Ugh. So ever since blogger went down i have not been able to sign in. so finally i had to download a new internet browser, & it has solved my problem. for now. im not happy about it by any means, but it will do for now.

so anyway, i received a few questions from some friends & typed them up. There are still some others that i havent gotten around to answering, SO if you dont see any of yours up, no worries. i will get to them shortly. 

ps: whoever the anonymous person who left the comment about where babies come from is... i laughed at that one. but unfortunately (or fortunately?) for you, i wont be answering that one. sorry.

without further ado...

Here's my question: Is it hard for you to be that honest? Are you worried about what people will think of you that knew you when you were the girl that you were in the past? Does this even make sense? hahah! We'll see!

To answer your questions, is it hard to be honest? not really. its really all that ive got, so i may as well use it to its full potential. its the story that the Lord has given me to share with the world. . . who i am to deny that to someone who may need to hear it?

That all being said, yes i am sometimes worried about what people, who know the "old me", will think. i was talking with an old friend of mine, & he told me this: "Lauren. no matter what you try to tell yourself, youre still the same ol' lauren. you havent changed a bit."

whoa. who knew that words could sting so much? dont people want us to change & grow?

i think that certain people have certain perceptions about who i am based on who i used to be. So when they try to speak into my life & offer up advice, its hard because i know that theyre not talking to me. . . to the me that ive become. theyre talking to the lauren that they know. and its hard because i want to bless them somehow & say thank you for being a part of my life at one point, but i also want to tell them to shut the hell up! because they dont necessarily know what theyre speaking into. and that's where it gets tricky.

so its a fine line. usually i just keep my mouth shut via electronic communication, but then i just talk it out with the BFF who somehow brings me back to sanity... :)

i will say this. there are some people who i let speak in still... i could probably name them on 1 hand, but its good advice nonetheless... :)

Ok. the honesty bug always gets the best of me. frig.

so Kaitlyn had asked if its ever hard to be honest... yes. but maybe not about what you may think...

In order to be honest i have to just sit down, write, & post. thats it. no editing. no spell check. no nothing. i just sit & write.

and that is hard because i am so afraid of coming across as dumb. or naive. or not smart. or. . . anything else. . .

so often times i get really insecure about repeating myself, or using incorrect punctuation or improper grammar. i know that may sound ridiculous, but i am pretty insecure about that.

so those are two things about my blog that make me nervous. that people who used to know me will put me back into that box, & that people will judge me based on my swift typing of the blog. . . 


what did u want to be when u were a kid?

What did i want to be when i was a kid? Its funny because i just admitted this to my dear friend a couple of months ago...

When i was younger what i really wanted to was win an academy award... that's one of the things that ive really ever wanted.

In 8th grade we had to make a presentation of what we wanted to be when we grew up. I slapped on a few pictures of famous actors & actresses (the only one i remember is a pic of Jennifer Love Hewitt!) and presented away. I dont think that anyone was really surprised about my career choice...

Ive always enjoyed acting. When i was in 5th grade i played the main in the school's production of Beauty & the Beast. It was just a one week put the production together sort of thing, but i thrived off of it. And then when i was a freshman in high school, it was the first year that we started putting on musicals again. I excitedly tried out, & played a town girl in our production of 7 Brides for 7 Brothers. I loved every minute of it. . . well minus all of the high school drama that goes on backstage.

My biggest acting moment came for me when i was a jr. in high school.

Auditions were being held at the beginning of the school year for the musical, & i put my heart & soul into it. I knew that since i was only a jr that i probably wouldnt get a big part, but i wanted to go for it. I knew that if i did i could maybe get a minor major role.

I remember them announcing the cast over the intercom at the end of, i THINK it was history class. It was announced that i would have the understudy role of Sandra Dee in our school's production of Grease...! I was literally crying. I was so excited to be able to be doing 2 things that i loved to do (act & sing) in front of an audience. I was only the understudy so i had 2 of the 5 shows, but i didnt care. It was as if somehow a part of my dream came true. The even better part was that when i wasnt playing Sandy, that i got to play the part of Viola, the soda shop waitress! I didnt care what part i was playing, because i was doing what i loved. Even as a waitress with maybe 5 lines, i still felt like i had the respect of my peers. It was something that ive always loved doing.

These days, my acting involves me pretending i know what im talking about when someone comes up & asks me if i know anything about a table saw! haha!

I will say this... i still have dreams about winning an academy award. But theyre just that... dreams.

Every year i sit & watch the Oscars & usually cry when someone wins. Their speeches are sometimes more wonderful than their roles in the movie that they starred in! But i get so wrapped up in it & somehow, sometimes it feels as if im there.

Maybe someday~

if u ran into the 10 year old version of yourself, would she be disappointed in you?   
 
And would my 10 year old self be disappointed in me...? Hmm... that's a tricky question. I know what my gut tells me, but i also know what maybe the truth or the "right answer" is.

My first gut answer was Yes. Yes, i do think that my 10 year old self would be disappointed in me. Why? Oh where do i begin...

I had such great dreams for myself when i was younger. Ok, so maybe they werent great, but they were mine. I wanted a simple life. I wanted to marry my high school sweetheart, get married, & have a ton of kids. I was going to live in southern MN with my best friend, Christina, & we were going to grow old as neighbors and raise our kids & take care of our husbands.

WHOA!! That is NOT what my life is looking like at ALL! There are definitely moments where i look at my life and grieve my old dreams... the old life that i wanted for myself. And i still do want parts of that for myself. I still want to be married & have a wonderful family, but i also want to be healthy.

Being at this place in my life right now, i mean there is no way that i can go back to where i was 3 years ago let alone 14 years ago. I am where i am, & its not what i necessarily dreamed for myself, but its what ive got. and im going with that. And in the end i think that its probably better than what i couldve ever dreamed for myself anyway~

I just hope that the 24 year old can keep giving me grace in another 14 years. . .

 
If you could go back in time 1 yr what advice would you give yourself?

Run. stay inside. harden your heart. just say no. go to work. go home. dont speak to anyone. if someone asks you about yourself, or for your number or email address or... just say no.

because life is easier that way. you wont have to learn anything. you can stay in you small bubble, lead a smaller life, & hope that there's grace for you.

That's what i wouldve told myself a year ago. Since i received that question, ive done nothing but think about what my year ago looked like. i was just starting at sears, meeting new friends, & making awesomely awful decisions. Let me rephrase... the choices that i made arent that awful. really. in the long run & compared the others, theyre pretty tame. However, for me... it was a bit rough.

i learned a lot of things the hard way, & had always hoped, & even thought, that i was better than that. that i didnt need to go out into the world & wreak havoc. I could just go out there, do my thingm & be ok with that.

Here's the kicker... i wouldnt be who i am now without experiencing those things. I wouldnt have known & felt the true love & grace that i experience now. Maybe there was another way for me to learn all of it, but maybe not. Maybe it would be harder now... either way. Im thankful that i know those things, but wish i couldve learned an easier way...

Another great thing that i learned through this past year was that my love for the Lord kind of won. I always knew that i loved the Lord, but i always wondered what would happen when i had to choose between loving the Lord & loving someone else...

and my love for the Lord prevailed. I couldnt turn my back on everything that i had learned, & how i had grown. It was hard. I was a broken person... but i learned valuble things. and i grew... so much more than i couldve ever thought.

So that's what i would tell myself. I would tell myself to run away, and harden my heart, and just go to work and then go home... because that's easy. and its not hard. But knowing me... i probably wouldnt listen to myself anyway...





courageously being really annoyed at having to type this out on a different browser,
lauren