk the face of the planet to run into me. I'm awed and inspired by my friends. I love my friends. I do feel very blessed, and this one blessing in particular I do try to never take for granted. My friends have taught me things no Sunday school teacher could have. They have helped me at times leave my comfort zone and be a better person. I doubt they would ever abandoned me in my darkest hour. The best of times of my life are usually enjoyed with them. They've helped me surround myself with good things and good people. They make me feel needed and loved, when I don't always feel that way about myself. They have been God's hands in my life. Some of you I have known for years and years. I will always remember all of my friends names, and I'll remember their faces and why they were a friend. So to all my friends...thanks for being a friend!

So my family, I don't usually talk much about my family. I guess it's because I never really had that close a relationship with anyone in my family. I do often feel guilty that I don't call or talk to them as often as I should. I do however think about them. I am just very different from my family. I often wondered why I have such a different life path than the rest of my family. I worry about my family, I try to help them when I can, do things for them, be there. I will say one thing about my family is that they let me grow at my own pace, never have lost patience with me and accepted me for all my choices. For that I am reminded of the importance of family. Even my own!

"In our choices lies our fate"

I like this quote. I suppose I really like the idea of accountability, especially lately, something about it really rings true with me, personally. Fate is also a fun idea that I believe in. I like sometimes that there is a fate hanging over our head, controlling our life, and I like even better that we influence fate with our choices.

So to this end I guess what I want to say is: I need to embrace life and all of its adventures more, get out the door and on my feet. Embrace life. Seize the day. Smile.