Happy Christmas!

Here's wishing all of you a very happy Christmas, whether you celebrate or not! May your day be full of joy and cheer as we celebrate the gift of love!

In other news, I will be posting on here irregularly for the next month in the interest of vacation time before my very busy January begins. Regular daily (weekdays) posts will resume Monday, 24 January, at which time I will likely be hurriedly trying to finish my novel for January Novel Writing Month. By February, you should hopefully have a sane Elizabeth back though.

Happy holidays! :)

Christmas Letter 2010: Anxiety, Prayer, and Faith

Each year, a friend of mine writes a Christmas letter reflecting on the past and what's to come. I liked the idea, so here's my first annual Christmas letter:

The Anxiety of Christmas Past


A year ago, where was I? I feel this has been a recurring theme in my life for many months, always comparing and contrasting where I was and who I was a year prior.

A lot has stayed the same. I live in the same comfortable house in Southern California that I've lived in since I was five with my massive bear of a dog and crazy nut-job of a family. I still write and direct plays at the local high school. I still put my shoes on the wrong feet sometimes. I still wind dry my hair, though now I do it by rolling down the windows of my car instead of just biking fast. I still chew on my lips when I'm anxious. In fact, I'm biting them right now just as my anxieties still bite at me.

I've learned a lot in the past year though. Leading students is an incredible challenge, but it is also incredibly rewarding. The director I was a year ago is not the director I am today, and the director I am today is not the director I will be tomorrow. My students force me to continue to learn and grow every single day.

A Prayer for Christmas Present


At this very moment in my life, I am very much in the in between. I have been unsure of what on earth I'm going to do with my life for a very long time. I've been leaping from idea to idea, finding all sorts of things I enjoy but never quite finding the one thing which excites every inch of me. I'd nearly resigned to the nonexistence of that "one thing," until very recently when the idea of working in the church crept into my mind. I don't know right now if this is the "one thing"— it feels like is just might be— but I think I'm okay with not knowing just yet. Living in the present has been a challenge for me because I always seem to be either stuck dwelling on the past or lost in dreams of the future, so I'm making an effort to just let whatever is meant to happen happen. The church feels more right every day, but if the church has taught me anything these past few months, it is to have faith and let go of anxiety, whether over the past or the future.

"What has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done. Let it be." — an excerpt from an evening prayer in the New Zealand Book of Prayer.

Faith in Christmas Future


As I reflect on the past, I must also look to the future: where I want to be and who I want to be. It seems I have had trouble figuring this out for a long time, though I have always put on a sure face. A sure face so convincing (to myself at least), that I forgot that I had no idea where I was going or who I wanted to be. This year, I don't want to live in fear of the unknown. This year, I'd like to put on an unsure face for a change and smile. I have questions, countless questions!, but the anxiety and the restlessness and the fear are unnecessary. I want to have faith this year.

Who am I?
Why am I?
Am I living the life I'm meant to lead?
Should I go?
Should I stay?
Which way do I turn?
Who do I trust?
Should I leap?
Should I wait?
If I take risks, will I be rewarded?
Or will I end up hurt?
If I jump, will I fly?
Or will I fall?

How am I supposed to answer all of these questions?

This year, I plan to have faith.

P. S. My EP (The Winter EP by Elizabeth Thraen) was just released yesterday. Let me know if you'd like one! They're 100% free!

Liar, Liar

I am a liar. Lies, lies, lies. Is that all I am capable of? Is that all I'll ever be? Just a liar?

I was raised to please and serve others. My interests were always secondary to all others'. I was also raised with integrity: I had to be honest. That's not to say I was selfless, honest, and totally perfect. Not in the least.

I began repressing my spirituality in middle school for various reasons. Being spiritual is definitely not "cool" in middle school. It's almost like believing in Santa, really. And religion is even more uncool amongst the LGBT community, young and old. Worse though was the Christian community I saw which was so deeply hateful with their "God hates _____" signs and warnings of eternal damnation. Should I deny my gender and sexuality in order to fit in with intolerant pricks (as I would have described them then), or come to grips with reality and let go of my childish belief in some mythical "God" to be with the smarter, more welcoming, better people of the LGBT community? It was an obvious choice.

I don't know when I decided I wasn't a "huggy person." It's a ridiculous thing to repress, really. But I was alone. I was incredibly lonely as a child. My best friend was a yellow Labrador retriever. I'm positive that much of my loneliness growing up was due to never feeling as if I had a coherent family unit. I know my parents all did the best they could to give me a good childhood, but I was alone. I hid under tables often. My "hug repression" started incredibly early in my life to the point that I cannot remember ever "being a huggy person." The only way I could cope with being alone was to convince myself that is what I wanted anyway.

Being aware of these repressions does not magically fix the problem. I've come a long way in recent months as far as accepting myself as a religious and spiritual person, but I can see that I still have far to go. I feel very afraid to admit to my "intellectual" friends that I have faith, and I am also quite afraid to admit to other Christians that I'm "Christian." Even more so though, I am incredibly afraid to admit to anyone that I'm even considering becoming a priest. I don't feel "Christian enough," and I'm also afraid of losing the respect of my non-Christian friends.

As far as hugs go, hugs are only the start. It's scary to me still to hug. Not terrifying, but when I think about the fact that I'd like to hug someone or be hugged, I get panicky. Hugs aren't allowed in my screwed up head. Hugs will lead to pain, loneliness, and awkwardness. I give awkward hugs. I know that's not true and any awkwardness in my hugs is a result of my self-fulfilling prophecy, but the little voice in the back of my head is still there. I'm getting over it. There are people I do feel perfectly comfortable hugging. More and more, in fact. 

But then comes the horror of dating. This has very recently started to become a question again. I feel damaged. Broken. The idea of subjecting anyone I care about to my damage makes me feel sick. Why should any one want to date me? Me who is nervous about hugs, let alone any kind of physical affection beyond that. Kissing? Shoot me now. I'm not sure whether I really believe it's disgusting or if I've so deeply repressed any desire to kiss that I believe the lie. I'm starting to think it's more repression, but that doesn't fix the problem. I was once a seven-year-old threatening a classmate with trying to make out; I have got to be repressing.

I don't really have a conclusion for this. I'm not at the end yet. I'm only on my way. One day, I'll laugh at how uncomfortable and nervous and awkward I was as a teenager, even in my 20s (which suddenly don't seem very far at all!), and know that I've come a long way. That's my goal; that's my conclusion.

My Soul Is Singing

It's weird coming back to blogging after a week off. It was a weird week, really. There's no way I could have blogged. In fact, I am quite glad I didn't, even if it now feels incredibly weird to be blogging now. I had an utterly transforming week to week-and-a-half. Rather than write something new for this post, I decided I'd share something I wrote in church on Sunday (what a day!). It's stream of consciousness, and some of it is in reference to other entries in my journal or things I've said/written in the past, but here it is:

Sunday. It is Sunday. Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. I cried. Cried like I've never cried before. [...] My soul rejoiced. My soul sang. My soul is singing. I cried and cried and cried. The world was beautiful, is beautiful. I feel so inspired. Jury duty? Why should I be upset? I am overjoyed. Why should I run from hope any longer? For this is my fear. I fear that there is much to hope for, much to be done. But why fear? There is hope. Oh, God, there is hope. My soul sings. Tears cascade down my face like hope bursting from me. I feel I may explode with joy. Can my body contain all of this goodness? Can this be true? My fears are calmed. My restless soul given peace. There is love. Oh, God, there is love. It bursts from my every pore. My head is aching from the pressure of all the good inside me, all the light, all the God. I cannot hold it all in. I can save the world. I can heal the world. I can. I can. I am capable of good; I am capable of great. This consumes me. The walls of fear and doubt and fallen. They have been torn down with mighty earthquakes and floods. Here is God's wrath upon the darkness and sin of the world. Fear is sin, the darkness within us. This is my Revelations, and now here is heaven on earth. My soul is freed. My soul soars; my soul sings. It is Sunday. Sunday. Oh, how it is Sunday. I am healed. Light and love and joy and peace and hope and truth have been restored. How can I express this? I must express this. I must share this. I must heal the world. I can heal the world. This is what I have been so hungry for; this is faith. I have faith. How is this miracle real? I do dare defy the universe. It begs to be left to die, to suffer, but I will heal it.

And to finish us off, here's another question from that 5000 question survey I mentioned earlier:

Where do you want to be in 5 years? A foreign country.

Finals

I forgot to mention yesterday that I'm not going to be posting anything up here until I'm done with all the work I have to get done this week for school. School > Blog. See you Friday or Monday!

A Place of Peace

T-minus only a few more hours until my first final. Guess what I did ALL weekend? Yeah, that's right, I studied. It was weird. I've never studied in my life, really. I just don't know how to study. But this weekend was different.

I wasn't home this weekend. I was house (and cat) sitting, so I more or less had the house entirely to myself. (There were electricians installing lights part of the time, but we stayed out of each other's way.) It was weird. Having my own house to myself is nice, but not the same. There was something about it being someone else's home, or, more importantly, not my parents' home, that made it feel . . . free-er? I'm not really sure what word I'm looking for. It was a peaceful freedom, and I started to think about what it'd be like to one day have my own home.

My house is going to have amazing lighting, a beautiful garden, and a kitchen in which you can really get dirty. Open rooms with fewer doors. Big windows. A study full of books and all kinds of arts materials. Maybe I'll get a "sound proof" room to use as a studio. The house won't be huge, but it will be nice.

Dreaming was my only real distraction there. It was quiet (minus electricians) and peaceful, and so I got huge amounts of studying done. I can't help but wonder what my life would be like if I'd ever had a place before this weekend where studying came so easy. Would I have been a straight-A student? Would I have gone to a private high school, gotten into a 4-year with a scholarship, and be well on my way to living the life originally expected of me? Is my definition of myself as someone who cannot function well in our society's education system based on the results of my environment rather than my inherent nature?

That is a scary thought. I'm not sure what to do with it. I never had a place where I felt comfortable enough to study and focus as a child, and by the time I was ten, I was already clearly not fitting in well with the education system. I've always considered this part of my inherent nature, part of how my mind functions, but if it's not, my whole idea of who I am is just blown. I don't know if it's who I am anymore. I don't know who I am.

But it's not a particularly distressing thought. In fact, I'm excited by the idea. It opens up new possibilities. Perhaps all I need to do to get through college, which had seemed so impossible just days ago, is find a peaceful place where I can study and focus. Maybe that's all I've ever needed for years. It's a liberating thought to see that college is still a possibility in my life. Every career which asks for a diploma isn't close for me. Doors have been opened.

Filler Post

I'm not sure what the lesson this week was; I'm taking the weekend to think more about it. And study for my Spanish final, yikes! (I am so not prepared. I'm going to learn Spanish over the weekend. A whole semester's worth because I forgot it all!) 

Hasta el lunes! (See you Monday!)

For Impossible's Sake

Question number five of the survey mentioned in Tuesday's post is, "What is your biggest goal for this year?" This one I'm going to have to answer in two parts: what my biggest goals for 2010 were, and what my biggest goals for 2011 are. Let's get started:

1 January 2010. A stressed-out high school senior anxiously awaits winter break to end in only a matter of days. Why? Because the biggest moment of her life is fast approaching: the opening of her very first play, written by, directed by, produced by, and starring. No one knows their lines. No one knows their blocking. No one knows a thing about acting or theatre in the least. The cast knows the play is going to suck. Cast members voice their dismal predictions daily, in fact.

6 January 2010. The final rehearsal. A run-through, and it is clear that there is no play. Morale is farther down than rock bottom. Their director cracks. No one is allowed to leave the theatre until they get their act together and have a decent run-through. Even if they're there all night. No one leaves. Another run-through. Under pressure, the cast finally comes together after months of disunity. There might be a play.

9 January 2010. The play closes. It was a success. No one can fathom how on earth everything worked out. But it did.

That was how 2010 began for me. All I wanted was to magically make it past the 9th. And when I did, I had no idea what to do next. I had done more than I could possibly dream of, and I went through many months just wishing I could find something bigger, something better to do. I did the impossible, and so the possible seemed boring. My biggest goal for 2010 was just to find something to dream of.

So as we go into 2011, I think I've found some new impossible things to do. My biggest goal for this year though is to stop trying so hard to do the impossible, just for the sake of proving I did something impossible. I'd like a chance to actually enjoy what I'm doing, and not just race wildly to find the next thing to do. I want to learn how to live in today, not just tomorrow.

Strip Me

I just fell in love with Natasha Bedingfield. There I was, wandering the great expanse of YouTube, when what should I find but a message from Natasha Bedingfield about her new album! I was sold the moment she started talking about stripping down and sharing and all those sorts of wonderful things. Well, almost. I liked her music before, but it had gotten annoying and over-played. I was sold on the hope that she would sound new with this album. I clicked the first track I didn't recognise as an old song:



And I was sold. As I write this post, I'm listening to the rest of the album and hoping someone will ask me what I want for Christmas so I can tell them something other than socks for once. ("Hey, Elizabeth, what do you want for Christmas?" "Socks." "No, seriously." "I seriously want socks." Christmas comes. No socks. Fail.) The album, which is on its penultimate track right now, is incredible. I forgot that Natasha Bedingfield had so much piano in her music, actually. (I have a not-so-secret attraction to music with piano.) I used to play "Wild Horses" all the time, and I completely forgot that it was her.

I suppose I didn't fall in love with Natasha Bedingfield today. I just remembered why I had been so totally in love with her before. It's different now though. Long ago, I wasn't a musician. Inside me, I was, but I had long before shut that off. But today, I can listen to her music and realise that, hey, I want to write such beautiful, impassioned music. I want to be like her.

I wish I could write an amazing review of Strip Me, analysing every track in eloquent detail, but the truth is that I'm no music critic. This album is clearly an exposure of the soul, a sort of stripping of the facades that fill plenty of mainstream music, and it is a personal experience. That's what music is, what real music is: a personal journey the artist shares with listeners. What makes an album good, in my opinion, is honesty and sincerity, and this album lacks none. I love this album because it speaks to me. Maybe it'll speak to you too.

5000 Questions

My desk is "under construction." The computer is unplugged and not in use, and I have been moved to an old laptop. I decided to hunt around the computer a bit to see what sort of stuff was on here. There were all sorts of cool things, including my 2008 NaNo Novel ("Why had tonight seemed like it had come straight out of a NaNo dare?") and a few scripts ("You better watch it, or I'll misinterpret your implications."). I also glanced through my old bookmarks and found something called The 5,000 Question Survey. Apparently, I had planned to complete the survey, but never got around to it. So I have decided that I'm going to slowly answer all of the questions.

The first question is "Who are you?" Isn't this just the vaguest question you've ever heard? Any question on a personal survey is asking you who you are. There's so much that could be said here, but most people either just put their name or something incredibly simplistic. I could give you my name, age, and gender, and you wouldn't actually have learned anything about who I am. On the other hand, I could write an entire novel (literally!) in response to this question, and you still might not know me. The thing is, our identities are so incredibly multi-dimensional, and each of us is so incredibly different (though also all incredibly alike), that no amount of writing is going to answer this question. So rather than be simplistic and rather than write a novel's worth of meaningless words, I'll leave this one unanswered. If you want to know who I am, pay attention.

Next, it asks, "What are the 3 most important things everyone should know about you?" Another tough question. I could be simplistic and suggest one-dimensional personality traits, such as stubbornness, or I could get complicated and explain three crucial aspects of who I am. But how can I choose what about me defines me most? Perhaps what most defines me is my unwillingness to be defined. Perhaps the first thing anyone should know about me is my strong belief in multi-dimensionalism and the world's inability to be defined. This very belief is what underlies most, if not all, of my other beliefs.

The second most important thing everyone should perhaps know about me is that I love cold weather. It's annoying her in Southern California where we don't have insulation and have no idea how to turn on our heaters, but there's just something about bundling up in all those layers and drinking hot tea, cider, or cocoa just to stay warm that feels a bit magical. And as much as I dislike how lazy the cold makes us all, it's nice to let the weather be an excuse to stop for a minute. But I still love our California sun.

The third thing, and perhaps this should have been first, is just one word: love. I'm not going to explain this one. All I can say is that: love.

"When you aren't filling out 5,000 question surveys like this one what are you doing?" Finally, a question that is at least vaguely less vague. Then again, it basically just asked what I do with my time. All the time. Simply put though, I spend my time living, thinking, and creating.

And the last question for today is: "List your classes in school from the ones you like the most to the ones you like the least (or if you are out of school, think of the classes you did like and didn't like at the time)." Hey, I bet you can't guess what my favourite core subject ins school was! Want to give it a shot? I know you do. C'mon, just guess! I think my favourite class ever though was my entire fifth grade year. Seriously an awesome year.

Delayed Friday

This is the post that would have been up last Friday, but got delayed by my EP/music video announcement:

Yet another week over. Yet another week closer to Christmas. Three weeks left! Three weeks of waiting in anticipation. Three weeks of trying to keep my big mouth shut. Three weeks still that I might spoil the surprise. But enough about Christmas— today is Friday!

Earlier this week, I spent my night discussing the "Clobber Passages," verses in Scripture that are used to "prove" that homosexuality is a sin. In all honesty, I had no interest in going to the discussion. I've had my fair share of debates about whether God thinks homosexuality is okay, and I'm over it. I'm over debates. You have to choose your battles, and I'm just not into battling Christians over a couple lines in the Bible. So much so that I was actually pretty annoyed that we were going to spend an entire evening trying to "arm" ourselves to "fight bigotry." To me, it felt a bit like heterophobia.

Maybe it's just me, but I've never felt particularly comfortable in homogeneous groups. It freaks me out. Whether I "fit in" with the group or not, it bugs me. When everyone is of the same race or sex or religious belief or profession or anything else you could think of, I start feeling like anyone who doesn't have that common factor wouldn't be accepted. When I found out that someone who identified as straight wouldn't be allowed in the group about affirming and integrating spirituality and sexuality, my red alert went off. The reasoning is that we wouldn't want someone who was just an observer, due to how personal a lot of the things people have shared are, and I totally get that, but it bugs me.

We didn't discuss the Clobber Passages to fight anyone though, it turned out. Despite my anxiety, the discussion made me realise that I had turned myself from caring about the Bible at all after hearing over and over about how the Bible condemned homosexuality. The God I knew would never do that, so the Bible wasn't the "Word of God" in my mind. It was just a bunch of stories, maybe influenced by God, but screwed up by humans. After discussing how each of the Clobber Passages had been twisted to fit a homophobic belief system and how, taken in context and translated better, they were condemnations of things like rape, promiscuity, and inhospitality, not homosexuality, I felt liberated.

The point of the group is to make peace with our sexuality and our spirituality, and that happened for me suddenly. I hadn't even realised how much in turmoil I was over a couple sentences in that massive book, and I definitely had no idea how badly I wanted to believe in the Bible like I had as a kid, but our discussion finally freed me of that conundrum which had been plaguing me for so many years without my even knowing it. So it turned out that it wasn't heterophobia in the least. It was about solving that inner turmoil which I'm sure most, if not all, members of the group faced on some level. It was about showing that you can take the Bible and God seriously and still be an open, tolerant human being.

It still bugs me that someone identifying as straight wouldn't be allowed in the group though. It feels so black and white. Who are we to say whether straight people struggle with making peace between their spiritual beliefs and their beliefs about sexuality? The debate about homosexuality is all around us and in everyone's lives nowadays. It seems almost idiotic that we wouldn't allow straight people into a group which is about, in a lot of ways, accepting homosexuality as okay and natural and totally fine in the eyes of God. We all could benefit from some open discussion.

EP and Music Video Announcement

Did I mention that I just recorded an EP? Yeah, I did. Four winter-y songs are headed your way quite soon! We just finished mastering the tracks, and, as I write this, I am listening to my own voice come out of my big, noise-cancelling headphones. It's a really weird feeling. But there's still something really big that needs to be finished before the official release: the music video. And that is where YOU come in. I'm going to need all the holiday spirit I can get to fill the video, so:

First off, I'm inviting everyone I know (or don't know) to send in their own video clips of holiday (Not just Christmas!) cheer, especially fun in the snow like snow angels, snowmen, snowballs and snowfights, sledding, and whatever else you can think of. Throw in your pets. All sorts of festive holiday decorations are super cool, especially lights, so send in footage of that too! Get creative! If you give me your email address (you can email me at ethraen@gmail.com), I'll even send you a copy of the song so you can film to the song if you want to dance, lipsync, or act like you're playing one of the instruments in the song.

And to my Los Angeles readers, you can film WITH me. Super exciting, right? If any of you happen to have a video camera of good quality, that would be especially helpful. For obvious safety reasons, I'm not going to post where or when the filming is going to take place on here, so you need to get on my mailing list (just email me) to get the info. And you, of course, are more than welcome to film on your own too! I'm going to need a lot of footage, and the more people in the video the better.

I'm really excited about this music video. It's a chance to bring everyone together in the holiday spirit, and I really hope it happens. At the very least, I have an EP I am definitely proud of that I will soon get to share with all of you!

(Friday's post has been moved to Monday!)

A Dream within a Dream

Edgar Allan Poe is, without a doubt, my favourite poet. The poor man suffered so very much in his life and never lived to see his beautiful words appreciated, but he is one of the most well-known and well-respected poets today. It's a pity he had to spend his life in pain in order to create all of the beauty that he did.

Obviously, I was thinking about Poe before writing this. Actually, I was thinking about songwriting and poetry and all sorts of things which led me to trying to find a good reading of a few of Poe's poems. There are a lot of beautiful poems to choose from, but the video below was incredible. I've watched it over and over and over again.



The music and reading were already haunting enough, but the video is just completely captures the irony and juxtaposition of the calm tone of the poem with the blatant insanity of the loss of a sense of reality. It's dizzying and sickening; I want to throw up.

There's something incredible and beautiful about how horrific and depressing Poe's poetry and stories are. This video just cut straight through me and opened me up. From the words "end of poem" (which I originally hated and now am not so sure about) on, it's just a spiral of ever-increasing insanity. I'm not sure I can actually bear watching it. It's like Requiem for a Dream or even Lost & Delirious, both tied for the title of Most Depressing Movie Ever. If you haven't seen them, I won't advise you to watch them. They're beautiful, but both always put me into a depressed stupor for days.

I think I'm going to be in a bit of a depressed stupor now after watching that video over and over. It's addictive.

TGIO: Thank "Gosh" It's Over

I did it. I completed National Novel Writing Month. Today is the first day of December, and I am so done. Although not really. December is the month of revision and also the month of preparation for JanNoWriMo! It's my favourite way to kick off the new calendar year because I refuse to write anything serious during the month of January. It's a ridiculous journey of sarcasm, oddity, and sheer insanity, and I always have way too much fun doing it.

But before I can get to the hilarity of January, I have a book to revise! It's incredibly exciting. Last year's novel was so atrocious that I only finished because I already knew it was so terrible that more words couldn't possibly harm it; it was easier to write knowing that no one would ever see the terrible thing but me. And so, when 1 December came, I closed the document and filed it away, never to be read again. Until this past month.

It just so turns out that the book isn't quite as terrible as I thought. I mean, it's horrid, but it's not unsalvageable. I don't really have a whole lot of interest in salvaging it, but if I wanted to, I could. The story just isn't "my thing" anymore. It was a horror/drama/romance/thriller/comedy/absolutely uncomfortable sort of story. It feels gross. There are little shining moments of good, but it's just horribly dark, really. Violence, hate, crime, etc. There's a psychopathic abusive boyfriend who turns out to be even more horrid than the "good guys" thought. And the "good guys" aren't exactly the most wonderful people either. It's just all around a rather unsettling book. 

But I'm not ashamed to have written an unsettling book. Writing is therapy. I was unsettled a year ago, and writing that book helped me come to terms with and understand my emotions at the time, just as Call Me Lux has definitely been a part of my journey of understanding myself and my own views this past month. It's a happier story, but it's not all rainbows and butterflies. And that's okay too. 

I'm getting a little tired of introspection though. By the time the first of January rolls around, I will be so completely done with introspection from revision, that I'll just have to spend the month of January writing goofy fun. It's my reward for working hard at my craft (of writing). 

Is it January yet?