Reality: Snapshot #1

Photo Credit: Khánh Hmoong

A five-minute post Camp Cameron snapshot on life so far.

Today, I messed up. I dilly-dallied and lazed around, didn't do my Bible reading like I wanted to, fell into a bad habit that I thought I got over with, felt envious of my friends who could drive, and then argued with my mom about the very same issue after that. I still feel this intense need to prove to my parents, and to everyone else, that I can, because I feel like I cannot and need their validation to 'prove' that I can. I don't feel like a transformed, victorious person in Christ at all, at least not today! I feel like giving up. I really do. After all, it's what I always do. When friends don't respond to invitations to makan together one, two times, I stop calling them together. I'd rather shop alone then to make plans with people who might not come along anyway. I'd rather be a hermit, under a shell, whatever you'd call it. I give up.

I give up. I'd rather not try than crash and burn again, in anything. I'd rather condemn myself beforehand than to actually fail.

Yet the God that I encountered in Camp Cameron was there the whole while even before that, asking me to look at Him:

Debra, though you may give up on yourself too easily, and though you always assume that everyone else has given up, too, I have never, and will never, give up on you.

All that self-condemning is a shield from people's condemnation, which most of the time exists in the realms of imagination anyway.

Deb, it's okay to feel pain, it's okay to hurt, but don't give up so fast-lah! There's so much in life that might be missed out if everything also give up so easily.

I will hold on.

Photo Credit: Neil Krug, text mine

ps. more on Camp Cam, and other happenings in June/July, soon :)

It's Time To Face The Finals...?

Last semester, most of my exam papers fell on Tuesdays too...talk about an exam day.
Pic mine

So, the finals start next week.

There's actually one more exam to the list above on the 13th, but it's a small group exam so it's not listed here. 6 papers in total. And I am studying for them alright, just that I zone out after 1/2 hour or longest is 1 hour...in my room, I would be the most distracted. There's a bed, and there's Internet access. No excuse, though. Still need to study.

This semester, I generally slacked off more than the last one. The last semester, I bought/photo-stated almost all textbooks, went for most classes, didn't skip any, seriously studied despite the Christmas season for finals and generally didn't go out much. Even with friendship dilemmas, the Jazz Band Concert and trying-to-adjust-to-new-university-life thing going on, I was blessed (I dare not say that I deserve it, because I didn't do 100% of my best) with a CGPA enough to earn a Dean's List award.

1st year Dean Listers in Comm School.
Pic by Wen Wen, my coursemate :)

This semester, things were different. For starters. there was more coursework than exams, so there was a lot of working in groups. I usually try to have a good work attitude/ethic, but I admit that slacked off (should have learned how to simultaneously handle two or more deadlines at the same time, something I haven't learnt to do). As long as the deadline wasn't next week, I procrastinated, and many of my assignments were handed in just in time, where I slogged through the few nights before deadlines. This will definitely affect the quality of the work done - most of the coursework I received back were all average (B/B+) in contrast to last semester (A/A-) grades.

As time passed, the amount of activities that came my way increased in duration as well as responsibilities, making me make the choice to choose between them (which I don't like to do, because I don't like disappointing people - pretty much a yes girl) before I run out of breath. If not, next year I'd be gasping for air...I had fun doing said activities though, so it's not a bad thing. Just that my focus has to come back to hitting the books and studying first before everything else.

I started not going to several mass-handled classes (students in the thousands because it's a compulsory course), and also some classes that started at 8 a.m.(woke up late). It's a good thing that for my core subjects, I still managed to attended most classes and get all the notes. But, it's a deterioration of determination from last semester. Somehow, even though I still enjoy what I study, this semester I didn't feel like studying as much.

I do not blame anyone else but myself for my lower expectations, letting myself off guard, and laziness/loss of drive this semester. For the finals, I'm roughing it out and trying my best, but basically there's not too much I can do when coursework determined the bulk of my grade this semester. There are a lot of lessons that I can learn from everything that happened in the previous year, and lots of memories as well - that's material for the next post, after finals are over. Until then, see you, and all the best for the finals (for USMers and other college/uni kids having finals)

Notice: Blog Reconstruction In Progress

MIA for a while due to heavy assignment load... & wanted a fresh new look/direction for the blog, since it's all over the place - with publicly accessed study posts and personal rantings. There's so much I want to wrote about, but pulled back because it concerned issues such as politics, social observances etc, and I cannot find other blogs sufficient to share what I really wanted to share. So, blog category organization is in progress. :) See you really soon!

- deb