A few months ago I started a project that involves me responding to journal prompts that are intended for elementary/middle school aged children. The exercise has been fun and enlightening and I've decided I want to share one of my responses.
Prompt: Describe someone who is a hero to you and explain why.
My brother. His name is Corey Eugene Arnett and at this exact moment he is 21* years old and in Jacksonville, North Carolina being a bad-ass Marine. Why is Corey a hero to me? He may be my little brother but he is not a little part of my life. He is the second most important person in my life. Corey is the person I identify most with, and it is for this reason that his accomplishments sometimes feel like my own. His decision to become a Marine would be enough to qualify him as a hero of mine but that is only one small part of his hero-ness. He has become an outstanding person. And I feel that I am the only person who knows just how far he has come from the ashes of our childhood. He is a good person. He is a moral person. He is a flawed person. He is a loyal partner in his relationship. He is selfless and humble. He is hilarious and spontaneous. He is full of hope and love. He is giving. He is thoughtful. He is an inspiration. He is my brother. He is my hero.
One of the best and most inspiring things about him is how he has taken in the same things I have as a kid (our parents teachings and flaws, our environment) and selected the best ones to use as a mold for his character. I think that takes gumption and a shitload of will. Love you, bud.
* I wrote this reaponse a while ago; he is no longer 21.
Monday, July 21, 2014
Tuesday, June 03, 2014
Windows
*
Let me start this post with a quote which is relevant to my topic:
What I found out was a personal revelation. In previous brain-assessing exercises I'd learned that I was emotionally oriented, but for some reason I didn't expect my top strength to be Empathy. The other four are Developer, Maximizer, Adaptability and Connectedness. The best part about taking this assessment wasn't the knowledge of those five words; it was the paragraphs describing how those strengths present themselves in my life. The above quote is taken directly from one of those paragraphs. They were meant to describe me and my behaviors based on this set of strengths gleaned from my assessment.
And so now we are to the windows.
What does a window do for a us? Silly question, right? It lets us see. What does it let us see? Could be a lot of things, but for the most part it lets us see outside. So what is the relevance in this? Are you sick of me asking you questions yet? The relevance may present it self in different ways to different people - different strokes for different folks. And that's cool, but what I want to tell you about is how windows are relevant to me.
Some of the most beautiful things in the world to me are the emotion I see in my family's faces and the emotion I see in the world around me. I think this is why I've made some scary yet eye-opening attempts at nature painting. I love looking outside. If I can't look outside, I feel like life is literally going on without me. I need windows. Even if it is raining or dark outside. I feel better because seeing through a window lets me feel.
I've always enjoyed and needed to be able to see outside, but until I read these descriptive paragraphs about my strengths, it never clicked for me. Now I can appreciate why I love to look outside and it makes more sense why I need to.
This is so weird to write about. These ideas are kind of abstract, and in truth, I don't think I've explained what I feel correctly. But it is the best I can do for now.
Let me know - does this make any sense?
* This post was directly inspired by the simple comment given by my dear soon-to-be-sister, Kari Cottingim, on one of my earlier posts. I'll always be thankful for these small comments she makes about my writing and the way they make me want to do more of it; to try harder to express the words that are locked inside me.
Let me start this post with a quote which is relevant to my topic:
"By nature, you now and then set aside time to appreciate the loveliness and splendor of your surroundings."A while back, in early 2012 my handsome, then-fiance got a job with a company that requires their employees to take the Strengths Finder 2.0 Assessment. Through this assessment he found out what his top 5 strengths are, how they relate to each other, and what it should mean to him. After about a year of listening to how he could relate his actions back to his strengths and our combined curiosity of what my strengths were, he purchased the book and assessment for me to take.
What I found out was a personal revelation. In previous brain-assessing exercises I'd learned that I was emotionally oriented, but for some reason I didn't expect my top strength to be Empathy. The other four are Developer, Maximizer, Adaptability and Connectedness. The best part about taking this assessment wasn't the knowledge of those five words; it was the paragraphs describing how those strengths present themselves in my life. The above quote is taken directly from one of those paragraphs. They were meant to describe me and my behaviors based on this set of strengths gleaned from my assessment.
And so now we are to the windows.
What does a window do for a us? Silly question, right? It lets us see. What does it let us see? Could be a lot of things, but for the most part it lets us see outside. So what is the relevance in this? Are you sick of me asking you questions yet? The relevance may present it self in different ways to different people - different strokes for different folks. And that's cool, but what I want to tell you about is how windows are relevant to me.
Some of the most beautiful things in the world to me are the emotion I see in my family's faces and the emotion I see in the world around me. I think this is why I've made some scary yet eye-opening attempts at nature painting. I love looking outside. If I can't look outside, I feel like life is literally going on without me. I need windows. Even if it is raining or dark outside. I feel better because seeing through a window lets me feel.
I've always enjoyed and needed to be able to see outside, but until I read these descriptive paragraphs about my strengths, it never clicked for me. Now I can appreciate why I love to look outside and it makes more sense why I need to.
This is so weird to write about. These ideas are kind of abstract, and in truth, I don't think I've explained what I feel correctly. But it is the best I can do for now.
Let me know - does this make any sense?
* This post was directly inspired by the simple comment given by my dear soon-to-be-sister, Kari Cottingim, on one of my earlier posts. I'll always be thankful for these small comments she makes about my writing and the way they make me want to do more of it; to try harder to express the words that are locked inside me.
Thursday, January 09, 2014
My World
My world is red with emotion. Everything I do, everything I see, everything I hear, everywhere I am there is emotion. And with varying degrees of intensity. Its almost like I see exclusively in emotion sometimes, and my eyes are my heart, the very middle of my chest. I can feel the emotion in objects. In people, places and moments. It’s electrifying and astonishing in depth and breadth. Sometimes I wish to crumble to my knees with the emotion of it all. And sometimes there is so much emotion that I can’t tell which kind it is. Anger or fear, happiness or relief. But I think most times it is so many emotions all together and at such high intensities that my heart would explode. A balloon in my chest cavity expanding with the warmth of the colors of emotion in my world. I wouldn't have it any other way.
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