To Every Season, Turn, Turn

For someone who prays all the time I have a remarkable lack of faith. I’ve been on a seemingly endless treadmill of striving, yearning, reaching … I started out to make this observation about the last year or so, but that doesn’t quite encapsulate it. From the womb probably paints a more accurate picture. When have I not been looking ahead, worrying over the details of the journey, mapping it all out? Crumpled up on my floor recently, face swollen and puffy, choking in between sobs so much of my life came into focus. It became so clear to me why no amount of believing in a grand plan, that God loves me, that hard work pays off has ever been enough to help me sleep soundly through the night.

So much of my life is motivated by fear, even the very good parts. And it’s a fear not easily assuaged, because it’s the most insidious of all terrors: the fear of oneself. It’s not that I don’t trust God, it’s that I don’t trust me. I don’t even feel fundamentally unworthy, it’s more particular than that. And it’s not quite a self-esteem thing. It’s a specific, virulent strain of self-doubt that I think is extremely and all-too common among people my age, especially among rabid, Type-A overachievers like myself.

It occurs to me looking back at how over-involved I was in high school, how quickly I raced through college, and how at every stage of my life I was only focused on the next and getting there ahead of the curve, as quickly as possible that I have never in my life allowed myself to simply just “be”. That is the fear of myself. I am not unkind, I don’t laugh like an asthmatic moose, my body isn’t covered in scales, I am occasionally known to crack a funny and I bake a spectacular red-velvet cake. But it’s never been enough, not for me. So I just keep on pushing, running, studying, tossing and turning. Something has to give and I think it finally has. Or is starting to …

I have already slain many dragons in my own personal quest for “enoughness”. I’ve put down notions of being the end-all-be-all to some nonexistent perfect man, of being at the very top of my law school class, of wanting to work at the world's snootiest law firm, of having the most money, the best figure or the brightest smile. Luckily, other people give me a lot more leeway than I give myself, for which I am extremely grateful. It is always the perfectionist who is the furthest from it because the standard being applied is such a screwy one.

But I’m starting to live a life that feels like my own. I have a homey little apartment, a varied and spectacular set of friends, engaging classes, a baseball team in the playoffs and by the grace of the Lord and a hiring committee- a job. I’m actually going to be a lawyer! I don’t just see a light at the end of the tunnel, I am basking in it. The assurances that now surround me, in my daily life and not just from frantic phone calls to California [ed. note: thanks, Mom! And Frank! And Chloe!], are beginning to comfort me into loosening my grip. I’m settling into a life that isn’t white-knuckled and every day seems new. And while the litter from my Spectacular Parade of Neurosis will likely clog up my life's streets forever, I’m glad that things are evolving into a new place, or that I am.