when i was bullied, i held on to wicca because i felt that it was the only left for me to still comfort in, talking to spirit guides and angels helped me get through the worst low self-esteem years in seventh-eighth grade when i thought i was worthless and no one seemed to take me seriously since lots of my classmates thought i was a freak, yet i still held on because i needed some hope to pull through.

Thanks SeaIsland;) There are some days when I’m not sure who I am as a person. It’s like there is a side of me that accepts myself and wants to do well in life and knows where to go and there are other times when I feel numb and empty inside and am not sure whether I should try hard in school. I think the underlying factors behind the stress I have are the idea that I want to be toned and 113 pounds and also the idea that I’m not sure if I can open myself to trust the guy I think I love. There are so many doubts in my mind that I’m inadequate and not smart enough for him and also my parents are very hard on me to do well in school and sometimes they rag me on how I need to work on preparing to manage money and prepare for college. Also, the idea that I have ap midterms, algebra 2 honors finals and SATs all this week (January 21-23). I think that whenever I do well in algebra 2 honors,which I am right now, my ap world history grade suffers, I think it is an 89 now. I am currently afraid that I might not make the grade curve to get into Rowan or Rutgers.

Thanks for the support, anita:D I like your idea of thinking about moving like the wind or thinking of trees in the forest, I think that would be a great idea to help me feel more secure, free and balanced. I think I did decent on the ap world history midterms (65 questions which were relatively easy and a comparative essay on how christianity and islam impacted women, i didn’t put the time period in my thesis and could only come up with one difference instead of two, but the overall essay was good and I had decent evidence, the least I think I would get is 4/9) or today which is good because I didn’t finish the Ch. 11 essay yesterday on the changes and continuities of Mongols in 11th-13th century because I was busy planning the timeline and the multiple choice questions (80) were hard. I took the ap english midterms today (jan. 21 at (:15-11:25) and i think I completed 22/40 of the multiple choice questions (skipped 18 because I only had an hour left and I still had the essay to write) and when it came to the essay, during the planning, I only came up with two cons for the essay (it was about whether high schools should form corporate partnerships and use the corporations advertisements to help spread the news about the sports) even though I was supposed to have three pros and three cons. With 40 minutes left, I wrote a good opening paragraph (I didn’t have time to touch up on my vocab, but I tried to do well, it included the theis I was going for the pro side and also the pros and cons) and I got to the second paragraph which I wrote about pros which were that it would encourage school spirit since more people would come if they knew reputable company was advertising and getting the news out and more people coming would mean more fans supporting the players. Another pro is to fundraise for school since by partnering with corporations, the school would attract more people and therefore attain more money for renovating school programs. The cons were the advertisements would distract student from their school works and it can be risky to rely on businesses because they can decline. I was having trouble putting evidence to support my pros in the second paragraph, I couldn’t think of corporations except for Apple and NBC news and was trying to make connections to them and how it would be a positive if high school sports aligned with them to advertise sports. I think I said that if high school sports were to align with Apple and make a negotiation that for every fan who goes to high school game would get 10% off Apple products, then the school would earn more money and more people would buy Apple products, but I’m not sure that was a good example. Anyway with 3 minutes left, I couldn’t think of any examples of how a corporation (specific name of corporation) could sponsor a high school sports game could increase morale of players and how it would help the school in its fundraising. I think i said something about how it would be less money for the school to advertise and that because the company would advertise for them, they didn’t have to worry about spending time getting the word out and also that the word could be spread further. i didn’t get to the cons paragraph because I ran out of time. Anyway, after the ap english midterm, I was just tired and was grateful that one of my friends was around and he and I talked about the exam and comforted each other. He said he didn’t do well on the ap english either, but I think he probably got a 5/9 and I got a 3/9. I have algebra 2 honors finals tomorrow and I hope I do well on that. Also I am nervous about SATs on saturday, but there is supposely a snowstorm coming up so I’m not sure. the guy that I had a strong connection with since seventh grade is worried that I’m being too hard on myself and I’m afraid that I’m losing myself. He seems glad to know I have two guy friends in ap english that help me, but he is also worried because I have a lot on my mind this week. Yet, i’m glad i have friends and support from you guys on tinybuddha, thanks a lot!

Thanks, anita;) The weather here in Northeast NJ is cold and windy and though, it is 21 degrees now, it feels like 16 degrees. It may snow late SAturday possibly a foot, but will turn to rain and possible light flooding will occur. I wonder what the weather forecast will do to the SATs, it turns out I just received a phone call, SATs are canceled, but I’m still wondering when they will be rescheduled. Most of the time I try to live in the moment and try not to worry about financial and school pressures and be grateful for friends, but sometimes my parents think I seem ambivalent about money and they rag me about it. I try to look at both the positive and negative sides in life and am mostly a realist. However, sometimes it’s hard when you have college applications to think about next year and especially when your parents keep ragging you about how everything requires money. Although i try really hard in school, it can be hard for me to retain all information because my mind gets sidetracked at times and that’s when my parents think I’m not applying myself hard in school, although my gpa is 97.5. Also there are times when my parents compare me with my brother who is really good at logical thinking, solving complex math problems and has technical mindset and they tell me how they wish I could be more like him, yet I am more like a creative writer and scientist.

I think I got at least an 86 on my algebra 2 honors final. While I arrived at 9 am, I was sitting with a friend in the cafeteria (that’s where the desk attendant told us to wait till 9:20) and I was helping her study for geometry finals. I was surprised I could still remember and understand geometry from 10th grade (I’m in 11th grade) and I was able to help her. I think reiki helps a lot because it was like my subconscious mind was helping me focus on the memories and making me finally understand geometry when at first learning it in 10th grade it was hard for me, but I still got an 82 in geometry honors. Since there were some other juniors and seniors coming in late for final exemptions, the desk attendant didn’t bat an eye when my friend Izzy and I signed in. I was exempt from my gym final, so instead of 7:10 regular school time and waking up at 5:45, I woke up at 8:25 and arrived at school at 9 am and the final began at 9:20. I almost ran out of time on the calculator portion of the final because I took 50 minutes on the non-calculator portion, there was one problem where I had to graph a polynomial function with degree of four and four zeroes and describe increasing and decreasing which took a while and I did bad on. On the non-calculator portion, I spent some time on a synthetic division problem because the answers i got weren’t what the multiple choice questions were, so I ended up picking the closest one. With three minutes to go, I quickly solved two more problems, one on finding the polynomial function using finite differences and another problem on graphing a vertical and horizontal transformation of f(x)=sqrt(x). I think I did bad on the graphing part, but i tried to pick the points as best as possible since I was running out of time. The greatest thing is I feel like my subconscious mind is working with my conscious mind to retain more information so I remembered most of the algebraic and geometric formulas I needed to use. I wish my parents would stop being so critical and telling me I have my head in the clouds. I try to live in the moment and if something is my fault, i accept the blame without complaining. I try to look on the positive side of things and expect things to turn wrong, so I’m prepared for them with a positive attitude. Also after doing some slight meditation, I realize that it has helped me realize that my thoughts sometimes do go far ahead of myself and I tend to over-criticize myself and let others define who I am. I have decide to listen to my heart more and go for my goals. My parents are very criticizing and they told me once that I wouldn’t make the gymnastics team because I couldn’t do a handstand, I ignored them and tried out and I made the team. Now I am on the high balance beam doing tuck jumps and having friends. I was only on the team in 10th grade because now I’m busy with my ap and honors classes. My parents think that I don’t apply myself hard in school even though I’ve gotten good grades, they think my interest in spiritual fulfillment is a distraction to my school work, but I feel it gives me comfort and also helps calm and center me in school. If you have any ideas on how to remain calm when parents criticize you or when they yell that you’re not good enough or complain about their life and how stressed they are and how you don’t know how to survive in life, please give me some advice. I would love to hear your ideas and in the meantime, I am working on building a reiki positive shield so I can filter out negativity.