What do Rolling a Kayak and Applying to the Peace Corps Have in Common?
I'm going to be blogging for the website time4thinkers off and on over the next few years, about my Peace Corps experience. For those of you who don't know, time4thinkers is an awesome youth-focused website maintained by the Christian Science church with lots of inspirational resources - such as blog posts. Here's my first post for them, published a little while ago, about my Peace Corps application process (and yes, rolling a kayak). You can read it on the site at: http://time4thinkers.com/is-your-life-plan-on-course/.
Is your life plan on course?
Have you ever done any white-water kayaking? My younger brother started to teach me this summer. When going through rapids, a kayaker first plans his “line,” or route, around rocks and other hazards. But even if the line is well-planned, it is possible that something will catch the kayaker off-guard and he will find himself flipped over by the current.
Life can be like that too, can’t it? One minute we can feel sure of the direction we’re going, and the next, something catches us off-guard and disrupts our plan. As a student of Christian Science, I’ve learned that God is Love, and as Love, God has a loving plan for my life. I may feel like I’ve hit some rocks along the way, but even if my route seems disrupted, Love’s remains intact. This higher “line” for my life, and everyone’s, is actually obstacle-free—which we see as we yield to Love in prayer.Sometimes, though, that can be easier in theory than in practice.
For the past year, I’ve been applying to join the Peace Corps. Early in the process I was told that I would be likely to go to French-speaking Africa in November to do an agriculture assignment. I got really attached to this idea—it sounded perfect for me! I even made plans to leave my job based on this timeline.
But near the end of the summer, I got a form e-mail from the Peace Corps informing me that, because of budget cuts and other factors, I was very unlikely to get this original assignment. Instead, I would likely leave much later than expected and would need to be flexible about the type of work I would do. The email also told me that since the Peace Corps was getting more competitive, I was not necessarily guaranteed a spot. Nothing about my future was as certain as I’d thought. I felt like I’d been smoothly kayaking down a river, confident of my route, but that I’d suddenly been flipped!
During my summer kayaking lessons with my brother, one of the main skills he taught me was how to roll the kayak. Once a kayaker learns how to roll, they can quickly right their boat when flipped. Although it’s ideal to stay upright the whole time, flipping really only needs to be a momentary disruption. Learning how to roll initially seemed daunting to me, but my brother told me not to worry. Anyone can do it, and it doesn’t require much physical strength. All I needed to do was learn the principles of how to roll a kayak, and then apply them.
When practicing how to roll, it was very tempting to panic while underwater. I wanted to strain towards the surface with my head so I could breathe! Actually, though, this was the opposite of what I should do. In order to successfully roll the kayak, I had to keep my head down and use my hips and paddle to right the boat. When I strained my head towards the surface, this actually kept the boat upside down and I’d have to be rescued by my patient brother. But if I remained calm and used the rules I’d been taught, the boat would right quickly with very little effort.
I found this lesson useful when I got that disappointing letter from the Peace Corps. I was tempted to get anxious and try to figure what was going to happen next. I realized, however, that as in kayaking, I had to “keep my head down”—not frantically try to figure things out myself, but instead trust that the principles I knew would help me regain my stability.
These principles are actually laws of Love that guarantee stability in life. The one I found most helpful at that moment is that God and Principle are synonymous. God is the only Principle governing our lives, and this means we can experience nothing unlike God’s goodness. In other words, goodness isn’t just wishful thinking or optimism. It’s unchanging law—as reliable and irrefutable as math. I didn’t know exactly what my next few years would look like, but I could know without a doubt that every moment would be a blessing. These simple truths did help me “right my boat” and regain my confidence in the future, and over the next several months, I reminded myself of them whenever I was tempted to feel concerned.
I did finally get an official invitation to join the Peace Corps: I’ll be leaving in June for an environmental assignment in Benin, a French-speaking country in West Africa! And some wonderful opportunities have opened up to fill the time between now and then. I still don’t know exactly what my two years in Africa will be like, but I’m confident that the principles that helped me through the application process will support me while I’m there, as well.
What do you do when something disrupts your plans for the future? Are there any spiritual ideas or principles that help you regain your peace and confidence?
Is your life plan on course?
Have you ever done any white-water kayaking? My younger brother started to teach me this summer. When going through rapids, a kayaker first plans his “line,” or route, around rocks and other hazards. But even if the line is well-planned, it is possible that something will catch the kayaker off-guard and he will find himself flipped over by the current.
Life can be like that too, can’t it? One minute we can feel sure of the direction we’re going, and the next, something catches us off-guard and disrupts our plan. As a student of Christian Science, I’ve learned that God is Love, and as Love, God has a loving plan for my life. I may feel like I’ve hit some rocks along the way, but even if my route seems disrupted, Love’s remains intact. This higher “line” for my life, and everyone’s, is actually obstacle-free—which we see as we yield to Love in prayer.Sometimes, though, that can be easier in theory than in practice.
For the past year, I’ve been applying to join the Peace Corps. Early in the process I was told that I would be likely to go to French-speaking Africa in November to do an agriculture assignment. I got really attached to this idea—it sounded perfect for me! I even made plans to leave my job based on this timeline.
But near the end of the summer, I got a form e-mail from the Peace Corps informing me that, because of budget cuts and other factors, I was very unlikely to get this original assignment. Instead, I would likely leave much later than expected and would need to be flexible about the type of work I would do. The email also told me that since the Peace Corps was getting more competitive, I was not necessarily guaranteed a spot. Nothing about my future was as certain as I’d thought. I felt like I’d been smoothly kayaking down a river, confident of my route, but that I’d suddenly been flipped!
During my summer kayaking lessons with my brother, one of the main skills he taught me was how to roll the kayak. Once a kayaker learns how to roll, they can quickly right their boat when flipped. Although it’s ideal to stay upright the whole time, flipping really only needs to be a momentary disruption. Learning how to roll initially seemed daunting to me, but my brother told me not to worry. Anyone can do it, and it doesn’t require much physical strength. All I needed to do was learn the principles of how to roll a kayak, and then apply them.
When practicing how to roll, it was very tempting to panic while underwater. I wanted to strain towards the surface with my head so I could breathe! Actually, though, this was the opposite of what I should do. In order to successfully roll the kayak, I had to keep my head down and use my hips and paddle to right the boat. When I strained my head towards the surface, this actually kept the boat upside down and I’d have to be rescued by my patient brother. But if I remained calm and used the rules I’d been taught, the boat would right quickly with very little effort.
I found this lesson useful when I got that disappointing letter from the Peace Corps. I was tempted to get anxious and try to figure what was going to happen next. I realized, however, that as in kayaking, I had to “keep my head down”—not frantically try to figure things out myself, but instead trust that the principles I knew would help me regain my stability.
These principles are actually laws of Love that guarantee stability in life. The one I found most helpful at that moment is that God and Principle are synonymous. God is the only Principle governing our lives, and this means we can experience nothing unlike God’s goodness. In other words, goodness isn’t just wishful thinking or optimism. It’s unchanging law—as reliable and irrefutable as math. I didn’t know exactly what my next few years would look like, but I could know without a doubt that every moment would be a blessing. These simple truths did help me “right my boat” and regain my confidence in the future, and over the next several months, I reminded myself of them whenever I was tempted to feel concerned.
I did finally get an official invitation to join the Peace Corps: I’ll be leaving in June for an environmental assignment in Benin, a French-speaking country in West Africa! And some wonderful opportunities have opened up to fill the time between now and then. I still don’t know exactly what my two years in Africa will be like, but I’m confident that the principles that helped me through the application process will support me while I’m there, as well.
What do you do when something disrupts your plans for the future? Are there any spiritual ideas or principles that help you regain your peace and confidence?
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