Now remember I wrote this yesterday, I have not proof read it yet, so excuse the typos or if there is an incomplete thought somewhere. If I have to, I'll elaborate on something you may not understand fully if I have left anything hanging.
Thank you guys for being open to hearing what my opinion is. I appreciate and aknowlege that as a strong asset you all possess.
Start post:
Good, points brought up by everyone!
This is the kind of good discussion I miss!
Please everyone; don't feel like you have to stop talking, if you've got something to say, say it.
We are a melting pot of sorts. We are all from different parts of the world, and even from different parts of the same country, and we can all appreciate each other’s thoughts, ways and opinions, even if we don’t agree from time to time. Respect for each other is must however. Although, I don’t really think I needed to say that, did I?
I think I’ll take my own advice.
I'm really enjoying reading everyone’s responses. I agree with a lot of it, and a few things being said have made me stop and think as well...then the "Ahhhhh, she's right about that..." comes after a few moments. It's great to be able to really dig into a post or two. Especially when I learn something or am able to ‘see’ something from a point of view that I didn’t even know existed! Man! I get so excited when that happens. I might be weird like that, but I don’t care!
A friend of mine and I were talking about this very thing recently, talk about ironic hu?
We were talking about what we were like some 15 (or 20) years ago. The discussion came about after a church member went Home to Jesus just a short month ago. I had literally known her all my life. Then we got to talking about how many members have gone Home, and how much the church has changed and what we were all doing while it was still ALIVE. Our church, sadly, is dwindling down. We have, I think, about 12 members left; we average about 15 in attendance per week.
We were talking about how we had Vacation Bible School every summer and how much fun we had and how much we miss that sort of thing, especially the food and the crafts LOL! We talked about the active members back then who are no longer members because they moved away or found another church family and joined or whatever other reason our church is dying.
But, let me say this: I'm 38 and 15 years ago I was 23 (not that I think no one can do the math, I just thought I'd be nice and figure it out
) I think Michael Landon died around the time I was 22. That hit me hard; I don’t ever remember NOT knowing him (but that’s probably a different message board! LOL!)
When I was 23, I was not even sure who I was! I had tried college, didn't do well enough so I dropped out. I was working at McDonald’s part time. The summer before, when I was still 22, I had gone to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to work at a camp for disabled children, thinking that line of work was where I was headed. Well, that was a bad experience and I won't bore anyone with that. I came home, got my job back at McDonalds (I was working there before I went to the camp) and worked all winter there.
Then, I decided maybe I wanted to be a chef. Well, I went to Nashville to work at Opryland (it's closed now - they made it into a strip mall or something) to learn. Well, that was an even bigger mess!
This was my attitude: I was always right, no one knew better than me, everyone else just didn't have a clue, my parents were from the stone age and would never understand how I felt. Blah blah blah blah....What a hard lesson to learn! It seemed like I was hitting my ‘rebellious teenager stage’ a little late. I was never rebellious as a teenager. I must have been subconsciously making up for it.
It took an event not long after that to slap me into reality. I had joined a religion that basically wanted control over me and my life to accomplish their goals and agenda. When it hit me one Sunday while sitting in the service; it was like blinders were taken off my eyes and I saw the whole world differently.
(I am in no way implying that that particular religion is a bad one, they are basically Christians but do not use it as a title or a name for their particular identity.)
So, that was me 15 years ago. I could write a book LOL! But I won’t. I know all you get the idea.
I don’t think I’ve fully matured yet.
Wiser? Yes.
More cautious? Somewhat.
Suspicious? You bet! Especially of what ‘see’ on the internet!
Still learning? Absolutely! I learned everything I could while my grandparents were still alive, and I spent as much time with them as possible. I do the same with my parents and my siblings. Life is just too short to not ‘LOVE’ the people you love. You know what I mean?
Would I have it any other way? No way!
Inconvenient? Sometimes, yes. But always worth it in the end.
I’ve always been a ‘calm’ person. I’ve never been rowdy, and don’t think I ever will be.
That’s why I think it’s so wonderful that the generation ahead of us, like the generation that Margaret belongs to and Karen’s are such valuable members of this board. I learn from them. I enjoy learning and listening to those who have ‘been there and have done that.’ I think I have told them both that at one time or another, and if I haven’t I should have. Everyone brings their own special thing to the party.
One thing I know for sure is that maturity comes in so many different levels that they are impossible to count. Everyone’s maturity takes on a different form, and may even come in more than one level. I think, for me, my maturity came, and continues to this very day, in three steps and is in a lot of ways rooted in my particular Faith. I’d like to explain farther if I may? And a lot of you may already know a lot of this stuff:
First is when I realized I was my own person. And I make my own decisions. But, not the kinds of decisions that a teenager makes who thinks they know all the answers does.
Second is when I realized there will always be consequences to those decisions, good or bad. Hopefully there will be a lot more good ones than there will be bad ones. There is a song I love, sung by the Imperials (among others) called “Casting Your Bread Upon the Water” (Youtube has several artists singing the song if you’d like to take a listen to it.) The song basically says “Keep on casting your bread upon the water, soon it’s going to come back to you on EVERY wave.” But you can’t cast your bread EXPECTING to get something in return. It doesn’t work that way. You cast your bread because it’s the right thing to do.
How do I try and create more good than bad experiences? Well that’s because of #3 below:
I don’t have to make any decision alone. I don’t make decisions, usually, without asking opinions from those I trust, or discussing it with my husband first. Unless the decision is extremely time sensitive and have to do something NOW. But that’s rare. All my life experience comes into play when I have to do that, though.
That is touching on my study of the ‘Event Horizon Theory’ which is taught in some churches of the faith I belong to. And, I really think that this is true.
This is the Event Horizon Theory in a nutshell: Everything that happens to you influences who you are today. Every decision, every person you come into contact with, every unpleasant thing you have to do, every person you love, every thought you think, every life lesson you learn, every World event, every local tragedy, everything that has occurred in your lifetime influences who you are today.
You can’t change WHAT you are (you are a human being) but you can change WHO you are. And hopefully, what you take away from those experiences (what you learn) good and bad, makes you a better person.
And that’s up to you; you decide if you’re a good person, the ‘person’ standing next to you does not decide that for you, because they have their own ‘person’ to worry about. Or at least they should be.
Not everyone agrees with the “Event Horizon Theory” among those who hold a belief in God (fully acknowledging that there are those who don’t believe in him – but that’s a different blog, I do not wish to offend anyone, please know that) Some, even in my own particular denomination, believe in fate and pre destination and other things such. And that’s ok. But I, speaking for myself only, hold to the fact that we can learn, and change our attitude accordingly. But, that brings up another point by the pre-destination and fate believing people, ‘You were predestined to learn that lesson, so in reality, you didn’t make that choice at all. It was going to happen no matter what.’
That’s a good point, isn’t it If you believe in predestination that makes sense to you. My counter to that is to ask the question ‘How do you explain God giving us free will, then?” Someone just doesn’t become a doctor because they were predestined to, they have to study and learn how to be a doctor before they can be one. That usually stumps them. LOL!
I can hear it, “Krystal! What?! Slow down! What the heck does all this have to do with this article about/with David Caruso?” I think one lesson (just one, there could be more) we can learn from going back 15 years with this interview with David is that just like everyone else, David has learned from his life experience and, from what we can see (of what he allows us to see) he’s become stronger or ‘a better man’ (if you will) because of it. I think it is good to acknowledge these sorts of things. I think it makes us appreciate our own experiences to a higher degree because it makes us think about our own life experiences and what’s happened to influence who we are. This in turn will help to influence who we are tomorrow. Hopefully in a positive way.
Well, gosh, I hope I didn’t bore anyone rigid! I haven’t written something this long in a long while! Thank you for sticking it out to the end. I hope I stayed at least somewhat on topic…LOL!
It’s late and I am very tired. But I am so looking forward to reading more in this thread tomorrow!