Too old for my age, too young for my own good

This is what I have been noticing about myself lately. I often do things that are typical 20 year old things to do (like be totally obsessed with my social life and flirting with boys), but then lecture myself and set goals about how i should not do those things so much (moderation in all things) because there are much more important things to be doing. Like instead of focusing only on getting to know guys i should be getting to know the girls in my ward, etc. Pretty much all of my guilty fun is ruined because it is that...guilty. It is ok though, i would rather be aware of my weaknesses than have no idea. At least if I know about them i can try to work on them...and boys are definitely one of my weakness!!

This weekend was crazily social! I went camping at Deception Pass State Park, then had a mini pool party equipped with pizza, went to a birthday party (there was a hot tub:), then left early to go to a dance and topped the weekend off by attending a Sunday evening get together! There are a lot of single adults here in Seattle, it is a lot of fun! But very distracting, I have to remember that i am here to work!

Camping though was awesome. It was on the Puget Sound and there was lots of really pretty mist. It smelled so good too! We didn't really DO anything, just sat around the fire talking and eating and then went to the beach once, but it was still really fun. We even had a tooth-brushing party (i love those). And we looked at the stars (which i also love).

Here is me and Jessie (my partner) at Deception Pass.

Gotta love the mist!!!

Work has been going good too. I love my research partner, i can't say that enough. We get along so well and are always together. We have similar views of social-ness and are both really social. She has more guys flirting with her than me! We are less of work partners and more of friends.

One thing I am learning about (partly because Meg and I talk about it frequently and partly because i just finished this book "Keeping the Love you Find" by Harville Hendrix which talks about it) is being self-aware. Recognizing what you do, why you do it and evaluating if it is effective and if it isn't, changing. It is kind of a hard thing, to look at yourself objectively and honestly. Making no excuses, only seeking to understand yourself. It has really helped me in my life though to see what I am doing in certain situations and understanding why. I think this is a big thing that could help relationships, I mean how can you expect to understand someone else, if you don't even understand yourself. Along with this whole self-awareness comes being aware of what your needs are and how you go about trying to get them met. Often times people try to get their needs met in an ineffective way, which causes a lot of strife in marriages. Needs are met best when they are known. Identifying and talking about needs can be difficult because it is very personal and requires that we identify an area of vulnerability (meaning a need that we cannot meet ourselves and therefore need someone else to fill it for us). I don't know about you, but sometimes i like to tell myself that i don't really need anyone else...this is the biggest lie you can tell yourself. We were not created to be alone, we were created to have relationships.

I figured i better live up to my blog title...so there were some "musings" for you:)