Why it's not a good idea to hold onto something good once you've got it

It was finals week, and I didn't want to leave campus. I thought I was insane. (I still think so because my life is so normal right now that I find myself wishing I was back at BU and stressed out––but that's a whole other problem.)

Coming home two weeks ago I was sad, and I don't get sad. I was tempted to just write it off; I thought, Jacqui, you're being dramatic. You're just tired. And while it's true, I was tired, and my world was not ending so there's no need to be a drama queen, I feel like feelings do have a purpose. There's something to be said for just letting yourself feel, which I really, really don't like to do. So here we go:

I have a great thing going in Boston. People, people, people who are incredible and I love and who have, in the past two years, let me become who I am. I know what classes I should be taking and I'm excited about them. I know what "opportunities" I have to get involved in for career development or whatever and I like it all. COM has a basement full of camera equipment that I love having access to. Boston as a city is amazing, my favorite, I can't get enough of it.

I'm home for the summer. I'm going abroad for a whole year. I'm an idiot.

But I'm slowly coming to terms with the fact that I'm not a fool for doing something new for a year. Objectively, duh, it's a great idea. But it hurts. I don't want to meet new people (I don't want to make new friends). My life is full right now; I don't want more in it (I'm afraid to start over for a year).

At the end of this semester, I realized that I felt okay for once. For the first time in a long time I felt like my life was not desperately lacking some crucial element. There was peace, there was joy, I was content. Isn't this a bad time to peace out for twelve months, when things are getting good? I'll miss so much!

And obviously I only felt this way because I was faced with the prospect of leaving it for a year. I think that often we opt to not choose gratitude right away because it's hard to look something good in the face that you don't think you deserve, but acknowledge that you have it. So we decide to ignore it until we think we deserve it––but that time never comes.

All this is to say that it's hard for me to turn my back on a good situation once I've realized I have it. I imagine myself as Scrat from Ice Age. Oo, these are good nuts. I think I'll keep them.

I'm afraid that I won't walk into another place of good-that-I-didn't-deserve; I don't actually know how to get there. Last time I tried to figure it out myself, I got where I thought I wanted to go, but I was beat up and exhausted and it wasn't quite right.

I'm realizing peace and joy are like this: Imagine you're Scrat, and you see what looks like your nut at the bottom of a giant cliff. You're not a flying squirrel, and you're only 62% sure that's actually your nut down there, but you're going to jump anyways, because what other choice do you have? Plus, you're the idiot that lost your nut in the first place, so you better fix this mess yourself. But then Papa Squirrel shows up and is like Here, this is better than the nut you lost. Please take it and don't go after that one down there, because you're not going to make it anyways. Trust me.

I think my fear of leaving a good thing says something more about what I believe about the source of peace and joy in my life than it does the circumstances themselves, though. Don't I trust the Father to lead me toward this end always? Apparently not.

It's hard for a matter of theology to be articulated in the blog post of a 20-year-old, so I apologize, but I do know that my daily experience with my own brain, my anxiety, nausea, tension in my muscles, and heartbeat rises and falls on this one matter: that God is good and He is for me.

Ignoring the ridiculousness of my Ice Age analogy for one more moment: Simply accepting the good nut offered to me has always been an option. But I normally don't say, Okay--because I think I'll enjoy it more once I deserve it. But that will never happen. And really, humility and gratitude have a funky taste at first, but then they're amazing. (Which is exactly like kombucha, by the way.)

So right now, I have a good thing, but I'm going to drop it temporarily for something that I can't guarantee will be as wonderful because I've only read itineraries and heard facts about a program. Each year this is true, though, isn't it? I see my class schedule online, I get emails from professors and bosses, I text my friends, I buy pillows for my dorm room. But none of this guarantees the quality of life I'll find.

I can't walk forward believeing that I'll be met with His peace and joy because I deserve it this time, because I don't. But I didn't at the beginning of the last year either and that didn't stop Him. So I do know that I can safely get off my butt and accept that whatever I get into, it won't be a bad nut.

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(But if you are asking yourself ¿POR QUE, JACQUI????: Romans 5:1-11, Romans 8:15 and 37-39, 1 John 4:18, Psalm 117, 118....to start)