Life Plans

I strongly suspect that at no point in my life have I ever experienced so many life-altering events in so short a time. At the time of my last update I was peaceably ensconced in a pleasant little world, bereft of anything more eventful than, well, deaths. Now, though, everything has changed.

No longer am I planning on attending graduate school to get a M.A. in European Studies--not immediately after graduation, anyway. It all changed on one fateful day in November.

Some may recall that last semester I took a course called "Introduction to Global Issues." My reason for taking it was the professor, rather than the subject matter. I had heard nothing but glowing opinions of her in my time here at college, and at the repeated urging of my friends, I decided to finally take a course with her. 

As anticipated, the course material itself was relatively straightforward. The information presented was not new excepting only its specificity-- I learned new terms, labels, and important individuals. Overall, I went to this class with the intention of enjoying myself and appreciating its international element. 

This fateful day was also largely affected by the fact that of late I have been exploring the precepts and ramifications of Christological Pacifism. These explorations have helped me to determine that I am, in fact, a pacifist, but I was not, at that time, so strongly convinced. Thus, I was reading A Faith Not Worth Fighting For in my spare time last fall; specifically, I was reading it last November. 

On this momentous November day, I was thoroughly entranced by the book. It is not an unusual occurrence for me to read whilst walking, and this day was no different. I walked into the classroom reading, and then I sat down reading, and I read, in fact, up until the very minute that the professor finally started to speak.

Right from the beginning it was apparent that this was not to be an ordinary class. She tended to begin our classes with a set of discussion prompts--questions to facilitate an interested and curious frame of mind. One of them was an inquiry into the nature of the main arguments supporting violence or condemning it, yet firmly within the context of Christian living. My hand shot up. After all, I had been reading a relevant book less than a minute prior. 

At her request, I answered the question to the best of my ability, while trying to keep my answer also brief--it is a very touchy and complicated issue, after all. 

The class went on, and the entire focus of the lecture was on conflict. As it happened, I was uncontested as the most globally-aware student in the course, so I was again able to participate in the discussion and summarize the conflicts which were ongoing at the time. 

This trend continued through the entire lecture. I stayed afterward to talk to the professor, and she told me something significant--she told me that if I was really so interested in conflict resolution, reconciliation, and peacemaking, then I should talk to one of her friends at World Vision. Prior to that moment it had not occurred to me that I would want to work for a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO). I had been set on going to grad school, after all! It was absurd. But, her idea stuck with me, and it resonated strongly. 

Over the next few days, several more isolated incidents occurred which all seemed to strongly indicate that I should seek a career in the field of International Development. I was absolutely aghast. Never in my entire life has anything seemed more clear to me, in fact--the sheer number of completely separated incidents which all led to various individuals telling me that I should work in development, or that I should look into peacemaking...either it is a conspiracy on a large scale, or I might actually be supposed to search for employment with an NGO. 

So, after that one talk with my professor, events began to snowball. I have since had many interactions with representatives of various NGOs, I have facilitated seminars and conferences on campus, and I have just returned from the Faith and International Development Conference out at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Perhaps I will write a new blog post about that in a few days. It would be refreshing to include my own opinion after the relatively objective article which I just wrote for the newspaper. Anyway, I digress. To return to my career change, I have actually just finished sending my resume of to a number of different NGOs. I have found a relevant job in Sarajevo which I want, and have already approached the organization to ask how I can work towards that goal. There are NGO leaders who know my name, and representatives who know my name, and I'm going to make sure that they know my college and my club. We are going to make a name for ourselves.

So, these last three months have seen a complete change of my plans, and it sits much, much better with me. To approach a profession in which I can tend to people--not their economic or medical needs, as I have learned that I am not qualified for either--to facilitate peace between them, has resulted in a strange and previously-absent sense of peace within me. Perhaps I have known subconsciously for a long time that I desired to make a career out of peace-building. Perhaps it stems from seeing the tensions between the Roma and the rest of Europe. Perhaps it is from seeing the tensions between Croats, Bosniaks, and Serbs. Perhaps it is from the United States and its saddening gun culture. Regardless of the reason, when my professor told me that I should approach a career in development, I realized immediately that it was the thing which I most wanted in the world, and it had just been granted to me.