Failure to Launch

Have you ever thrown a paper airplane, watched it fly for a few seconds and then nosedive to the floor? Or have you ever seen a video of a rocket taking off and then shooting straight back to the ground? I feel like that is a perfect description of how adulthood has gone for me so far. I recently read an article about the reality of postgrad depression and how it isn’t talked about much. It’s true, and I think it applies to a lot of people in this stage of life that can be referred to as “emerging adulthood.”

 At this time last year, I was trying to push through the last few months of grad school and applying for jobs like crazy. I couldn’t wait to get home and “start my life.” My time away from home had proven to be lonely and full of challenges. So, I desperately wanted to secure a job back home in order to have something to look forward to. However, I wasn’t just applying for any jobs; I was ambitious. You see, I had a vision of what I thought my life was going to look life after grad school. I had it all planned out in my head. I had done this previously and planned out my grad school experience, and when that didn’t turn out like I hoped it would, I thought for sure the rest of my life would go as planned. Something had awakened inside of me when I became a social work major my junior year of college. Suddenly, I had so many hopes and dreams for the future. I wanted to do EVERYTHING. I was on fire and throwing myself into everything social work-related at my school and in my community. I figured I would go off to grad school for a year, thrive and shine in the program, get my degree, and come home and be the BEST social worker there ever was. I didn’t want to get an “ordinary” social work job, as in working at the same agencies a lot of my classmates worked at. I wanted to stand out and do something different. So, I applied for positions for programs that were just starting and looked for every unique opportunity I could find. Apart from my career, my true passion is girls’ ministry. My friends and I had started a ministry for preteen girls when we were in high school and had planned and hosted conferences and retreats every year since then. The ministry seemed to be growing and we had so many ideas for the future. Moving away for a year kind of threw a kink into the plans, but I figured it would be fine. I would get my degree and come back and jump back into the ministry, picking up where I left off and watching it grow instantly. I would live with my parents for a couple of months and then move into my new apartment. Oh, and I would find a new church family closer to where I would be living. I had two churches in mind that I would visit, and I was sure it would only take about a month to decide which one I would stick with. In the midst of all these big changes, I would absolutely soar and be an incredible social worker. Doesn’t that sound like a dream? An excellent plan?

The rocket launched in May of 2019 and came crashing down just a few weeks later.

What I didn’t factor into my plan was the fact that I have always had an extremely difficult time with change of any kind. For the first time in my life, I wouldn’t be a student. I would be transitioning out of what was the hardest, most mentally and physically straining year I have ever experienced and coming down from a crazy ten-month long adrenaline rush. Though I had two degrees and a head filled with new knowledge and experience, I still had SO very much to learn. If I had considered these things, I could have thought through them and prepared myself. It has taken me several months to realize that pride was in the way. I thought I could do it all and I was ready to be great. A friend recently referred to it as “rushing success” and constantly being focused on what’s next. Proverbs 16:18 says “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” I had good intentions. If you had told me I was being prideful, I probably would have been offended and appalled that you would suggest such a thing. But that’s exactly what happened.

Instead of everything going according to script, God allowed the script to be torn to pieces. He allowed my physical and mental health to spiral down into a place where I could no longer function. He allowed me to fail and feel the pain of disillusionment and rejection. He allowed me to be lonely and seemingly unable to connect with people no matter how I tried. None of it made sense and it made me angry. WHY would God allow these things to happen after such a hard year? Why wouldn’t He let things work out the way I wanted them to for once? Was it really too much to ask?

I am slowly beginning to realize that, just like always, God knew my plan beforehand. He knew what it would lead to in the long run. More than that, He had a plan that was much, much better than anything I could dream up in my head. He knew I wasn’t going to take the time to slow down like I needed to, so He basically forced me to. He humbled me and reminded me that I still have so much to learn before I could take off running and make all kinds of mistakes because I thought I knew what I was doing. The process has been pretty awful. Over the past several months, I have done a lot of sleeping, crying, questioning, and just trying to survive each day. I spent a lot of time thinking my life was over and wondering if I even wanted to live if it was going to be like this. I’ve said the words “I hate my life” more than I’d like to admit.

We live in such a fast-paced society that I think a lot of us, especially at my age, buy into the idea that we need to hurry up and do great things because time is running out. There is always something happening, and we don’t just need to keep up, we need to stay ahead. We look around and see our peers getting married, having kids, progressing in their career, and other great things and feel like a failure in comparison. It can be so discouraging when “right now” isn’t what we ultimately want.

Even as I type this, I’m still in a waiting period. There are so many things unsolved in my heart and things are not set in place that I thought would be months ago. Every day is a new learning experience. I am discovering that I need to slow down and value the things I am learning during this time. I am not defined by the opinions of others or my progress compared to someone else’s. Every individual’s journey is unique and there is no right or wrong way to grow; it just happens. Mistakes are okay. Failure is okay. Mental illness does not subtract from our worth or disqualify us from doing great things. It’s all in the way we respond and move forward. Several years ago, I heard this quote at a conference: “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” I have never found this to be truer than right now. The past few months of what I saw as destruction were really just God breaking up my faulty foundations and laying a new, firm one. This perspective changes everything and I am so grateful for the process, as painful as it can be.

This song has been speaking to me a lot the past few days...

https://youtu.be/VQkHD15J7HI