Sometimes when complicated problems occur, you may have no idea how to fix them. Experience only goes so far and your resources may not be strong enough to conquer the problem right away. Overcoming certain difficulties requires careful maneuvering and usually a lot of outside support. The world can seem daunting and formidable some days. It might seem like no one can help.

When things get this bad, you might start thinking of giving up on whatever you were trying to accomplish. Having tried everything you can think of, you might believe it’s easier to just scrap all the work you have put in while trying to make life better and go back to the way things were. After all, weren’t things simpler then? You may have been miserable and hopeless, but at least you knew where you stood. At least it wasn’t hard.

I am writing about this in very vague terms so you may be able to reflect on your own life situation and whatever difficulty you are encountering. Likely you are dealing with some kind of problem. I feel like just when I get around one obstacle, another one appears in its place.

This is the maddening beauty of life. We are constantly being challenged to grow. Growth can be so painful, but it’s always worthwhile. This is the “character-building” your mom always told you about. It might be easier to stay where you are, but if you’re not expanding, you’re contracting… if you’re not busy being born, you’re busy dying.

I wish there was a way to wave a wand and make everything okay all the time, but the fact is, everything is usually not okay. There’s always something that could be better or something that isn’t right at all. All we really have power over is how we let these situations affect us. It may not seem like you have a choice about the way things affect you, but you do.

You can always choose a different approach. Try some different way of coping. You can’t wait for the day when everything will be okay because that day will probably never come. What may come is your ability to accept your life as it is in the present moment, and appreciate the good things you do have. Sometimes obstacles can teach us what’s really important.

You may ask, why would California Coalition for Youth light Sacramento green?!

California Coalition for Youth is lighting Sacramento green to raise awareness for Runaway and Homeless Youth month taking place in November 2011!

How can you help us with this exciting event?!

For one, tell everyone you know about California Coalition for Youth!

Follow the legislation that the Coalition supports and become educated on issues affecting California’s youth!

Second, look us up on Facebook and follow our alerts!

Last but not least, continue to raise awareness for California’s homeless and runaway youth!

So, if you’re reading this, go green for CCY!

When you feel alone
You might stay isolated
Trapping all you think
is ugly inside
creating blocks to guard
against your will

When you’ve messed up
you might now know
where the pieces go.
You can’t put things back
the way they were

your old reality is shattered.
Destruction of the past self

under the ruins,
a desire to fix things
to change

you are free now
the excess, the ugliness is gone

you’ve reached the bottom
where your creative work begins

Rearrange
the broken pieces, find new materials
add stability and mold with your hands
Using the strength of your imagination,
you will begin to rebuild

a life fully resembling you
all of your pain, your sweat,  your resolve,
memories you wish you could forget
becoming  something new

Before judging and scrutinizing a situation, it is best to rally all the information before acting. Make an informed decision; otherwise, actions can be more catastrophic.

But as I got older, “maybe” had arisen and became a prominent word in my vocabulary. People didn’t want to outright deny me. To soften the blow, they came up with the ingenious response of “maybe” because fails to directly deny or accept my request. I can’t really say it’s a lie, but it isn’t the truth either.

Maybe is also used as indecision and therefore speculates on a given situation. I don’t understand maybe because it doesn’t really convey much information. People use it to say things in such a way to attract their audience and make them believe that they are on your side by saying things you want to hear, thus, indirectly offering a glimmer of hope.

But the truth, whether good or bad will reveal itself in time. So, isn’t it better to know sooner rather than later? Maybe is not a real response. It’s a probability, but it never indicates how much is or isn’t in my favor. I expend so much energy thinking about the possibilities. Sometimes, people even utilize maybe without saying the word. For instance, the US sent troops to other countries, after the September 11th terrorist attacks in 2011, one of them being Afghanistan. On that day four planes were hijacked and two planes crashed into the World Trade Center and killed many people. The leader of these attacks, Osama Bin Laden, had lived for a decade afterward. Then he was finally caught in a compound located near a military base in Pakistan. Since he resisted arrest, he was shot which killed him. This event occurred over a month and a half ago. Now, the Taliban Leader is dead. Is that mission accomplished or what was our goal(s)? If that was the only goal, then the American troops no longer have a reason to reside in Afghanistan and should be sent back home. In the news, there is talk about pulling the troops out, but no decisions have been declared as to “how much and how fast.” The verbose exposes written by journalists and televised by broadcasters arouse responses in their viewers. The appeal to the direct approach is a definitive answer; however, concision usually sounds cacophonous and abrupt and may respond negatively. They prefer the smooth harmonious sounding well weaved answers of maybe. They are temporarily sufficed with the response and fail to ask questions because further inspection into the matter could abolish the implanted ideas that previously shaped to the moldings of one’s belief of the answer.

and remember pay attention to what you consume.

I read a recent article about e. coli, one of the many microbes that when consumed causes food poisoning. It can grow in unsanitary water, vegetables and meat. In their lifetime, an individual will most likely get food poisoning on multiple occasions. Recent outbreaks of e. coli infestations include the cucumbers infestation in Spain. It is very common to acquire food poisoning by hamburgers and undercooked meat. Meat from an country could potentially cause food poisoning. In fact everything has microbes on it, however, more often than not, most people do not get sick. It’s only when the microbes grow exponentially large that food poisoning occurs.

To decrease the likelihood of acquiring food poisoning, buy fresh meat and prevent the amount of time it sits outside in the hot sun/counter.  If you aren’t using it,store it in the freezer, refrigerator or cooler. This is a very smart thing to so, since cold temperatures isn’t optimal to cause exponential growth (unfortunately warmer weather is).

The authors also provided other information about killing e coli from meat, but the other ways aren’t practical for most people and it admitted meat will taste different. Food poisoning is uncomfortable and annoying. So take precautions and  have fun and safe beginning of summer.

All of us have picked a number (1-30) and have committed to posting a blog, every month, on that day. We will be blogging about anything we want, but have also come up with monthly topics, in case we need some ideas and suggestions for blogging.

So Far we have picked Safety Issues for June; this includes all perspectives on what it means to be safe. It can be in your relationship, with your friends, or any other time. For July our topic is Substance Abuse Awareness.

Ana, Talia, Shomari, and Jevon have all picked a number, and if you want to take the challenge you can pick a number too!

Here are the numbers so far…

Ana-3

Jevon-12

Talia-20

Shomari-27

Any YAB member/CCY blogger who is interested in participating can post a blog with a number on top and we will add your name and number to the list.

We will be updating the monthly suggestions for the rest of the year soon.

And don’t forget to keep a look out for our monthly blogs.

Happy Blogging!!!

Ana

Need support?  Don’t want to talk on the phone right now?  Check out our new service:

We Hear You! Online LIVE CHAT on Tuesdays from 4:30 pm – 11:00 pm (Pacific Standard Time) to get in touch with a live counselor who can provide you with more information, resource referrals to shelters, medical services and on-going counseling.  Simply, we are here to listen. 

Our topics include runaway and homelessness, dating violence, child abuse, depression and much more.  If you or someone you know is in crisis, we are here to listen now either online or on the phone.

Current Hours of Operation for the We Hear You! Online LIVE CHAT:  Tuesdays between 4:30 PM Pacific and 11:00 PM Pacific

Connect with a volunteer who can support you with your concerns and questions [U.S. Residents only]. 

If you are feeling suicidal, please call our 24-hour helpline immediately at (800) 843-5200. All calls are confidential and toll-free 24-hours a day, 7 days a week.

Warning- using a mobile device such as a cell phone or Smartphone to access may We Hear You! Online LIVE CHAT can cause disconnections or connectivity issues.  Please only log-on to use We Hear You! Online LIVE CHAT from a secure internet source.

Click here for our LIVE CHAT.

(800) 843-5200 (24/7)

We Hear You! Online LIVE CHAT – Tuesdays from 4:30 pm- 11:00 pm (Pacific Standard Time)

I don’t know if it’s this hard for everyone else, but, judging from the number of career help books and career counselors out there, I suspect that many other people have suffered from this!

Part of the problem, I think, is the fast pace of our world. It is hard to understand that there is a process to everything when so many things are available at the click of a mouse. The movies you download might take a year to make, but you get them in sixty seconds. The fruits and vegetables you eat had to be grown, picked, and shipped to you. But we don’t see all of this stuff that happens behind the scenes, the hard work that makes something wonderful happen; we only see the finished product: Point B.

Well what if you are at Point A: you are a young adult trying to figure out a career, and you want to get to Point B: being established in a career that you enjoy. The process can be  long and complicated, but we don’t always think about the fact that our teachers were once students or famous musicians were once just regular people with odd jobs practicing until all hours of the night to master their skill.

Everyone’s career paths are different. For some people, making a map and a list of goals might help. For others, that may be futile because they still need to figure out what they want to do. It takes a lot of research, a lot of getting to know themselves, and a lot of trial and error, for some people to finally end up with a career they are happy with. It isn’t always glamorous! And it isn’t always easy to say what you want to do with your life when you have not had much experience in the world.

If you are feeling stuck, you might be searching too hard for a quick answer. The best thing to do might be to slow down and open up to the process of life. It isn’t always straightforward and it doesn’t always make sense. Nourish your gifts and don’t try to force them to turn into anything. Pursue what you want to pursue. Pursue what you love, but realize that even the things that bring you pleasure are not always purely pleasurable. Things that are worthwhile usually don’t come easy. Don’t compare yourself to other people. It is your uniqueness that makes you so essential.

It’s a process and everyone’s processes are different. If you keep working towards Point B, you will get there and maybe you won’t even realize it when it happens because you will have been so absorbed in the present: in the process of becoming!