to vote or not to vote...

once upon a time i ran for class office.   i was a freshman - happy to be in a new school and ready to be on student council.  i can remember making signs and being so excited at the thought of being elected.  in the midst of it all i asked my mom a question...

"do you think its okay to vote for myself?"

"of course it is.  if you don't vote for yourself - you don't believe in yourself.  do you know i lost an election by one vote?  i voted for the other guy to be nice and i lost."

so i did.  the ballots came and i cast my vote... for myself.   i still lost and never ran for office again.   lucky for me, losing out on student council lead to speech team, newspaper staff (hello photography), and friends who were also not on student council. 

fast forward a couple years to my college public speaking class.  at my college there is a thing called a speak-off.  held every year between the different public speaking classes to determine who was the best of the best.  being a former speech team president - i wanted to win.  however, i had to get there first.  the person who represented each class was determined by the class. ahhh voting once again.   it should not have been hard.  i had a KILLER speech.  except... my best college friend was also in the class.   she too had been speech team president.  we both wanted the speak-off.  bad. i can remember us saying something to the effect of, "you do not have to vote for me.  vote for yourself.  no matter what - we will be excited for whoever wins."

at this point i'd like to say that God knocked our snobby speech team butts to the ground.  who were we to think it was for sure one of us?  but it was.   votes where casts.  once again i put my own name down.

i won.

by one vote.

i'd by lying if i said i habored NO guilt.  i did. i told myself that she probably voted for herself too. 

 but we had sworn not to tell who we voted for, so there was no way for knowing.

i went to the speak-off and ROCKED it.

i did not win. but my prof lead on that i should have ;-)

fast forward even more years. 

a contest.  10 photos. photographers from all around the area. an email. voting for days upon days.

did i vote for myself?  you bet.

after all i did promise to stop comparing and believe in myself more.

voting ends in a matter of hours and like i said before i am happy to be in the top ten.  truly.

 in the end the most important thing is that i believed in myself to even enter this contest and i determined to  keep believing.   keep reaching.   keep dreaming.

i will pray bigger than i have ever prayed before.

thank you so much to everyone who voted and believed with me.   now go cast some votes on your dreams.