thanks anita;) from apocalypto, flint sky (jaguar paw’s father) told his son “Fear is a sickness. It will crawl into the soul of anyone who engages it. It has tainted your peace already. I did not raise you to see you live with fear. Strike it from your heart. Do not bring it into our village.” I agree with this quote, i think if you let your fear become too great, it begins to control you and it brings you stress, so when fear comes, face it. in the movie, jaguar paw asks for strength from the heavens when being chased by the aztecs, he says “Resting fathers, fly me up your strength.” in this way, he and i seem to share a connection, i get my strength from my friends, buddha, nature and angels; jaguar paw gets his strength from the heavens, nature and his ancestors. there were times when jaguar paw was tired of being chased, but he knew he had to go on, he couldn’t stop now since he made it this far, when he was afraid he would remind himself of all the horrors he’d faced and with renewed strength keep going and he would tell himself “I am Jaguar Paw. I am not afraid. I am strong. I am a hunter.” Also, when faced with the Aztecs near the river with rapids, he tells them this also the fact and his hope that “my sons will also hunt the forest after i am gone.” i think he is telling the aztecs that he isn’t afraid, that he still has hope since his wife is safe somewhere and he is finally facing his fears and being a leader. i think it is true that you should always believe in yourself, turn adversity into strength, don’t let your fears overcome who you are, don’t let others tell you who you are and you are stronger and braver than you think. jaguar paw was often uncertain of his strength and bravery, he would often wonder if he could lead the mayan clan after his father, but after seeing the aztecs’ horror and enduring so much, he realized his strength and bravery that he didn’t think he had. i’ve always wondered what makes people continue living and keep going despite everything; i think for jaguar paw it was the fact he didn’t want to end up like the other mayans, he had to try to survive for his ancestors in heaven and also his love for his wife. i think love and sheer will can get through a lot. i hope you are okay and continue to hope and be strong, face your fears:)

Thanks anita;) I like the idea of going back to former posts to re-encourage myself;) It’s okay for you to post my poem and start a new forum on tiny buddha;) I’m thinking of starting a forum on goals where people can post their goals that they’ve accomplished, their ways to achieve goals and their goals in general and we can be each others’ inspiration. Also I am thinking of creating a forum on fear where people list their fears and how they either overcame them, live with them or how they will work on how to deal with them and it will also be motivation for people to let go of some of their fears. Tell me what you think.

Thanks, anita;) I may be busy with ap classes this week, so I might start the forums just yet. i had a physics honors test on projectile motion today (not so sure i did so well), an ap world history test tomorrow, a pre-calc test wednesday, ap english quiz on nickel and dimed. i just am annoyed that a day after the SATs , the teachers have to pile up on the tests, but it’s probably because progress reports come out this week. most of my teachers go really fast and they try to cram everything in and if you fall behind, you have to catch up on your own since most of your classmates are in the competition and they can’t help you. that is why i like my pre-calc teacher since she always takes time to make sure that all her students understand the topic and when a student is shy, she encourages him/her to speak up and will often take some time to sit with him/her to make sure she/he understands the topic. everyone in my pre-calc class helps each other and they are laid-back. at our school if you take many hard classes such as ap and honors, there is an ‘A team’ who complains if they don’t get a 98 or better and they are often the most impatient and most competitive since they work really hard, yet at times they tend to look down on others who do worse than they do or become jealous of those who do better than them. one girl on the ‘A team’ told me today that i didn’t work as hard as she did, that i focused on non-important things and that i wasn’t as smart as she was. she told me that i was too dramatic and carefree in my work and that i didn’t really care about my grades at all. she really put a division between me and one of my friends when she said that i was using him to get ahead in school since i couldn’t do it alone. i tried to explain to him that we were friends and i enjoyed learning from him and also having fun with him, i would never be that selfish, but he wouldn’t even look at me. at lunch two guys who i knew did track saw me and asked me why i looked so upset, when i told them, they told me that i was smart, i had friends, i shouldn’t listen to negative opinions of other people and that i would go far. we talked about track and working out for a while and before they left they told me that they believed in me and that i was a good person. they really cheered me up and i was glad. my lunch buddy and i discussed about math and we were helping each other with history and he was also telling me that i was a hard worker and not to be too competitive. my lunch buddy is perfectly fine with taking simple notes and not really caring about competing with other people, but just making himself better in school. also this morning before classes my special friend saw that i was a bit tired and he came over to ask if i was okay, he told me that things would be okay and i would do well in my classes and that he cared about me. after the physics honors test last block, i was a bit stressed and annoyed and before we got on the buses, my special friend said he was worried about me and asked if i was okay. i told him about how i felt the teachers were really putting a lot of pressure on me except my pre-calc teacher and how the ‘A team’ was really competitive. my ap world history teacher had assigned a six-paragraph comparative essay on friday, day before SATs and monday she explained briefly the document-based essay (dbq) and she went quite fast, so i was trying to keep up with her. the physics honors test took the whole block and i was quite annoyed after that. i also told him about my two friends in ap english that tend to shift alliances and my lunch buddy. he was a great listener and when a friend asked him if he could help her with her homework, he told her it would have to wait. he listened and told me that it doesn’t matter if my friends would compete or that there was competition, what mattered is my health and happiness which can only be defined by me. he was glad that my lunch buddy continued to be enouraging and he told me that he believed in me and that no matter what, i would succeed. when i told him that i wasn’t sure i was going to make good grades this semester with the competition, he told me that i had to trust and believe in myself and that i was perfect and beautiful no matter what others said and that he would always be here to help me. i seriously think he is my spiritual partner since he is always around when i need some encouragement. he always senses when i am sad and is just around, sometimes just seeing him there listening makes me feel better. he told me that i was athletic and he was glad i was trying out for track. there are times when we are busy and we drift apart, but he seems to understand that it is our busy schedules because after i told him this story today, he seemed to relax and didn’t think i didn’t care about him anymore. i think he is starting to appreciate my new found confidence and interest in math and science and he is thinking of pursuing a science related field so he can help me. people always ridicule us when we are together because they think we are in a relationship, but we really aren’t. we share a platonic spiirtual love for each other and it’s more than a relationship since we are here to encourage each other and help each other be more in divine love and healing.

i think i did well on a my ap world history test today. my physics honors teacher gave us the review packet today and announced a test tomorrow on projectile motion so i only have a day to review everything. also i have a pre-calc test that same day. on thursday, i have an ap english test and i still have 2/3 of the chapter to read fore nickel and dimed. the great thing is that sometimes when i feel like my conscious mind is totally lost and i’m not sure what i’m doing, my subconscious mind picks things up and i find that i do better with it than my conscious mind because it processes things faster. my pre-calc teacher is great, she taught us many shortcuts on how to foil and also find rational zeroes of polynomials and i think my mind works so much faster in solving problems than it used to. it’s amazing how much my subconscious mind can help me especially when the teacher goes fast and i only have 15 minutes to solve a problem or analyze through 12 documents, but i was able to do it with my subconscious mind. these days i know how to quickly work my way through problems such as long reading passages (i read the questions first and tackle the questions that pertain to individual sentences in the passage and then i skim the passage for main ideas), also at time my subconscious mind may help pick up clues or i’ll have a gut feeling that one answer can’t be right or that i should read this sentence because it might help with a question. also when it comes to math and science which i love these days, i find that my subconscious can eliminate the ones that are illogical and work to find the right answer. there are times when my conscious mind feels totally lost and overwhelmed and i let my subconscious take over. math and science (physics honors i s a bit hard, but fun) are great for my subconscious since they challenge my mental ability and also give hands-on experience to the real world. in english, i feel like all i do is define literary terms in books and in history i just analyze events of different time periods, both of them don’t really apply much hands-on knowledge of the world. with math and science, you can explore ways to solve a problem and you can calculate lots of things such as your gpa, car distance, amount of books you could possibly read in lifetime. there are times when i have free time and my subconscious wanders to geometric formulas that i actually understand now when i didn’t understand them in 10th grade and i find myself experimenting with triangles and degrees for fun. i have a friend whose teacher doesn’t explain physics well and when she shows me her work even though there are some topics of physics (she’s in regular) i still need to work on, i find that i understand her work and i can show her a more simplistic way of doing it. my physics honors teacher, although he goes fast at times, he has taught me how to do simple calculations and my pre-calc teacher (who goes at a good pace) has helped me understand how to see where the equations come from. my ap world history class has helped me learn how to analyze things quicker and my ap english class has taught me how to argue my point in my writing. i think i am learning a lot of the college skills i need. my lunch buddy is great also because he is always helping me with my knowledge in math and science even though i am better at word problems than logical sequences. the girl from the ‘A team’ was arrogant as ever today and when i made peace with my friend and got pretty good grades, she acted like she was still so much better than me. she didn’t say anything, but when she walked past me, she would have her head in the air and she would walk like she was a really smart person and she glanced at me and quickly looked away like i was beneath her. my lunch buddy told me to just ignore her and i didn’t pay her any mind because i was busy helping my friend with her physics assignment. my lunch buddy has a great sense of humor and there are times when i tell him why i’m stressed and he laughs and it makes me laugh because i realize that i shouldn’t let a little thing like one test grade mess up my whole day.

Thanks anita;) i think my subconscious mind helps a lot because it makes homework go faster, i wish i could write in the textbook for ap world history and ap english since it would make it easier and save time. i enjoy math and science because a lot of the problems can be solved quicker with equations rather than reading the passage and analyzing it, also it is more interesting. i wish i understood my physics honors grading system better because sometimes assignments are from about number of correct out of about 35-52. i wonder how he calculates, it would be good to know so i can average how i do on a test at times. the anticipation of the grades after the aftermath of the test and not knowing the grading scale makes me anxious at times that i did bad on a quiz or test.

I think I have found a new title for a poem which will be called “What path to take?” and it will talk about the adventure of life, the obstacles and hope to keep going even if you feel lost in life.

It’s Not My Time

I’m not giving up
Even though I may fall or fail a test
It’s time to get back on my feet again
I may struggle in geometry honors
I may complain and feel like a failure
But it’s not my time to quit
It’s never my time to quit
I’ll make it to the end
Sometimes I feel as if I’m hanging by a thread
Afraid to let go
Afraid to lose control
But I know I have to look on the bright side
I thank everyone including those on this site
They have taught me much
It’s not my time to give up
So I’ll keep trying.

geometry in 10th grade was hard, but i understand it now. this poem is about trying your best in life and even if you feel like everything is against you to keep going because things will get better. you’ve come this far and it isn’t worth it to give up now, there’s still a lot to live for in life such as seeing the beautiful sunrises and sunsets and the stars at night.