Reflections of a True Millennial

Oh, hey there. So, yeah I haven't written for a while! Life's busy after all, but life's good too. A lot has happened in the past few months! For starters, the blog was featured in the January issue of the Patriot Post: Woo hoo, publicity! But I probably proceeded to kill that publicity by not writing for two months. A lot of the times, life gets in the way. My most recent post is describing the busy time I will have doing robotics. Well, it was a busy time indeed. After six weeks of long days after school and on weekends, we successfully made out robot. Indeed, it is something to be proud of. We compete in the FIRST Robotics Competition and went to the Orlando regional two weeks ago. It was an awesome experience, as always, and our team came out ranked 7th out of 61 teams, giving us the highest position we have ever gotten. We got picked for the 4th-seeded alliance, but unfortunately lost in the quater-finals. Watch us in the following matches at  https://www....

So welcome to the portion of the year where I act most like a nerd. Yeah, it's robotics season!  When I spend free time looking up other robots, and I'm at school so much that conversations go like this: "Hey want to hang out tomorrow?" "Sorry, I have to go to school." "But, it's Saturday..." "Well, yeah I have robotics." So, moral of the story: I'm lame.  But, you already knew that! Before you close the page, don't worry I'm not going to wax poetic about robots in this post. So keep reading! Being at school late everyday is challenging and tiring, but it's fun. I enjoy doing the things I do, even though they take up time. Time is limited, and with our time we can do things that we enjoy and things that we do not enjoy. Finding a balance between these two opposites is difficult. For example, you most likely do not enjoy all of your classes at school, but the knowledge and benefit they give you ca...

     Time is one of the few things that we have no ability to ever take back. There can be no way to rescind what you have done in the last second, minute, day, hour, year, or lifetime. With the abundance of blessings in the form of technological advancements and other devices designed to save you time, you think we would all do our best to live each moment of our days to the fullest. However, we squander our time in ways that bring no lasting blessings or happiness. Fear or laziness compel us to stick within our own sphere and not venture out into new territories. "Maybe I would do that, but I don't know how to." "Maybe I would do that but I don't have time." "For all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: 'It might have been!'"      - John Greenleaf Wittier       Too often we live beneath our capacity in our day to day lives. Many of the things we accomplish on a daily basis add nothing to our lives for good. If thos...

I meant to post this a while ago, but got lazy. So pretend it's 2012 again... ----------------- "Look not behind thee." Genesis 19:17      In less than two days the new year will come.      A time of hope, a time of change, a time of renewal.      But in the world today, hope seems like a far off concept sometimes, a foreign feeling that exists not in our own hearts or homes. Everyday it seems that more and more tragic stories are heard while looming economic cliffs and other national crises hang near. Cries are heard in every direction for gun control, economic regulation, and other measures of the sort. The words of the hymn "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow echo fittingly: And in despair I bowed my head "There is no peace on earth," I said, "For hate is strong and mocks the song Of peace on earth, good will to men."      And so it seems that in the world today there is a ...

"As a country, we have been through this too many times. "Whether it's an elementary school in Newtown, a shopping mall in Oregon, or a temple in Wisconsin, or a movie theater in Aurora, or a street corner in Chicago, these neighborhoods are our neighborhoods, and these children are our children. We're going to have to come together to take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics." -President Obama, 12-14-12 Yes, this has happened to many times. Small towns plastered across national news for all the wrong reasons. Intricate stories laid out over weeks displaying a web of corruption and a trail of broken hearts. Too much. Places like movie theaters and schools seem like places we can't even go. Since I was a kid, my perceptions of the time when my parents grew up seems like a time when everything was perfect. Old home videos from their childhoods set up a viewing window into another time. It seemed like...

Yay, it's December 2nd! Christmas is almost here. December is one of my favorite times of year, you can just feel the Christmas spirit. And you can see it too, in decorations going up around the house.      In the above picture is a little basket in our living room with all the Christmas books we own. Of course there are many classic titles by classic authors with classic characters and classic messages. But headlining the pile has been a book by an odd title by an  odd author with odd characters, but a classic message. Well, staring me in the face every time I pass by, "The Lump of Coal" by Lemony Snicket coaxed me into reading it this afternoon. I remembered the story was about a lump of coal who could not find acceptance anywhere and his journey, but didn't recall the last and perhaps most important paragraph. When the lump of coal finds a purpose to his cold, black, charcoal-y life, Mr. Snicket closes the book with the following paragraph...

There's an oft-quoted question, "If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?"So basically, if video of your life were to be put on screen in a courtroom, would they be able to tell who you say you are? Today is a day of thanks. And by scrolling through Facebook, being with family, and many other activities we can quickly tell what everyone else is thankful for. We also have opportunities to say what we are thankful for. Pretty simple concept. So what about tomorrow? We'll always be thankful for our friends, families, food, clothes, and whatever. But will we always show it? If someone sees us on April 3rd or June 17th, will it be obvious what we're thankful for? Or will we be pessimistic and complaining? Be thankful everyday, and show it everyday. Don't ever take life for granted, because before you know it the things you have will be gone. You'll be off pursuing other things in life, and wishing you ...