If you asked me a year ago where I thought I’d be today, I would have told you Mizzou with my very best friend and believed it with my whole heart. I spent the last 2 and a half years of high school wanting to move onto the next stage of life: college. Even though I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, I knew I was ready to be independent. That meant attending a university to get a degree that would allow me to get a really solid job. The cherry on top was that I was getting to go and live with my best friend! Yet, here I am today, sitting in my parent’s living room, typing a blog because I’m leaving for 9 months to travel the world and share Jesus with people…WHAT?
God is a funny guy. Honestly, I think He spends most of His time laughing at us and the plans we make. I remember there was a week in the middle of the semester at Mizzou that my best friend wouldn’t shut up about The World Race and how bad she wanted to do it. Being a supportive friend I listened and encouraged her about how awesome it would be, but in my head I was thinking there’s no way either of us would do that right now. We are in college so that we can start the rest of our lives! I will admit that I’ve always wanted to travel around the world and I’ve always wanted to go on a mission trip, but I was “normal” so I was going to college and then getting a job. I would just get a job that would let me have a lot of vacation time… (this is where I imagine God laughing hysterically).
Little did I know that God would really put those desires on my heart a short two months later during Christmas break. While in Colorado with my family for Christmas and then with some friends, I started thinking about how I didn’t feel like I belonged at Mizzou and realized how much I was dreading going back. I was declared a pre-nursing major but anytime I really thought about being a nurse for the rest of my life, extreme anxiety would kick in. It’s not that I absolutely didn’t want to do that, it was just that I wasn’t 100% sure. If you know me really well you know I don’t do feelings and emotions very well, so I would push that anxiety away and refuse to think about it. For some reason the beautiful mountains of Colorado (my favorite place on Earth…so far anyways) brings out the adventure in me (as well as really making me contemplate my life). The two weeks I was there over Christmas break made me want to have nothing to do with “normal.”
And here I am, doing the most abnormal thing I could think of any 19 year old doing. I know that a lot of people (even people that love me) don’t understand why I am choosing to leave my family and friends for 9 months to go to some of the most impoverished and dangerous places of the world. When I really start to think about it, it doesn’t exactly make sense in my head either. But my heart is all in. 100%. No doubt. And my heart is for the Lord, so I’m doing it. Do I have any fears? Absolutely. I’m missing Thanksgiving (my favorite holiday) and Christmas with my family for the first time in my life. I’m missing my nephew’s fifth birthday. I’m missing my little brother’s graduation. I’m missing anything that happens in the lives of my family and friends from September to June. Even scarier than that I’m going to have to open up and let a whole group of new people really know me, because they will be my family and friends for 9 months. But I’m doing it. And despite all of that, I can’t even find the words to describe how excited I am.
World Race Gap Year 2014, I’m ready for ya!
