How to Be a Woman

(Written in St. Petersburg)

Nothing speaks attraction more than, perhaps, confidence in yourself. Something changed. What was it exactly? I feel different, I feel healed. I know that when a girl believes she’s beautiful, that she’s attractive, that she can say to herself, “I’m worth getting to know,” that it’s true. Maybe because it makes you more attentive to the other person, and not thinking in the back of your mind, I have this need, give me something in return. Even when I wanted to be thinking of the other person, I know I cried inside, help me. I’m listening to you, help me, I’ll try to help you. How can you give out when you hurt so much? You both end up miserable together. I think because I know I have nothing to lose, I know I’m ok when a guy responds and makes conversation, or if he decides not to, that’s ok too. If I was honest with myself, I’d probably want something like that too, just someone who’s happy to be a friend, anyone wants a friend, and that’s always a good start. I can see why I didn't seem attractive when I thought myself unworthy, when I couldn’t look someone in the eye. I noticed American men like confident women, you have to be friendly and outgoing to make friends,and  not always expect them to initiate. Culturally, that was an adjustment for me, I've been used to men initiating everything, even friendship and conversation. Russia’s different, girls aren’t friendly to men. That’s fine too, there are subtle ways of being friendly, just making yourself more approachable and nicely responsive.

The Grass is Always Greener

This blog was meant to be mostly written in the month leading up to my 22nd birthday, it was a good plan but I'll keep going since I only ended up posting twice. It's summer, I'm enjoying this week off before work and research starts. I also found a website called Wishbomb that allows me to post goals and deadlines. I find I always have great ideas for projects but don't organize myself well enough to undertake them. It's actually nice to set a goal and see the amount of days there are in a summer, I've set aside blocks of times for various activities--a hundred days to really develop a writer's blog, thirty days to write a short story, and roughly thirty days to rewrite a research paper. The important thing is for me to produce, no matter how unpolished something might look. Like this blog post. I've gone off topic. You should see how many started and unfinished blog posts, letters and stories I have saved on a document. It gets reused, but it's better to just put something out there and maybe come back and tweak later.

It's funny the things we learn from our mothers. My mom has had a lot of wisdom to share, it's interesting to see what applies and what doesn't, in terms of how our life experiences are becoming different. I thought I would marry like my mother out of college and follow my husband around the world like she did. Many of the women I admired shared similar experiences. They shared a joint calling with their husbands, and often became full-time mothers. I thought mine would be the same. I imagined a career to be a means of support and a way of getting by until my turn came. I never dreamed or desired to be a "career woman," to me that was too, singular. A woman friend I was speaking to the other day, who shared a similar life experience as my mother, said she envied me pursuing a career! Envied! And I, in turn, protested, "But I wanted the life that you had!" She admitted there were pros and cons to both, and in honesty they are different callings, with special blessings accompanying each. I never thought I would want something so much in terms of a career, and knowing what I want makes seven to eight years in school feel like nothing. I'm all for marriage, but that's not the plan God has for me at this moment. Time is with me right now and I'm going to use it. Rather than holding out and thinking what if what if, I realize I have all the time in the world.

Concerning Faith

For many of you in college and getting ready to graduate, how do you see your lives right now? My last post was for those of you waiting for that "special other" to come along. This post is for you friends who fall into the "happy-in-yourself" camp. I've been meaning to follow up on the first post for awhile. I wanted my second theme to be about faith.

It's been an interesting season. It's spring semester of my junior year. I've been very busy between jobs (three of them, one I hope to finally drop) and classes, while vigorously trying to make plans for the coming summer, applying for jobs and internships, and studying abroad in the fall. With all the things I want to do, it's like a puzzle that I hope to see come together, but my time is pretty tight! I'm seeing the blessing in continually seeking and asking God to give me guidance and provide for my needs. I can get overwhelmed pretty easily, and fall into the trap of considering myself self-sufficient and independent, when I really need to be falling back and trusting God at the end of the day. The self-sufficient idea is a lie, most of what I have, I didn't come up with myself. Finances for example. I have jobs, but I've had generous gifts from family and grandparents toward living expenses. When I look back and count where everything came from, I congratulate myself less and less by realizing my dependence on the generosity of others.

 So, concerning faith, I see this as a season for learning to fully rely on God. Even when we could consider ourselves independent, no one is ever immune from things going wrong, losing a job, losing a house. Learning to trust God is something I'll be doing for the rest of my life, no matter how well-to-do I might become. I guess this is a big deal for me because lately my goal in life had been to get to a point where I wouldn't have to rely on other people ever and I could construct my own safe-house entirely on what I had merited and earned. My thinking was off. I could see why people who rely on themselves become anxious. Maybe some people feel strong in themselves but I don't. I know I'm vulnerable and open to attack, just on my own. Life is too big for one small person. And that's not our purpose in life anyway, to have a comfy life for ourselves. It's a plus, not a goal. I'm hoping God will provide all these things as I seek him out, we'll see what happens :)

How He Loves

If I could write back to my sixteen-year-old self, this would be for you. If I had a daughter, this would be for you. In the meantime, my young women friends, just a few thoughts I thought I'd share, some of which, I hope, may be useful.

I know you're thinking it. We all want to read about it, find new things about it, find some place where we can relate, some nook where we could integrate and write ourselves into. I've thought a lot about love. Ever since I was fourteen or fifteen, old enough to wear make-up, getting past that pre-teen, early teen stage where we're still not quite sure what we want. We all want to be loved. At a certain point we figure out that we want to be loved by a guy.

Around the time I was sixteen, I thought I was so wise. I learned good principles, from my parents and books I read about waiting. At the time, love meant waiting to be intimate with one, and only one, person. I  felt if a guy wasn't willing to wait, he didn't really love me. Since then, yeah, I was in for a few shockers, I learned that people had other views, and those who shared my views made mistakes. The principles I had were right, my sweeping conclusions about people were not. I was an idealist, I thought I could be perfect, and other people too. I thought love could be perfect.What I've learned since then is that it's awkward, it's a learning experience. You don't just love people perfectly and naturally.

I've learned that I, and other people too, are insecure. It's scary to let people in and love you. In theory, they'll love you for your good points. That's what we want and hope. But they have to love you knowing your bad too.

It's funny, I've made a full circle. At this stage, love is waiting in a slightly different sense. Waiting for a man to grow and realize he loves you. Not expecting him to be other than what he is, in some cases, a slow-mover. Accepting that love takes time to grow. Accepting that he doesn't love the same way you do, doesn't feel emotion the same way you do. We all want to be loved, you'd think it was so urgent we'd die without it. It's not true.

My personal panacea to overcoming this anxiety about being loved is trust. For me that means trusting in God and his goodness. We make the mistake of believing that God doesn't love us or want the best for us. I sometimes think He's indifferent. It's funny, when we start remembering, or perhaps realizing for the first time, that God has only good intentions for us, the extent of his love for us, then we'll realize why and where we wanted love in the first place: from our Father. All other places are secondary.