the liberating relinquishment

I woke up super early again this morning (though not quite as early as I wanted), and it was lovely.
Today was a very, very lovely day. I am tired now, but I wanted to say this:

Over the past week, I have found that my days have become increasingly lovely.
And not simply based on circumstance or environment, either. (Though those have been very lovely too!)
Allow me to explain:
I gave up a lot of things in my life that before, I thought that I couldn't live without. And it's freeing in a rather strange sort of way.

The older post I wrote, "on letting go" was the beginning. The first step.
This, now, is the realization of that post. I am now actually living out what I suggested then. And it's incredible.
Because when I wrote that previous post, I said that I needed to let things go, but now, I actually have.

First, I gave up my (once) best friend. At first I thought that I couldn't possibly do this. Which, it turns out, was exactly my problem. If you are unwilling to let someone go, this probably means that they have an unhealthy hold on your heart. And sadly, he sure did. But no longer.

Next, I gave up facebook. Not that I had a particular issue with it in the first place, but I spent too much time on it and it was too tempting for me to "stalk" people instead of genuinely investing time in them.

As of now, I have gone 6 whole days without logging onto facebook! Yes! I know!
That seems like nothing... unless you are an addict who logs on 15 times a day, like I did.

Also, my friend Eric is fasting from music for lent. Which is pretty intense.
But I admire him for it. Music can be overwhelming and dangerous, and one should be willing to cut it out for a time in order to focus on what is important.

Now you see, most of these things that we are asked to give up are not bad at all! In fact, I truly believe that things like friends and the internet and facebook and TV and music have made my life a whole lot better.

But, the essential questions is: can you live without these things? Can you give them up to pursue something better?

I try to think about this really deeply:

Everything I come across in this world is so temporary.
Even my heart, the very organ that allows me to live, and my lungs, what allow me to breathe each breath, are temporary.
And so, what if they went away?
Well, then I would be dead.

But there are still parts of me that would go on. I would still have a soul. There would still be a God, and the things in my life that I did out of love and for others would last.
And I think that it is these sort of things are what is really important.
And worth living for.

What hinders you from truly living? What prevents you from following the Author of Life?

Think about it.

There is a liberating freedom in letting go.

Tea Time

I have a cousin named Gary.
I like him. He is fun.
He likes tea a lot.
Right now we are having a tea party.

He likes this website:
www.teavana.com

To quote Gary about the site: "Best tea blends ever. Jizz in my pants. Oh wait...that's a thing..."

Happy tea time everyone!

animal collective has eaten me alive

oh my goodness.

The past few days while I was staying at my grandma's house, I started listening to animal collective a lot, and then suddenly I discovered that I was taken over by their music.
It seems silly, but I really have not discovered anything so strange and beautiful and unique and creative and grotesque and fun and weird and funny and sexy all at once like this.

The best part is that, for a very long time, I just thought that their music was "weird." Like, creative, sure; but also too trippy and strange and lacking some essential substance. But what I have now discovered is that the musics is real. Lyrically, it's honest and romantic and poetic and has a lot of depth.
Some of it still sounds like weird stoner music, sure. But it's good. I like it.

I had planned to just paste a bunch of lyrics from a bunch of their songs right here. But there are way too many that I love.
There are so many that I find amazing or that apply to my life right now. Or that I just find amazing in general. But a lot of them are odd or oddly specific, and you will most likely be left wondering about their context.
For now, I will leave you with just one.

In The Flowers:

Then we could be dancing
No more missing you while I'm gone.
There we could be dancing
And you'd smile and say, "I like this song"
And when our eyes will meet there
We will recognize nothing's wrong
And I wouldn't feel so selfish
I won't be this way very long




So, yes. Animal Collective.

Maybe I should quit them.
Maybe I should take a break.
But it's hard.
For I have already been devoured.

Please, don't listen to them.

In other news:
There's lots of other news.
I went to Belmont park and La Jolla shores with my teacher today (Wednesday) to record things with a $10,000 microphone and it was very fun.
I also have a lot of fun plans this weekend. I'm excited!
And no, they don't even include Disneyland. Sorry, Chris.

a list of things!

Things I really like right now:

Waking up early, long walks, laughing at nothing in particular, Eric's choir concert, anything stop-motion, bees, doing sound and lights on Monday nights, Watchmen, the RELEVANT podcast, mardi gras, dancing, whenever the turn signal of the car in front of you matches the rhythm of the music you are listening to, sunrises, epiphanies, photographs, eating dinner at Beef n' Bun with Courtney and my crazy professor, new music, http://www.kiva.org, sunsets, bacon cheeseburgers, cooking pizza, food in general, old music, twitter, my professor asking me weird questions about twitter, playing the piano, Welcome to the Welcome Wagon (the sound and the look!), music in general, dressing up, trees that are huggable, things that are soft, cats, dogs, encouraging words, fast cars, sexy-looking cars, laughing at something in particular, reading, finding things that were lost, bow ties, the bible, people named Tim, listening to old Switchfoot songs that I haven't heard in a while, Switchfoot in general, moments when you look at the sky and realize that life is a precious and amazing gift, the planet venus, all of my wonderful friends whom I deeply love and am very thankful for, my weird family, two jackets, Jesus.

Things I really dislike:

Low-fidelity audio, 15 pairs of ugly pants that don't fit, split ends, gross boys who only talk about drugs and pornography, gross boys, drugs and pornography, discouraging words, freaking out over nothing, wasting time, the fact that I am unorganized, when dogs eat my stuff, cheesy "Christian" things that don't represent Christ at all, losing something you really love, cars, bruises, sin.

dogs vs. cats

I think I decided that I'm not really a dog person anymore.

Well, I never was a "dog-person" but I'm not as much of a "dog-liker" anymore.
[/stubtle reverence to a Demetri Martin joke]

I actually love both animals quite a lot! I have owned incredible cats my whole life, and while I love them immensely, I have always wanted a dog, and secretly loved them more.

But right now I am house sitting for my grandma, and her dogs (two little dachshunds) have been acting like spoiled toddlers lately. Yesterday I bought a small box of peanut butter candy eggs from the Dollar Tree, and I had them in a plastic bag in my backpack which I put on a desk. I thought that they were safe there. In fact, I didn't even think about them. But when I got home from church, my backpack was ripped open, and there were pieces of plastic bag and candy box everywhere... and all of the candy was gone.
I hope my grandma doesn't read this blog. Because I feel really bad and I probably won't tell her about that.

So, yeah, dogs are cute, friendly, loyal, faithful, trainable, more adventurous and fun, but they just majorly lost some points right there. Also, the dogs are whining really badly right now and they won't shut up.
Sigh.

Plus, when I drove up to the house last night, I opened my car door and then this really awesome cat jumped up into my car and sat in the passengers seat. His name was Oliver. He was pretty cool.

Anyway, feel free to participate in this great and endless debate.

Also, a new RELEVANT podcast is up!
Check it out!

Dear Eric,

Hello.
This is a letter written to you, Eric.
I am writing this to you because lately, you have been a very good friend to me and you have listened to me and you have taken a lot of crap from me.
This could be because you are far away at school and you don't have a lot of other friends there, but either way, I appreciate it.

I want to say that I was right about the hammer.

The kiss was the hammer.
The hammer that drove the nail into the coffin that held my dead friendship.

The friendship that once sailed so beautifully is now dead.
And the coffin is nailed shut.

I will admit that I am a little sad, but no, I am not bitter.
I'm tempted to be hurt and confused and upset, because you and I both know that I didn't want things to happen like this.
In fact, I don't really know what I did to cause this, and perhaps it was not me at all.
But I am not going to be upset or angry. I am just going to accept it.
So please, dear Eric, do not tell me to try to do anything about it or change it, because I can't. And that doesn't really matter anyway, now does it?

I wish I was wrong about the hammer. But I was not.

The only hope I hold is that I know the God whom I love and serve and trust, and am learning to love and trust more and more and more each day, can resurrect the dead.
He has done it before and will do it again. All that he requires of me is for me to trust him and to follow him, which I am learning to do all over again.

Thank you for sharing that passage from Job. It was really beautiful.
Things right now are alight, and they will get much better.

Also, tonight I get to see you sing while wearing a bow-tie! I am excited.

Thank you for reading and understanding.

Your friend truly,

Morgan

P.S. I realize that my hammer metaphor potentially gives a whole new meaning to the quote: "The hammer is my penis." from Dr. Horrible. I find that hilarious.

today my fortune cookie said this:

I agree, cookie.

lately

This is a conglomeration of the books, movies and music that have impacted/influenced me lately.

I was going to explain each one of them, and how and why I decided to listen to/read/watch them, but that would take too many words to say.

Some things have been for school, some because of friends, some because I wanted to re-discover some of the older gems that I previously cherished. A few of them have some fun and long stories behind them

But I'm trying to not say so many words. I talk too much as it is.

However, if you want me to explain any of these, just ask! I certainly shall!

(P.S. I filled this with yummy surprises!)

on letting go

Life is, and continues to be, a crazy, beautiful and impossible mystery.

People are born, relate to each other and live their lives and learn and grow and discover things and seek after God and help other people and hurt other people and here am I in the midst of all of that trying to figure it out.

Around this time last year, I really thought that I knew who I was and exactly what I wanted; but it turns out I'm still growing and learning and changing.

I am learning once again what it means to let go. What it means to trust God. To really trust him. To trust him with my life and my heart and my future and my job and my finances and my relationships and everything. Learning what it means to be who I am called to be and to live out my purpose.

Through this, I also sadly realized that I had held a (metaphorical) death-grip around the throat of one of the best and most amazing friends that I have ever known. This was hurting him, and tragically, further killing the relationship that I was so desperately clutching to. For this I am truly sorry.

But what I did (what I realized was the only thing I could do), was I let him go. It was maybe one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, but I did it.
I burned the bridge that had held us so closely together, and I trusted that God would take Kenny's life into His perfect hands.
Maybe one day the bridge can be rebuilt, but right now that's not what is important.

What is important is the new freedom I have found in this letting go and trusting.

Friends, air particles, you should try this!
Take the most important person or thing in your life and let it go. Give it up to God. (Unless of course the most important thing in your life is God, in which case, that is good.)
But, you will be amazed at how your life becomes whole again when you trust the one who created your life to truly take control of it.
It is the freedom that Christ died to afford me; this I know.

Well, I think those are enough words for now.
Tonight I have to write an "identity paper" for my communications class.

We shall see how that goes.
I find myself rather hard to define.

a real family

Yesterday was a fun and interesting day.

I got a new phone and had a fancy lunch with my mom and saw the movie Coraline (which was only amazing because of the 3D, which was amazing) among a few other fun and interesting things.
Also, I had planned to go downtown to see Fiction Family (whom I love and adore in every way) at anthology with Courtney.
But unfortunately, the tickets were sold out. Entirely.

I was actually... completely alright with this.
Which I realized shows that my heart has grown a lot. I year or two ago I would get rather upset when I couldn't see a concert that I really wanted to go to. I placed a lot of importance on those things. And I still do find them wonderful and important, but also, now, my heart is in a better place.

Well, instead, Courtney and I met up with Athan and Becca, and we had several serious discussions about our lives and God and death and the bible and spiritual issues and everything, and it was pretty incredible.
Also, we exchanged a bunch of greeting cards. This is a fun practice that I recommend. But I guess it's really hard to explain (Athan...), so I'll tell you about it later.
I really love my friends and I'm immensely thankful from them.

So, I didn't spend the night with Fiction Family, but instead with my real family. Well, my friends. But you get the idea.

And today was an arrested development marathon.

I have not made a huge mistake.
Life is beautiful.