The Road Less Travelled

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference

-Robert Frost

 

With classes finishing in April, the final component of my program is a 200 hour practicum placement in a field of work I'm interested in. Its similar to an internship where I get to implement everything I've learned these past four years into a professional work setting. However, I don't get paid, in fact, this course is worth six credits so I actually have to pay to do this and to graduate.

 

It's been a fairly long process as I had started applying for this student placement (before I left Korea for my abroad experience in fact) as you are suppose to do it a year in advance before your final year of courses. I feel I've always known where I wanted to do this practicum, but I never really looked into it until the beginning of this term. I had my hopes up with one ideal place, but that fell through, and it took a while before I figured out what I really wanted to pursue as a career. I still remember how much joy I found when I discovered a job description and title that had my name written all over it. It was so me, it seemed so achievable, and could I dare say it was my calling? 

 

Without giving this job title away, jobs in this field were actually harder to obtain than I thought as most people under this job title worked in boutique firms and pretty much ran their own show with their fairly small team of assistants, so I didn't find any open doors on my own in terms of my student placement. 

 

So a little background info...

 

My adviser is one of the sweetest and most positive lady on this planet. Nothing could ever go wrong in her book and she is always so on top of things. She's the coordinator of every student's practicum and has a few tricks up her sleeves in the networking and professional world. So to speed this story up, my adviser found me a couple of potential placements and I had finally narrowed it down to two, but knowing me, I couldn't choose between option A and option B. Both had pros and cons. Both were ideal. Both  lacked what the other had. Both had what the other didn't. 

 

I kept pushing my decision deadline and I just couldn't decide at all. Since the end of Fall Break last week I decided to surrender the options to God. He knows best, and I asked Him to show me loud and clear which route He wanted me to pursue. I was just too bias in my own head to make a decision. A few friends I had mentioned it to told me to pursue Option A: away from Edmonton, a corporate company, had the tendency to hire, offered potential career advancements, and was a huge focus on my marketing minor-advertising. The only drawback was a lack of fashion, whereas Option B: had a large component of fashion and was under the job title I wanted to pursue, but I would be situated in Edmonton, work under one major person (though I would gain the tricks of the trade being mentored one on one), and I wasn't sure about any career advancements or having any job security in this picture, as this person I would be working under only has a part-time position in this option.

 

For the longest time, I honestly thought I knew what I wanted. I guess having had the intention to leave Edmonton, parental ideals of wanting me to be job-secure, and going through a 'quarter life crisis earlier (read all about it here), I personally thought option A would be better for me. Despite this justification, I was so unsettle about the lack of fashion. When I thought about seriously considering Option B and what I would gain from it, I was unsettled about it too because the future seem so blurry afterwards. I just kept hopping back and forth the fence these past few days and wishing I could just do both, but this isn't a multiple choice test where option C is all of the above. 

 

Well Saturday came and a dear sic of mine was sharing at E3C so I went to support her. She's always been a confident and humorous speaker so I knew she would nail it. I just didn't know she would nail the answer right in my heart during her speech. Her speech was the tipping point of my decision and I just knew right there and then, sitting in that second row, where God wanted me to be. She talked about how God is the only one who knows what you are going through, that we should seek our maker who knows us best, rather than try to fix what we think are just petty problems ourselves-just like how you would go to the cell phone manufacturer/company to complain about a malfunction than figure it out on your own, and that it really takes faith for you to know what you don't know because God always Always ALWAYS knows. 

 

To move in faith you must be willing to be uncomfortable. Faith is not comfortable. Faith is always outside of your comfort zone -Jaeson Ma

It's amazing when you seek and ask God for help because He always answers. In this case, through bits and pieces of my friend's speech, the above quote, and God-cidences, I chose the road less traveled. Despite many people telling me to opt for Option A, a connection I probably would've never made on my own (PTL for advisers) and gain an experience like no other with a internationally known corporate company, I finally realized I was leaning towards it for the wrong reasons. Yes, it would be wonderful to  get hired from an internship, settle in a new city, and have the prosperous pay, but it all went back to why I'm studying what I'm studying. I never enrolled in Human Ecology for the money in the first place, I never decided on studying this program to get me somewhere big (though it be nice if it did happen), and I realized that I didn't want to go for a job just to feel comfortable and secure. 

 

Instead, as hard as it may be as I'm saying this, I think the prospect of being insecure, of stepping out in faith, of allowing God to reveal his glorious plans for me through Option B would be better. Whose to say that God won't bring another corporate opportunity my way again? Whose to say I can't network in a wee little city like Edmonton? I did. When I was sitting on the fence with my decision. I'm sick of doubting and taking control of my life, so from here on, God is going to take the wheel before I swerve and and crash on the road more taken. I'm not going to leave skid marks where everyone else has, instead, I will pave my direction through Him who leads.

 

Let's see where this takes me.