When I first came back from Europe, a lot of people asked me,
"has it been hard transitioning back?" The answer was always
"no" because I assumed they were asking if I was tired or if I missed
traveling. I didn't struggle with jet lag because of carefully allotted nap
times on my flight back, and I was still eating, sleeping, and reading things
like I did in Europe. No problems there.
On a surface level, it has been fine and dandy. But I'm slowly
realizing that transitioning my heart back to reality has been much more
difficult. When you're a free-spirited traveler, ain't nothing gonna hold you
down. You start dreaming about all the places you could travel to and all
the things you could do, you laugh at all the things you don't have to do, and you forget
where your real home is.
Let's look at some of the things Paul wrote to the Philippians:
"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain."
What do I desire? Do I value Christ above all the gifts and blessings of this world? Do I look forward to heaven and being with Christ, my Lord and Savior? Am I excited to know that my joy will be complete when I get to spend a sinless eternity worshipping God? Do I really believe that it is better to be with Christ? That when I have nothing, all I have is Christ?
Uh...
So in this current season of unemployment, I am thankful that God
doesn't give me what I want when I want it, especially since He knows I have to change a few priorities.
When I originally chose to go backpacking instead of looking for a
job, I told myself that I wanted to learn how to be content with uncertainty
and not knowing what I would do after I graduated. It all sounds delightfully
holy and spiritual, until you find yourself freaking out over rejections and
saying, "okay God, you can stop sanctifying me through trials now..."
It is so important to learn how to be content, both in plenty
and in lacking. What if I seek to find my worth in a job, don't get it, and
then fall apart? What if I get an awesome job and let it go to my head and
praise myself? Either way, the problem comes from finding security in things
other than God.
A few years ago I was terrified that I wouldn’t get accepted into
any grad schools, so I wrote a list of some blessed failures. I've added a few more points to the list, and it always makes me chuckle when I think about how silly my anxiety is.
- Rejected from competitive Berkeley (which I was depending on to be my salvation from home), attends amazing UCSD.
- Lazy in church hopping, unknowingly ends up at church with sound doctrine and Gospel-centered fellowship.
- Vows to never be friends with “intimidating and aloof” robot team captain, now super good friends.
- Church split is hard, grows much at RGC.
- Rejected from every single internship except one (EK), now super spoiled at EK.
- No car to drive to summer school at 8AM, makes new friend in Christ (roommate of a neighbor who randomly invited me over for dinner).
- Really surprising rejection from matsci lab after being assured the position after working for a year to get it, realizes true passion is in thermal-fluids.
- False hope from Boeing (LA), stays in SD for the summer, gets 2 new positions at work and goes on first business trip to Florida.
- Failed Chinese placement test Fall 2011, realizes 2nd week that there never would have been enough time to study for it because of robot project.
- Not placed with desired teammates for 156B because of scheduling issue, has awesome new team members.
- Completely bombed job interview with sensor company and rejected from two fluid mechanics internships, gets to do propulsion research with NASA.
- Caused a devastating diesel spill accident at lab because I forgot to turn off the fuel, but discovers a simple and novel way to solve a problem I struggled with for 3 months during the clean up process.
I know this won't be the last time I'll have to struggle and wrestle with uncertainty and fear of the future, but I have full confidence knowing that He who began a good work in us will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.
