When I was younger I had a premonition about caps and gowns. When I put the gown on a few days ago, I understood why. Something about my body type and the way the gown was shaped made me look like a dumpling when I put it on. I'm still not completely past cringing when I see those pictures. However. I'm going to post some anyways, because I know the rest of you don't mind as much as I do. In fact, if you get a laugh out of any of them, let me know. ;)

            Well, it's almost done now. Senior recital is marked off, graduation is over...all I have to do is finish my final requirements for my degree, a couple more months of work due to deadlines, but it's great because I know what I have yet to do, and it's a clear course now until the end.

            Things are going to change around here, I hope. First off, I intend to write more. No more of this "once a month if you're lucky" nonsense, I'm going to see if I can't do at least twice a month. Also, I want to start experimenting more with music and singing, and I'll be posting some of these experiments on this blog, poor thing, I hope it can endure all my musical messing around. In all honesty, however, after having some very insightful conversations with friends, I've realized something about myself, that I've refused to admit for several years. I've always thought I was very good at doing things that were right and showing my true self no matter what other people thought of me, however, I realized last week, that more and more things have been creeping into my life over my teenage years, that were merely a facade, a calculated one, but a facade nonetheless, a well thought out veneer over my personality, displaying only that part of me which I wanted the world to see.

            I want to stop.

           You may see things start to change(I really hope you do, in fact). I'm going to stop trying to make something picture perfect before I post it, as though I am perfect and have a perfect voice, which I definitely do not. I'm going to stop talking like I know it all, because, as a friend of mine wisely pointed out not to long ago, we can probably safely assume going into an argument, that eighty percent of what we believe is false....imagine getting to heaven and discovering that half of what we built our lives on was sand simply because we believed in our own ideas like they were the gospel truth.

           This does not mean that I will be less firm in my convictions, start advocating relativism, or be any less bold in stating the truth. However, it does mean that I will be more careful that when I state opinions, they will be clearly qualified as such, and I will be far more careful when challenging the opinions of others, understanding that not only do they believe theirs as strongly as I believe mine, but that it's a prideful assumption to believe that somehow the opinions I generate are closer to the truth than theirs.



             What brought this on? Well, I met, or rather got to know more thoroughly, a few individuals while on campus for the past two weeks, who not only defied all my preconceived notions of them, but stood up to me and my ideas in a way no one had done with me in a very long time. I'm thinking seven years, at least. Well, not only do I admire people who stand up to me rather than back down, but I also learned a few things from them, such as one of them telling me that I was bad at arguing because I made it sound like  I was always right and anyone who disagreed with me was going to hell. It was hard to hear, but I needed to hear it.

            So, I'm going to try to be a lot more gracious in my opinions, but the other thing that I hope will change, is that I will try to be a little less preoccupied with my appearance in other people's eyes.

             I'm going to post videos of me that sound horrid to me, pictures of myself that might not be flattering by my own standard, but if I'm able to bring others a little joy or blessing through them, then I'm going to post them, and I can jolly well like it or not for all I'm going to do about it.

            
             I'm going to try to be a little more vulnerable, since I've discovered I'm good at it, because, guess what, we all struggle with inadequacy and feelings of falling short, and the last thing I want is to plaster myself up there like some vision of perfection and discourage the loner, the limping and the laboring(among whom I am the most so) into thinking that they're the only ones who struggle with sin and general imperfections.


           So, the first thing I'm going to do to dispel this aura I feel I have created around myself is that I am going to share a video which, technically wise, was pretty bad, and visually isn't the most stunning. However, I'm posting it because I think you all will enjoy it and because I have promised that I would post more of my singing  endeavors.

       The song I'm posting is "The Prayer," a duet which many of you might recognize. I first sang it at my senior recital the weekend before last, and when my friend and I sang it then, it was pretty perfect. The few mistakes we made were nearly unnoticeable. Well, it so happened that we got a full recording of every song in my recital except that one. At first I was pretty upset. It was almost perfect, I wouldn't have been ashamed to post it up all over the internet. What I got instead was a full recording of my friend and me singing it at the senior showcase last Friday, where not only did I not have a chance to warm up properly before hand, but God contrived to get me nice and out of breath right before I started singing! Not only that, but the dress I was wearing was not flattering in the camera. I realize now that I should definitely have worn a solid colored outfit....well, I think you all are going to enjoy it anyway, so, here goes.

             Wasn't my friend great, though? God was good to give me the chance to sing with him....we had a lot of fun doing it!

     Anyhow, I'd love to hear from you all. Am I completely crazy? Can you relate with the thoughts I shared? Did you enjoy the video? Would you enjoy seeing more of my singing and musical experimentation on this blog?

  

Thus far has the Lord brought me, and by His grace alone shall I continue. If any of my classmates are reading this, I want to extend a special thank you to everyone of you, graduated or not, who spoke into my life over the past two weeks and convicted me to this change. God used everyone of you all, and we are the class of 2017!

          Look forward to more unusual updates, dear readers. May God be with you until I write again.


  

         All my love.

           ~ Christianna