Wow, it's been three months since I've posted anything and time seems to go by so fast.  What's really sad is that the older we get, the faster it seems to go by.  I wonder if that means that, as we age, we can handle all of the repercussions of how we spend our time with increasingly less emotion...

As I look at my whiteboard, the same things that were there the day after school ended are still there, and I'm starting to wonder how I'm really spending my time.  Summer has been great so far; I've been to Tucson and played piano for a voice concert for students from NAU, gone to San Diego with friends and hung out on a boat in a marina across from Sea World, been a part of a handbell group that I , honestly, love to death, and tried to live my life in order to make myself feel a little bit happier.

Last semester just about killed me.  I was so busy every day with jobs and stuff that it completely sucked the life out of me, and those of you who read my livejournal KNEW it.  The summer is my time to recognize that it's not fair of me to beat myself up 10 months out of the year, and that it's not fair that I do so many things for other people, but rarely do things for my own benefit.  I'm graduating from college in less than a year and I don't have hardly any of the credentials that I need to be able to apply for the next step in life, even though I've made a ton of commitments and supported myself through school, etc.  It sort of makes me feel like the "business" side of me has been completely non-existent through college.  Here I am with no money and a bunch of jobs that make other people happy; I'm not doing the things that will take me to New York for grad school, or help me to get into the pit of a Broadway Orchestra.  I'm just doing things to get by. 

Well, summer is the two months out of the year I get to change that philosophy.  It's a chance to delve deep into my passions and create things that excite me, find opportunities that resuscitate my joy in being an artist, and find people who share the excitement that I do about something, ANYTHING.  And now that I've taken a month away from all of my duties during the regular year, I think I'm going to start being more productive in these areas.

Cutting back on procrastination is huge, and getting myself motivated is an even bigger concern.  If I can do those things, then I will be able to accomplish SO MUCH MORE than I could have ever hoped this summer.  But I don't like writing music anymore because I just don't see the rewards of it soon enough, and I don't like exercising because I can't see results immediately, etc....so what I should be thinking is that I should try to make myself happier over the LONG TERM.  It takes more time to do that, but I'll be truly happy instead of this "fake happy" that I have right now (which is still better than how I feel over the course of the year, but nowhere near where I should be).

Here's what I truly need, in the order of how I need it, over the course of the summer:
1) Money.  I need to look for scholarships so that I can get money easier than how it comes to me now (6 jobs and too much hassle), so I can quit some of those jobs so I can have more free time to pursue art.
2) Desire.  It's time to WANT to be better at the things I know I'm good at.  I'm so content with coasting through college that I haven't even though about how good I COULD be if I really tried.  And in the meantime, people with less talent are passing me by because they're more dedicated, and the last thing I want to do is watch someone else take the success that I could be having.
3) Daily goals, and the motivation to meet them.  I think I'm going to try to do around 5-10 things a day that I want to do (i.e. read a book, learn about music, practice, exercise, compose, etc.) for a short amount of time so that I feel like I'm actually DOING things this summer.  It's so often that I only think about things instead of act upon them, and so even if I do these things for just a half hour every day, at least I'll feel like I'm making steady progress.

It's time to be the person I've dreamed of being.  It's time to set my aspirations higher.  It's time to focus and live a purpose-driven life.  I deserve it, I've worked hard and there should be nothing stopping me EVER.  Let's do this.

And best of luck to all of you, too...because you all are incredible people and deserve the best in life, also.  But sometimes, when you draw slowly into monotony, it becomes the time to ask yourself..."what's stopping me?"

The answers are out there, and all we have to do is reach.