Ah.

Sometimes I wonder, legitly, if I have some sort of sociopath in me. I find it hard to care. About people, about things, about my life, about my Spiritual self. Maybe it's just apathy, but it's a hard-reigned apathy if so. Perhaps I'm so out of tune with who I am and with God that I've simply phased out of the human side of my nature and split into two different people.

On the one hand, you have the warrior. The priest. The scholar. The wise young man. The writer. The author.
On the other hand, you have the coward, the sick, the lustful, the dispassionate, the cold, and the strange.
They're at war, constantly, now. And I can't ever escape. There is no escape from self except in hard work, which is fleeting to pursue. This is why I want a longboard. The only other time I could escape from myself, aside from working, was when I rode a longboard that my friend Kade loaned me while we worked at a fireworks stand last summer.

Fortune favors the bold, but often times it abandons those that do not work for their own happiness. Depression is one thing, but I am not depressed. I'm apathetic, and there is a difference. You can still work hard while feeling apathy. It's much harder to work--or move--at all when you're depressed.

I am not being an example of the believer that I should be.
And I don't know if I can find the strength to ask for the strength to become that believer again.

Buggie

There's a young woman on tumblr that I've gotten to know reasonably well over the last year or so. Well enough that she stayed at my house, at least.

Please ignore how ridiculously young I look.

Anyway, on to my point.

She's coming back in July, and I'm looking forward to it. She's a bright young woman and she has a lot going for her, but lately she's been hitting some rough patches, and I don't know how to help her. I wish I knew, but ahh it's so difficult trying to figure out how I can talk to her.

I rarely have any difficulties in talking to people--especially girls--because I'm often extremely comfortable with who I am. Lately though, it's been getting harder, and I don't know why. It's puzzling and irritating, especially since Buggie is going to be staying with me and my family for a solid week.

Ah well.

Hard work

Today I worked for about 7 hours straight doing yardwork for people I didn't know. I did it with my friend Cameron, though, so that was one of the huge uplifters for me while I was working.
We arrived at the house and walked into the backyard, where a huge pile of dirt (6 feet tall, wider than a car is long) was sitting. The man (Mark) and his wife (either Shanelle or Danielle or something along those lines, we never really were sure) greeted us and told us to start shoveling the dirt into wheelbarrows to move up a small slope and onto their backyard, where we would rake it out flat and then put sod over it.
Long story short, we did all of that. Sod isn't that heavy, but it's cumbersome, and therefore is kind of annoying to handle. Once we raked and put the sod down (after they fertilized it), we cut the edges of the sod up and then called it a day.
When they were cutting the sod up, though, they took a 30 minute break. A different section of their backyard still needed more dirt, so while they were all relaxing, I was wheeling up a lot of dirt, and did so 6 or 7 times.
As such, my limbs are sore and my head still pounds slightly, but it was worth it.

Just gonna leave this here

What Silhouette is actually like

Despite the earlier pictures, we really are a bunch of lunatics. XD

Silhouette Ballroom's Last Performance

Everyone in this picture is amazing. They're examples of leadership, wonder, hard work, team effort, love, support, and friendship. We're a family, in a way, and more than one way. And tonight, we're going to be performing for the absolute last time as this team. We are Silhouette, and we've gone through a long, tough road together.

I won't pretend I haven't had issues while being in Silhouette. But those only pertain to me, and overall, being a part of this dance team has been absolutely amazing.

That's me and my partner, Shay. We did a Viennese Waltz together and it was awesome. I'd include more dances but I think I'll cover those more later on. Right now I just want to get my thoughts on on here as an actual journal. I haven't had a journal for a while, and now that I do, I want to record as much as I can onto it before I forget something.

Step 2.Patience

Patience is a virtue. Your own timing may not be anywhere near as important or even as good as the Lord's time. His timing is also far, far more perfect, and while not everything will fall into place with your timing, it always will with His. God has a plan for you, and ultimately He'll send people that will gently try and steer you onto His path. Whether or not you obey those gentle signs--whether they actually are gentle or not--is up to you entirely.
Take into account the existence of Paul, then Saul, or Alma the younger or Alma the elder. All three of them had committed great acts of wickedness. In Saul's case, he went around and preached a lot against Jesus' teachings and continually persecuted him. Alma the elder was a wicked high priest, until the Spirit wrought a mighty change of heart to him when Abinadi visited him and the King and his court to call them and their people to repentence. In Alma the younger's case, he was basically doing the same as Saul was, except with added murder, threatenings, bribery, adultery, and other acts of violence.
In the end, though, each of these three became mighty tools in God's hand. Paul became and Apostle. Alma became a Prophet and helped to construct the Church in Ancient America. Alma the younger became a Prophet after his father, and was an extremely impactful missionary.
They had the choice not to obey and listen. But they did. And in the end, they had to go through some extremely hard trials before they were able to do what they needed to do here.
Too often we pray for patience and then expect it right away. How do we even get patience? The answer is simple. We are patient through whatever it is that we're going through. Through trials, tribulations, traps, tests, and the fiery darts of the adversary. Each one just loves to go at us and get in our way so that we doubt our faith, our God, and His love for us. But in the end, everything that happens to us is for our benefit. Even--especially--if it doesn't seem so at the time.
Patience comes from adversity. So do most things. Wisdom comes from trial and error and being able to see things beyond your years because of experience and observation. Strength comes from trials and from tests.
Patience is vital to being a mother or a father. When your car has broken down, your child is screaming in the booster seat, it's raining, thunder is striking overhead, and your head is pounding in exhaustion, patience is something that is hard to grasp, but very useful for the situation at hand.
Patience and the ability to be calm in a tense situation go hand in hand. And it's a skill that everyone should work on. In a world where we have nearly everything instantly, wirelessly, and without much work, patience can be hard to come across.
So, work on being patient. Learn to become more willing to understand and lend a helping hand to those that can't help themselves or are struggling to do so. You help them, and yourself at the same time. It's a win-win situation, and those are always worth working for.

Questions from Stephanie

1. Panda or Koala?
PANDA. Because the only reasons Koala's are really even "safe" is because they're too stoned to think and I don't know if I trust a stoned animal with ridiculously sharp claws. o_O
2. Would you rather shoot one friend or ten total strangers?
It sounds possibly sadistic, but one friend. If they're doing something so stupid that they need to be shot, I'd rather be the one to do it than to kill 10 people.
3. What's your favorite number? Why?
7. Because it's one more than 6, and I've always liked the look of the number. It looks like a cliff edge that slopes inward. And that reminds me of Wile. E. Coyote videos from when I was younger.
4. Where you you see yourself in 5 years?
Married. And sealed, in the Temple, to my amazing wife, who may be pregnant. Probably in a house. And I'll own a gun, because the way this country is going, I'm going to feel the need to have some form of protection for me, my wife, and my possible unborn child.
5. What is your scariest memory?
When I was like 9, there was a tornado in Salt Lake City. Torrential rain was pounding against the windows. I walked back and forth, pacing, because my mom was driving somewhere in the storm. It seemed as if buckets of rain were being continually smashed against the windows. Lightning and thunder were common and close. Finally, mom drove back, and I gave her a hug, but she was gone for like 7 hours. That was pretty terrifying for me.
6. Do you like peanut butter?
YES. REESE'S FTW!
7. Would you rather be too hot or too cold?
Too hot. I can deal with heat. I don't do well with cold. Heat makes me want to relax. Cold makes me want to slaughter something violently.
8. Does it annoy you when people point out innudendos?
Yes. Beacuse I know what it's like to have a gutter mind, and I never EVER want to be that kind of a person again. It's horrible. And yes, they may be everywhere, but I'd rather keep my mind clean than focus on sexually oriented material.
9. What happens when you get really hungry?
I get irritable and I really really need to eat something before I start shaking. I can be a bit of a bomb when I'm ravenous.
10. Have you ever broken anything? How?
I was swinging on a soccer goal post that lacked the netting when I slipped and tensed up just before hitting the ground. I had a hairline fracture on my left humerus. That sucked.
11. If you could change your family somehow, what would you do?
I'd add a girl or guy that was my age and had the same or very similar interests as me. I feel like I really want someone to be close to that I'm biologically related to, even if it's somewhat distant, that I can talk to a lot.

Happenings

I'm Jordan. You probably knew that. I'm often on tumblr. I write quite a bit and am getting considerably better. Especially since I've figured out that I need to use those darn apostrophes. I'm getting better at it.
I'm a lifelong Mormon. And I'm afraid that, at times, I haven't been as close to my religion as I'd like, or I haven't been a very good example of our teachings. I really do want to become better at that, especially as I strive to be worthy of serving my mission.
What's a mission? A mission is a 2-year term of dedicated religious service where we proselyte in various towns, cities, and inside of homes, if we're invited in. We're "called" by the leaders of our Church to go and serve in a given area that we believe they receive upon revelation from God.
Basically some guys in suits tell us to go to some city or country we've never been to before to tell people that there's someone they may not know that cares about them more than they can understand.
Anyway, as of right now, I'm considered "unworthy" to go on a mission. Why? Well, here's the hard truth. I'm addicted to a form of stimulation that is considered a sin in my Church.
To me, it's an absolutely disgusting thing, but it's hard to be rid of. I fight it along with many, many other people that I know or have known.
"I'm a lifelong Mormon" is a horrible sentence. Why? Because Mormon was the Prophet that abridged several plates of brass and gold way back a few thousand years ago. I am not Mormon. I wish I could be like him, but I'm definitely not him. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We're more commonly known as "Mormons" although we're encouraged to use our full Church's name whenever and wherever the subject arises.
Currently not a lot is going on in my life. I just came back from a small 3-day camp called Shakespeare Showdown. There, I was in charge of 9 12-17 year-olds that were quite the fun group to be around. It was quite exciting to be there, and I wish that I could go again next year, but if my plans work out, I'll be on my mission!
I am a Ballroom dancer. However, we only have 1 performance left before we're done. It's the ultimate wrap-up, with over 20 performances going on. I love my dance company, Silhouette, but I won't pretend that I don't have some minor negative feelings towards it.
I use Linux Ubuntu 2D 12.04. I think. It might be 12.10. That may not even be out yet. Whatever, I'll look that up later.

The purpose of this place is for me to be open about what I feel. On tumblr, which I dearly love and yet may never leave, I feel trapped. There are too many people that have gotten to know me too well for my liking. I feel as if I can't say what I want to--need to--because of this. And so I came up with an idea to reconnect to my past and revisit Blogger. I see they've totally streamlined the interface. So good job on that, Google. I like it.
Occasionally, I swear. Occasionally, I'll have posts that are somewhat explicit because of the nature of my addiction. However, those posts will be rare, and they'll have warnings in the title, so no worries.

Also, I really like to talk a lot. I have a lot of time on my hands and, as such, will usually have no problem typing up huge posts.
I have two signatures that I'll probably switch between depending on the nature of the post. Usually it will be oro tius, which means "I pray more" or "pray more", according to Google translate. I should probably ask Stephanie if that's the right translation, since she knows a lot more about Latin than I do.
The other signature is surgere ut libertatem, which means "rise to freedom". Those will be on my posts relating to addiction.

oro tius