In the Days of My Youth I Was Told What It Means to Be a Man
Pre-Male parent'due south Twenty-four hours Confessions
Do you ever say to a friend or family unit fellow member, "I take a confession," only to realize moments later that it'due south more like a statement of accepted fact rather than a divulged secret?
For example, I often tweet/say/proclaim publicly that I am addicted to Cheez-Its. I near ever tag a form of "confession" onto this statement, just I'm certain that all who know me are thinking, "Who'due south this guy tellin'? We've known this for years."
Speaking of things that I want only accept no coin for…
Reader, meet Stührling. Stührling, come across reader.
Now, before you write me off every bit vain or materialistic, you must understand a few things. First, I'm currently using my wife's quondam Blackberry Pearl until I can beget an iPhone. And I accept to say, this thing has seen better days.
Using my wife's Blackberry to get me by is an deed of agony that Les Miles and Jordan Jefferson could fully empathize with. And by that I mean that it's but doing the job until I can tap out and start a new flavor (zing!).
Until then, I'm relegated to using my beaten-to-Hades-and-dorsum cell phone every fourth dimension that I need to check the time. Occasionally, I'll pull this cellular relic out during a meeting or some other social function to be immediately greeted by gasps, shrieks and ridicule that would make Rebecca Blackness point and laugh.
Summary: I demand a watch. And skeleton watches are pretty much the coolest things since sliced bread–wait, no, sliced cheese. And that brings me back to square one, which is a square one.
Before we wrap things upwardly, I demand to state what this mail service is really about: my father.
My dad is a very quirky, off-the-cuff, lighthearted and spirited human. He is also very sober-minded, frugal, wise and loving. I didn't write a blog post for Mother'south day (sorry, Mammy!) because I merely forgot, simply if I had, then I would probably tell you that what makes my father such a great man is the adult female standing beside him.
Similarly, if at that place is anything good that could always be said of me (think for a few hours and perhaps y'all'll come up with something) then it is most definitely a directly result, or an easily detected byproduct, of my dear ole dad's influence in my life.
Happy Father's day, Jay Lindsey. You're a human after God's own heart and the representation of who I aspire to exist.
Back to business: I've got a confession to make. I dearest Cheez-Its.
-Jus
Keep Your Legs Churning
- I get through a lot of phases. This is true from a social stance and from a personal evolution stance as well.
Often, I need a good kick in the pants to become me motivated to piece of work out, read more, write more than or actually launder the laundry that's been sitting in the hamper for the past iii days.
Inspiration is at present manufactured, packaged and sold in many different styles and sizes, merely the ones that get me off the burrow are suggestions from respected friends and peers.
You might be firing on all four cylinders correct now; if so, and then that's great! If yous're like me, then consider these few tips for personal/professional advocacy.
Update that resume, fo.
Yous never know how or when a new opportunity will present itself, but you tin be waiting for it by ensuring your resume is trimmed and polished.
I recently had the privilege of helping someone etch their resume. Male child, exercise I remember the anxiety of piecing together my ain resume for the commencement time. Heck–I still get anxious when I prove someone my resume considering I'grand terrified of the possibility of an older version somehow slipping in and contaminating my updated resume.
Y'all might take everything up-to-engagement, but that document simply looks staler than a bag of leftover BCS National Championship Fritos. Take a look at Mashable's list of fresh, new resume designs to milkshake things up a bit.
Who knows? You might mess around and draft up a killer resume.
Make your own online portfolio.
Designing and publishing a personalized online portfolio sounds very daunting at first, merely it really is the next step in professional evolution later on you've tweaked that resume.
Thanks to the encouragement of one of my April faculty instructors, I built an online portfolio and it was a lot easier than I initially anticipated; a lot more than gratifying, too.
Weebly.com is a great place to become started and it makes publishing, editing and even purchasing a permanent, personalized domain name piece of cake.
Feature things that you invested fourth dimension and pride in, then refine what portfolio pieces make the cut every bit time goes on. You might first out with a few pieces that make you experience inferior compared to others (I all the same feel this mode), but you'll only get better if you're pushing yourself to create and be more creative.
In closing: continue yourself open up to new things and new ways to promote yourself. These aren't trendy or fleeting fads. Rather, they are means to go along writing, creating and progressing in personal and professional development.
Roll Tide!
-Jus
Fragile and Exquisite
When I logged into my WordPress, I was greeted with a dust rag and some Pledge. This web log undoubtedly accrued some grit since my terminal post, just I'll endeavor to voice something new.
First things outset: Coil Tide!
I accept enjoyed the singled-out pleasure of witnessing two national championships since my transfer from UAHuntsville to the University of Alabama. Besides those in my graduating class, few others besides Bear-era alumni and kinesthesia tin claim that honor.
I'm pretty darned proud of that.
Can we talk about the game for a 2d? Just a few moments…Ok, mayhap more than a few.
Football is a game. If you know me at all, you might dubiety my realization of that uncomplicated fact. You are more than justified in regarding me every bit a fanatic.
Believe me when I tell you lot that I feel I have used football game and the honey of the game to drive me through academic, spiritual, professional and personal obstacles over the by iii-and-a-one-half years.
I won't fail to acknowledge my likely abuse of football, the entertainment value and the emotional swings that come with the territory. If y'all've been on the negative end of that spectacle, then please take my most sincere apologies. If yous've shared that mountaintop experience with me, then I am honored to know you!
You can't disregard what certain things mean to certain people. Seeing Tyrann Mathieu wait on as our defense accomplished something he couldn't stirs things in the Reddish faithful that tin't be explained by a simpleton with a blog.
Nosotros (the Bammers, that is) all heard the criticism when we won the 2009 BCS Title.
"Y'all only won considering Colt got injured. If he stays healthy, that game's a dissimilar a story."
It'south liberating when you lot think about the performance of our team as a unit in the absence of starting wide receiver Marquis Maze and starting linebacker C.J. Mosley throughout various points in the game.
Dominate wasn't a word last night; it was a lifestyle.
Let's call this department, and all the emotions of Bama'due south 2011 national title, "the exquisite".
"The delicate"
I went to work today, enjoyed great visitor and exchanged honey annoy anecdotes with the about enjoyable of company. A detour to avoid traffic led me through the storm impairment near 15th and McFarland. Reality check, y'all.
My married woman, brother-in-law and I were i.37 miles from never seeing Saban hoist a 2d crystal brawl.
Really, man? That'south what you're thankful for?
Correct at present that'south what comes to mind, and nosotros can each dig deeper, simply the blatant reality of Alabama football is that it's comfort food for a hungry, cleaved city. It's another precious step toward normalcy.
It's morphine in our veins. [Insert additional metaphor for good mensurate]
For those of usa who trembled, witnessed and lost on April 27, 2011, we know what it is.
Maybe you lot don't need that reminder, but I did. Those of us who survived owe it to those we lost and those who came to our aid to interruption, if only for seconds. Thank whoever and whatsoever it is that we cling to for one more day and 1 more Rammer Jammer.
Life is both fragile and exquisite, so proceed accordingly.
Sign off:
I want to extend my thoughts, prayers and best-of-luck wishes to everyone starting the Spring 2012 semester tomorrow. I don't green-eyed you, merely I am decumbent to rag you in your current land. Deal with it.
Also, good luck to the Bama Cheerleaders and Big Al in their pursuit of more trophies downwardly in Orlando this week. Roll Tide, y'all!
Half mast
Recently I have been wrestling with the gravity of the four/27 storms and the grief that washes over our community.
There are signs of hope that come with the mention of words or phrases similar Charlie Sheen, T-Town Never Down, The Crimson White, The American Red Cross, Toomers for Tide and countless others. However, in that location are still individuals left below the rubble of their own livelihood.
That thought is very difficult to validate–at least in my mind. My initial reaction to all of the sights, smells and sounds left by the EF5 twister was to count it all fiction. Even now, I'thousand blessed and blogging from a powered, air-conditioned home that has iv walls. My wife is nestled in the next room without the suffocating grief of a lost kid, sibling, mother, father…
Why were we spared? That'southward the 2d matter that runs through your mind afterwards the initial gravity of our city'south situation sets in. We're not any better people than those who occupy the Alabama Housing Dominance homes in Rosedale. Nosotros're surely not ameliorate souls than those who lost their lives in Cedar Crest, Alberta or Wood Lake.
"It doesn't work like that", you might say. Y'all're probably right. There'southward admittedly no rhyme or reason to the storm's swath and those it leaves behind. However, information technology makes y'all wonder why you weren't in the mile-wide line of terror and destruction.
I believe firmly that Christ died for me. Information technology is because of that perfect sacrifice that I enjoy a human relationship with Him daily. If I'chiliad being honest, I will tell you that I would take multitudes of terminal exams to avoid the pain that rains down on T-Town right now down the street from where I compose this blog post. I would even fail every last one of them to avoid the deaths across the state. That's a hefty statement coming from a committed higher student Forget about GPA–I want mothers to feel their children'south warmth.
I'yard obviously just venting, but this is what keeps me awake.
While I grapple with the weight of the storm's wrath, would you pray? If you're not a praying person, then would you please donate? If y'all're restless, as I am, would y'all join me in the healing process and become swing an axe or laissez passer out water? Retweet The Crimson White'south tweets. If you're on Twitter, then call out celebrities and ask them to retweet support/donation info.
Let'south do something.
Dorsum In The Saddle
You know how yous get gung-ho about a new hobby, invest fourth dimension in that hobby, then life completely re-prioritizes things for y'all? Well, that'south exactly what happened to my blogging upstart.
Merely, I'm back in the saddle once more.
Nosotros at the Academy of Alabama are now less than a week away from dead week, which precedes finals calendar week. I officially have one dead week remaining in my collegiate career later next week. Quite bluntly, its the most farthermost class of bittersweet I think I've felt in some fourth dimension.
On one hand, I have a head full of steam built up from all the incredible upper-level PR courses I've taken thus far. On the other manus, in that location are five fingers.
No, but seriously–on the other mitt, I find information technology difficult to view this college feel from the terminal perspective. I would like to provide a disclaimer that I'm non being paid to say whatever of the post-obit.
Transferring to the University of Alabama has been one of the best decisions I've made. The environment I've been blest with: relationships, education, training, dear, t-shirts, etc. spawned situations that I never thought I would access.
Before I decided to transfer to UA, my dad told me that he would support me in whatsoever collegiate decision. His one request was for me to be excited about whatever I chose, and let that excitement flow into my studies and professional pursuits. He's a pretty smart man, I must say.
I'm in a position to graduate from the nation's top-ranked PR program, develop a portfolio to be proud of and enter an otherwise daunting job market with conviction and drive.
Because that's a major office of living a fulfilled life. I'chiliad no philosopher or big thinker by whatsoever stretch of the imagination, simply I feel like finding your passions in life make lots of other picayune matters autumn into place.
It's no easy feat to magically stumble upon your life's calling. Heck–I might not be anywhere near my life'southward calling. For now, I know that I'm where He wants me to be; where I'm meant to exist. Fifty-fifty though information technology'south hard at times to be away from family and friends who I literally cannot live without, I detect condolement in knowing that I have a means—professional capability–to eventually place myself back in that everyday environment with them.
I guess this brings me full circumvolve: I'm back in the saddle once more.
II
Today'southward post comes to y'all courtesy of Led Zeppelin.
Fittingly, the title of this 2nd post is Ii, which is likewise Led Zeppelin's best album. If you don't own information technology, you should seriously consider purchasing it immediately.
Recently, I was talking with a good friend about guilt. Non any item sort of guilt, either–only an overarching guilt regarding my life in full general. For example, I'll ride my bicycle to class in the mornings and showtime thinking of anything and everything to get my mind off of the cold air that is chapping my face to pieces.
While pedaling along, I'll have an inventory of all the things I've been blest with in life and become overwhelmed by all of the things that fall into that inventory. My relationships, my family, my tangible property, the professional opportunities I have, etc. I could probably type up a small novel of all the things that I am extremely thankful for.
Typically, you might only say, "Oh, homeboy is just getting all warm and fuzzy feelings and is grateful. He's overly happy-go-lucky." And typically, you would exist right to say that about a person.
The feeling is actually intense and mainly makes me examine the lives of others in my sphere of influence. I feel guilty that I've had both of my parents up to this bespeak in my life and that they've loved me, raised me and taught me to exist my own person.
What's the signal of blogging about all of this? I honestly don't know. Maybe I just demand a venue to vent thoughts and this was the first thing that was readily available.
Side annotation: if you lot search "blest" on Flickr right now, you'll probable see these ii images.
And this.
Reeling things back in
I think that this intense feeling of gratefulness could be a manner of shaking me out of my stagnancy and routine. I probably demand information technology and I'1000 excited most the opportunities that be. And then, the real question is, "Where do I go from here?"
I don't have the answer. Maybe you do? Feel free to contribute your thoughts, as I have already contributed mine.
As well another side note:
Some people in this globe are really screwed upward. And I don't say that in a joking manner…
When I picked Lindsay up from school today, she told me about an experience that she had and I am once once again reminded of the depravity of our generation. Crazy earth we alive in.
But, then again, I'1000 no one to comment on other'south condition when I accept my ain compartments of life that are fractured as well. Let'due south label this random cord of thoughts and rambling every bit "status".
In the words of Kenny Rogers: "I only dropped in to come across what condition my condition was in."
"Eight-year-olds, dude."
-Jus
Drain American
The championship of this get-go mail service is the electric current album playing on my iTunes. For at present, I call up it would be cool to name each mail service according to the electric current musical influence. We'll take to come across how long that lasts, right? Right.
I don't exactly know what motivated me to sign upwards on WordPress and get-go blogging. Though, I'm adequately certain that my best friend was a motivating factor as he just started blogging equally well. I guess I should formally apologize to those I gave flak to in the by regarding the practice of blogging. #Hypocritealert! Haha.
From here, let's say that my posts are motivated by daily occurrences, relationships and the touch on they have on me, bookish/professional pursuits and things that autumn elsewhere around that spectrum.
Feedback is welcomed! You can postal service feedback hither, on Facebook or on twitter (twitter.com/jblindsey). I assume you're reading because you're interested in my life or because I'one thousand that person that you similar making fun of with your friends.
In either situation, I'm honored to take yous visit this particular spider web address and hope to proceed yous entertained for at least the first few paragraphs. Which reminds me: if you're all the same reading my blog this far down, I'thou super impressed!
Consider this my introduction to blogdom (sic?) and my sincere 'thankyou' for stopping by.
Roll Tide.
-Jus
Source: https://justinlindsey.wordpress.com/
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