Words as Weapons | Birdy

I'm not a huge music person, so I just discovered the incredible artist Birdy. I am so in love with this song right now. You all should listen to it.

I feel your knife as it goes right in

Cut to my core but I'm not bleeding

All that you say trying to make me small

Well, the bigger you get the harder you fall

. . .

If you use your words as a weapon

Then as a weapon, I'll shed no tears

. . .

The Music of a Violin

There once was a girl who lived in a dream;
Until one day she awoke with a scream.

She looked all around but it was so dark,
The world was so sleepy and quiet as a lark.

Which she thought was rather strange,
Because larks have a superb vocal range.

Current Obsession 1

So, I haven't done a lot of music reviews in the past, but I just thought I'd post this because I am absolutely obsessed with Pentatonix and their Christmas music lately. I'm definitely putting them on my Christmas wishlist! These people know how to sing.

It feels like Christmas day...

Yesterday, I got a package in the mail. It was something that I had purchased from Amazon about a week earlier. It was just a small package, that could be easily lost in a pile of bills and junk mail. Yet it held the excitement of months of waiting and anticipation that was all winding up into a glorious peak of delight. Yes, it was the new Taylor Swift CD. Why does something so insignificant in the grand scheme of things turn out to be so exciting?

Who cares, honestly. lol. I have played the album on repeat ever since the moment that I opened it. I nearly have some of the songs memorized. So yeah, here are some of my favorite lyrics at the moment. Taylor Swift, can I just be as good as you?

And that's how it works
It's how you get the girl
And then you say

I want you for worse or for better
I would wait for ever and ever
Broke your heart, I'll put it back together
I want you for ever and ever

I should just tell you to leave cause I
Know exactly where it leads but I
Watch us go round and round each time

You got that James Dean day dream look in your eye
And I got that red lip classic thing that you like
And when we go crashing down, we come back in every time.
Cause we never go out of style
We never go out of style

He's so tall and handsome as hell
He's so bad but he does it so well
I can see the end as it begins
My one condition is
Say you'll remember me standing in a nice dress staring at the sunset

                                         [via]

Secrets from my Past 2

Read part 1 here.

[via]

Around the time that I started going to college, this new artist named Owl City was just starting to become popular. I listened to his song "Fireflies" on facebook and honestly wasn't that impressed. My brother was, however, and he immediately went out and bought all the Owl City albums he could find. I started to like some of his beginning stuff from Of June and Maybe I'm Dreaming. When I went off to college, I borrowed a couple CDs to listen to in my car. Then one day, I was bored and started looking up my favorite artists on the internet (namely Owl City and Taylor Swift). The moment I began reading Adam Young's blog, I was hooked. I connected with his writing on so many levels. He was speaking my language and I had never experienced such a deep connection with anyone in the past. I had always viewed myself as a little different, a little un-understandable.

This Adam Young seemed like an exact replica of me. He was a dreamer. He openly admitted that he was a shy guy from a small town in Minnesota. His writing was filled with so much symbolism and deep thoughts, but they weren't just out there for everyone to understand. You had to think about it and draw your own conclusions about what they meant. I loved that. I read one of his blog posts that was about introverts, and I bought the book that he recommended (The Introvert Advantage) and read it from cover to cover; I learned more about introverts than I ever hoped to know, and all the while I was coming more and more to the realization that I was perfectly normal and it was okay to be an introvert.

During this time, I also became obsessed with Owl City music. His music was just like his writing, only better. It was filled with all the same symbolism that you can draw a million meanings from, but it also has that incredibly upbeat feel to it. How can you listen to that without feeling happy and joyful? I think part of being a dreamer is being incredibly optimistic. I loved that happy feeling - I love being happy, and I nearly always am. It also helped immensely that he was so openly Christian. He had morals and similar values to me, and as a freshman in college, trying to figure out my own beliefs in this world, that was hugely encouraging to me.

It wouldn't be until much later that I would realize how much more I shared with Adam Young than just being introverted. We are both INFPs - dreamers, healers. Even though I didn't know that at the time, I felt the connection. It was so good to have someone that I actually understood and who was so similar to me. I can't tell you how many hard nights and weeks and months reading Adam Young's blog got me through. He was my beacon of hope. And whenever I thought I couldn't make it in this cruel, harsh world, I would go to his work and find happiness.

PS- I still love both Owl City and Taylor Swift. And in a way, I feel like Taylor Swift is similar to Owl City. She's not openly Christian, but most of her songs are optimistic and somewhat dreamy. She writes with a lot of symbolism that can be interpreted however you want it. I'm also a slightly hopeless romantic, which may be another reason I like her music so much. She's fun, but I'm not as much into her as I am Owl City.

My God's Not Dead!

Let love explode and bring the dead to life. A love so bold to see a revolution somehow... Now I'm lost in Your freedom, In this world I'll overcome. My God's not dead, He's surely alive. He's living on the inside, Roaring like a lion.... Let hope arise and make the darkness hide, My faith is dead I need resurrection somehow... Let heaven roar, And fire fall, Come shake the ground with the sound of revival. My God's not dead, He's surely alive. He's living on the inside, Roaring like a lion. He's roaring, He's roaring, He's roaring like a lion.

A couple thousand years ago, there was a man that lived and walked on the earth. He was a man unlike any other man. He was so incredible and made such an impact that if you merely mention His name today (two thousand years later), nearly everyone knows exactly who He is. And His name continues to cause one of the biggest controversies of the ages. Why all this fuss? Why do people remember Him - why do some love Him so much, and yet others hate Him? He was just a lowly carpenter. A man who lived an unassuming life, who didn't even so much as have a house to call His own. He wasn't rich. He wasn't powerful. Why is He such a point of contention even today? Why hasn't His name long been forgotten in the annals of history?

Because this was not just any ordinary man. This was God, come down in the form of man... He lived a humble life, dedicated to saving mankind from their own sin. He suffered to the point of dying a humiliating and excruciating death for this cause. But thankfully the story does not end there. He did not stay in the tomb. He rose again! The miracle of miracles happened. Surely, if nothing else proves His deity, this does. He didn't stay in that tomb, but He rose again and He lives today.

And that, my friends, is the foundation of Christianity. If Christ did not rise, then Christianity is dead. If Christ did not rise again, then He would have been forgotten. No one would love or hate Him. The mention of His name would be of little or no consequence to most of our daily lives.

My God is not dead!