But with the ending of the seasons comes decisions, with decisions come questions, with questions come pressure. Decisions to be made over where to live next, what career path to follow, to keep pursuing relationships or decide you've outgrown them, graduate school, marriage. All these decisions to be made in the next few months that will ultimately dictate the life I'll have in the future. The weight of these decisions are heavy on me.
There is a constant pressure around me to keep up with my peers. I have intentionally tried to surround myself with people who have things figured out so they can either inspire me to do better and discipline myself or just drag me along beside them when I don't have the motivation to do it on my own. Some of my greatest role models and inspirations have been people I sit next to in class or my roommates. Seeing people go after their dreams is contagious.
But comparison creeps in. Seeing great people receive fantastic job offers or move across the country to continue their lives is intimidating when you don't have all the details figured out yet. I constantly find myself asking, should I be doing that too? Should I be applying for that prestigious internship, should I be going to grad school? Should I be moving somewhere new? Why doesn't my life look like his yet? Why don't I have everything figured out? It becomes hard not to think less of your life when you haven't been able to commit to a decision and chase after it. Chances are the people who have the dream job have had their career path decided a little before you did. Stop comparing.
I remember when I picked my major. At the time, I didn't believe I was really good at anything or really passionate about programs that my college had to offer. I knew I loved math and I knew I needed to help people in my future career. Business was a "go-to" major for most kids like me who didn't have an epiphany when they were 12 that they wanted to be a neuroscientist or be a firefighter or an engineer. "You can do anything with business" people always said, so business and finance it was. My major was decided. I'm still not entirely sure where this major will take me or who I will ultimately become studying finance, but something tells me not to quit.
When people ask what I want to do with my finance major, I simply say I just want to help people. That's it. There's no detailed plan or path I see ahead of me. I haven't made any decisions or taken any jobs. I'm clinging to the promise that God has my future and that I shouldn't worry too much about where I'm headed as long as He is at the root of all of it.
Jesus doesn't care nearly as much about the perfection of our decisions as He does the heart behind them.
God has placed in my heart for as long as I can remember a deep compassion for others and a heart that loves to solve. A heart for the church and a heart for investing in others, doing all I can to help make other people's lives easier. It's taken me years to realize this within myself because the world tells us we should constantly be focusing on our lives and making our little kingdoms as glorious as they can be. But my passion is what it is, and it needs to be my direction instead of my detailed plan. Some of the coolest things in life didn't happen because of a plan, but because God willed them to happen. I need to make decisions to follow what gives me joy instead of following what success looks like to the world.
I haven't made any life-changing decisions and I'm still not sure what life my education has set me up for. I know I'll make my fair share of mistakes along the way and do things that fail. But with every decision I need to remind myself what my purpose is and if this decision is pulling me towards that passion or pulling me more towards glorifying myself.
My decisions don't need to be perfect to be right. My life doesn't have to look perfect to have purpose. And I don't need to overanalyze every move I make. Just find the next step in following what you're passionate about, and just do that. Even when it all seems intimidating and unattainable, find the next step and complete it.
We don't need to take huge leaps towards our dreams, we end up missing the journey that way.
Keep it simple - just find the next step and do it.
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