I’m what they call a type A personality. I’m a
perfectionist… I’m even trying to perfect not being a perfectionist! (a work in
progress). I’m also an over committer, I always have multiple things going on
at a time and as soon as something comes off my plate I find something else to
replace it. I’m excited to spend 11 months committed to nothing except God and
sharing His love with others.
I’m 24 years old and I graduated from Berry College in May
2008 with a degree in Business Management. I’m currently working in property
management, an industry that I am less than passionate about, I coach a womens
crew (rowing) team at Brenau University, something I am overly passionate about,
and I’m almost done planning a wedding for my oldest friend. God has used each of these things and more,
even the job, to prepare me for this trip and grow me up in Him.
I grew up in a loving, Christ centered home, and have been
blessed beyond measure to have a supportive community in my family, church, and
friends. A lot of my life I took those blessings for granted. My parents have
always believed in me and have supported me in this decision to follow God
around the world. I also have 2 sisters who are AMAZING and have beautiful
hearts that want to serve the Lord with all that they are.
I absolutely love being a coach! I began rowing in college
and discovered my passion to use this unique sport to invest in people and
inspire them. It was this sport that helped me discover my life’s mission
statement: I want to inspire people to reach their personal potential for
greatness! Thank you to the Berry College Viking Crew, especially Womens
Novice A – “Catch 22!” I cannot thank you enough for the difference you have
made in my life.
Though I am excited that God has chosen me to go on this
amazing journey as His ambassador, I can’t help but think of the things I will
miss. The things I will miss most will be coaching and my cousin Molly Grace. This
year I have been able to coach 14 wonderfully unique women who each make me
love what I do and I am so sad that I will not be there next year. I feel as
though God has given me this amazing opportunity to do what I love, coach, and
now He is asking me to give it up. God is asking me to love Him more and to
take action expressing that love. I am sad to give it up, but God is well worth
sacrificing this and so much more. Molly Grace is actually my 2nd cousin,
she is also my roommate. I have been blessed in watching her grow from day 1
and cannot imagine my life without her. Just 6 days before she was born, her
mom, Mary Beth, and I moved into a rental home in Auburn, GA and ever since
then I have been able to experience the joy that is Molly Grace. I have already
shed tears over the fact that I will not be here for her 2nd
birthday or her 2nd year of life and I’m sure I will shed more, but
I know that God has a plan.
I’m not going to lie, it is hard to process and grieve all
of the moments I will miss while I am gone. I am a relational person to the
core and I can’t imagine missing out on the big events in the lives of my
friends and family. But I know that God has led me to this place for a reason,
not the least of which is that I asked for it. I asked God to “expand my
territory” and oh how He is! And I asked for a deeper relationship with
Himself, to be used by Him, I surrendered my life to Him and I am so happy that
He is answering my prayer! Although this
is not exactly what I had in mind, I’m glad I serve a God who has bigger and
better plans for me than I have for myself.
So, how did I come to make the decision to go on “The World
Race.” Well, it started with my sister who mentioned that she thought it might
be something I would be interested in. We didn’t talk much about it, and
honestly I forgot about it. A few days later the idea came back in my mind, and
again and again for a few weeks. At that point I said, “God, are you trying to
tell me something?” So I went online and looked up this elusive trip. I got
really excited about it after reading just a few things and decided I should
shut the computer. I tend to get my hopes up about things and then they become
about me and not about God’s will for my life, and I wanted this to be ALL God
if it was His will. I made the decision to not
actively think about the trip and only pray and surrender it to God anytime He
brought it to mind. For about 2 more weeks the Spirit continued to speak to my
heart and remind me of all the events that He had used to lead me to this place.
He began to confirm that this was not my own voice but rather His still small
voice leading me to this place. After looking more deeply into the trip online
I decided to pray more intentionally for God’s guidance and spoke with my
mentor who advised that I begin walking through the doors God opened. Not 100%
confident, I decided to take a vacation alone, something I have never done. I
ended up going to 4 cities in 4 days and God revealed to me more about Himself
and His desire to fulfill my desires. It was a sweet time to get quite and
alone with God and He confirmed even more that I was to lay down my desires and
trust Him to give me life to the full!
To backtrack for a moment, almost exactly a year before I
applied for the trip, I attended a Bible study where we discussed the passage
that says, ‘sell all of your possessions and then follow me.’ For that entire
year God kept bringing that scripture to mind and I kept asking why. “God, do
you want me to sell everything? If so, what/who do you want me to give the
money to?” I was subtly reminded, and now see, that God was preparing my hear t
to be ready to give up EVERYTHING. My comfort, my stuff, my life, my all. He
has also been reminding me that I need to be more eternally minded for a while
now; and building the eternal kingdom is what this trip is all about. Part of
doing that means dying to myself. It wasn’t until I decided to pursue The World
Race that I began to see what God was asking me to do. He does want me to give
it up, and this is His perfect timing.
Ironically, I feel like I missed something… ha! I guess I
will just have to blog those things later. If there is anything else you want
to know about me, I am a pretty open person so feel free to ask!
