Originally Posted: September 3, 2014
On August 24, 2009 I started a little project. I call it a project even though it’s more of just writing in a journal. 8/24/09 was my first day of college at Berkeley City College. The first entry is mostly about how much I hated being in college. How I felt like I wasn’t supposed to be there.
I’ve written 285 entries since then. I’ve gone through three notebooks. The first was an (the) Office notebook that my buddy, Aundrea Schindler, gave me in high school. Notebooks have always been a popular gift to give me over the years. I guess everyone knows I enjoy writing. In high school it was probably more obvious, I carried a notebook around with me everywhere. Nowadays I jot things down in my iPhone. Probably less obvious. Probably not texting when you might think I am.
The second notebook was a holographic Toy Story notebook and I am actually 23 years something. This notebook chronicled a very confusing but ultimately optimistic time in my life. I had just moved back to Houston, TX after 8 years living in California. It was weird, it seemed as though I spent all of my time in CA getting used to leaving Texas behind. When I finally did, it was time to come back.
I started going to college in Houston and I was really lonely. I wrote in the notebook everyday, wrote and recorded a lot of music that not many have heard, I wrote stories, discovered The West Wing and made a ton of videos for my YouTube Channel. I knew it was going to be difficult going back to Houston because most of my friends had either moved, were away at college or I had just lost touch with them over the years. I was lonely, but wasn’t sad. Jesus instilled in me the sense that he was building towards something and never let me forget it.
On to book 3 of the College Journal. That was what I called this series of journals until either this week. “The College Journal Vol. 1” and so on. This was a burnt orange notebook that I really love. It’s the current volume. I started writing in it when I first moved to Austin, just like all the other notebooks. Eventually, sometime in 2012, I stopped writing in it. There’s a post I looked back on in 2012, sometime after I had stopped for a while. It describes UT, Hope 242 and mentions the idea that maybe I stopped writing and started participating.
I certainly like the idea of that and think to some extent that that was true. Somewhere along the way I got so wrapped up in this journal, it not only became a place where I could relieve stress, express my thoughts, doodle, pray, worry, praise and feel understood, it became the only place I could relieve stress, express my thoughts, doodle, pray, worry, praise and feel understood. Which I think might have been going too far. I’m glad I was pulled away from volume 3. I’m glad I met people that asked me about all of the things I was going to vent into a burnt orange notebook.
God certainly had/has a plan. That’s why I miss it. That’s why I started writing in the notebook again. I summarized everything that happened between May of 2012 to Aug 2014 and continued journaling this week at my new job. I love reflecting on where I have been, what I used to think and how I used to feel. Regardless of how embarrassing or silly it seems in retrospect. Reading through how I went from hating college to loving it, reading through how I was worried about my life, to reading about how it all came together, (and is still coming together) is amazing. Its just wave after wave of God’s faithfulness and provision. I’m so thankful for every single thing that he did for me and for every single thing I went through and felt.
This time around I want to try to juggle both. I’ll write and participate. I want to be out there living and building relationships but I also want to have written record of the tiny part I’m playing in God’s plan.
Thank you, Lord. The last 5 years have been incredible. You could do nothing for me for the rest of my life and at the end of it, I’d still have so many things to be thankful for.