Technology is the death of romance

As some of you may or may not know, I have been on the struggle bus of romance for most of my adult life. The past year I’ve spent pursuing someone I kept telling myself was worth it. But in reality, I should have ran away when he dumped me via text message the first time.

Technology has led to many issues in the world of dating and romance. First of all, there’s countless dating websites and apps that promise you they will find THE match of YOUR dreams. The endless swiping makes it seem like there is a bottomless pool of applicants, and with that idea comes the idea that if the guy in front of you doesn’t work out, there’s another potential match behind him. But the reality is that I have matched with the same 3 guys countless times, and they are still just as single as I am with no more potential than the last guy I gave a chance.

And maybe it isn’t technology, maybe it is just my cold, wearisome heart that has been to hell and back. Married, divorced, had a kid with someone who never saw me, been on countless first dates, even tried my hardest to see the best in people only to crash and burn. It might be me, but technology has killed what little romance was left in my life.

Email or text message break ups are a cop-out. They are the cowards way out of a hard situation. I know because I’ve been that coward. It seems easier to just text. Easier than a phone call or face to face conversation. But even my first boyfriend who cheated on me had the decency to break up with me in person. And while that was uncomfortable and awkward, it was still 100 times better than a text message break up.

Despite my struggles, I am still pushing forward and focusing on myself and my happiness. But I think it is important to look for both green flags and red flags when meeting people. So I will leave the top green and red flags I’ve seen in the world of dating and meeting people when it comes to technology

Red flags:

Always on their phone/can’t pry their eyes off of the their phone on a date

Is more concerned about their social media accounts than actually making connections (guys and girls who just want the insta followers and not to actually date)

Prefers to text/email over having an actual conversation via the phone or face-to-face

Green flags:

Puts away the phone and keeps it away unless using to show you videos or pictures

Makes you feel more important than any device

Prefers to talk via phone or face-to-face and makes an effort to create those conversations as much as you are

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Healing is a journey

I wanted to write another post about partnership and what it is I’m looking for in life, but then I realized my last post was kind of a cliff hanger, so I am here to update you all.

First of all, I started therapy. Honestly, I am not sure why I ever stopped therapy and am I so glad to be back on my healing journey. Secondly, I was able to navigate and create boundaries that were necessary with the person I mentioned in my previous post. While there have been more tears and hard days since, they are getting more manageable as I focus more on myself and my healing.

While I know healing is a journey and I am just now re-starting it, I am already feeling less triggered and more centered on my wellbeing. I’ve been taking time to pray, meditate, and manifest what I want out of life. And, honestly, my social life has been exploding. I have been growing my network in and around Oak Park. I started a single moms and dads social group that has expanded to local singles. It went from once a month thing to a weekly meetup (but not on the meetup app haha). I have been coaching a running camp with my students at the school where I teach, in addition to teaching summer school. I have been training for the Chicago marathon and meeting new friends through different local running groups. I have been tutoring about 4-5 students a week for ACT or SAT. I’m about to travel to visit one of my best friends and get some much girl time with her. I’ve been living my best life with my daughter Aria as well. She tends to join at least half of my runs, and has been even enjoying the after-run beer with us! Just kidding, she just sips on her juice or water and eats all of the cheese sticks haha.

All of this to say, I am feeling fulfilled and full of joy these days. I am in a career I love. I am working towards that 2nd Master’s degree and more than halfway there. The only thing that I would love is a healthy and beneficial partnership.

That’s where I’ve been manifesting and I saw this post the other day on Facebook that one of my awesome friends shared. A healthy partnership is something I’ve never had, but it is something I both desire and deserve. This is something I will be working towards preparing myself to be a good partner who both receives and gives the love I deserve.

What is one thing you’re manifesting?

Princess warriors

Last Friday was an amazing night! It was Sheer One Night event at Free Church. Over a hundred women gathered to mingle, eat, and grow together. Pastor Urshanna was needed elsewhere, so Pastor Katrina spoke in her place. And she brought down the house!

Katrina opened the night with this visual from Ephesians 3:1-8: Paul became a servant of the gospel by the gift of God’s grace given to him through the working of his power. Although Paul was less than the least of all the Lord’s people, this grace was given to him: to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ. What does this mean? Even the least of us, even the worst of the worst, are given God’s grace when we follow Him.

Comfort

When you need comfort, Jesus wraps His arms around you. Don’t be anxious about anything, but in every situation present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:6-7)

Correction

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9) If you’re not disciplined then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. (Hebrews 12:8)

Compass

I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you. (Psalm 32:8)

We stay connected to the bride…

• On Sunday Mornings: Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. (Colossians 3:16)
• In small groups: And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds,  not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:24-25)
• Through serving: You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. (Galatians 5:13)

We discover Jesus as our constant savior

We need rescue from…

Others

He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters. He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes, who were too strong for me. They confronted me in the day of my disaster, but the Lord was my support. He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me. (Psalm 18:16-19) We are princesses of God but we are not damsels in distress!

 

 

Ourselves

For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. (Romans 7:18-19) 

We have a great capacity for mistakes.

Some additional passages that are great to read:

Philippians 4:8
1 Peter 3:3-4
Proverbs 31:25-26
Psalm 100:5

Marvelous Halloween Weekend

Halloween at church

This past Sunday was a blast! Captain America, Black Widow, Antman, and Dr. Strange all made an appearance at my church (Free Church)! And almost every kid was dressed up either as their favorite superhero or their favorite character. Historically, church and holidays like Halloween have been kept separated. Many traditional churches don’t even acknowledge Halloween, or they say it’s evil and try to encourage their members to not participate in the holiday.

While I grew up attending very traditional Catholic churches and schools, my parents always let me dress up as who (or what) I wanted to be (other than when I was a toddler and they dressed me as a strawberry). I actually trick or treated through high school, well beyond the normal age limit for trick or treating. But I never saw the holiday as an evil tradition. If anything, it was one of my favorite days of the year since I got to dress up as someone else and I got to collect candy.

I think it’s cool and important to recognize and celebrate Halloween inside and out of church. One way to think about it, we are celebrating the eve of All Saints Day, which is a day to recognize the saints.

Marvelous Superheroes

Not only does Free Church recognize Halloween, it also celebrates it by bringing in the good guys and gals. The Avengers are some of the best superheroes out there! They make great role-models as they fight crime and protect the good guys. Children and adults alike can look up to these superheroes, very similar in many ways to looking up to Jesus and His teachings. I see the similarities between Jesus and superheroes and can honestly say that I admire and look up to both. This is one reason why I love to dress up as a superhero.

Another reason is that feeling when a kid recognizes the superhero you are and wants to be just like you. I love seeing people smile and feel safe around me (or Black Widow). In general, I love to dress up though as any character that I can pull off. (I.E. Wonder Woman or Han Solo)

Who’s your favorite superhero? Do you like to dress up? Who are you being for Halloween?

See more pictures from this event HERE

Have a happy, safe and ghoulish Halloween!

Modern art

On September 23rd I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) in Chicago to see the acclaimed Takashi Murakami exhibit: The Octopus Eats its Own Leg. It was the last weekend to see the exhibit, so I bought some tickets beforehand and was able to snag an early time to avoid most of the crowds.

The art was beyond anything I’d ever seen before (very interesting!). And the stories/ideas behind it were amazing to learn about. I spent about an hour exploring the exhibit and another 45 minutes seeing the rest of the museum. The entire museum is pretty small, which is nice as we know most museums can be overwhelmingly large and tend to take a day or more to take in everything.

Please enjoy my pictures below. Did you check out this exhibit? If so, leave me a comment. I’d love to hear what you thought of it!

Do you even riot, bro?

Riot Fest Chicago 2017 was this past weekend. It was only my second time attending Riot Fest, but I’ve attended similar music festivals (i.e. Lollapalooza) many times. This past weekend was a blast!

Friday night opened up with amazing acts like New Order and Nine Inch Nails. Saturday I took it easy, and Sunday I partied the hardest with The Vuluptuous Horror of Karen Black and Prophets of Rage. Overall, an amazing weekend of talent and entertainment. Before the fest, I ran 20 miles on Thursday morning for Chicago marathon training. I hit the gym twice (Friday & Saturday) and I made it to church on Sunday morning. I had 4 days off work and I feel like I definitely got the most I could out of my time off.

The only bummer part was Paschen being sick and missing Friday & Saturday of the fest, but we made up for it on Sunday. Epic. I also ran into my cousin on Sunday after we kept missing each other on Friday and Saturday. Enjoy the photos, and if you’d like to see some videos check out my instagram @tanoshii66

 

 

At first, because of the crowds, I was tentative to go next year, but I think it’s worth it to attend this festival again in the future. Did you go to Riot Fest? Did you enjoy it? Would you go again? Do you like concerts? Do you even riot, bro? 🙂

Festa Italiana

On Sunday I attended this Italian Fest in Milwaukee with Paschen. It was my 2nd festival I’ve ever attended in Milwaukee, Bastille Days back in 2009 being the other one. As per usual, I didn’t do much research so I was surprised when we got there that we had to pay for parking and to get into the fest. Were we in Chicago or Milwaukee? I thought Wisconsin was like the country where everything is mostly free or cheap. $10 to park and $13 to get in, then I had to pay even more to attempt to satisfy my raging hunger (which is normal).

 

Despite the cost to get in, I felt I was transported to Italy itself. Nevermind the highway right next to us, or the strange Wisconsonites, we felt like we were in Roma. The pizza was sub-par and the Bosco sticks K.O.’d us. But never fear, we found room for gelato and espresso. We also got to ride the ski lift but unfortunately it was too hot to ski. Wait why is there a ski lift and no mountain? Anyways. Overall, had a good time but pretty sure anything I do with Paschen would be fun, other than maybe watching paint dry. That’s never fun. 🙂

When to walk away

Do you feel emotionally drained and don’t know why? Do you doubt yourself after talking to your partner? There are 5 things that every emotional manipulator does to confuse and drain you.

1. They will persistently dismiss your emotions. If you ever tell your significant other about something they did or said that hurt you, they will turn it around and say you’re making it a bigger deal than it really is, disregarding your feelings. Their apathetic attitude will eventually make you start doubting yourself, so you introspectively gather your thoughts and start believing it’s your fault. You lose motivation to pursue the issue any further.
2. They play “tit for tat” pretty well. If you ever become confident to approach them with what you think they are lacking in terms of affection or intimacy or emotional support, they  will respond by listing all the things they find lacking in you. They might try and throw it back at you and once again blame you for the reason there’s even an issue in the first place. If you’re like me, this will just make you crawl into your shell further.
3. They are completely different people when no one else is around. You’re with your friends having a great time, everyone’s laughing. But then at the end of the night when no one else is around, your partner starts a fight saying how terrible you are with his friends and how mean you are to him in front of his friends. He can make fun of you but you can’t make fun of him back. Sometimes it feels like he just wants to fight.
4. They try to convince you that everyone else is on their side. We all make mistakes, but if you make a mistake and you’re with an emotional manipulator, one thing to look out for is if they try and point out to you the error of your ways and tell you that everyone else is in agreement that you’re wrong. These supposed phantom alliances that allegedly conspire against you leave you feeling left out and insecure. If you inquire as to who’s saying this, you probably won’t receive an answer or they will just lie to your face.
5. To them you are not intelligent enough to understand their reasoning. An emotional manipulator is not prone to explaining their own actions to you when asked, their reason will be that it’s too complex for you to understand. Their goal is to put themselves above you by pointing out to you your lack of intelligence. If your partner continues to withhold information from you, you will never know when you do something right or wrong. This puts you in a terrible, vulnerable place to be attacked over the smallest things.

Speaking from experience, if your significant other is doing these things, it’s time to leave. There’s no reasoning with someone who’s unwilling to be reasonable. And no one deserves to be manipulated like that anyways. We are all our own people and we all have a right to our feelings and emotions.

Defend yourself from these types of people. Raise your tail feathers and quills. Don’t let manipulators get to you.

 

Eyes to the skies

This past weekend I went to the Eyes to the skies festival in Lisle, IL. It’s an annual hot air balloon festival that I’ve always heard about but had never attended before. I had fun but was unfortunately a bit disappointed and technically it’s my fault.

I was under the impression that the balloon glow included the balloons being released into the sky. This isn’t the case, the balloons are actually released at 6:30pm and the glow is later on at 8:15pm. I thought it was all at the later time, so didn’t arrive until closer to 8pm. While the balloon glow was cool, it was hard to see since the balloons were still on the ground. And the field where the view was clear was very crowded as everyone was making a mad dash to get into it. We decided to sit on the nearby basketball court thinking the balloons would go up. My bad. 🙂

The only other thing that sucked was parking. The parking lot was a few miles away from the festival and they had school buses shuttling people back and forth. At the end of the night, the line for the buses was about two to three blocks long. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

Overall, a fun time and now that I know the actual timing may consider going back some other year. But I’d take a motorcycle next time to avoid the parking hassle. 😉

I hope everyone has a safe and happy 4th of July! What are your plans? Fireworks? BBQ? Comment below your favorite part of the holiday.

Magnetic Energy

Have you ever met someone and instantly connected with them? Almost like a magnet, they draw you into their world and make you feel welcome. Like your energy melds well with theirs, and you both give off a similar vibe.

I’ve noticed that this tends to happen when I meet other positive and passionate people like me. When I meet someone, I try to read their vibe and adjust my approach to them accordingly. I have a lot of energy, but am exclusive in regards to who I share it with. Usually when I first join a new group of people, I remain pretty quiet as I observe everyone and how they interact with each other. For example, I started running with this fun run group about two months ago and I didn’t really tell anyone much about me until about 3 to 4 weeks into it.

Another good example is a new job. It usually takes me about 2-3 months to warm up enough to be a fraction of myself at a new job. I do this so that I can learn the company culture and environment without tainting it with my craziness. This is also a way for me to be careful that I don’t overstep my bounds at a new company. What tends to happen is that most people think I don’t know English or that I’m from a different country that’s how quiet and shy I seem those first few months. I’ve had many people ask me where I’m from and when I respond with Chicago they ask but where were you born? Chicago. Still Chicago.

As long as you’re positive and passionate, we will likely get along. Just don’t lie to me. And don’t call me Jenny. Do you have a magnetic personality? Do you give out your energy? Or do you reserve it for only certain people? Or maybe no one other than yourself? Leave your thoughts in the comments below. Thanks!