I am sure we all would agree that pleasures are temporary and require little if any effort. The things that gratify us, however, are more lasting and result from effort and involvement. So sit back and think about it. It's probably true that being part of something bigger than one's self is one of the primary factors that create happiness. So could it be in discovering who we are, we stumble onto something outside of ourselves? Something that we are just a part of?

A guy by the name of Mark Sanborn once said that Abraham Maslow was working on a higher level in his hierarchy of needs when he died. Most of us can recall the fifth or highest level is self-actualization. According to Mark, Maslow suspected there was something more, and that the highest level of actualization was more like self-transcendence. I wonder how true that rings in your own life. We need to be part of something bigger. We need to know that although we can accomplish much individually, the power of community and involvement enables us to leverage our skills and abilities. Investing our time, energy, expertise and resources in something bigger than ourselves, it seems, offer the highest rewards of happiness.

The story of the scriptures, and ultimately the Grand Narrative of Jesus Christ, is our story. The story of Christ followers through the centuries – every interval and period; triumph and defeat, pride and shame - this too is our story. Contextualized in the present, we continue the telling of the Grand Narrative with our lives. Daily, hourly and by the minute, new chapters are being added, chapters that tell of holistic and missional lives, not bound or compartmentalized by psycho or demo graphics or specific locations or events, and far from the cancers of individualism and anonymity; the story, the Grand Narrative, calls its participants to live lives intertwined with each other, and with God Himself.

"The answer to the question 'Who am I?' can only be given if we ask 'What is my story?' and that can only be answered if there is an answer to the further question, 'What is the whole story of which my story is a part?'"
(Lesslie Newbigin)

(Taken from Phil again...he's been doing some great emails lately!!)

Have you ever wanted something so bad only to receive it and think its not as good as you thought it would be? We have this tendency as humans to build anticipation for things that a lot of the time, once experienced or acquired are not what we thought. Maybe it's because we are searching for something to fill our souls and we always think this next thing will do it but it never does. I think love is a lot like that. It draws us in with promises too good to be true and then after time we realize how real that very statement is.


All of us want to love and want to be loved. All of us crave to find that one person that we can spend the rest of our life with. In fact a few weeks ago when many of you wrote out your dreams it was apparent that this is a huge want/desire for a lot of you. Intimacy or love is a crazy thing. Our music is filled with songs around the subject. Our movies are captivated with it and even some times distort it. Our books are saturated with it. Our minds are consumed with it. Our souls crave it. So how do you find it? And is it possible that there might be people out there that never find it?


I'm convinced that in our quest for love, if it's legit, we should and always will end up at God. Follow love and you will eventually find yourself at God since He is the epitome of love. But it's in the journey along the way that a lot of us can get lost, confused, jaded, and just give up. Jesus said the most important thing in life is to love God and to love others. I don't see that as two separate things. In fact they are synonymous. Does your heart crave intimacy like mine? I'm sure it does.


Phil
(Email devotional from "The Project")

Guess what (I'm sure) the Varty Boy's and Co. did yesterday? Apparently my car alarm was going off at approx 9:30pm. Later on when I went to go home, I got to my car and there was a maxi pad (clean) stuck to my window. Nice.... am I not supposed to be respected as an elder or as a supervisor?? I guess not. Lol. Ah well, I guess it shows that they feel comfortable around me enough to do pranks on me and that I'm one of their "friends"?

Well, anyway, I gotta say - facebook is quite good. I mean there's so many people on it that I'm reconnecting with, people that I totally lost touch with from all stages of my life. It is also much more user friendly than myspace and has great functionality (this is my webmaster analytical side coming out). But I don't think I'm going to abandon myspace so quickly...I do still like looking for and reviewing new music, etc, and I have a lot of friends on here too. Facebook still seems a bit too highschool...maybe cuz I'm mainly finding a lot of old highschool friends on there. Oh well, I'm enjoying it to say the least.

Back to the topic of london... I'll try and make this short...what did I do in 1 week? (point form)
1. Went shopping to oxford street (TopShop!!!), Covent Garden, Long Acre
2. Did lots of wedding stuff - Jenny and I made an awesome hair and makeup team!
3. Went with Carys to see The Lion King musical - which was amazing!
4. Went to Jazz gig with Vincent, Ed, Alex, Carys, Lynette, Kerry, Jenny, Jono, Mandy, and Luke.
5. Had breakfast, lunch and dinner dates with various people. Ate: Wagamamas - yay TWICE!, Fry ups (Full English breakfasts), Pizza Express, Thai, Pret Sandwiches, Spanish Tapas, Italian pasta, Korean food, and had Chinese Take away.
6. Walked around everywhere - Thames at night so magical

So yeah, I'm going to try and go back to London before I'm 27 (highly skilled migrants visa requirements). BTW - really, it's gotta mean something that my hair and skin were so great in London! I'm back in Edmonton and it's all dried out again and looking horrible. It felt like I had a great hair day every day while I was in London!! AND people asked me for directions too - and I still remembered them! I know my way around London so well, and I love the culture and people. *sigh* Seriously, if I could take you around London (my point of view on London) for a day, you would love it too! You wouldn't think that everyone is so stuffy or that it's too busy or anything like that. You'd realise how easy it is to make the city what you want it to be and still find excitement and tranquility all in one afternoon.

Okay, I'm off. I've got to think of a way to get back at the Varty Boys (or Boy is probably more like it)

My friend Diana signed me up for Facebook!!! She just made a page for me! So now I'm going to have to take it over and make sure that it's correct in representing me.... I know, I know, I said I wouldn't ever go to the dark side of facebook - and technically I haven't done anything wrong, but I guess I'll just set it up and leave it.

Anyway, Hi People!!

How's everyone been?

I'm still jetlagged a bit, better now but hopefully I can get back into the routine of things again soon. I still need to unpack my 2 huge suitcases too...I brought back a lot of stuff from London with me - my books and cds and more clothes (surprise, surprise).

So what's my decision you ask? My decision of Edmonton or London?
Well, (as I've already told a lot of people) I know without a doubt that I'm meant to be in Edmonton right now, that my decision in returning back here was for the best and has worked out so incredibly well for me. But I also now know that I'm a London girl through and through and am going to try and get back to london before I'm 27.

Some things have really helped me with this: including the new requirements for a Highly Skilled Migrants Visa, which I still have to look more into, but also my encounter with my old work and them telling me that they'd definitely hire me if I come back or even probably go through the entire visa sponsorship process again if I told them that I'd return.

But regardless of any of these "decisions/conclusions" I've come to, I will be living my life to the fullest in the here and now! I can't continue to only think and plan about the future or else life will pass me by and that's one thing I won't allow. So, gonna take each step at a time, each day as it comes and keep living in God's promises for my life.

(Update on what I did in London to come next.....)

I'm off to London for a week!! Only a mere week! I wish I could be there for a month at the minimum...but alas, I have responsibilites here and I know that a month would make me bankrupt because I wouldn't be able to control my spending there...haha... that especially true when I would go out with Jackie and Kiana - what a lavish life we lived...good times, good times.

I'm so exicted though and know that this trip is going to be really good for me. I have a strong feeling that it'll either set in stone my longing for London or do the opposite and make me realize that London was a chapter that is now over. Either way I'll be happy to know and to then live on and keep going in the right direction.

Well, I have to go back and work - because I'm away for 2 sundays I had to finish as much as I could for this sunday and next...it's been stressful to say the least and I've been pretty busy, but I'm loving it. Now I have an Encounter commercial to make and a few design things to finish off.

Talk more randomness later!

Sez

First off - Thank you Lord!! To whoever wants to tell me that tithing doesn't make a difference, I'll show you a big fat tax return cheque that I just got back!!! It's more than the entire amount that I've tithed too! I was so needing this! Now it's like London is paying for itself...yay!!!

Okay, I digress...

K, I've titled this blog the way that I have because I've just started taking Hip hop dance classes (finally - after saying I wanted to for so long). Well, i've just started on a real consecutive basis now. Actually, I initiated a hip hop drop in class provided by my church because I couldn't find a drop in hip hop class in Edmonton that fit in with my schedule, so I started one....well that was one of the reasons. And it's not like a "churchy" second rate hip hop class, nuh uh - I recruited one of my close friends who's a competitve hip hop dancer and been taking advance classes for like 3 years to instruct the class! It's been awesome so far. But anyways, to make a long story short - I feel like a complete retard in this class! Lol. I swear I can dance and I'm pretty good and really enjoy it, but just dancing in itself if so different than doing routines which require technique and form and skill. For instance, today in the routine that we learned, there's a bit of popping, and I couldn't pop for the life of me. Lydia (my friend, the amazing hip hop dancer) was trying to show me how to do this arm pop thing and the best I could do was do an Oprah wave - ie. make the flabby part of my arm jiggle...hahaha.. yeah, not pretty.

And then with the end of the routine, it felt like I had 2 left feet and I couldn't make my arms do it's part at the same time as the leg work part... it was all just a mess really. If you had been there you'd agree. Oh well, practice makes perfect right? Hopefully I'll get better soon.

BTW - this week has been so busy and we didn't have internet at work at all! It's so crazy how dependent we are on internet and email nowadays!

K - LONDON IN 1 WEEK!!!!

K, I've been so restless the past few days. Busy with work and church (work which is church) from 9am - 10pm this whole week. I'm super tired during the days but at night I can't fall asleep! I should be sleeping right now, my body is tired but my mind is going crazy. Argh - I can't help myself. I'm doing that thinking too much thing I do.

What am I thinking about? Everything. God, life, future, past, memories, friends, family. I think I'm getting really anxious about visiting London... I don't know if I'm going to want to come back to Canada while I'm there. My friend Christa is going on this europe backpacking trip and stopping off at London first so she's been asking me my advice on where to stay, what to see, etc. Well, I forwarded her that "Things Guide Books Don't Tell You" list that I wrote about London (it's in my blog some where from last year, and Amy has it referenced in her blog too), and I wrote this extensive list of my favorite things to do and things to try and check out and it made me miss London so much because I could picture everything that I was telling her to do so perfectly. Then just about an hour ago I was so restless that I thought to try tiring myself out some more, so I started to rock out to praise songs that I used to sing with the Equippers band... while I was doing it I could completely imagine myself at Big Day Out or Shout Conference or just a regular sunday on stage just jumping around and worshiping God. I could remember it so well like it was happening right there.

Why do I still feel so strongly about London? Do you think this is something that is in me for a reason: like I'm meant to go back? That's what I keep leaning towards. I know being in Edmonton has been so good for me - I've done so much that i really needed to do and I'm totally at such a good place with God right now and with my family, but is Edmonton my future?? I guess I just don't like being helpless...lol.. not helpless but more like not in control... which is, I know, where I'm supposed to be. It's funny, I'm talking to a lot of friends and it seems like almost everyones concern right now is regarding finding a potential mate... now this is funny because I'm 100% positive that that was my concern last year at this time, but right now, contrary to increased importance with increasing of age, it's probably the farthest from my main list of concerns. I guess I'm thinking that it's more important for me to find where I truly belong first and my specific purpose and I trust that all that other stuff will sort itself out easily enough.

Lol...here's a thought... maybe in a year and a half I can move to Vancouver and work for John and Helen Burns at Victory Christian Centre and that way I can satisfy all my wishes. I'll be in Edmonton to finish off Faith Works bible college and help renovate the house. Then I'll live in Vancouver closer to my extended family and closer to Jess, and John and Helen Burns go to London practically twice a year! So I could go with them...hehe... That would be the life. Why not?

P.S. I'm anxious but still very happy. Life is good because God is good.

I'll see you guys in London in 17 days!

I don't know if I'm just too rational or too sensible of a person but I just couldn't enjoy a movie because it was just too wrong! Okay, I don't mind watching things about superheros that can fly or read peoples minds, I can watch medical dramas where the main character is constantly day dreaming, I can enjoy films with little people with hairy feet running around and big trees that come alive - but boy cows?!?

Do you know what movie I'm talking about? Yes, none other than the cartoon animated film - Barn Yard. I didn't realise how wrong it was until the first 2 minutes of the movie and then I started putting it all together - "wait...his name is ben and that one is odus (or something like that) and they have boy voices, but they're COWs! with utters!!"

I think the makers of that film either don't understand animals or the entire female kind. Maybe they thought that cows are a type of independent species and the fact that they have utters and produce milk is something that is a trait of that species and doesn't just apply to the females...?? Retarded film makers! Boy "cows" are bulls!!! Cows are female! They have utters because that is the equivalent of breasts! Cows milk wasn't created for the intention that God knew it would make an amazing and refreshing human beverage that would go great with cereal - as shocking as that realisation is for you. All these stupid people and their miseducation of the younger generations....

Okay, that's my rant. It's out of my system now... the movie is kinda funny though....

By the way - I'm in camrose waiting at my brother's dental clinic for my invisalign appointment, so I might be writing a few blog entries today to pass the time. 

I'm going to see Swtichfoot this thursday! Yay! it's going to be so awesome. I haven't gone to a concert for a while. I went to the sidetrack cafe with Mia, Nehal, and Elizabeth and saw Serena Ryder a couple of weeks ago and that was cool, but that's different from going to a concert. Oh and Nehal got us Gwen Stefani tickets!! SWEET!! That's going to be so wicked! I can't wait!

What else...? Oh - I finally booked my flight tickets to LONDON!! YAY!!! I'll be coming back to London for a week - from March 19th - 26th... it's going to be crazy busy mostly with Jo and Pieter's wedding, but will be so amazing to see everyone and familiarize myself with London again. Goodness, I miss it. Apparently, Carys and Gretchen have been plotting to try and keep me there, something about stealing my passport or someone dressing up as the penguin of death and tackling me? Lol. I love you guys.

There's things that you see and realise that you were a part of that and helped to make it happen and so proud to have shared in something so special and meaningful. That's how I feel about this... (can you spot me in The Big Day out part? and no, I'm not the girl in the Equippers College Flyer cover...not all asians look the same you know..ahem..that was directed to you Jase.)