June Mix: Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am

What can I say? I had to make this mix in a hurry.

It turned out sort of perfect though, if I do say so my self.

1. In the Danger - Blake Miller
2. I Saw You Blink - Stornoway
3. This Head I Hold - Electric Guest
4. The Long Run - Jhameel
5. Ready Or Not - The Fugees
6. Chillin' On The Plane (M.I.A//Lady Gaga//Wale) - Brand-x
7. Manchester - Kishi Bashi
8. Fifteen (ft Chela) - Goldroom
9. Leave The Lights On - Meiko
10. Gone Tomorrow (Live at Cecil Sharp House) - The Staves
11. Alice Springs - Mystery Jets
12. Hjerteknuser - Kaizers Orchestra
13. Holiday - Poor Moon
14. Pioneers - The Lighthouse and The Whaler
15. On the Sea - Beach House
16. Big Black Car - Gregory Alan Isakov


NOTES:
1. Blake Miller. You are a tricky one to find. Nothing on Soundcloud OR Youtube. Strange.
2. I'm just liking these guys a lot of the time.
5. I always forget how AWESOME these guys are. Am I right?
8. You can snag this track for free if you like these guys on Facebook.
12. Norwegian.
15. They will be here soon!

A Poem for Thursday: "A Noiseless Patient Spider" - Walt Whitman

A Noiseless Patient Spider

Walt Whitman

A noiseless patient spider,

I mark'd where on a little promontory it stood isolated,

Mark'd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,

It launched forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,

Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you O my soul where you stand,

Surrounded, detached, venturing, throwing, seeking the sphere to connect them,

Till the bridge you will need to be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold,

Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

The Danger of a Story

Now that I'm on this story kick, I figured I would share one of my favorite TED talks with you:

I love this talk; it is so needed.

Many of us get frustrated when "our story" is told for us, especially when it is one dimensional and wrong. It makes me stop and think about all the incomplete stories I have heard and believed in my life. I'm worried that it is going to get worse. 

While the information we receive through television and internet becomes more personalized, stories that don't fit our world view are left out. Computer algorithms analyze our searches and clicks, finding information we seem to be drawn to. But is also omits information that doesn't interest us. It assures we are offended as little as possible. Our views our challenged as little as possible. Instead of growing and becoming richer, our world is, in a way, shrinking.

How do we fight it?

Do any of you have an ideas?

I'm not sure myself.

But I know that I want the full story.

Or, you could wait 105 years...

The sky has been very cool the last few weeks. Tonight, there will be a Venus transit across the sun!

And you better check it out now, or else you'll have to wait til 2117. Listen/read to this great segment from All Things Considered about the event. 

Our Stories

Here is another post from the United Way blog!

I love the stories from StoryCorps. Here are some of my favorites that I didn't have space for in my other post:

Watch the animation of this conversation here.




Watch the animation of this conversation here.







**********************

I love these stories. I could listen to them all day.

Your Meaning

Our Relief Society Instructor used this video to start off her lesson:

I've always had the gospel as part of my life in one form or another. You would assume that as a return missionary I would become adept at answering these worts of questions with scriptural evidence to back up my assertions. But after being home for almost three years, I'm realizing I didn't know as much as I thought I did.

As a missionary, you learn to make and set goals. You do this daily, hourly, by the minute. It is necessary to train us and refine us. It's easy because you can have confidence that it your goals are always true and right. It is good to have conversations with people about the gospel, to teach lessons,  and visit with less active members. It is good for anyone and everyone to do that. And it is right for you to do because you are a missionary and your purpose is literally spelled out and recited everyday. (For me, it is engraven in my heart in Spanish):

Invitar a los personas a venir a Cristo, 

a fin de que reciban el evangelio restaurado mediante 

la fe en Jesucristo y en su expiacion, 

el arrepentimiento, 

el bautismo, 

la recepcion del don del Espiritu Santo y 

el perseverar hasta el fin.

But then you come home, and your perspective needs to make a drastic shift. You are supposed to think of yourself. It's disorienting. Suddenly, what's "right" isn't so clear anymore. I don't mean right as in the difference between right and wrong, but what is "right" for each individual, unique person. We all have the same goals of happiness and peace, but the ways we can reach those goals are unique.

I really appreciated this relief society lesson, because it forced me to reconsider what I am doing and why. My personal mission statement had been constructed on a base of what I could achieve: get a masters degree, find a fulfilling job, marry in the temple, create a family, etc. Those are all worthy  goals, and I'm still striving to reach them. But I think it's important that our purposes be something that we can accomplish daily. They aren't a single achievement but a sustainable state of being. 

And I think that is what living the gospel is supposed to mean. We don't have the gospel so that we can complete our personal checklists, but so that we can become whole.

We have help available to us so that we can figure out what we're supposed to do and who we're supposed to be. Near the end of her lesson, our relief society instructor shared this scripture from Alma  chapter 37:

Seems simple enough. I'll let you know how it goes :)

Here's to the Freakin' Weekend.

Actually not freakin' at all, just busy.

I convinced my co-workers to go to that Dance Walk thing that all the hipsters are talking about. YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO JOIN ME. Then there is the Free Rooftop Concert . Tomorrow there's soccer (my 2nd to last one! yay!), temple with the ward, and international cinema. Then Sunday has officially been declared "Sleep Day". Yes.

Hope your weekend is equally enjoyable.

Oh, and I've been listening to this song a lot.
That's all.