Jess's Journal: Life Unscripted

Many things happened during the nearly three years of law school. When I started this blog years ago, I struggled to figure out who I was. The only difference between high school and college was that I had obstacles. I had barriers that no person in their 20s should have faced. Don't get me wrong; I had obstacles in law school, but I overcame them.  It should not be a shock to anyone that I persevered through the law school obstacles, with the only obstacle left being bar admission. I am graduating with a law degree nobody can take away from me. Here I am with a message to my younger self. It's a message I wish she had heard while going through the education program. The message I heard was to find somewhere where you will shine. If she were to hear that now, transfer schools. My younger self did not deserve to be somewhere she had been gaslit at any turn, where she was called a liar when going to board meetings instead of chapel service, and she certainly did not deserve the l...

I recently completed my 2L year. All I have to say is, it is hellish.  I had some highs, and some pretty low lows. Nothing prepared me for how law school was going to go.  Since it is summer now, I want to get back and start writing again, one day at a time.  Although this blog post is going to be super short, law school has kept me busy. Now to wait for grades. 

It's been a while since I hit the books for school, so I thought about creating a new blog post documenting what it has been like for the first week of classes. For my first year of law school, I decided to live on campus. My goal is to get into a routine and gain the college experience I'd never had. Making the most out of every opportunity is valuable.  To prepare, I've been reading some law school blogs. The articles range from study habits to social life and networking.  But ultimately, the experience is what I make of it.  To be honest, the first week of classes was tough. Understandably, I'm learning a new way of thinking. Reading a case as well as briefing takes a lot of effort and practice.  To the left is a picture of all of my casebooks, plus other books in my assigned locker. Law lockers are good for the time you attend law school. Having less back pain is a plus to having a locker.  As for specializing in law school, this is my first year. My biggest...

Well, a lot of things have definitely changed since the last blog post. One year has turned into two due to the pandemic. Two more LSAT attempts later, I am finally law school bound. I will attend Northern Kentucky University Salmon P. Chase College of Law this fall, with that being said. Two years later, I get to fulfill my dream of becoming a lawyer. I looked at all of my blog posts over the past couple of years and learned a lot about myself. Perhaps I am more prepared now than I was after graduating with a B.A. in English.  Mentally, I am more grounded and centered. Perhaps there is some good in living through a pandemic. By establishing healthier ways of coping, I have realized that it is okay to not be okay. Anyways, a few days ago, NKU sent me the acceptance email. It's a whole different world now. I'll make a new label on the law school experience eventually and will restructure the blog's website to make things more professional on the branding aspect. This blog wi...

It is month 3 in quarantine and I am still healthy at home. Cabin fever has set in and the LSAT-Flex has been made official. I have experienced a lot of highs and lows emotionally during this time. I guess COVID-19 has made me realize I needed to make more time for things that matter.  When looking at the posts I have written over the past few months, I definitely changed my perspective on a lot of things. For one thing, I definitely complained about things during my gap year in previous posts. I complained about having an English degree. Well, perspective changes quite a bit in a few months. At least I have a degree. At least I graduated debt free. For some reason academia came back in full force when I thought about writing an entire lesson plan on the differences between requirements and recommendations.  Well, enough of the sentiments. My 0L gap year is almost over. I'm taking the LSAT-Flex from home, for hopefully the final time. After June I will figure out if I start my...

Wow, what a Good God. A lot has been happening over the past couple of weeks. It's hard to comprehend what has been happening lately in my life. I have to admit, there are days where I struggle immensely with my own self doubt. Lots of people go through these days, especially when we interact with others. But enough of the personal, this post is about worship styles. James 4 begins with this: "What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions." Talk about a slap of reality. We're constantly fighting with and against ourselves. We're quick to speak and slow to listen. I'm writing this blog post tying James 4 to the context of worship. Denominations quarrel over methods of wo...

The last thing I ever thought about was entering the legal profession. No illusion this time. There. I said it. My first post confirming that I am applying to law school for the fall 2020 semester, LSAT notwithstanding. How did I get from a confused former education major to a graduate with an English degree taking that step and having that step confirmed? It was that fateful day before I left for Georgia with my classmates taking the Flannery O'Connor night course at Union. I was near the Writing Center at Centennial Hall and I remembered blurting out: "I want to go to law school." Without a single thought, panic set in. Instead of unconditional support from my friends and colleagues, I got concerning remarks. They made many reasons why I needed to back out of law school -- one example was an unnamed female lawyer with an alcohol problem. Another reason was the textbooks. All the mounting dread started to cave in and I thought, "Am I making a huge mistake?...

Never thought I would use vision for my first post of 2020, but I feel that it is a great topic for the start of the year. For all my glasses and contacts folks, this one is for all of us. Every year, I would have a routine eye exam to monitor changes in my vision. Once changes were documented in my prescription, I would then see the optometrist for a change in lenses. The eye checkup was as usual. But today's was a little different. On the prescription for my left eye, I discovered that I have astigmatism. Shocker, right? Except not really when you get headaches, constantly squint, and other things. Astigmatism is actually very common and it gradually develops from a combination of heredity and environmental factors. Luckily, it was caught on time and can be easily fixed.  But life is not exactly 20-20. Life does not have simple solutions to correct errors. It's not exactly a one size fits all type deal, even in LSAT/MCAT/DAT/GRE prep (plus other standardized test prep...

This blog post is an important one for me to write. It has gotten apparent that my twenty-fourth birthday is coming up in a few weeks and I, yet again, have put myself in the crossroads of life. My devotional readings as well as my prayer time revealed revival as a #OneWord for 2020. But wait, there's more. One of the other words I've considered is grit. Grit definitely ties into responsibility. And one of the many gripping things I've wrestled with in the past few years is that while the Lord closes doors in order to protect us, we have to sacrifice our own comfort and safety to follow the path that the Lord has for us. I think now is the most important time to recognize that God  usually does not put you in the most comfortable or closest school or path. We're not meant to be comfortable. We're not meant to be secure. We're meant to get out of our comfort zone. I think that's the most important value of all. At the end of the day, our own closed doors se...

Ten days until the end of the decade, and I am getting ready to reveal my #OneWord for 2020. Although this time, I will also talk about how the past decade has shaped me all the way to now. At the start of the decade, I lived through the heydays of Facebook and Twitter. I was in middle school trying to get my start in music through covers of popular songs. But then I realized a key part of copyright. Then I tried to get my comedic chops going and it did not work out either. As of today, my YouTube channel sits empty. Then, Vine came along my high school days. Humor dominated my junior and senior years of high school. If you haven't heard of Vine, it was basically a six second version of TikTok minus the lip-syncing.  In music, I gradually went from listening to pop, hip hop, and country to rock, punk, and metal with some hip hop sprinkled in. Contemporary Christian music also was a part of my playlist in some moments. That was a snapshot of my life over the past ten years...

Today as I am sitting at the table, with coffee in hand, preparing for a December TV update for Pop Culture Cosmos, I thought about a lot of things. Jessica's Show is coming out of hiatus. I have been radio-silent on the podcast front since November 17. There are a lot of things to address. It is December 12, and a lot has happened since the last post. I'm going to clarify the paragraph, " When I was in college, I surrounded myself with like-minded people, same views and interests. But nowadays, I want to surround myself with people with different backgrounds, cultures, views, hobbies, etc. I have since limited contact with the people I associated with in college, with the exception of a few people. I'm probably not going to get into the details of what led to that, because I have no business putting all that stuff out there on social media. But one thing is for sure, I don't have the same group of friends I did back then. That's life. There's no drama, n...

How do I word this blog post? It's December 2, and the year has gone by super fast. I've learned quite a few lessons on forgiveness and relationships in the past few years, but more so in the past year. I have a hard time putting this into words. Two posts were in my drafts folder on this blog and this year is not even done yet. There are so many open possibilities that I have at this point so I can go anywhere if I set my mind to it. Back in high school, I was trying different things. I was on the journalism staff briefly, I was in choir for two non-consecutive years, and I tried my hand in academic team. I was also secretary of my high school's Book Club and the Future Business Leaders of America, and interestingly enough, books were an integral part of my undergraduate career. Even now, I am still trying out new things. I learned that for every plan that does not work, there are always backups. I will be sharing one of my backup plans. For a backup plan, I thought ...

Since we are in the middle of the semester, I decided to share a couple of poems I've written at the moment. Since poetry has been a recurring thing on my blog, I wanted to share more of my work for my own personal enjoyment. I have more coming soon, so watch out for more. Dancing When clouds float across mountain tops, Impressions and misty waters stop leaving footprints as they glide upon hearts taking part – dancing set apart on color charted fashionable runways Our eyes gaze Sun sets ablaze enough for one last song crafted by human errors. Screenwriting Like an archer  She shoots and misses She aims --her intended target the screenplay buzzing  through miles  without reaching its  bullseye Like changing gears  on a rough drive through the mountains,  a clear fog reaching the surface.  Like a capstone paper assignment  receiving feedback in red font -- like the my...

Over the past few months, I thought I would write this long-awaited post. Part 1 and Part 2 are hyperlinked within this post, so jump in and read them to see the journey. Two years after I wrote these two posts, I went on a huge journey to discover things about myself I never thought about. I learned about health and love. I learned about vulnerability. I learned about trust. I learned about the importance of keeping touch with people in a healthier way. I also realized that people have multifaceted personalities. The other day, it really hit me. There really is no such thing as old Jess. Nor is there any such thing as new Jess. I'm just me, Jess. And I'm evolving as a person. While I believe that God can change a person, the biggest strides in life are that the person takes steps to change. Maturation did not really happen overnight. Some of the biggest lessons I've learned in the past two years are some of the most challenging things I had to learn. As I've gott...

Some chapters in life are not going to end happily, and that is okay. I never thought I would start a blog post with a theme of accepting that life doesn't work out the way I planned it out. I never planned on taking a gap year, but I am because I need to know what it's like to rest. I accepted that opportunity last October and while it doesn't make sense to most people, it was what was best for me. I never planned on graduating without an education degree. But a what was likely a tough decision for the dean to not allow me to go further into the program turned out to be what was best for me. My heart shattered into a million pieces, understandably. It took me two years, but I finally accepted that God was not calling me to the school system. I decided to close that chapter at graduation, reverse a previous open letter to my old major by writing a new one, and not look back. I could go on and on about the plans I have made while in college that have not worked out the w...

Dear Education, It is time for me to apologize and own up to everything I have done to you, both in what led to the parting of ways and the aftermath. After all that's said and done, I am the only one responsible for our eventual outcome. I take full responsibility of my actions since the open letter from two years ago. If anything, the experience I had the last two years made me realize a lot of things. I was the one who chose to lie to lose a scholarship. I was the one who tried to change myself instead of being real with you. I was the one who rejected any attempts of constructive criticism through your action plans by living in complete denial of everything. I was the one who was competitive and perfectionistic. And I was the one who decided that being negative towards you or doing things out of jealousy through both my social media use and in real life was healing when in actuality, I was continuing to hurt myself and everyone in the process. Especially for attention. I kn...

Ever since I graduated college with a Bachelor of Arts degree, I had a series of revelations about myself I never realized before. Honestly, I never thought this blog would last like it did. Originally, it is a way for me to cope through life's struggles and challenges. As I matured, I discovered thought patterns and habits that are no longer present in my life. Some of the biggest factors of healing is recognizing the sense of power within yourself, or as I like to call it, inner strength. News flash: the world is not out to get me. Failure is not a death sentence. Nor is it a mental road block. Failure should not paralyze you. In fact, it should be your greatest motivator to rise above it all. Personally, I would like to tell my younger self this to save her from feeling worthless. Because even in failure, you are worth something. In fact, facing my fear of rejection by not taking it personally is a part of the maturation process. In fact, seeing how a lot of my peers handle ...

I remember thinking today during the reflective period about the newness of life. Recently, I have worked on the Bible reading plan, "Longing Wrongly". I asked myself what I longed for. Well, consistent with the transparent intent of this blog, I should reveal this. Over the past year, I did a lot of soul searching. Just like how sometimes endings may not be what is intended and doors close, new things come to existence. Apparently, the ending creates a new beginning. Today, I finally decided to let the pain, bitterness, anxiety, sadness, and anger go. Throughout the process, God was healing me from the inside out. It was not easy. Trust the process. It's worth it in the end. We can acknowledge the past and how it affects us, but if we dwell on it, it will be hard to move forward. God sends people even during our lowest points to carry us. God did not promise healing, He promised to be with me throughout these points. It reminds me about the parable about the how th...

Somehow, I feel led to share what has been on my heart the past few weeks. Since I am heading into the final stretch of the semester, I had so many thoughts and emotions roll through my mind and heart like a rush of wind. Comparison is the thief of joy. How am I going to break that down? It starts with a Facebook post, an Instagram post, a Tweet. Then I see people share about getting engaged, a pregnancy, wedding photos, and everything else under the sun. And then questions come into my mind, such as, "Why not me?" "Why am I still single?" "Am I pretty enough?" "Am I smart enough?" Then a feeling a dread comes in...rushing, rushing, rushing like the Cumberland River during a storm where there's a flood. But snap back to reality. What gives? That's how you know comparison is the thief of joy. It leads to jealousy and bitterness. It leads to acting without thinking. It leads to discouragement. What's the cure? It's...

It is Day 6 of the Daniel Fast, and a lot of things have come to pass. The semester has started, and the assignments are clear as day. But there were things I did not understand. This morning during my quiet time, I discovered the word abundance. Now, it refers to what we have in great quantities. There is a great quantity of time. There are great quantities of knowledge I have. But what we do with these qualities may lead to things becoming idols that rob us of both. This morning, the Word became so clear. For the past week I have been trying (and failing!) to fast off of the news and limiting social media that I have almost no sight of the forest beneath the trees. For now, it is time to refocus. God is still on the move. He will always move. I will receive it and believe it.