come and go

A rainy day in C-U.

I would like to be on top of things. I have this plan: spend the mornings keeping up with religion, education, and world news; spend lunchtime emailing people; spend the afternoons working on my dissertation proposal; exercise; dinner; then spend the evenings emailing, reading, watching movies; bed by midnight. Up at 8. That sounds nice, doesn't it?

If I told you the number of times I've made up a schedule for myself and then proceeded not to follow it, your head would explode.

Time to stop planning, time to start doing. I am so good at figuring out what I should be doing, but so bad at actually making those things happen. Maybe this is because doing what I know I should be doing means breaking some old habits, and this can be a rather difficult thing to do.

I am on the Religion and Peacemaking email list of the U.S. Institute of Peace, and yesterday I received an email advertising a job opening, dealing with (guess what) religion and peacemaking. And you know what? It sounded like just the kind of thing I'd like to do--and they were actually looking for somebody with a PhD! So I'm thinking that I should spend these next couple of years preparing myself for these kind of positions, which means bringing myself more in touch with what's going on in the world, and trying to gain some experience with interfaith groups locally. There are these dialogue institutes, too, like one at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, and I think I'd enjoy working for one of those.

The main thing here is this: I am not cut out to be a scholar. This is in part because I'm not particularly good at it, and in part because I'm just not that into it. I have thrived when I've been working with others, on projects that matter to us...I think of Student Life at CMU, I think of the Religious Studies Club at USF, I think of teaching...these are the things that make me feel most alive. I do not feel most alive when I am sitting by myself, trying to write a paper that hardly anyone will read. I like writing, but I don't really enjoy writing academically. I don't enjoy being a scholar for its own sake--I can only do it, I think, if it's directly in service of something 'practical.' I'm not knocking scholarship here--some of it is important--but it's not for me. I am surrounded by people here who actually should be scholars--fellow students, faculty--people who are good at it, and I can just see that it's not me.

And you know what? My mentor at USF knew this, 3 years ago. I remember him telling me that I shouldn't get a PhD--that I should go into something like politics, because my talent is working with people. He knew it. He knew I wasn't a scholar. He knew me better than I knew myself.

I think much of this past semester--maybe even this past year--has involved me coming to terms with who I am, in a number of ways. And part of this has been coming to terms with the fact that I've been on a path for the past 6 years that isn't exactly the best for me. I have always seen myself as a professor, a scholar, but why? I don't think I ever really stopped and considered whether it was really really what I wanted to do. I finally did this year, threw myself horribly off-balance, got awfully depressed more than a few times, but every time I felt hopeless, I think I brought myself closer and closer to the kind of life that would fulfill me. It's like I've been chipping away at the life I'd expected but didn't necessarily want, and building the life that I actually do want. It's a process, but I think I'm on the right track.