So, after a long, prayerful process, guided by mentors, filled with encouragement of friends from all over, I've decided to leave Denver Seminary and the counseling program after this semester, aka in three weeks. If you're interested in the story, I'd be happy to share it with you over a beverage of your choice. Anyhow, it begs the question, What next?

What do I want to do when I grow up?

What a great question. One to which I wish I knew the answer.

It's funny.

First, I wanted to be a meteorologist.
And then a marine biologist.
And then a journalist.
And then a bioethicist.
And then a lawyer and politician.
And then a music teacher.
And then an abolitionist.
And then a counselor.

And now I'm finding that I don't really want to be any of those things.

I mean, I could start a whole other list.

Coffee-shop owner.
Worship leader.
Pianist.
Businesswoman.
Overseas missionary.
Administrator.
Wife.
Mom.
Campus minister.
Professional Scrabble player.

But I don't want to do anything, per se. I just want to be.

But how do you do that in a world that insists on defining yourself by what you do?

And furthermore, how do you reconcile the incongruence between being who God made you to be but also needing to pay bills? What does that look like this side of heaven?

Work has been broken in life after Eden. Instead of allowing us to express our identity as the Image-Bearers of God, it has become our identity. One that is suffocating. Like a noose around our necks. Every major or career I've pursued thus far has felt like it expresses certain parts of me but chokes out others.

Maybe I'm asking the wrong questions.

Maybe it's not about finding the dream job.

Maybe it really is being. Being grateful. Being present. Being alive. And accepting the incongruence of work after the Fall. Living in tension. Sigh.

It doesn't answer my question. But is it an answer I really need? To use the counseling cliche "the process is the point." Sigh.