No matter what sport I was playing, I was always told “to get to the next level you have to learn to be comfortable with being uncomfortable”. Being innately security focused yet also achievement driven, I found this forced me into conflict with myself. How do I challenge myself, take risks, and jump feet first into the unknown while also trying to prevent failure at the same time? In all of my years of competitive sports I never found a way to balance the two. Rather I learned that failure, pain, and loss are all inevitable facts of life. My hope for these 9 months is that I will learn to sit in the discomfort, the disappointments and the suffering and simply listen. That in those moments I would seek God’s voice and direction before my own and I wouldn’t be fearful of being ‘undone’, but instead would see the beauty in the pruning. (s/o John 15)
I don’t know what the next 9 months hold for me and if I am fully transparent that uncertainty scares me. This is the first time in my life where I don’t have an end goal or an expectation of performance. The fellows program will simply be what I make it. If I take the advice of our family systems professor the only goal I should really have for myself is to follow these six stones: sitting, experiencing, tolerating, holding, voice, and walking (I am calling these the six stones to survival). To sit and listen, experience God in the everyday and the mundane, to tolerate the big and small frustrations (or my roommate Morgan’s aggressive sarcasm - with love of course ;) ), hold each other’s delicate memories and stories, give voice to the gospel, and to walk on the path with God.
Sara Cliborne