What If?

When I was thinking about how to begin this post, I was thinking about how another life altering decision has been made and how to properly tell it.  Tell it to remember how i'm feeling after finally figuring out the opening scene for the next act of my life.  Tell it to explain to those I care about just what i'm doing next.  Just what shenanegans I was going to pull this time.  It was when finally sitting down to write that I realized just how "life-altering" our choices, actions and decisions can be.

You realize that you could play the "what if" game for the rest of your life.  What if I wouldn't have gone to Ball State?  What if I would have lived in a different dormitory?  Taken different classes?  Had a different major?  What if I wouldn't have come to Korea?  Those "what ifs" make you step back and realize that even though the phrase "everything happens for a reason" is a bit cliche, it's true.  The steps you take and the moments you make are what makes life as unique as you are.

After reading a blog that one of my good friends suggested, a specific quote in a recent post resonated with me.  She says,"We all get attached to goals, to performance, to success and we end up over-committing, trying to please everyone and sometimes forgetting to just please ourselves.  Yes, life is short, but it is what it is.  We all need to slow down, to just be happy where we are for a minute, to breathe, to take in our surroundings, to be grateful for the gifts we have been given.  Life isn't about crossing your goals off your list, it is about loving every minute you are alive."     

She's right.  My life isn't about crossing yet another item off a list.  Figuring out the next step in my life.  Rushing to continue the process of growing up.  Thank you whoever you are for reminding me to enjoy the process of finding myself.  Whether it be in Korea, at grad school or another continent entirely.  Somehow in this process of living I forgot that i'm on a journey that at the end of the day only I have to be happy with. It's mine.  It's my journey and it will be what I make of it.  What I choose it to be.

While the next chapter of my life is yet to be planned, the next few pages finally are.  I have decided to go back to school when I come stateside this fall.  After two years away from the education that inspired me to be a teacher, I am finally ready to go back to school and inspire myself again.  I have hope that I will find the right school for me and prepare myself for the future that I know is somewhere ahead of me.

I still have yet to choose the schools to apply to or take the ever-intimidating GRE (sort of a graduate student's version of the SAT) but I still have time.  I have scheduled the appointment to take the test here in Korea this coming June and will hopefully garner a high enough score to get me into the school of my choice.  The next few months will be an interesting balance of studying and continuing to tackle life each day at a time.  Wish me luck!