So in my Capstone Seminar we had to write essays about ourselves. I really don't like writing about myself at all. But its nice that our prof. wants to get to know us I guess. This class is all about sorting through everything you've gotten out of life at Huntington, and I'm excited about it. Anyway... below is my essay. The whole time I was writing it I felt like I was blogging. So I guess posting it makes sense.
Self Reflection Essay
I’ve never been very sure of how to start essays like this without sounding trite, or like I’m describing myself in some sort of singles advertisement. But I guess I’ll just start with the basics. I’m twenty years old and in my third year at HU. I started out as a double major, studying youth ministry and journalism but I recently dropped down to a youth ministry minor. My routine 18-credit hour semesters are behind me and I actually have time to read for my classes now. And I get to read for fun, and breath. Breathing is good. This year I have also been serving as the editor in chief of The Huntingtonian, which has occupied a lot of hours and thought in my life this year, but I absolutely love being a part of it.
I am the second of three daughters born to two people who grew up in the same little Indiana town, became teachers and got married. My dad is a basketball coach and therefore has moved us from one tiny Indiana town to another—he even spent two years coaching at a tiny college in Ohio—essentially in pursuit of winning a few games. Both of my parents came from a Christian background, but their personal faith was kind of shallow for most of my childhood. It has been just the last few years, as my faith was radically changing, that my parents’ did as well. But church was always important for them, and their background helped to build a few foundational truths in my life that I really believe have driven me to where I am—the existence of an almighty and loving God and the importance of being a part of a church family. Children’s church, Sunday school, Vacation Bible School and church camps helped to fill in all of the gaps for me and when I was nine I began to understand who Jesus was and what a monumental thing he did for me. I was baptized the summer before I started fourth grade.
My faith for about three years was much like my parents, shallow and without any real responsibility of action or service to God. Through junior high though, with youth group, some really great conferences I got to attend and summer camp, I started to realize what it looked like not to simply accept what Jesus did for me, but to live like Christ’s sacrifice meant something to me. When I was sixteen I attended a Christ in Youth conference in South Carolina with my youth group, and felt God calling me to prepare myself for a life of ministry. At the time I felt like if you were called to minister, it meant that it was to be a full-time vocation. I began teaching children’s church and my youth pastor Brad became a great mentor and brother-like presence in my life. I started my freshman year at Huntington double majoring in youth ministry and journalism, as I said before. It was always an internal struggle for me—I felt like I had to choose between youth ministry and journalism, something that I have a natural talent and passion for.
The past two and a half years at HU have taught me that every call from God is perfectly tailored to each individual. Working with youth will always be a priority in my life, but taking a leadership role in a church or ministry organization is not where God is calling me right now, it seems. But when God spoke to me at 16, I was limiting the possibilities he had for my life. I always thought that my persistence to study journalism was me being selfish, but I am almost sure that is where he wants me to be. But what am I going to do when this college stage of my life is over? I really couldn’t tell you. I’d love to be writing for a news outlet somewhere, and working with junior high students in some capacity as well, probably as a volunteer in an organization. But I’ve also played with the idea of graduate school; there is a media studies program in Indianapolis that I’ve been looking into. I love the fact that I don’t have to know right now, and that the possibilities for my life are almost completely wide open. Life plans and goals scare me. There is a sophomore on the newspaper staff that has this four-year plan written out for her life. The day she told me about it, I was so scared for her, and for me. But allowing God the room to maneuver in my life and to send me wherever, whenever—while it too seems scary—has given me the freedom to live each day as I would love to continue throughout the rest of my life. It has enabled me to continue being the student of my life, not the teacher. I’ve become the participant, not the planner. Giving up the control and taking God out of the box I kept him in for so many years has been liberating for me.
There are a few things that I believe define me as an individual but I am still far from being able to define who I am. Its fun to think of myself as a work in progress, someone who’s chasing after God’s heart who’s finding my own in the process of it all.
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