Yom Tov

Hello Everyone!

Unfortunately, I started to write this post on Sunday and never posted it!

I hope that everyone had a great Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.  I am thankful that my parents were able to come up for Erev Yom Kippur and Kol Nidrei.  Dinner before the fast was catered from Brent's Deli: Chicken Matzah Ball Soup, Latkes, deli Turkey, deli Pastrami, deli Cornbeef, Rye Bread and Chinese Marble Cookies.  My suite mates and I have been eating almost non-stop since yesterday evening.  I cannot imagine going back and eating dinning hall food for dinner.  I would much prefer to eat Brent's Deli for days.  They have the best Jewish food on the West Coast.

In the Rabbi's Sermon Friday evening, she talked about truths and lies.  Apparently, 1/5 of every statement a college student tells their parents is a lie.  But where do we learn to lie?  From our parents.  As my parents were there, it is an inside joke.  In fact, it appears as though we lie on a daily basis.  Lies can be as simple as "I like you shirt" when you don't.  If we lie so often, how do we stop?  We can stop by keeping our mouth shut when we cannot tell the truth, or when we do not have something nice to say.  Currently, I am watching Gilmore Girls Season 1 Episode 5 and the topic of when to tell the truth and when to lie came up.  Lorelei said "I don't know what to tell and what to hide"after telling her mother the truth and her daughter telling her to lie.  In my opinion, you should not lie, and if you have to lie to hide something, then telling the truth is a must.

The only update I have on the thesis front is that my experiment has failed twice more.  I only have about another week to complete my experiments for the thesis, but I plan to continue when I can because I want to get the experiments right!  On the grad school front, I finally have a list of schools complete and my letters of rec are starting to get in order!

I am glad that this week is coming to an end.  I have not been sleeping a lot this week due to the busy season that is called midterms.  I had two midterms this week; it was very stressful.  I love learning new information, but I don't believe that exams portray all of the knowledge that I know.  I am excited for this weekend, and being able to take some time for myself to relax and read a book.  I have such amazing friends and family members that have helped get me through this week.  My friend wrote me this amazing sign that she posted on my door this morning that lifted my moods tremendously.

As always, talking to my mother calms me down, and makes me happy.  She knows me so well, and I always feel more relaxed after our conversations.  This week, minions were the key.

And my true minion inspiration:

L'Shanah Tova!

L'Shanah Tova!  

On this day, September 24, 2014 the night before 1 Tishrei 5775, I attended dinner and services at Hillel.  We have a a very tight-knit community; it was amazing being at "my Jewish home away from home" again now that my Jewish friends are back from abroad.  Tonight, Rabbi Daveen Litwin gave a sermon on fears and hopes explaining that the right balance of the two is essential to ensure that you continue to thrive and are able to push forward with your life.  Included in the top 10 list of fears in the US is flying, intimacy, spiders, death, and being alone.  I was surprised to see fear of flying at the top of the list, but was surprising was that both intimacy and being alone were on the list.  How do you draw the line between intimacy and being alone?  How does one define intimacy and being alone?

In my mind, I think of intimacy as engaging in an intimate or sexual act and being alone as having no one around you (no friends or family) that you can lean on.  I decided to look up the definition of intimacy, as there are many different connotations of the word, and being alone.  

intimacy:
1. the state of being intimate
2. a close, familiar, and usually affectionate or loving personal relationship with another person or group.
3. a close association with or detailed knowledge or deep understanding of a place, subject, period of history, etc.
4. the quality of being comfortable, warm, or familiar

being alone:
1. solitude is a state of seclusion or isolation, i.e., lack of contact with people

While being alone has a pretty clear-cut definition, there are many definitions for intimacy, making the line between intimacy and being alone different from person to person.

If there is no clear-cut line between intimacy and being alone, is there a clear-cut line between fears and hopes?  Is there a connection between fear and hope?  In general, one concentrates more on their fears than their hopes as they are more scared about obtaining their fears than their hopes.  I have decided to write a list containing my fears and hopes.  As you can tell from the list below, my fears and hopes are very much rooted in the now and my "immediate" future.


Fears:
-That I won't be good enough
-That I won't meet my families expectations
-That I will not obtain my academic standards this semester
-That I will not be accepted into a graduate program
-That I will not do something great with my life
-That I will not find a husband
-That I won't remain healthy, or that my health will get worse

Hopes:
-That I become confident with myself and who I am
-I have a successful career and help advance cardiac care
-That I make an impact on the world
-That I have an amazing family
-That I become more outgoing
-That I can manage my time better and participate in the senior college events

What are your fears and hopes?  I find that my fears and hopes are highly interconnected, and maybe that is what keeps me going?  I work hard so that I will meet both my expectations and my families expectation, which in turn will help advance my career and make me more confident.  I can find the connections between my hopes and fears, but one thing that is interesting is that wealth is not at the top of either of my lists.  Many people are concerned about their wealth, yet as long as I have an amazing family, am happy, healthy, and love my job that is all that matters.

Hectic

Hectic.  That is the word I would use to describe my life right now.  I feel as though I have been running around for days trying to get all of my school work accomplished and attending all of my meetings.  I think the worst of the week is probably tomorrow.  I will have no more than 1.5 hours to my self starting at 9:30 am and finishing 10:00 pm.  Then I will have to start my schoolwork.  To give you an idea of how much I have been running around, I walked 14,000 steps today with an average of about 12,000 steps per day for the last week.  I had no idea senior year would be this crazy; I wish I had been warned!  

In spite of all that, I have still managed to take some time for myself everyday.  I have relearned how much I love to read, and make sure that I read every night before I go to bed.  It really helps me unwind.  

In fact, I made a Costco run this weekend, and I picked up some "typical" college foods: 5 lbs of cookie dough, granola bars, snack packs, and wine (for when I need to unwind a bit :)).  

I also managed to get off campus for some pretty good food! 

I even got to sneak off to the pool for a "work out".

Until next time!