5 Things University Taught Me (About Me)

Photo taken in May 2011 when I first received my acceptance letter to UNI

1. I am much more driven than I thought.
 There were times I thought it was the end for me. it wasn't. 

2. My dreams are mine I'm sure of it.
 This degree has been what I've wanted since I first read the name of it in a magazine. I know what I want. I know that I know what I want because I enjoyed it too much. When my teachers were caught up in grades I was caught up in 'but that LITERATURE though!'

3. His strength is made perfect in my suffering,
   Yet though he slay me I WILL praise Him. Blessed is she who has believed.

4. My friends are more amazing than I knew.
  One semester a friend read my textbook for me when I couldn't because I had eye strain. One semester someone else recorded my notes for me because I had eye strain. One semester I failed and someone listened to me b*tch for quite a lengthy amount of time. One semester someone listened to me and helped me talk about school work so my auditory learner brain could function. One semester a friend listened to me read my notes allowed so I could remember it better even though she really wanted to go to bed. I saw who would follow their words with actions and not complaints.

5. I will sacrifice for it without doubt.
  That one is so harsh but it is so true. I know what I want and because I know what I want I am willing to sacrifice time. Over the past four years I missed things, big things, things that allowed me to become disconnected with the people I love. Scarily though, I love this more than a momentary connection. This love has been with me all of my life and if I have to choose between moments and it, I will cry as I walk away but I will choose it. Of course, easier to say because I don't have much in the way of the materials like husband, children and house yet.

Throw Back Thursday : That time I went to orientation at my university

 I'm about to take you into a time capsule of my life, the first day I stepped into my university as a real student. Imagine the scene, this was me cataloguing my time, fears and excitement.This me at the beginning of the first semester. I know because I wrote it on my very previous blog (thus the old watermark) I enjoyed reading this. Reflection, is still good.

=================================================================

Orientation Ahoy, Success on the horizon
August 29th 2011


So I'm finally starting the degree I've longed for all my life. ^_^
It's crazy how you could want something for so long and then end up on the brink of getting it...It's like swimming in a wide open ocean for so long... rather...how Columbus must have felt, having been doubted for so long, that even he must have started to believe his dream was futile.

Everyday, waking up to more open sea, just floating and floating and floating until one day he feels a clench in his chest as one of this sailors screamed out 'Land!'

I imagine even he dared not believe it, even as he watched his dream now visible on the horizon, approaching him now, getting closer to him even as he got closer to it...anxiously awaiting that moment where they would meet in the middle and touch.

Not till he'd put his feet on dry land and his dream was tangibly real.

I went to orientations and this MOE worker, also a past pupil of my Uni and heck even a holder of the same degree I'm pursuing (I knew immediately cause we're cool like that you see :p) Her speech was so motivating I had to take down a couple points ^-^ She told us to:

Reflect, who are you doing this for? Is this a job pursuit you could see yourself doing for the rest of your life?

Check!

Right now it feels like this is it for me, I've wanted this for so long the idea of getting it makes me mush on the inside. I keep trying real hard to not dwell on all the door that will be open to me afterwards since hey, I haven't even started yet!

It WILL be tough!

Still, sometimes I can't help but smile at the possibility of finishing, the things I'll do, the places I'll see and the people I'll meet after I accomplish what has been my biggest life goal for so long. I tell myself, when I'm done, this is it, no more study, I'll finally have what I want and I can just live life.

Though I guess all those 'doors that will be open' thoughts just proves it doesn't it? This probably isn't 'it'' No matter how I feel right now, it's within human nature to want more, yet....I can't help but wonder...what WILL I want after this? I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a faint idea...or three ;)

Well, anyone who knows me knows that it pretty much already is now isn't it? lol! Well here's hoping it becomes even more deeply rooted in my heart :)

Ground yourself, it won't be easy. Find something that keeps you grounded and feeling secure. For some of us that will be God (hopefully I am one amongst that some) for others it might be their commitment to bettering their family for their new born son. Whatever it is, hold tight to it, cause things are about to get crazy.

This I am looking forward to and I suspect it will be thus. Heck working and studying tends to brings out a discipline and determination in yourself that shocks even you! You've got to succeed by FORCE. No ifs ands or buts about it and when you come out the other side of that tunnel, tired, warn but smiling with diploma in hand. A winner.

I look forward to it!
Quotes from Mrs. A. Philip

============================================================


Here I am now, in senior year! What do you think of my old school writing style! haha

Peace. Love. Begrudge not small beginnings.

Throw Back Thursday That Time I had The Learners Nastalgia

I've had school on my mind so much lately. I've decided to write about what's on my mind. This is another old post which, unless you've been with me a long time you would have never seen.

 ==============================================================

 
So I'm an English student. I love
learning and I love studying.
Or at least I think I do half the time... You see it's...something being a student and a worker all at once.

Regardless, I love saying the long title of my degree Eng&Lit with Edu.

It reminds me how much I've wanted it all my life and now here I am fighting to get it done. Only second semester and i'm already fighting,
to stay motivated, to find the time to get it done due to extra ordinary circumstances...

Yet it never stops amazing me, that no matter how difficult and depressing it gets.. when I have time on my hands I don't know what to DO with myself outside of school work!

I've had it take up so much of my days, so much of my time that when that time is presented to me again like 'here, have at it' I almost find myself feeling guilty.

Of course there are things to fill my time!

I've got a book to finish reading and poetry to edit and compile for my own anthologies...and lets not even think about the novels that need editing and finishing...oi vey!

Yet, there is that strange sense of 'incomplete' when there isn't an assignment to even THINK about.

it's hard, it's tedious it steels my creative soul but i... love school and i wish ultimately that i could focus my attentions only on it until i'm through...

It's like walking a long road knowing that no matter how tired you are, no matter how much your feet hurt, no matter how long it seems like it's going to take ..

You'd rather be walking to your destination than dreaming about it.

==================================================================

Oh how things have changed since then! Picture taken from the zazzle.com site when i played around with the idea of making my own school tee.

 Peace. Love. Keep Calm and Just Graduate

Originally posted08/05/12

My Secondary School Experiance

I've heard so many people talk about just how horrible their secondary school life was and I honestly marvel. I feel so blessed to have gone to the school that I did. At the time I went their they were not a school one was expected to be proud of exactly. You see, they had a harsh history and were often looked down upon.

Within our walls however we had teachers that cared about us as people, not just as students. Who treated us like we could be great. Who knows, maybe everybody has this feeling about their school.

I never worried about bulling. Our class was always on the positive side of things. We were a little family who go annoyed when you didn't come to school because they missed you and would have just stayed home too. There was the girl who brought breakfast and shared it with everyone, there was the one who did your hair, there was the one who was good at this subject or that one.

It was a great time.

I always knew I would write, I knew as well I would need to have a back up because that probably wouldn't rake in the mullah too quickly. Academics didn't come easily but I did learn to narrow things down so that they were in line with my vision.

My teachers taught me how to be a good person. They told me what I would need to show that I was skilled. They pointed me in that direction and I went for it.

Peace. Love. Go for it.

10 Struggles of Being an English Major

 // Linguistics is sexy, which makes you a little more odd than average as you swoon over the way something is said rather than what is said, making your friends roll their eyes at your strange fascination of how the tongue can bend in ways that hold your interest for reasons completely unrelated to sexuality.

// Text book theorists are usually hilarious, full of wit, sarcasm and irony as they present their theories and are often poets or novelists themselves which makes you feel rather proud because as far as you're concerned your teacher is a literary superstar and you get to be thought by them and read their knowledge even though students of other disciplines just don't get how awesome they are or why you would read your textbooks for fun if you know, you were ever allowed time to breathe.

// Being OCD about either grammar, linguistics, spelling or all of the above. Those disciplines take over your brain until you start hearing everything in punctuation marks and phonemes.

 // Mr. Darcy is basically my fictional equivalent of Trey Songz. In fact everyone has one, a fictional equivalent that is.Mr. Knightley comes in a close second.

// Okay, I had to get over marking on my books it's true and how about them references? Underline? Italicize? SPRINKLE IT IN FAIRY DUST?!  Plus yeah, a literature get the jokes on 97% of this list.

// You dream of getting rich so you can buy two copies of books, one for reading and letting everybody touch and the other for putting on a shelf within view and admiring for its beauty so for now when people touch your books a little part of you screams murder on the inside.

// Beautiful books make you tingle in all kinds of places. I mean has any body seen these?! I am loosing myself hungering for the Pride and Prejudice copy of these bad boys. I seriously almost cried, their beauty near brought me to tears.

// When someone says 'I haven't read the book but I've seen the movie!'with pride, you have to exercise restraint of judgement. It's not on purse that you're judging them it's just your training rebelling.

// There just isn't enough time in life to spend reading Literature before you grow old and die as you have to you know, get out there and live and keep your commitments and all that and this makes you very sad.

// Libraries speak a special language to your soul so they feel like a sacred home and you get well miffed when people do not appreciate the life of its own such a place has.


 There are more but I thinking I'll stop here. Who's your literary Trey Songz?

Peace. Love. Language.