Sophomore Slump? (More like Comeback of the Year)

Last night my roommates and I created a ruckus the likes of which I’m sure the Eisenhower fitness center has never before seen. It was brilliant. We were in hysterics, and although I’m not sure that’s the best condition for exercise, I’m totally okay with it being a condition I live in most of the time.

I’ve only been back at school for about five days, and already so much has happened. Sometimes, having so many good things happen in rapid succession makes me nervous. I worry that something bad will happen to counteract it all, or I’ll mess up and ruin everything good around me. But last night while Jazzi was trying to show Nat and myself ridiculous ab exercises, I realized something. It is totally okay for things to be going okay. I can spend the majority of my waking moments happy, even joyful. Over the past several months I’ve been dealing with and working through a lot of heavy and sometimes really upsetting stuff. But in this past week I’ve had closure, some errant loose ends in my life have been tied up, and I finally feel like I’m moving forward in God’s plan for me.

Over the summer my mom told me if you want to move forward, you have to move forward completely, leaving the door to the past shut firmly behind you. I have a hard time shutting that door. I want a fall back plan; I want to know I have other, safer options if the new things I’m trying go wrong (or just not the way I want them to). I learned this week that shutting the door can be hard, even painful, but it can be done with grace and hope. You don’t have to slam the past behind you so hard the frame rattles, but you have to be firm and trust the new direction you’re being led in is ultimately better for you and probably everyone else involved.

I feel like the next chapter in my life is beginning. I feel ready for this year and whatever it will bring. I feel ready to continue operating in the calling God’s given me, wholeheartedly. Last year I think a lot of fear (of rejection, of embarrassment, of just plain not being good enough) kept me from trying things I wanted to do. Well, in about an hour I have my first jazz ensemble audition, after which I have to go to the ice cream social to recruit for the step team, and then tonight I’m going to the first Powerhouse worship session in order to continue the process of becoming a member of their worship team.

Am I scared? Absolutely. All kinds of things could go wrong, or I could be rejected, or any number of other catastrophes. But will I let any of that stop me? Absolutely not.

There was a time when I let fear paralyze me. There was a time when I would not stand up for myself, or fight for what I wanted.

No more.

Things fall apart. People mess up. I mess up. It’s just another part of the human condition. But things can also come together. And things can go right. This semester, I think things are going to go right.