Progressive Challenges

I'm home for Thanksgiving this weekend, and I must say that I am very glad to have some much needed alone time. You never really appreciate having your own room until you move into an apartment filled with nothing but estrogen. No offense to my roommates, but I like being by myself. A lot. Even though I have this love to be alone, I also love to hang out with my family.

Since I've been home, I've noticed a lot more family problems than I initially thought we had. There's jealousy, accusation, and even mistrust. It starts to worry me a ton and I think it's something that all of us should address while we have the chance to grow closer as a family. Though none of those areas affect my personal life, it's my job as a peacemaker to make sure nothing goes unresolved. Hopefully we can get these family issues taken care of by the end of the year.

2016 has been a pretty eventful year. My brother got married, another step-brother left on a mission, I graduated, and now my step-sister is getting married next weekend. With everything happening, I think it's easy to take little ways to say "I love you" for granted. As a family, we've gotten so caught up in the events themselves that it's hard to concentrate on supporting and loving each other throughout them.

Despite small little family issues popping up, our family has still continued to want to do good for others. Recently, my mom and I gave Jared $1000 for his mission, and Reino paid for two veterans' Thanksgiving Dinners at Chuck-a-Rama that he had just met. My uncle offered to take me, my dad, my brother, and my sister-in-law to Shilo Inn's Buffet for Thanksgiving. These are the events that just happened recently.

Kind efforts are definitely being made, so the fact that issues pop up despite the good we do is a little scary. Believe it or not, karma isn't the driving force of what happens to us. Although it's good to do nice things, doing nice things doesn't prevent the bad things to happen. I feel like the bad things come when we need a challenge to help us progress.

My family is definitely progressing right now. We're all progressing and moving onto our own lives and the challenges that will help us grow into them. It may be hard, but with each other's love and support we can help each other get through it.