Values and Lifestyle

So for my marketing class, we had to take a VALS test, or Value and Lifestyle Survery. My professor thought that it would help us figure out what segments different people fit into...although I think that it is somewhat irrelevant to Marketing, it was pretty interesting. The website if you're interested: www.sric-bi.com/vals (Click on “VALS Survey”)

My VALS Survey

My Primary VALS type is Experiencer. The Primary VALS type represents dominant approach to life. Experiencers are motivated by self-expression. As young, enthusiastic, and impulsive consumers, Experiencers quickly become enthusiastic about new possibilities but are equally quick to cool. They seek variety and excitement, savoring the new, the offbeat, and the risky. Their energy finds an outlet in exercise, sports, outdoor recreation, and social activities. Experiences are avid consumers and spend a comparatively high proportion of their income on fashion, entertainment, and socializing. Their purchases reflect the emphasis they place on looking good and having “cool” stuff.
The Secondary classification represents a particular emphasis you give to your primary approach. My secondary VALS type is Innovator. Innovators are successful, sophisticated, take-charge people with high self-esteem. Because they have such abundant resources, they exhibit all three primary motivations in varying degrees. They are change leaders and are the most receptive to new ideas and technologies. Innovators are very active consumers, and their purchases reflect tastes for upscale, niche products and services. Image is important to innovators, not as evidence of status or power, bus as an expression of their taste, independence, and personality. Innovators are among the established and emerging leaders in business and government, yet they continue to seek challenges. Their lives are characterized by variety. Their possessions and recreation reflect a cultivated taste for finer things in life.

Fix You

When you try your best, but you don't succeed

When you get what you want, but not what you need

When you feel so tired, but you can't sleep

Stuck in reverse

When the tears come streaming down your face

When you lose something you can't replace

When you love someone, but it goes to waste

Could it be worse?

Lights will guide you home

And ignite your bones

And I will try to fix you

High up above or down below

When you too in love to let it go

If you never try you'll never know

Just watch and learn Lights will guide you home

And ignite your bones

And I will try to fix you

lately

so lately i've been so stressed, so busy that I really honestly don't remember to breath at times. I know i do it to myself. I like to stay busy, especially when i'm trying to avoid things. but busy and stressed are not always the same things. The staying busy part was intentional, having multiple jobs, doing homework and studying and driving around. but the being broke, maybe having to sue my past landlord, dealing with an ex that frickin threatened me tonight...these are not things that i asked for. things that not only do i not need, i don't know if i can handle them right now. I literally feel pathetic lately. I try so so hard at so many things. and so many things come crashing down on me. Now that i'm single, i know that i have to do this alone. but that's what friends are suppose to be for right? to be there for each other? Don't get me wrong i have some amazing friends...but what do you do when you're all alone crying in the middle of the day because you don't feel like you can take it anymore. only to wipe those tears away and take a deep breath because you know you have to leave for work.

or what if...its late at night and you try to go have fun, but it crumbles right from underneath you. you try to call someone, you try to reach out...but there is nobody there.

what then? so here i am, back to where i get so often. so scared to trust others. so scared to actually take down my walls to trust others to be there for me. especially now when i am no longer with the person that was there for me the last four years. Ya i know, i could turn to God, but he knows that i need someone there physically...someone to hug, someone to tell me it's going to be okay...

people who have that are so fortunate and take that for granted at times i think. unfortunately the people in my life that i think would take the time out of their busy schedule to listen to me...i haven't even known them that long. I hate crying in front of people i know so well, including my own mother, so why would i in front of someone i barely knew??

does anyone else run into this? just wondering. I used to think that something was wrong with me. some reason why i feel like nobody is ever there for me...but i've come to the conclusion that its a series of unfortunate events. I am usually a very strong person. Very happy, motivated, mostly, joyous and encouraging person. not lately. Lately I need someone to be that for me.

what do ya do?!

Friends and Family

Friends and family are probably the best things in life. Without them, life would be so much harder than it already is. I don't want to take them for granted, and I hope I never do.

It kind of reminds me of the song, Bless the Broken Road by Rascal Flatts

I set out on a narrow way many years ago

Hoping I would find true love along the broken road

But I got lost a time or two, Wiped my brow and kept pushing through

I couldn't see how every sign pointed straight to you

Every long lost dream lead me to where you are

Others who broke my heart they were like northern stars

Pointing me on my way into your loving arms

This much I know is true, That God blessed the broken roadThat led me straight to you

I think about the years I spent just passing through

I'd like to have the time I lost and give it back to you

But you just smile and take my hand

You've been there you understand

It's all part of a grander plan that is coming true

Except I would change a couple of the worlds to apply to my friends. Because a lot of my friends that have been in my shoes or have not, have been there for me. And I appreciate it, very much.

So Thank you, You know who you are.

heart-broken

I was going to write this really looong sappy blog about how hard it is to break someone's heart. But in all reality, there's not really much to say. And it's not fun to write about that. The real truth is, that I may have broke his heart, but my heart is broken too. To the point where it physically hurts. Everything hurts, but mainly my heart, emotionally and physically. It hurts to breath, it hurts to think, and it hurts to smile. I never thought the term "heartbreak" would ever be literal. If I look back at my past, i've been through a lot of hurt, a LOT. But what I never realized until today, was that before, I was hurt, betrayed, abused...but never heart broken.

Although I know it is the right thing to do, not one part of me, not one little inkling feels good about it, not even okay. In a way I do feel like I'm free, but like a bird that's been caged too long, I don't think I could live on my own. I know, a little dramatic and I don't mean it literal, but that's how I feel at the moment.

I just pray that God will give me the strength I've been praying for all of this time. I have faith...I have hope that he doesn't give me just the strength, but joy.

please

Please Lord give me the strength to take this opportunity to surrender to You. Please give me the strength to walk onto a new pathway of life and leave behind the other, because I know it will be hard, perhaps harder than I am capable of, that's why I need you. I need you to be there for me now, and in the future. I am going to be depending on you throughout the upcoming moments of loneliness, confusion, emotional termoil. Please.

i miss my friends.

can i just say that i miss my friends terribly? Not anyone in particular (th0ugh i do have some in mind...) but i mean in general for the most part. Friends from middle school, high school and those most recent. I'm not even graduated from college yet but i feel as though i have moved on to a new stage in my life. i think that i've been thinking about it a lot lately. but my friends, as well as my family have made me who i am today. those good friends, and bad friends, that molded me and shaped me....i have to be thankful for them. I sometimes wish that i could hold onto those friendships for all eternity, but as we all know too well, that life takes us down different pathways, but doesn't necessarily mean that bond is broken. Sometimes i look back at people that were in my life for a brief time and realize that even they have made a huge impact on my life, otherwise i wouldn't think of them from time to time. It isn't necessarily a sad kind of missing them, just enough that i wish i could see them again, in hopes that they are doing well and maybe even thank them for being my friend in the past.

so to all of you. thank you. seriously. from the bottom of my heart. because we can't all stay friends forever, you make a huge impact on my life while we were friends.

i guess the hard part is moving on and accepting change. change...such a simple word and a hard task. looks like i better get started on accepting this change.

good day to you all.