When life starts feeling like an E! True Hollywood Story...

You know how in  E! True Hollywood Stories, they always break up a person's life into sections or "chapters"?  (Example: The Younger Years or A Star is Born) Yeah.... I do that. Funny thing about breaking your life into chapters-- you never really know when the next one is going to start. 

My life chapters have thus far been marked by events. "[Insert event] changed my life! Put my on a totally different trajectory!" So.... naturally, when I got home from my Mormon mission, I had this feeling that the chapter which began with that life-changing 18 months would last past my mission, through graduating college, and through anything else that would come my way until...... I became a "wife". Marriage was a logical next "big step which changes my life path forever (dun, dun dunnnnnnn)" But, remember how I said you can't really know when the next chapter is gonna start? Yeah........ 

The universe (or God or hindsight or [insert own noun]) blessed me this summer with seeing that this monumental day, my 26th birthday-- the day when I officially become closer to 30 than 20-- the day I officially feel old-- the day I'm not particularly excited about (I have this thing about even birthdays; I'm more of an odd number fan)-- would mark that next chapter. I know. I know. No event has kicked started this new era unless you want to count "finishing off a summer of being the world's greatest bum" as a special event. No real life epiphanies either. It just kind of happened. 

So what does this mean? I haven't the faintest idea. That's the other thing-- you can't really guess what the theme for your current chapter would be. I almost feel like that is messing with fate or destiny or something. It's trying to figure out the lesson before living through the trial. BUT, I do know what will end with the beginning of this new chapter.... and what most likely will continue. 

I'm saying goodbye to the land that has stubbornly planted itself in my heart- Utah. I'm not sure if it was Utah itself or if it was the people I met here, the college I attended, the adventures I had but our joint roller coaster ride through these past 7 years will forever bear their mark on my soul (to be a bit dramatic... which I can be... because I'm old now). Utah is to me what the blue blanket was to Linus; it was my security blanket that I literally felt afraid to go without.  But, just as Linus eventually left his "blankie" most likely to be put in his childhood box, so is Utah becoming a land of my past-- not my future.  

I'm also saying goodbye to the my most favorite outlook on life-- my beloved Peter Pan complex. I don't want to grow up; I don't like change; I like being able to do what I want, when I want; and I do believe in fairies. All the responsibility of being an adult seems so burdenous (I'm pretty sure this isn't an actual word but I like it so I'm gonna keep it) to me. You mean I now have to take responsibility for my actions? You mean I can't always just do what I want but perhaps should put aside my feelings for the greater good? You mean sometimes I have to take a job for the sole purpose of paying the bills? I DON'T WANT TO! (See? I told you I have a problem).  

I've come to realize that my Peter Pan complex is actually hurting me more than it's helping. I think Peter never realized that growing up doesn't mean you have to stop believing in fairies, or stop going on make-believe adventures. It simply means your world changes from you being the sun to the actual sun being the sun.....? I guess what I'm trying to say is being an adult has more to do with learning to be selfless and responsible than it does with no longer having "fun". I'll have to let you know how this pans out. ("Pan"... no pun intended... although that was pretty good....). 

There is one last thing I've realized about marking your life into chapters: simply because a chapter ends, doesn't mean the struggles end with it. This one is the biggest bummer of them all. I mean, shouldn't a new chapter give you a fresh start or something? A clean slate or at least the struggles of the past chapter be wrapped up nicely in the end. Although..... maybe, just maybe, the fresh start comes not in having troubles no longer but in having a new perspective on how to overcome them. Yeah.... I think that is it. It's almost like when you get to a new level in a game and you get a special power or some weapon or something gets "unlocked". I think I like that way of thinking better, it's more of a challenge (and if there is one thing Peter Pan loved more than Neverland, it was a challenge). 

Okay, this is long enough. Perhaps I'll learn how to stop rambling in this next chapter..... My dear friends, here's to a new chapter in the AWESOME life that belongs to Corrine Anne Christison.

I am an optimist. I always have been and I think I always will be.  I typically think this is a positive attribute to have. I don't understand when people see this as a problem.  That, somehow, because I'm looking at the world with "rose-colored glasses" that means I can't see reality. I am somehow ignorant of the biased media; or that I don't fully understand what evil there is out there in the world; or that I am uneducated about the happenings of other countries. Let me be very clear-- I know what the reality is. 

I will never forget the day my mind was first opened to the reality of child abuse. I was probably in middle school. I read about two parents who were going to jail because they whipped their boy with an electrical cord, burnt him with cigarette butts.  I will never forget when I learned about the genocide in Darfur. I was 16 years old. I saw pictures of the villages completely burned to the ground. I will never forget the day on my mission where I heard first hand accounts of two women who were sexually assaulted  I will never forget the day I visited the Genocide Memorial in Rwanda and saw the skulls and bones of countless people slaughtered.  I will never forget the day one of my 6th graders asked me what a "slut" meant because a few of her classmates were calling her that.

I am not ignorant of the world. I have lived in third world countries. I have seen poverty that most Americans cannot imagine. I have visited a mother and daughter living in a one-roomed shack smaller than the bedroom I'm currently sitting in; their only source of income being the tiny stand of a few vegetables and candies the only sold outside their home. I have met orphans whose families were killed in unspeakable ways by the LRA. I have met people who remember the days of the military coup in Ghana where they feared to walk around in case they got caught by some soldiers carrying the wrong voting card. I have read books, cross-referenced articles, watched documentaries, written papers (for I did study international development and anthropology in college) on the lives of women, children, men around the world facing conditions beyond imagination.

The hardest thing about knowing is the weight it adds to your soul. Make no mistake: I very much feel the weight of the world on my shoulders. I have been so troubled that I sob myself to sleep. I have been so overwhelmed that I question the very existence of a loving God.  I have been so angry that my hands shake and my heart feels it will leap out of my chest. I could let these emotions overpower me.  I could raise my voice by spewing words of hate against the acts committed by hundreds. I could join others in their diatribes about the evils of the world; I could join the ranks of those hating. But I will not. Some think it is a mark of courage, but there is no strength in hating.  The world needs to realize that it doesn't matter if you are hating something that is wrong-- it is still hate. I will not apologize for refusing to join the ranks. No, I will turn my anger, my sadness, my emotions into something better. I will turn them into love because to the very depths of my soul, to the very core of my being I believe in the power of love. 

The Fight We MUST Win.

L-O-V-E.  So much feeling is packed into this small four-letter word. In my opinion, it is the most beautiful in any language because it represents the best of humanity.  R-A-P-E.  Equally emotional, this is the most horrific four-letter word in the English language.  It represents all that is evil about the human race. 

The ultimate symbol of love between two people- sex- is turned into a power-show of horrific proportions through rape. Perhaps that is what makes it so uneasy to think about. Perhaps that is why we are so afraid of it. Sex is already stigmatized in many cultures that a violation of the act gets pushed further down the "do-no-talk-about" list.  

In fact, rape is so stigmatized that we do not like to report it; on top of that, the police often hesitate to do anything about what is reported.  To make matters worse, we feel uncomfortable placing blame on the perpetrators when blame ought to be placed.  Take the Steubenville Case. A CNN reporter had us lamenting the football careers of two teenagers who raped an almost unconscious 16-yr old girl.  Really?! "It's sad", they say.  No.  It is not sad that they do not get to play another day of football, they made their choice.  You know what is sad? The fact that those two boys, and the other onlookers who weren't penalized, thought it would be okay to have sex with a girl who never said "yes".  It is worse that they thought it was funny enough to take pictures, videos and blast in across the internet.  That is what is really sad about this story.  This heinous crime has worked its way into the minds and thoughts of teenage boys in Heartland, America-- the once iconic "innocence of America".  It seems as though no matter where you look, rape has left it destructive presence. 

We as a human race, for whatever reason, are slow to change. Honestly, it took us around 100,000 years to decide to plant food instead of chasing it around all year. It took 300 years for the Atlantic Slave Trade to be abolished.  It took a Civil War to free the slaves in America but it wasn't until over 50 years later that those of color truly became "free".

Rape has existed since .... well, forever, I suppose. Every 20 minutes, a woman in India is raped; it is down to less than every 5 minutes in South Africa; even America, that number ranges between every 2 to 6 minutes. It is easy to write it off as "a sad reality of life".  Try using that excuse to the girl repeatedly raped every day because she is held in bondage in a brothel.  Maybe we could use the excuse "well, that's more of a problem in the city with all those hoodlums".  Steubenville proved that one wrong.  Let's use the typical "insert-victim-blaming-insult-like-she-was-wearing-too-tight-of-clothes-or-she-was-flirting-or-she-was-drinking-too-much".  Try telling that to the countless girls who are on a date with a boy who just does not understand the word "NO".  Or tell that to the wife who is raped by her husband because he thinks it's his "right" to have sex whenever he demands.  

I admit that for the longest time, rape seemed like such a far-away thing; the problem of another time, another place.  I feel awful that, like countless other freshman at BYU, I made jokes about the rape whistles given to us. I feel awful that I spent the majority of my life not even giving a second thought to sexual violence; honestly, I'm not even sure when I realized such a thing existed in the world. But, thankfully (at least I see it as thankfully), I realized that rape effects our reality whether we think it does or not.   I would be lying if I said that every once in a while, when I see a man walking down the street towards me at night-- I hold my breath and I feel my heart starting to pick up. I feel my mind saying "please don't let him notice me. please don't let him do anything. please.".  Is this because I have had a "close call"? No.  It is because rape is part of my reality.  And I must tell you, it is a part of yours. Yes, you. The person reading this blog right now.  Rape is part of your reality.... whether you want it to be or not.  

Rape is not something we can, nor should, push aside any more. It finally feels like the cards are starting to unfold, the stars are aligning, all the ducks are coming in a row, whatever cliche you want to insert. The fact is that NOW is the time for us to STAND UP. This is more than a discussion of gender equality; the negative effects of the media; of pornography; of the marginalization of women. This is a discussion about HUMAN RIGHTS.  The most fundamental human right-- the freedom to choose-- is torn away through the act of rape. India, Egypt, and countless other countries are telling the world that they ready to change.  And these brave men and women are proving that our VOICES really are the most powerful weapon of all. But it cannot end there-- we must become more comfortable discussing the issues; education is key. We must hold police officers and judges responsible for upholding the law.  We must lend our voices in support for those men and women in different cities, different countries who are searching for their own solutions to the stigmas and hurdles in their society.  We must win this fight my friends. We must. 

that Catholic tradition I can't get enough of....

I have a confession to make.... I LOVE LENT! Seriously, ever since I started doing it, back in high school, my testimony of it has only grown.  It wasn't until I got to BYU that people said "But Corrine, you aren't Catholic"..... Well, I didn't know I had to be Catholic to find a reason to be closer to God. My bad.

See... that is what I love about Lent. The purpose of it-- to honor Jesus Christ.  In similitude of Christ fasting for 40 days, Catholics started the tradition of giving something up for the 40 days before Easter. Over the years I've given up TV to laziness to chocolate. Man, that last one was a toughie.

Ever since I realized Lent started crazy early this year, I've been thinking about what to do. I wanted to be prepared; really give this the deep thought such a tradition deserves. The idea came to me-- give up "mediocrity".  I pushed it aside because, how do you measure that? I mean, it's a good idea because someone once told me that the problem with my generation is that we are okay with being mediocre.  (I'm sure the same could be said for every generation).  But that idea-- MEDIOCRITY-- kept coming back.

I kept seeing all these inspirational quotes like:

So I did what any human being would do-- fall into a funk because I felt like the universe was telling me I am mediocre.  :)  Seriously though, all these "signs" seemed to be telling me that I'm being mediocre right now and something needs to be done about it.

I'm not mediocre because I make mistakes, just in the same way that what makes me extraordinary is not not making mistakes. I'm mediocre because I'm not living up to my potential. What is my potential? Well, I'm not entirely sure but I know it's big because I am royalty. I'm a daughter of God ....You see, it's GOD who makes me extraordinary. It's his influence, his belief in me, his Holy Spirit that inspires me to achieve great things; and it is his grace and strength that helps me do them.

So.... I AM going to be giving up mediocrity for Lent. And I'm going to do that by giving up for 40 days, those things which are taking my time away from God. (Admitting of course that I'm the weak one who can't help but be distracted by such things). So, what does that mean? That means no movies/TV (with one exception), no Facebook (minus once a week where I can answer messages since its the only way I have to communicate with some very important people in my life), and no internet. Goodbye Buzzfeed, goodbye Pinterest for 40 days. This doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to turn into a monk and only read my scriptures but let's just say I'll have a lot more time on my hands for service, for reading great literature, for mediation, for exercise... all those things which feed my soul and make me feel closer to God.

Lent 2013.... let's do this.