Will Death Lose It's STING?

There are 6,884,855,849 people in the world. Almost two people die per second. In one minute 102 people will have died. Every hour 6,098 lives will be gone. Have you ever gone 24 hours without sleeping? It's draining once your body starts to shut down, but before it does and you have mysterious energy,  its liberating, you feel in control of your life. In that 24 hours of joy, 146,357 people didn't have a choice to stay awake or not. In 55 hours 2010 will be over, and about 53.4 million people will have died this year. Read these statistics again and then ask your self:


"WHY AM I STILL ALIVE?"


Regardless of your religion, gender, occupation, age or disability, you have a purpose. Even a dead person has a purpose and they may not have fulfilled their purpose until after they died but none the less he/she had a purpose.
In high school death revealed it's self to me and it became a reality that death is coming. Recently, my best friend died at the age of 20. There were no words that could be said to heal the pain. The thing that made me have an epiphany is realizing it could have been me. Cancer has no eyes, it has no emotion. Just as easily as Kristen was diagnosed right before our freshman year in college and then battled for two years and finally was taken Home this august; it could have been me.


When people die we tend to ask "why?" and I realized we should be asking "why not...me?"


Regardless if you believe in heaven or hell or God, you are living, but why?
Why are you not apart of the death statistics?


Your purpose only matters if you know it.
The searching and the trials and pot-holes that we have to get through to find our purpose is called life.


Carpe diem is a phrase from a Latin poem by Horace that has become an aphorism. It is popularly translated as "seize the day". Carpe literally means "to pick, pluck, pluck off, cull, crop, gather", but Ovid, a Roman poet, used the word in the sense of, "To enjoy, seize, use, make use of". Though it is a misconception that it says "seize the day" this may be because it is a translation and translations are not perfect.


I begin to think that Ovid was not trying to change the meaning of Carpe Diem but make it more applicable to people's life's.


"to pick, pluck, pluck off, cull, crop, gather" could this not be a metaphor for life?
In life we pick things such as friends, majors, husbands, wife's, schools.
In life we pluck, we transform, we examine
In life we pluck off people who are not positive to our life's, we pluck off choices that will not enhance our the way we live.
To cull means to gather the choice things or parts from, which is what we do in life when we receive advice, or when we hear a sermon, or when we experience just about anything. We should learn from everything and cull the fruitful things.
To crop is produce supply. I feel my best when I'm being productive or giving back in some way. This is essential to living life abundantly.
Finally to gather, in life we gather many things and that's what makes us, individuals because we all have different items in our basket. But it doesn't matter who has what and who is better at a certain thing or who makes more money than whom. All that matters is what is in our basket helps us be the person that we are.
Look inside your basket and see what you have, don't compare, focus on yours and then ask your self  why you were given those items. Then ask your self what am I going to do to utilize these individual strengths to the best of my ability?


You only have one life to live and you don't know if 2012 is in your book of life.


Death will lose it's sting when people realize it could have been them, ask themselves why not me, and then dive in to every day they are blessed with as if it is their last.


 Work Hard, Play Harder, One life to live, NEVER give up.






Don't ask (it's forbidden to know) what end

the gods will grant to me or you,  Don't play with Babylonian
fortune-telling either. It is better to endure whatever will be.
Whether Jupiter has allotted to you many more winters or this final one
which even now wears out the Tyrrhenian sea on the rocks placed opposite
— be wise, strain the wine, and scale back your long hopes
to a short period.
While we speak, envious time will have {already} fled
Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future.


------Poem by Horace


Sources:
www.wikipedia.org
http://www.wholesomewords.org/missions/greatc.html#worldpop

THE DAY THAT WE SAID "I CAN DO IT MYSELF"

I love this poster. When I look at it, it inspires me to do my best in school and encourages me that I can do it no matter what. Some people look at this and compare women to men in the workforce, that's what this poster was supposed to do. From then on that has been the mindset of women, that we don't need men, that anything they can do, we can do better. That's not true, we do need men, what we don't need is for men to define and dictate us.

People always say "times have changed" and so that gives people the right to do whatever they want, then when someone questions their motives they use that as an excuse; but what they should be saying is "people have changed." I want to talk to both men and women about the pursuit of the opposite sex. I can say that the events in the times have changed people and their way of thinking. For instance a man that was not raised with his father, has not realized that God can be his heavenly father, or had a father but he wasn't a good example will not understand how to pursue a woman. On the woman's side if she was not raised with a father and had a mother who had to do everything alone, then she will probably have that mindset as well. On the other hand if she was raised with her father but he abused her mother in any form and the mother put up with it, then she most likely will think that it's okay. If a woman was not told or has not read in the bible what she's worth then she excepts what society says she's worth. This is happening so much it is excepted for woman to pursue men. If women would stick to their guns and not settle for weak men who don't have the guts to pursue them then it wouldn't be excepted. Men if you truly like a woman, MAN UP and stick to your guns and make a commitment to convince her. I don't know why men are so scared of MANing up? If you can't do it then you don't deserve to be called a man. It is your job no matter what happens to be THE leader. The reason why women have become so cold hearted and independent is their experience. Men if you lead a woman in good experience then she won't be so cold for the rest of her life. Men if you would stop limiting your abilities and realize you are the new century hero, so act like one! Women, if you would set your standards higher, men would have no choice to treat you like your a gift, and not a option. Stare at him until he open the door for you, let him pay for your meal, let him go out of his way to pick you up, expect him to come to the door and wait because Lord knows we won't be ready on time, let him put down his jacket on a puddle so you wont have to step in it, let him make decisions, let him treat you like a your rare.

We teach people how to treat us.

Get your lesson plan out, STICK TO IT and if they don't pass, FLUNK 'EM!

 Keep going until you find your valedictorian!

NEVER BE A STUPID GIRL........ BE A WOMAN WITH HIGH STANDARDS!

music and sports, so synonmous

 I've heard a lot of women say they can't understand how men can watch sports all day. Well men are thinking, how can we shop all day. Well I love sports, basketball in particular, but if you have a hard time watching sports try to spot the celebrities in the crowd. It's interesting to know who likes what team and then you wonder why. Well that's the question I asked when I saw drake at one of the UK games and then heard that drake actually is a true fan. This was my conclusion.

When I initially found out that I was coming to Kentucky the first things that came to mind were John Wall, Drake singer/rapper being a fan and coach John Calipari. I just thought that Drake made friends with Wall from the past and then he came to the Big Blue Madness last fall to see Wall and just ended up blowing up the arena with fans because he is who he is.

I started to ask my new Kentucky friends about the relationship with Drake and UK and they all said Calipari is friends with him. That intrigued me because Calipari does not look like he would be interested in R&B and rap music. After I did some research I came to find that you can’t judge a book by it’s cover, especially when you look at Calipari.

Calipari is very “in-tune” with the times. He has a twitter, he has a Facebook, he has a website that he blogs on. Not only does he have accounts with the social networks, he, himself updates them FREQUENTLY.

He seems to be very transparent because he has nothing to be ashamed of and I think that is a characteristic his players recognize. He is active in the community with his recent basketball camp tours around Kentucky and in the world with his recent visit to Haiti. I think that is so admirable and a lot more coaches should open their minds outside of basketball.

I think that because he is so open-minded he has the upper hand in college basketball and that is what makes him the best college coach in the nation. That is why he had five players drafted in the first round, not because he calls good plays but because  of who he is off the court. Coaches are always talking about team bonding and getting to know your players. With Calipari it seems like he treats his players like sons, not puppets. Maybe him being Italian has a lot to do with it, but ultimately he puts himself in their shoes and any coach regardless of nationality should do that.

 It may seem like I’m blowing him up just because he listens to rap and so do his players, so that must make him a great coach. But its deeper than that. Let’s take the lyrics that Drake uses for instance. He talks about giving back, relationships, success and being a good person.

 I’ll admit sometimes the rapper is a little cocky, but that’s what makes hits. Going into anything with a positive attitude is the method used in every form of competition. Who can’t relate to these things in some way? I think Calipari realizes that Drake isn’t a typical rapper. He’s a young man striving to do great things with his talent. Just like all the men on his college basketball team who are trying to do great things with their skills, and CLEARLY they are doing it.

I also think Calipari realizes in order to  coach them effectively, he must know his players mentality. Being that his players are young men he must get into what they get into. Not to say he’s trying to be “down” but what person can take criticism from a person that doesn’t really know them. It’s not that he wants to be young, he just has to understand how the young minds are thinking in 2010 and it just so happened to be on Drake, who he actually likes.

A quote from H. Gordon Selfridge from the American-British retail magnate comes to mind when I think of Calipari and his mentality.

“The boss drives people; the leader coaches them. The boss depends on authority; the leader on good will. The boss inspires fear; the leader inspires enthusiasm. The boss says 'I'; the leader says 'we.' The boss fixes the blame for the breakdown; the leader fixes the breakdown. The boss says 'go'; the leader says 'let's go!'"

Basketball has been in my family since I can remember, but leadership is what I attained from playing. I’ve never been a coach, but I’ve always been a leader. Calipari is a great coach because he’s a great man. He sits and talks with his player’s about their life. He doesn’t stand over them telling them about his achievements because he is one with his team.

My friends in Dallas, Texas may not like it when I say this, but with a team and coach combination like this one I have to say from the bottom of my heart — GO BIG BLUE!



photo's were taken by Victoria Graff and Clay Jackson 

LET IT ALL HANG OUT or SUCK IT IN?

    I have never been a skinny girl, but I've always been above average in height so it all evened out. THANK GOD! I was never really worried about my stomach until I got in to middle school and I started to look in the mirror a little more often and for a longer time. One of the things I always heard growing up was "SUCK IT IN" so that's what I did, all the time! Then once I got into high school I was on the basketball team and in Texas so I was getting a great work out for a couple hours a day. The idea of being skinny was gone because I thought to myself "its not like I'm eating Twinkies and watching TV, I am an athlete." I realized that I was never going to be skinny because my body was not built that way. So I decided it didn't matter what the scale said as long as I was healthy and I felt great.
    The idea for this blog came to me one day while I was working at Starbucks in Oklahoma and I told a customer I liked her shirt and immediately she sucked her stomach in. I thought to my self WHY DO WOMEN SUCK IN? Maybe they were raised with people saying "suck in" all the time and now it's just a habit. Maybe they think it makes them look skinner, but if you really look at woman when she sucks in yeah from the side she looks thinner, but from the front she looks wider! Why would women suck in for the purpose of impressing a man? Eventually if you go swimming together or you are so blessed you end up marrying that person they are going to see your stomach... and they are going to catch a view of your stomach when you aren't sucking in. So why suck in ladies? Be you. Men love when they find real genuine women (they are very rare). IF YOU DON'T LIKE YOUR STOMACH DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!  Besides that most importantly do it for you because honestly men never notice (unless you have a suck in technique that takes away inches!) lol even then your being fake! so BE YOU, BE REAL AND REMEMBER TO NEVER BE A STUPID GIRL!

Bill Elsen, former editor for the Washington Post, has been teaching the other scholars and I how to think like an editor throughout the week. The most important piece of advice that I will try to make stick this summer is to act like a employee and not a intern. I was afraid that I might not learn a lot in my internship because I would be overlooked. Mr.Elsen taught me that if I am afraid of that, make sure I am seen. For example, in the staff meetings, make sure my opinion is heard, even if it may not be the best idea. I think that was great advice because it will let the editor as well as the other employees know that I am a “go getter”, and I don’t just wait for someone to spoon feed me.
He also taught me, the term “Face Time” which is time with your editor. He explained setting a specific time with the editor will be the most affective. Then when I actually get the opportunity, make sure I ask questions and listen well and then actually make the changes! I really enjoyed his lectures because I feel like he gave us a “reality check” on life in a newsroom.
Today is his last day with us. Sad to see such great wisdom walk out the door. He is definitely a mentor I want throughout my career.

Charles Pittman

My goal in life is not to be rich, or be seen, but to positively impact the world. I used to be worried that if I wasn't physically talented at anything then I couldn't influence anyone or have a reason for people to look up to me. When Charles Pittman came and spoke to us today at the Freedom Forum, I realized his biggest impact on the world will not be the millions of peoples hearts he captured when he was winning all those football games, but his passion for diversity in journalism. I believe that is what will stick with people forever. I know that impacting the world takes leadership, that got me thinking where did i get my leadership skills from? Mr.Pittman said "leadership is not taught, it's learned. He explained later that learning is not given to me, that I must go and get it. I plan to "disturb the peace" by taking his "recruitment" speech and apply for the job of change.

Multimedia Training for the Diversity Institute Multimedia Scholars Program 2010

Today I was given the first flower of a bouquet of blessings. Today was the step to impacting the world. I learned so much that reassured me that this industry was where I belonged. My passion has always been in areas that help the "underdog" such as the civil rights movement. The video we watched today on how journalism exposed the truth of the jim crow laws brought me to tears. The video made me realize the only good hate is when you hate- hate. The video also opened my eyes to how journalism is so valuable and it should never be over looked as an important field. Science, business, math are all important subjects and I would bet that every university values them highly. Why is journalism not as high of value than then other subjects? Journalism has progressed and grown and branched out into different mediums just like any other subject. This made me think about my career goals. I wanted to be an entertainment reporter, now, I don't know if that will suffice my desire to impact the world. I used to think that the reason I wanted to become a journalist was to inform people of matters that are happening in the world that they did not know about, so that maybe it would lead to a positive change. After watching the video I don't think that being an entertainment reporter would do anything but inform people of celebrity gossip and the hottest clothes and music. Is that is what people need to know? Is that what matters today? Do I want to report about things that people need to know, things that can expose the negative and positive things that are happening in our world today. Or do I want to report about things that people can live without but because the United States is so spoiled we think inanimate things are necessary and newsworthy.

Blogging = consistency

I was talking to one of my best friend's a couple of months ago about blogging and promoting yourself through multimedia. Today we were talking again about it and I came to the conclusion that I REALLY need to be more consistent with my blogging. So, I am making a goal to blog every morning! I think this will be great! I'm going to talk about topics from life lessons to fashion and more importantly everything that interest WOMEN! I think the only thing I'm interested in talking to men about is how to treat women better... for now.  Work Hard, Play Harder, One shot to live, NEVER give up.      -NBASG

W.O.M.E.N.

College W.O.M.E.N. is a new organization me and four other amazing women started this year at Langston University(Langston Okla.). Our goal is to enhance the minds of women. First, we will start off with the women of the students at LU. Then, we will expand to other colleges and high schools around the United States. Finally, I hope that one day we will be a organization impacting the world. We promote Leadership, Academic improvement, Developing together, Innovation, Empowering one another, and Self-Worth. From this we created the acronym "LADIES." Our motto is "W.O.M.E.N. Enlightening Women." I think that by starting of with training the mind of a woman everything else will fall into place. A woman's view of the world, the environment, the less fortunate, men, children, sex, and family all start in the mind. A person's perception of things are usually determined through experiences or "role models". Girls become Women when their perception is not influenced by the media or what a man thinks of them. Women are one with themselves and don't need anyone else's opinion to make them who they are. Women listen to other people's opinion by choice because having an open mind is the only way to grow.

An organization that could change the world

College W.O.M.E.N.-- UNSTOPPABLE
NBASG- THE NEXT BIG THING

MORE DETAILS COMING TONIGHT!

Coming Up Next

Welcome to the Ashley Show! (text version)

Here are some things to look foward to coming up on The Ashley Show:

1. Interview with "The Team" from Langston University
2. Interview with Langston University's Fraternitys and Sororities
3. Anchor clips
4. On the scene reporter clips

If you would like to view my resume or newspaper clips e-mail me at ASHLEYbenASHLEY@gmail.com

The first step into the blog world

Welcome to THE ASHLEY SHOW!
I'M Ashley Benson... and that's all you need to know!

Just playing with you all, here is a little bit about me.

I was born in Oklahoma City, then moved to Tulsa, Okla. when I started school. Around the end of my sixth grade year my family and I moved to TEXAS! Which was probably the most awesome decision God made for us! Anyways, to keep a long story short, I am from Flower Mound, Texas(suburb of Dallas). I go to Langston University in Langston Okla. right now(more on that later). I am a sophomore, double majoring in BROADCAST JOURNALISM and psychology. I would love to be a reporter for a high market station and then eventually become an entertainment reporter.

If you would like to learn more about me here are a couple places you can contact me:
Ashley's Facbook
www.twitter.com/lovelyamb
ashleybenashley@gmail.com

Thanks to Crystal Hilliard from Jackson, MS, I finally have a blog!



Things to do:

1. Apply for internships
2. Follow up on all the scholarships I applied for
3. Get KALU news up and running
4. Resume tape
5. Post them on my blog
6. Get hired at a high market station
7. Start my career!