I want to post an update on my life and what I am doing.

It has been a really long time that I have been able to take time and breathe.

Recuperating in America is tough. I have been back for over 2 weeks now, but it has felt longer then that. And generally in my life that means its time to move.

But my plans have changed.

I decided last week to stay in America and live here till I am ready to move on.

As many may no, I was going to be leaving for Taiwan in late March. God has begun to direct me and pull me in another direction. And its one I am not comfortable with exactly.

This is why I am staying though.

To live "uncomfortably.”

I spent the past 6 months learning and living in Gods ways...not mine…and this was somewhat uncomfortable.

And my way was to leave learn some more.

So it’s not the fact that I don’t want to learn and go to school. It’s because there are things in my life I still have to do here and now.

Going to a school in the fall is a yes...all the way, but more then where I go or what I do, I need to be living in the here and now of Clovis CA.

I want to say sadly at the end of that sentence, but this is the Lords planning.

I trust and have faith that things will work together while I am home. This country, this state and this city are lost.... just like the rest of the world, but I don’t see it so much that way.

God has really laid it on my heart to be creative and work in people’s lives here.

I also want to make it known that this has no ties to anyone’s influence, making me want to stay.

Not my family and not my friends in Clovis or Lakeside have made me want to stay. This is my choice and decision, which I know is what Christ wants.

Walking in his obedience is how I want to live my life ultimately. And with that, I want to be in places I am challenged. (Not that I wouldn’t be in Taiwan)

I have been surrounded with friends and family in prayer and affirmation with this choice. And I thank you all for your support.

God has blessed me with great people in my life, and they have spoken truth to me about this.

I thank you all for understanding. If you have anymore questions please call or email me. You can also get a hold of me on Facebook of Twitter.

Abagato1@me.com

Well I'm here now

In a place of realization and curiosity.

A place that is foreign.

I'm a stranger to what I knew and where I have been.

This has revolutionized my view.

I am still searching for my place in the midst of this unfamiliarity.

It's easy for me now, to know where I am found at.

But the location of my human body is displaced in many ways.

I want to know more and grow deep.

Why?

And why is it a challenge at times.

Seeing the past frustrations and being thankful...yet sad.

Not sad because I want to do those things again; just sad that that style of life happens to others.

I want to be apart of the solution, not start a new one.

Join a cause, unseen, to impact change.

No agenda

Lacking legalism

And embrace creativity

Get out of what has remained the same.

Not all of this for myself, but with others, and amongst the groups of people.

I'm a messy, and at times confused human being

Just like you.

Like me.

I want to rise to the realization that I can't do a lot but live life,

and live it accordingly.

I don't want to be a radical

I want to be a realist.

Never do I want to run the country. But do you think love and respect can be THE "change"?

I think it can.....

My last week in China was when President Obama gave his State of the Union address. I am a left wing moderate/conservative...depending on the issue. Some may say I am unable to be categorized; I see myself as a peaceful decision maker. Haha

Besides that point, I realized something I never payed attention to before in Government.

He called out Republicans and said that they did this and that.....Well it is true they did do the this or that, that he was talking about.

But what about himself?

The Republicans constantly shove an agenda towards the Liberals. But so do the Liberals.

Right?

It generally is a mudslinging party between the two, of whom said or did something.

Really....It is!

Both sides call out each others wrong doing...and neither fully getting a point across.

This just leads us to bad choices, and division within ourselves.

People assume way to easily that someone is right or wrong.

What about the homosexuals that are republicans?

What about the kid who is orphaned and needs love from a family?

What about the average guy who just got diagnosed with cancer and can't afford bills, so essentially he can't afford his own disease?

I'm not saying I know the answer or agree with it all, but what about the core of all these things?

They all have a heart.

And we need to show,

Love

Real, authentic... Love

Processing through this week. It is good... Changing countries is different and new, like really new to me. I forgot what America was like for 2 months. I stepped off a plane in Taiwan, but in doing that I had prepared myself for that moment months prior to its happening.

When I chose to go to Taiwan and China I immediately told myself that it would be new. I also wanted something different in my life at the time, I was searching for more. Not only was I searching myself during school through learning, but I was needing to get away for a new experience that would mold me. So I let control go and do its work.

I longed to be in that country, I searched myself to how I would react to a new place. I began to learn myself.

I got there and still looked deep inside myself. I learned how I reacted to people close to me, and the natives. I learned how I was in another place, and it was much different then who I am as an American.

Now this shouldn't come off as though I changed because I was in a new place and I could get away with it. It was because I was a guest and I had a purpose being there.

I became apart of that country in some ways.

There are things I saw and experiences that I just can't grasp.

I literally can't grasp some things I was apart of.

Because my mind had been set on the things I needed to do in those moments. As a result I am processing them now.

And its hard.

I have no regret that I didn't think much of it during those times either.

My heart is content. But not in all areas, and those places will take time to discover

for myself

for others.

So here we go

Change?

We say we want change or were changed because of our experiences, but what does that really mean?

I went through a season of life that challenged me and taught me to do things different.

Change...yes, but not of what I do or what I act like.

I still do things that I did years ago.

I still drink my favorite drinks and eat Swedish fish.

I still laugh at dumb jokes and say "that's what she said", if necessary.

Immature at time; I am aware.

But I am still, me.

What has "changed" is the way I think, or how I respond to things at certain times.

I do like to read and write now (and for those that have known me I hated both for the longest time)

Other then those minor things, I am still the same. Kind of.

I looked deep into who I was during this time, and found I didn't like who I had become.

I had a past that need to be transformed. It all started with the willingness to admit I was wrong, broken and lost.

I was living on repeat, everyday.

But enough of that. My point in all this is about something greater.

Just living life.

I just finished Donald Millers new book "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years"...it inspired me.

He is writing about his story and the things he went through that made his life more "story" worthy. He claims he was doing nothing that made his life valuable and interesting, so he starts doing a bunch of different things.

Something I took away is that I am just living life, and within it we need to have good experiences to fully live.

Okay, that blows my own mind......I am living, and because I am living I should make the most of it and do it to it's best. This is also God's purpose for us. But it hits me about where I am at today.

I'm in a library writing on a blog, so you may be thinking...really Aaron??

Well I am in Montana and just returned form Asia. I never thought or wanted to be in Montana. It snows all the time, and no one lives here.

But that's something I realized. It may not be that big of a deal, but it's different. New.

An out of the ordinary thing to do. To come here, learn how to be with people in another country, and then move away for another 2 months to a foreign land!?

It's one of these things I can't believe I just did.

And those are the kind of moments that make us aware we are living a good story.

My old youth pastor used to ask us about graveyards and what things are written on the plates in the ground. I never got what he was talking about...and I still don't fully know what it means in many way's.

He would say, "You never see things written on it that talk about how good their job was, their work ethic, the car they drove, the cloths they wore, things of that nature."

Continuing he would talk about the dates of when they were born till the day they died.

Kind of morbid? Yes. But true.

It's the things we do in between those years that dictate what is remembered or written on our slab. It may not say much but they tend to look like this:

"Amazing Father, Loving Wife, Kind Hearted Man, Adventurous."

Those are words that describe the action the person took during their life.

And I want to me remembered as a loving and genuine person.

I know I want to do things that may be crazy, because that is living how we were made to be.

Out of ordinary, and into a good story...our own story, and we get to decide how we want it to be read.