Open your thought closet

“You need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select your clothes every day. This is a power you can cultivate.” -Elizabeth Gilbert

As a sorority girl with more than 22 dresses in her closet,tons of shirts, skirts, and other apparel that could outfit my entire sorority, I know that when picking out my outfits I will spend hours trying on every item to make sure it’s perfect.

An outfit is something that people use to express themselves, who they are, what they like, etc. They also use it as a form of control. But why is it that they don’t realize, that we can do the same about every thought that we have.

Anytime a thought pops into our heads, we have the power to push it away or to dwell on it. So often people are sad over the past, over fear of the future, or over things people said or did that hurt us. We have the power though to decide that these thoughts will not be allowed to take residence in our heads, just like a landlord of frat boys breaking the floor for the third time, KICK THEM OUT.

Decide to only let those thoughts that make you happy and enrich your life stay in your mind, pushing yourself away from those pesty negative ones.

Dream Big

“Don’t be afraid to give up the good and go for the great” -Steve Prefontaine

As college students we are always being told conflicting opinions on this concept. Do we take the safe route and choose the major, the internship, or the organization that will be the most secure in landing the 401 K? Or do we choose to join the club were interested in, take the internship without pay, or to turn down the job to backpack across country the year after graduation?

It’s easy to say to follow your dreams when you don’t have the pressure of what comes next on you. But so soon that what comes next is what comes now. Then again comes the eternal question, can money ever really buy happiness?

I think there is a balance to this just like there is for anything else in life. Don’t pass up on a opportunity that may actually put you in a really secure place financially, emotionally, physically, etc. At the same time don’t be afraid to aim high and dream.

Remember if you shoot for the moon, even if you fall short you’ll still land in the stars.

In Honor of LeLaf Week…

“Write Drunk, Edit Sober” -Ernest Hemingway

Young writers love this quote. We all know that when coming home from a party,you can bet at least one young, inspiring writer to take a crack at this.

When people are drunk mistakes are made, texting is hard enough let alone writing the next great American novel. But the idea is to appealing to knock. Why do we love it so much? It’s a combination of three reasons.

1) When you write drunk, the creative juices are flowing. We get so caught up making a sentence sound grammatically correct and knowledgable, that great ideas are being passed up! But when drunk one can’t care enough about the comma that should go there, or how your ex-boyfriend would feel about you telling that story. The words just flow, presumably.

2) EVERYTHING is better when drunk, even your writing sounds better. Also writing a novel while drunk comes without regrets or shame the next morning. It’s one of the few things a person can do while drunk that doesn’t lead to an embarrassing “what did I do last night?” conversation.

Imagine it, your sitting around the table the next morning talking to friends, one is regretting that boy she kissed, the other is regretting that table dance she gave, and the other is regretting the painful call to their ex. You can share that while they were doing all that, you wrote a book.

3)The quote itself tells you not to deal with the problems now, deal with them when you’re sober. For now, enjoy the feat of writing this excellent piece of literature.

AND HERE A VIDEO TO SUPPORT OUR BOYS IN THE 150th RIVAL GAME.ENJOY LE-LAF

Politically Correct or Make the Corrections?

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“I always put in one controversial item, it makes people talk.” -Dorothy Draper

Ah, Controversy, how we’ve missed you my dear friend. It almost seems that controversy has become something that everyone is afraid of nowadays (as if I know anything other than nowadays?). Nobody wants to talk about things that might cause anger, or conflict, or can rub someone the wrong way.

But controversy is a beautiful thing, and the only way that any issues will ever be solved. On a college campus there is a never ending supply of controversy that no one seems to want to talk about, at least not in a constructive manner.

There are clubs and support groups for every issue, but how does this really help if that’s where the controversy talk ends. The only way to fix issues, is to start admitting that they exist, and they survive in the culture we have because controversy can only be discussed at certain times, in certain places, and everyone always needs to be that big thing called POLITICALLY CORRECT.

Let’s start the discussion, let’s talk about Greek life colliding and budding heads with Non-Greeks, about racism going both ways, about the rape culture (not just female victims, but men also), let’s discuss them in a respectful and constructive way. When culture becomes stagnant, the culture itself and the people in it cease to grow and thrive. Controversy keeps it alive. Well Dorothy, you said that well.

Is there a unique mold?

“In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different”- Coco Chanel

Why do we dye our hair colors like blue and purple, or refuse to buy a dress we love because our friend has it? It’s because we want to be unique. Every one of us wants to feel like there is something about themselves that sets them apart from the person next to them.

However, I would assume our dearest Coco had something different in mind than the new hip hairstyle when she said this. It’s about personality, it’s about no hold backs of ones opinions and self.

We are at our absolute rarest when we aren’t fitting to society’s mold, or the expectations of those around us. Why do people go nuts over the song “All about the bass”? Because it’s a girl singing about how she’s no size two, and she loves it. How often do we get told by society it’s okay not to be thin, and it’s okay to love not being thin?

No two people have the exact same genes, childhood, family, experiences, opinions, preferences, dislikes, annoying qualities, or charming qualities as each other. We are each all beautifully unique when being ourselves and refusing to conform. This is what will make a person irreplaceable.

The more we fit the mold, the more we think and act in the ways that we expect someone who is unique to think and act, the further we are from being special, and the further we are from being irreplaceable.

Naturally made and developed into our own weird individual means no replications possible, ya can’t replace something that has no replica. Coco Chanel said that well.

For More Fabulous Quotes by the Fabulous Coco Chanel :

http://www.cocochanelquotes.org/

 

Are pants optional?

“Getting real sick of underwear and responsibilities.” -Unknown

Here it is people, the future leaders of America, straight off of an Instagram post I saw today. Now we can judge all we want that people who don’t like responsibilities are lazy and who stay in bed all day are bums, but really can you say you’ve NEVER had one of those days?

It’s that time of year where the weather is getting colder, the work is getting harder, and classes have less weeks to imagine the promise of a better grade due to “all the work I’m going to do next Saturday/ the amount I’m going to study for the next test”.

No, lets all admit it to ourselves. Ladies, you don’t want to change out of those leggings you’ve been wearing for three days, and guys you miss your pastel colored shorts and shirts, but the sweats you’ve been getting away with lately, well you don’t hate them.

Bottom line is, we all have this point, and that is why we all could relate to this quote. Sometimes you really just want to forget the responsibilities, crawl into bed not wearing pants or anything with even a hint of a zipper, and veg out.

We want to put that paper off until tomorrow, make those notecards next weekend, order some type of food insanely high in calories, and have a hot date with Netflix. And NEWSFLASH: THAT IS OKAY.

Now, let me clarify…this is okay when done every so often…every now and again when it won’t be damaging to your grades/ work life/ relationships.

It’s okay to shut off the world, and your phone and give your responsibilities and your pants a big old BRB…as long as tomorrow you put your big boy/girl panties on, dress wonderfully, and face your challenges refreshed and ready.

To my Instagram source, and whoever came up with this quote let’s just say…they said it well.

How they say it, How we say it

Hi All! This is my first post to the blog and I wanted to explain a little bit about my intentions.

So it’s a common trend to see post of quotes, and pictures with quotes on social media sites such as Instagram and Facebook. What is it that these people feel the need to share this quote with all their social media friends when they see it?

It’s because they relate to it. They read the words of the quote and apply it to their own lives, their situations, and understandings.

Each person can interpret a quote according to what makes sense to themselves, and that’s what I plan on doing. Each post I’m going to take a quote and put it in my own words, put it in one of the possible ways that the youth of social media understands it.

A quote is a short, concise way of stating a message that  might take someone else paragraphs to get across. I’m going to take what they said and say it how we say it.