Monday, November 29, 2010

My Myers Briggs Personality Results

One of the courses I'm enrolled in this semester is called Career Planning. I needed to take a free elective, so I decided to take one that would possibly help me determine my career path...because that is kind of important.

My teacher assigned us to take the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality test. It was an online test and I sat at my laptop and answered every single question (all 500 of them) as honest as possible. For each column you possess one of the personality types.

The first column covers: Where you focus your attention
Extraverts(E)- People who prefer Extraversion tend to focus on the outer world of people and activity.
Introverts(I)- People who prefer Introversion tend to focus on the inner world of ideas and impressions.

The second column covers: The way you take in information
Sensing(S)- People who prefer Sensing tend to take in information through the five senses and focus on the here and now.
Intuition(N)- People who prefer Intuition tend to take in information from patterns and the big picture and focus on future possibilities.

The third column covers: The way you make decisions
Thinking(T)- People who prefer Thinking tend to make decisions based primarily on logic and on objective of cause and effect.
Feeling(F)- People who prefer Feeling tend to make decisions based primarily on values and on the subjective evaluation of person-centered concerns

The fourth column covers: How you deal with the outer world
Judging(J)- People who prefer Judging tend to like a planned and organized approach to life and want to have things settled.
Perceiving(P)- People who prefer Perceiving tend to like a flexible and spontaneous approach to life and want to keep their options open.

About a week later the results came in...

I'm an INFJ! Out of the 16 personalities, this is the rarest personality type, making up 1% of the world's population. The description for the INFJ Personality is...
  • Seek meaning and connection in ideas, relationships, and material possessions.
  • Want to understand what motivates people and are insightful about others
  • Conscientious and committed to their firm values
  • Develop a clear vision about how best to serve the common good
  • Organized and decisive in implementing their vision
  • Often insightful, creative, visionary, symbolic, idealistic, conceptual, complex and deep
'They value the depth and complexity of their insights and creative gifts as well as those of others. They want to see these insights realized in the world'.

My blog and artwork immediately came to mind. :)

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Home Sweet Home

I went home for Thanksgiving Break after being away for three months. I told my parents I was coming home Wednesday, but I surprised them and walked in the door Tuesday night. My mom's initial reaction when she saw me standing in the doorway, was to run backwards and into the kitchen cabinets. haha
 
We had a party of 14 people last night for the FSU/UF game and things got pretty rowdy. I'm not a huge football fan but it was fun nonetheless.
 


 
Seeing my parents again is so crazy, knowing I'm coming out to them in EXACTLY one month!

I need to get packing because I have to drive back to school in a couple hours and get ready for finals next week. Much love guys!

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Gay Movies

Hey guys!

I want to share a couple of movies I recently watched and really enjoyed. All three of these movies have to do with homosexuality and religion.

1) Prayers for Bobby
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1073510/


2) For the Bible Tells Me So
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0912583/


3) Latter Days
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0345551/

Enjoy.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Feeling Trapped

"We're imperfect people trapped in an imperfect world until we get to that place beyond."

When I was thirteen or fourteen years old, my world began spinning around me. It was as if my sexuality prior to this time period was kept in a box and out of nowhere, that box had been ripped open for the first time by a child on Christmas morning. As I noticed my attraction to other men, I promised myself I was just going through a phase. I reassured myself that it was just my hormones playing tricks on me and before I knew it, I was going to be into girls.

WRONG.

I continued to lie to myself and deny every gay related emotion that came to mind. This marked the birth of the mental issues that began overtaking my mind. The act of sequestering your emotions is very damaging to a person's psyche.

What would my family think of me? What would my friends think? What would the world think? I suppressed myself so much, to the point that I became an internalized homophobic myself. I avoided guys at my high school who were gay or feminine. I figured if I only associated with straight people, it would give me a much better chance at becoming straight myself.

I tried, I mean really tried to find a girl that I was sexually attracted to. I do have a lot of attractive female friends, but none of them made me feel the way I did when I saw an attractive guy.

This battle that I was playing, to force myself to find just one girl I had sexual feelings for took it's tool on me. I knew I was losing the fight when I started getting more and more random boners in High School when I would see a cute guy and start fantasizing over them and imagining what they looked like under their clothes.

These thoughts scared me, so much so that I felt like I needed to  seclude myself. I avoided parties and events with large numbers of people, so I could feel like I was in control, since I was not in control of my mind.

Than the paranoia kicked in. I was so petrified of someone saying something or outing me, so I avoided as many social functions as I could. This isolation began to deplete my confidence, which led to being ashamed of myself. My self-esteem continued to plummet and I began to become anxious and than depressed. I remember going to bed at night and asking myself why I was different then all my friends. I would pray that if I couldn't be straight, that I wouldn’t wake up at all.

Homework and studying became an outlet for me. It forced my mind to let go of any temporary homosexual thoughts and to focus on the assignment. Doing my homework was a lame way of rewarding myself. Doing homework relaxed my mind, it was my pause button.

The Power of Self-Reflection

Its official, all my roommates are now in the loop! I came out to my third roommate this evening. I honestly couldn't have received a better reaction. He was so nice and understanding about everything.

I have now come out to a DOZEN people and I could not be more proud of myself.

I have learned several things along this journey that I want to share.
  • Coming out is not easy, but NOT coming out is 100x harder. In doing so, you're authenticating yourself and giving your soul the best gift you ever could.  
  • Things do get better, so never act upon dark impulses when you're in a negative headspace.
  • You're not alone. The pain and agony you feel is the same pain other people have felt and overcame. Be proud of the person you are and know that God loves you.
  • Crying doesn’t mean you’re weak, it means you’ve been strong for too long. I have cried more in the last four months then in my entire life combined. It's a form of healing, so embrace your emotions and just let them flow.
  • Each and everyone of us is here for a reason and you my friend, are going to do great things.

Tyler Clementi, Asher Brown, Seth Walsh, Justin Aaberg, Raymond Chase, Billy Lucas amd Cody J. Barker. These were seven individuals with a purpose and a dream. Seven individuals who ended their lives after being bullied and harassed because of their sexual identity. “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” – Maya Angelou

It's heartbreaking that these souls felt so isolated, that they saw death as an exit from this existence on Earth. Suicide is never ever EVER the answer. Your loved ones would be haunted by the pain forever. If you feel like you're more of a burden and that the world is better off without you, you're wrong. The world needs you. We all have a life purpose here on this Earth and you'd be selling yourself short by cutting your life short.

Never be bullied into silence. Accept no one's definition of your life, but allow God to define yourself.

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” Revelation 21:4