Salvation

Belief Turning into Pure Pressure

Responding to Pure Pressure is part of the human nature- it can have effect on everyone.

                When reading the essay “Salvation,” I feel like it was more of a sense of pure pressure. I’ve been through pure pressure; like a time I was partying with some friends. For anyone who has been intoxicated, or in my case, too intoxicated, you know when enough is enough. But when you have friends around you saying, “come on, one more shot… just one more.” You seem to get irritated and finally give in and take just one more shot; later realizing it was a mistake. I feel like the little boy went through pure pressure having everyone telling him to go, “be saved.” There were people around him shouting and jumping, and people (including his friend Westley) running to the front of the church to be saved and see Jesus. I’m sure when the boy was sitting alone he got nervous and felt pressured to do the same. When giving in to his aunt, and people around him, he went to be saved and the outcome wasn’t so great; he didn’t see Jesus and therefore, no longer believed in him. I think it’s up to each individual to find out their own way to see if they believe in Jesus, not test themselves because of everyone else around them wanted them to. I feel sorry for the boy, because him trying to ,”be saved,” turned into him  not only no longer  believing, but, feeling ashamed, and as if he was a liar.    

Cell Phones... The Cause of Rudeness.

I think Charles Fisher is stating that cell phones are completely horrible. They do come in good use, especially for an emergency. He's stating that people loose respect to others due to constantly using their cell phone. I agree that people have become "Zombies," when texting or "facebooking" someone on their phone.
I've experienced many things with rude individuals on their phones. Such as people bumping into me and acting as if it were my fault. Or someone swerving at me in their car or cutting me off because their text message was SOOO important. I don't know, I do love my cell phone. It's nice to be able to keep in contact with my boyfriend through out the day when we aren't together, but there is a "right" and "Wrong" time to text each other. Like while he's working or while I'm in a lab class cooking. I just think people need to realize that they are allowing cell phones to completely take over their life, maybe if they realize, they will not zombie out into their screens anymore.

Darkness at Noon

I agree with his point of view all the way. I believe that his purpose is, everyone should be treated equally. Just because he's blind, doesn't make him non-human. People are so quick to judge that it's crazy. Hasn't anyone heard the saying, "Don't judge a book by it's cover," or "Looks can be deceiving." People are so quick to say no to him because he's blind, that they don't take the time to notice his education history, or get to know him as a person. How will they ever find out his talents if they don't give him a chance?
I can't say that I've personally experienced this, but I did work with the special needs children my senior year of high school. They were treated so poorly, and they had such big hearts. The teachers who would watch after them wouldn't let them say hi to anyone, or even waive. All I can remember hearing was, "DANNY... keep your hands in your pockets!" He was so sad and would sit and stare at the ground. That's why I loved working with them. Funny thing is, some could whoop my butt in basketball. Just because they looked differently, talked differently, or acted differently, doesn't make them useless. They were really intelligent too, I guess some people just don't have the patience to work with them.

"So, What's So Bad About Being So-So?"

I would have to say that she is stating the fact that she enjoys doing many things, even though she does them poorly. She sees it as, you don't need to be great at something to love doing it. She likes having more than one hobby to keep herself entertained. She's also saying, don't worry so much about perfecting something, other than learning it to love it. Although, she isn't saying don't try so hard in work, but to do so in your other activities.
  I can go both ways with her on this. I don't fully agree or disagree. I myself, come from a very active, competitive family. My brother was a Football and baseball star. I did basketball for 2 years, volleyball 3, softball 10, was a cheerleader for 10 years, and cheer coached for 2. Also track for 4 years and cross country for 2. I was always into sports, I had to be active, and most importantly stay in shape. I enjoyed all of my sports. I'd have to say, I loved being worked hard, and I liked my strict coaches more so than my non-strict. Winning is fun! :) I'm sure everyone agrees. It's not so much fun to be the only one putting your all into practice, and have your team slack off because the end results are LOOSING. Who wants to be that one team that wins 1 game a season??? I've experienced this in Cheerleading. People say it's not a sport, but i disagree. I would come home more bruised and tired from cheer practice then my brother would from football. You try being thrown up in the air and not being caught. It's quite painful I must say. My first year of cheerleading I had a really strict coach and at cheer competition we won First place. The second year my coach was there for just fun, and we didn't place. There is a such thing as working too hard, and not working enough. It was a bummer to go from winning to completely loosing. Then when I took up cheer coaching some of the cheerleaders disliked me... especially my sister. I was pretty strict. I made most of them cry from working too hard, I will admit I felt a little bad. But when cheer competition came my girls worked so hard, and nailed their routine. When they announced the winners, (my team) the look on the girls' faces paid off. They were so happy and came and gave me a hug, and thanked me for working them so hard.
  I do understand that there are kids out there in it to have fun, and also in it to win it. But if you're one of the kids who want to just have fun, I say make a team with kids who just want to have fun. There are kids out there who want to work their butt off, and hate having kids on the team who are (say in baseball), in the out field chasing bumble bees around. But anyways, as I am saying, I like to work hard. Maybe if you're like 6 years old playing sports you shouldn't be too strict, but as you get older, things should be more strict. Most kids go into the game knowing they will have to work at it, and they accept it, others just don't, and you can't always change their attitudes towards it.