Dazed But Not Down

Cause it's been so hard to tell what's been going on recently 

          Well, it's definitely been a while since I last blogged in this one. Just lazy old me can't ever find the effort to come back to it every once in a while. 

          Right now I should probably be studying huge words for the SAT or reading that book that Mr. Scott assigned me. But once again, I'm finding something else to do instead. 

          Lately, despite more and more activities and things coming across my way, whether that be playing the piano, school stuff, tree-planting, student government starting, Christian Club starting, etc, I'm starting to really just not make a big deal out of it. 

          The reason, unlike most of what I've been doing before, I'm relying on others to help me now.

          During fellowship on Saturday, we talked about what makes a good leader. And that leader has three primary traits, to not run away from danger, to trust that God is going to help you, and to allow other people to assist in whatever you want to do. 

          What I've really struggled in was letting other people do my work. It sounds pretty crazy but I've never liked working in teams that much. The reason, I didn't care about how well we were going to do whatever we did, I cared more about my own glory. I didn't want to share the recognition and attention that would come after whatever was done. 

          As I'm slowly maturing, I'm starting to care less about myself and more about having the best possible scenario. 

          With that being said, the more work that's being taken in also brings in an equal amount of stress. But, in the midst of all this, I'm not complaining. All of which I do is pretty much just plain old business and you can never complain about that. I just have to get it done. Giving up is simply not an option.

Stopping For a Minute

Because Everything is Just Going so Fast

          Well, it's certainly been a while since I've last had the chance to actually write and not have to worry about a grade or getting yelled at by a publisher.
          A lot of things are going on right now but I can't really complain. Most of it is just school stuff anyways. Ranging from all kinds of homework to writing about those Mission Bears. I've been practicing a little piano too.
          For my work ethic, my plate is overfilled and I'm not eating at fast as the food is being served. Many other people might be more than a Hunid times busier so I'm not about to go into any details regarding what I do.
          However, going through with all of these assignments really had me pondering about how daily routine life is supposed to be similar to. I'm starting to figure out that as long as anybody is walking on this Earth, every individual is going to have a gargantuan amount of things to do.
          This Sunday today really turned out to be a moment in where I could stop and reflect on what "busy" really means. Doesn't being busy mean piling up your schedule so much that it'll actually fatigue you? Or does it mean stocking up on activities to the point that you're running out of time for free blocks?
          It's finally coming to me that "busy" really means that the squares on your calender is at its apex and you have no choice but to turn down people counting on you because you simply can not be in two places at once. Sure, you could work on homework and be "tired", but that really depends on how efficient and smart you are at performing your tasks.
          I'm not a busy man. I might be taking on projects and chores that are driving me to invest in a fair amount of my time. But if you throw my whole schedule to somebody else more qualified, that person is probably going to have an easier time. I'm simply just not as smart as I think I usually am.
          But, despite realizing of this discouraging fact, I'm not really bothered by it. If anything, it brings a lightened expression to my face. It gives me a perspective that I'm not really that talented, and if you hang around with me. You will be able to recognize that I'm as cocky as a full-grown lion. But this state of mind of other people out there being better than me at every little thing reminds me that God created everybody equal.
          I might be okay at school and plus-plus at writing about basketball. I might be decent at a lot of things. But knowing that all kinds of people near or far away from me can do what I do at a higher or lower degree is a reminder that it doesn't matter about how good you are at anything. It shows that God loves everybody regardless of your traits.
          So it was pretty nice to just have a quick 20-minutes to ramble about a certain thought. I was sort of all over the place and wasn't really thinking about what I was writing about but I'm not writing this paper for a grade, a publisher, or anything like that. I'm just writing to pass time.

A Regularly Unique Monday

From Left to Right (Our Daily Bread, The Bible, My Utmost For His Highest by Oswald Chambers)

          So, it was Monday which meant that it was time to depart for school in the morning once again and I'm not going to lie, it was a bit of a challenge to rise up from my bed. But, being late for school wasn't really an option since I had Mr. Scott's class first thing in the morning.
          By the time I had arrived in school, I had about a good 20 minutes before the bell rang. I utilized this time to go grab a box of "Rice Krispies" that my school had provided for us. I would be able to settle down and calmly enjoy my breakfast. My table mates and I would have a short time of free comment until the bell rang which marked the beginning of school.
          I would go on and on for about five paragraphs about how my instruction schedule went but I will elect not to and just say that I had a day in school with no particularly special events.
          After school, it would be pretty boring. Boring is a word that I work extensively to refrain from using because saying that word signifies complaining. The day next few hours of the day would be extremely boring however. Right after school, I had to attend the Mock Trial class which seemed to be an endless lecture of sound. I never really had a moment where I was really into it.
          Following the Mock Trial class, I hopped on my dad's car so he would drive me down to the SFUSD department for the SAC cabinet meeting. The SAC, is basically a gathering of every public school in San Francisco. Normal meetings would consist of two representatives from every school in one room following an agenda. The main goal is to make progression in our school system through the perspectives of youth. It's basically politics but with kids. Today was the cabinet meeting, which I was required to go. The cabinet in the SAC is what people usually see as a government with a president, secretary, etc. I'm the historian, which meant that my presence was mandatory. I had to put my journalism in delay by missing Mission's game against ISA because of it. The meeting in itself would turn out pretty well. I was able to active in the discussions and enjoy a friendly meeting with the other individuals attending the meeting.
          Once I got home, it was a pretty relaxing period of time. It was the night before the CAHSEE, which is abbreviated for California High School Exit Exams. This meant that the upcoming days would be ones that would feature no regular classes. In fact, because of Chinese New Years on Thursday and Furlough Day on Friday, all the kids had to do was take their exams and enjoy an extended weekend. I spent the stress-free night watching a little "My Wife and Kids" and practicing the piano. One thing that I was able to do that was never a consistent thing in my routine before was reading the Bible. I've decided that since all I do is waste time writing blogs and watching TV, I should be able to have plenty of time almost every night to read at least one page of the Bible every night. I have decided that I will be starting the Book of Proverbs as of tonight. So far, I've read only up to Chapter 3 but compared to what I've been doing before, this is progress. I pray, I go to Church, and I am open about my Faith. But one thing I almost never do is strengthen my understanding of God's Word. Also, it's good stuff. It's interesting to read and take time to comprehend the message being purveyed. One more thing that I'd like to add about reading it on my personal time however is that the content of the Bible actually cheers me up. It heightens the level of my joy and ultimately brings me closer to God. I would cite a scripture and write a whole other blog about this but I'm pretty happy with this one right here.

Enter The Ritchie Rich!

          Well, I'm going to start keeping a blog now to highlight events in my daily life as well as provide insight on my current state of mind.
          I guess I''ll start off with a little background information. In summary, I'm just an ordinary kid in high school who loves going to Church. There's not really much I do in school except work, study, and work.
          So today, it started off quite pleasantly. I woke up at around 7 in the morning and washed up to get ready for school. Usually I would go to school a little early to check in with my work from both school assignments and extracirricular activities. This morning was a bit different because I didn't have any stuff to check in or tend to. So I just got some breakfast(which wasn't exactly gourmet) in and waited for the bell to ring.
          My first period class(English) in the morning turned out to be pretty enjoyable. Our usual teacher Mr. Scott was absent. Because of this, we had a substitude who's name was coincidently Ms. Scott. We didn't really do much in this class except for watching a portion of "Romeo + Juliet" which was honestly pretty bad. This movie was basically a reenactment of William Shakespeare's "Romeo & Juliet". The actors attempted to recite the traditional lines but the product came out exceptionally corny and boring. I wouldn't give that movie a high rating however, I would prefer a day of viewing a movie like that over a regular lesson from Mr. Scott any day.
          My second period was(Advanced Algebra) quite frustrating to say the least. It was the last class before the big test on Thursday(my school has a block schedule which meant that we have each class every other day) so we had an activity called a group challenge. A group challenge is basically answering a question from each section that we studied over the past weeks. After answering that question, the teacher would come over and ask everybody at your table an explanation about step-by-step details. I was annoyed not only because I had trouble doing the questions, but my teammates would insist on making ruckus inside the classroom. Because of this, our table was dotted off points just because of misbehaving. Now, in order for me to make up those points, I'm going to have to study on content that I can't comprehend just so I can stay on track if I want to pass this class.
          Lunchtime wasn't really a break for me,I was just about to settle down in a room to eat my lunch until I realized that I forgot to do something. I just realized that I had to go down to Mr. Kennedy to talk about the school athletics page that is currently under construction. So I went alllll the way down to his office on the other side of the school to check in with him. I went down and we discussed about sending the schedules to the program representative speaking with us. I really think that this website is going to be successful if I am able to effectively invest my time into it.
          Third period(biology) wasn't anything special. Our teacher just gave us the whole period to make a poster on Meiosis. It wasn't anything special.
          After school ended, I procceeded to go to the gym for basketball practice. I'm technically not on the team but I simply just sat there taking any notes I can to see if anything was interesting enough for my upcoming articles.
          A couple hours later, I looked at the time and saw 5:28 PM. I headed out to the Mission parking lot because I needed to hop on Ms. Colker's car so she could drive me to the YEF office. It was there at the YEF office where I had to be interviewed by donators of my action plan to start a tutoring program in my school. The other individual sitting in the car was Junior Marvin Jordan. I didn't know him that well but I knew him well enough to know that he was cool. After we got to the office, Marvin and I were seated in the lobby and waiting for the interviewers. I expected a pretty boring time in the next couple hours but that was not the case. As we were waiting, I was telling Marvin about the "Popeyes" that I was going to eat for dinner after. Strangely enough, that statement I made would lead up to more dialogue. The conversation we had wasn't just any conversation though. We were talking and sharing abour our faiths of God. Throughout my whole career in school, I've never had a conversation with somebody that was strictly about God! It was amazing, we discussed about so many things such as talking about scriptures, sharing personal experiences with God, the difficulties of inviting others to the House of God, and how our belief gives our stressed lives an extra boost! I couldn't believe how exciting it was to actually have a discussion with a classmate about the most important topic of all! We were than called in by the interviewers. The informal meeting would turn out well as all the questions asked were able to be answered appropiately. After we went down to go home, we chatted for about another half-hour or so about Christianity before we were finally off. This was probably the biggest highlight that I've had in a long time. I mean, getting good grades, earning grants, writing articles, etc. They're all great but to find another brother that has such powerful faith and be able to find the common ground to share our thoughts was overwhelming.
          After I went home, I ate about five pieces "Popeyes" fried chicken before I went to go get washed up. I than watched some of "My Wife and Kids" before I started to practice playing piano. I have a presentation for Church related event coming up and I need to be able to play "Amazing Grace" in order for our group's plan to flourish. I probably spent a good hour wasting my time writing this but I really thought today was something special. Actually, everyday is special because no two days are alike. I should be finishing up my Chinese 1 homework and sending athletics schedules to the representative but I still find myself in front of the computer screen writing this. I'm having fun though. It's good to write everyday, that's how you get better. I just hope that I won't be too concentrated on my actual work and focus more on living a Life of God. As everyday passes, I inch closer to death. But at the same time, everyday that passes seems to be a new level of Faith that I've reached and I just love how I'm surrendering myself to God more and as every moment that occurs strolls by.