learning to live

I am sorry it's been a little while since I've written, life got a little crazy before I left for California! I'm back now after a much needed hiatus from the daily grind and I am ready to get back into things with a  new perspective and energy for life.  I needed this trip out to LA, I needed it to clear my head, to help me appreciate life, but most of all to just spend a few days with no agenda and no responsibilities was what I needed the most.

Our adventure began on Wednesday morning at 2am and we hit the ground running and didn't slow down until we got home at 4am today. I met Laura last summer through Katie who is a very dear friend to me. Katie and Laura are sisters, completely different in personality yet so similar in the way that they show their love for Christ and people.  I love this girl, she has this amazing ability to see and appreciate every aspect of life, especially through food and culture.  Thank you Laura for showing me what it's like to live life so freely. 

I've had a lot of fun getting to know Josiah over the past few years.  He's a great guy with a heart on fire for Christ.  He was also a great travel buddy!

 

 

we are such tourists.  fanny pack anyone?!

Venice Beach...experiencing California

What's a trip to California without the Hollywood sign?!

Hermosa Beach. perfection.

A huge part of our trip was defined by food (I think we spent more money on food than we did on airfare...eek!!!) I love food, I'm a caffeine, deep fried, sugar junkie. If we weren't actively eating, we were thinking of what to eat next.

Laura introduced us to Asia de Cuba. This was by far one of the most phenomenal meals I have ever had in my life. Forget the fact that I could fly round trip to LA again for the less than the cost of the meal, it was TOTALLY worth it!  We got 2 appetizers, 3 main dishes and a desert and each dish was as awe inspiring as the next. When our Lobster Pad Thai came out Laura looked at our waiter and said "how do you deal with this!?!" She said it perfectly! How do you deal with so much food that is so perfect in every way?! I will not soon forget this experience and will be back to Asia de Cuba within the year. I promise. 

We all love coffee, and fortunately it's everywhere! Oh, and so was Yogurtland. We stopped at Yogurtland only twice, but each time was awesome! You have the choice of an overwhelming amount of frozen yogurts that you serve yourself and pile on as many toppings as you can think of... glorious.

Cheers to a great time in LA with great friends, food and some much needed time away from real life. 

My Story

I was compelled to share my story yesterday after hearing our pastor speak from 2 Corinthians 3:1-18 .  We viewed a video from I Am Second and Pastor Doug shared his story, and encouraged us to share the story that God has written on our own lives. 

I have always been hesitant to share this part of who I am, probably because it touches on some of the most intimate and darkest parts of my life, but after breakfast with an old youth leader and yesterdays sermon I am more than ever convinced that this is my time. Until last year there were only a few people who knew my story and my struggles, but I was finally able to share all of it with the youth group during a Wednesday evening, and give them a glimpse into the amazing power of God and salvation and now I am ready to share it with you all. 

The twin and I were adopted during the summer of 1988 and I'm not lying when I say that I couldn't have been given better parents or a life (hi, Mom and Dad!!!). I was raised in a Christian home, learned to love Christ and do good at an early age. During high school I found alcohol, drugs, sex and what I thought was pure freedom. I believed all of Satan's lies and fell into a trap and thought that I had it all. During my first year of college I finally realized my need for Christ and even then I still had a twisted view of who God was and is. During 2008 I left the church that I grew up in and headed to Word of Life Chapel where I was able to develop my own identity. Only a handful of people there knew me and the fresh past I was just emerging from, and the rest of the people that knew me, knew only of me because of the reputation that my mom has because of her strong faith and involvement in Christian Women's Club and Moms In Touch (also because I was one of those adorable little Korean twins, we don't have too many of us up in here in these woods, lol). I was able to become my own person, I was no longer "the daughter of Gary and Evie", but I was Ashley Joline...the Asian :) and I was no longer "one of the twins" I was just me. It helped me start over, which I honestly  feel would have been virtually impossible had I stayed at my parents church. 

Word of Life has been one of the best experiences in my life and it is here that I have been able to truly learn what it means to love Christ and reap all of the wonderful benefits that I have as believer. Thanks to my parents who never stopped praying for me, youth leaders from Hope who are still impacting my life, and a great church and youth group I have been able to serve God by loving him completely and I am LOVING it!

Just a little promo. I signed up for the 22 Day Challenge from I am Second and I challenge you to do the same as well!

-Ash

twisted lies

I have no words, at least no positive words to describe how I am feeling right now. I know many of you heard about the terrible fire that ravaged a local farm and claimed the lives of 7 innocent children, we are all saddened by this loss, and my prayers are with the family, but my feelings right now are aimed at the members of the  Westboro Baptist Church.

They are planning on picketing the funeral for these children on Tuesday, and I am honestly struggling to find the words to say right now. Just pray for these people, pray that they would truly see God's love and desire for goodness in our lives. God can be an angry and just God, but he is not a God that seeks revenge. 

Just pray.

sunshine on a rainy day....

The moment I've been waiting for...

the iPhone4 on the Verizon network!

it brings me much joy to see such organized packaging

Goodbye Andy the Android. I won't be missing you.

Ash Wednesday

When I was a kid I used to love to pretend that Ash Wednesday was my day, a day named just for me! I have actually gone quite a few years without paying attention to Ash Wednesday and Lent, but when I logged onto CNN this morning to catch up on the daily headlines I was drawn to this article titled "Explain it to me: What's Lent? And what are you giving up?". So I read it just to see what people would be giving up.

It took me less than 30 seconds to find this, "I have given up my all hopes on god and Jesus, hell and heaven or in life after death. I am a pantheist. Please believers do not bother to pray for me. I am happy as I am. Thank you" - Agha Ata. This literally made my heart ache, as I was looking through page after page of people giving up coffee, chocolate, snack foods, media, this man was choosing  to give up on the reason for Lent. Sadly he is not alone, 900rr is giving up "Jesus mambo jumbo.... nonsense" Joe says "I will be giving up nothing for lent as I am not crazy enough to have bought into the christian propaganda machine. Christianity promotes intolerance, hatred, and violence."  Two different Ann's and An Irish Fellow are giving up Christianity and Jim is just "giving up religion" and that was only on the first 3 pages! It makes me wonder what on earth we are doing as Christians that are making people feel this way.

shared fears though worlds apart

Lately I've been overwhelmed with the fear that I am going to die an untimely death, and also that I do not have enough time to do everything that I need to do this week and all of these feelings were reinforced after this following conversation...

Sarah:  why don't you concentrate your prayers on me living to be at least 88, every now and then I get paranoid that I'm going to be one of those people that dies young

Sarah: this week is one of those times lol

me:  yeah, funny you mention that. 

me:  I've been having that feeling all day.

Sarah:  oh fantastic

me:  about me though. not you.

Sarah:  about yourself?

me:  you'll live to be at least 88.

Sarah:  sometimes I want to run to the doctor and have them do every possible test on me lol 

Sarah: where do these thoughts come from? 

me:  YES! lol I've thought about it too!! 

Sarah: but it makes me feel better to know you think you're going to die too lol

me:  oh great. thanks! lol

Sarah:  lol you know what I mean

me:  I do 

Sarah:  hoooottttttttt 

Sarah: maybe I'm going to die from heat stroke? lol 

Sarah: okay, too soon to joke about this 

me:  lol yeah lets stop! 

me: happy thoughts!

Sarah:  okay, but why do we think this way

Sarah:assuming we're both psychotic

Sarah: which I think is a safe assumption

me:  because we're afraid of what we don't know
Sarah: you mean because life's been predictable to this point and now there's no school and no semesters left

me: yes.

Sarah: do you get mildly panicky that you're running out of time?

me:  are you inside of my head!?!?!

me: GET OUT!

me: DEMON LLAMA!

Sarah:  lol this is so good though!!!

Sarah: it means we're just both crazy!

me:  but I dont want to be crazy!

This is absolute craziness. We both know deep down that we are only going to die when God calls us, but somehow that fear of the unknown is what grips is tightly to our core. I don't tend to worry a whole lot, I'm a pretty casual person, however, when I start thinking about the possibility that my life here on earth could be cut short it REALLY really freaks me out. Maybe it's more the fear of suffering, I don't know, but like Sarah said... this is good, it just means we're both crazy!


Also, let me just say... I know you're seeing a lot of "lol'ing" going on up there, but I can promise you, that wherever an "lol" is placed, there was real "lol'ing" going on. 

L dot A dot California hot

Ok, I've waited long enough. This won't be the last time you're going to hear about this, so I apologize in advance..but the countdown is officially on...we have 19 days until we are Los Angeles bound! I was excited before, but I am TOTALLY pumped now. I am excited because I always have big dreams and fun ideas, but I rarely follow through with them so, the fact that this has all materialized just amazes me! 

I want to be the type person that stays up late (I am actually getting better at this), makes spontaneous decisions and goes a lot of places...but alas..that is not me.  Those who know me, know that I do hate change, I don't necessarily like new situations and sometimes I am quite lazy, yet I am plagued with ADD (and refuse to take my medication because I would rather enjoy eating food than focusing) and am totally unable to sit still or focus on anything for more than 3 minutes. We have self diagnosed Josiah with ADD as well, and if you spent more than 2 minutes with the lovely Laura Gregg, you too would notice that she has ADHD and the greatest sense of humor of anyone I know. So here we are, 3 crazy people who collectively may be able to focus on one thing for oh, I'd say a good 10 minutes! Spring Break 2011...LA, get ready! 

Laura sent me an email with a tentative breakdown of what our week is going to look like...and here are the highlights, I had to copy and paste this straight from my email because I just love the way that she breaks this all down!

• Wednesday- Kick it ol' school, keeping it kingdom trivia night and showing you my digs.
• We should take a ride and have a party in Yari (Yari is her Toyota Yaris) day to Santa Barbara for some beer and wine tasting.  It's BEAUTIFUL and it gets you out of the concrete jungle for the day- I am thinking Thursday
• Friday- Hiking?! Yes please :). There are some beautiful hikes up in Malibu or we can go to Runyon Canyon where you are guaranteed (well maybe not completely) to see a famous person.  
• Saturday- Tourist loveliness…."Welcome to Hollywood", go look at the stars and stuff, if you are into that. Have a drink, show LA our swag and rock it at a fun restaurant to show you LA Nightlife.
• Sunday- wake up super early, eat breakfast at the best place in LA, gain 5 pounds since Josiah thinks I am fat anyways, and rush back to LAX to put you on a plane from the best coast to the east coast 

And this is why I am so excited to keep it kingdom in LA for SB 2011!!! (I'll explain keeping it kingdom in my next post, as I believe it is TOTALLY worthy of having it's own post, or at least sharing a post with Super Chrish)

-Ash

quarter life crisis

Well, another year older. First, thanks to all of you who blew up my Facebook and phone all day with the birthday love! Now, before I say what I am about to say let me just preface it all by saying... I know I am only 23. I know I have my whole life ahead of me. I know that I am still young, but just give me a moment. 

Yes, I am just 23, I am still young and do have my whole life ahead of me, but why is it, that this particular birthday has me feeling especially lame, unaccomplished and just plain discouraged. I know that "life is all in what you make of it" but, I feel like I am having a quarter-life-crisis, which I thought I already had when I turned 20 and bought this: maybe my crisis is still continuing?! Uh-oh.

Maybe its just the fact that everyone seems to always get so excited about birthdays, and to me..it's just another year. Mostly, probably because life since I have settled into the daily grind of the real world has seemed lack luster and blah. Whatever the reason may be, I am going to count my blessings, think of all that I have accomplished in my short 23 years of life,  not everything that I haven't done and I am going to continue to fight the urge to buy something expensive and make rash life decisions. 

So my birthday plans for the evening. Enjoy some cake with the roommate and my parents, and do laundry! I wasn't kidding when I said that I really don't enjoy birthdays.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the love from my friends and family, just not the birthday part necessarily.... I'm excited to see what kind of cake is awaiting me at home though! The roommate asked me what my favorite kind of cake was so I told her "FUNFETTII!!! or chocolate cake with peanut butter icing, pineapple upside down cake, red velvet cake, or chocolate cake with brown butter icing, or white cake,  or yellow cake, ice cream cake...I really like cake!" (that could be a really good childrens book..."If you give an Asian a birthday" it could go along with the 'If You Give a Mouse a Cookie' book series!)

"Consult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what it is still possible for you to do." - Pope John XXIII

-Ash