For the past few years since graduating from Florida Gulf Coast University in 2013, I have been feeling very lost. I feel like I have been floundering through life trying to figure out what this whole grown-up thing looks like and what God is calling me to do. I am 24 years old and everyone has an opinion about what my life should look like right now. I should be starting a career, I should be getting married, I should be traveling, I should be saving my money for the future…the list goes on. What most people don’t do is actually ASK me anything. A lot of people have opinions about what I should be doing, but not a lot of people want to hear what I have to say about my life. Only my close friends actually ask me what I feel like God is calling me to do and pray with me for clarity on what that is.
I grew up in Palm Harbor, Florida with my dad, Joseph, my mom, Darlean, and my big sister, Amanda. I always admired my big sister. She has always known exactly what she wanted to do. When she was four years old, my parents got her ballet lessons for Christmas and from the time she started dancing, she knew she wanted to be a professional ballerina. Amanda moved out when she was 16 years old to go to the best dance school in the country and became a professional ballerina with the Miami City Ballet Company at the age of 17. When she knew that dancing wasn’t fulfilling her call anymore, she felt God leading her to become a lawyer. She is now about to graduate from Yale Law School, again, the best school in the country. She has always known what she wanted to do and she goes out and does it.
My world changing big sister and I in Ireland at the Cliffs of Moher
I have always wanted that feeling of clarity. I have wanted, for just once, to be absolutely sure that God is calling me to do something. For the first time, I feel like I have that with the World Race. As scary as it is to think about, I have a peace that this is what God is calling me to do right now. I know my parents are worried for my safety and I’ll probably cry almost every day leading up to and on the trip because I’ll miss my family and friends, but this is right. This is where God has led me. He has used so many people to get me to this place. My best friends have been so supportive and have encouraged me through this whole process. One person in particular has really impacted me and helped me with my decision about going on the race: Alexa.
Alexa and I a couple days before she launched on her race
Alexa has such an amazing heart for people. She is fun and beautiful and caring and kind. Alexa and I met at Trinity New Life Church a couple of years ago when we were babysitting for one of our church’s meetings. We talked about work and school and all of the things that people talk about when they meet for the first time. Right away, I knew that she was a fun person and that she was someone who would be a good friend. After that night, unfortunately, we didn’t really see much of each other except on some Sundays at church. Then, this year in March, we finally connected after saying for months that we should hang out. Alexa came to my birthday party and then we made plans to meet up the next week. We met up at Pollo Tropical and I will never forget our conversation that day. Alexa began to tell me about her journey to finding the World Race. I wanted to know everything. I probably asked her a million questions and she answered them all for me.
I knew then that I wanted to be involved with the World Race somehow, but at first I thought that was just going to be me helping Alexa with her fundraising. Slowly, though, she encouraged me to pray about going on the Race myself. At first I said I could never do it and it would be too hard, all of the usual excuses, but then I committed to just pray about it and ask God what He thought about it. After a few weeks of this, I felt that He was letting me make the choice, and I chose to apply. I have already been learning so much just through the process of applying. God is teaching me about patience and trusting in His timing. I am excited to grow through my experience with the World Race. I want to be stretched and I want to grow closer to God every day of my journey. I want to grow in the spiritual gifts and be able to walk in them daily.
I am so excited for this journey that God has called me to and I can’t wait to share with you all what He is doing in my life through it. Please continue to be praying for me to grow and learn something new from God every day! Thank you all for your support and encouragement, I couldn’t do this without you guys! Here’s a link to Alexa’s blog, subscribe and see all of the amazing things she is doing! And don’t forget to subscribe to mine as well! 😀 Love you guys!
