This post started out as just one sentence in a cover letter for a job I was applying for. It progressed into a whirlwind of emotion and near panic.
When I was younger, I wanted to be Indiana Jones. Now that I’m a bit older, I’ve laser-focused my dream to travel writer. A broader idea…storyteller.
If I could be paid well for doing anything in the world (other than being a mom), I would choose to travel the world and tell stories.
I’ve worked for the same company since I was 28 years old. I’m an art director, graphic designer, social media marketer. I love research and I love creating. I’ve been sitting at the same desk for almost 20 years and as much as I enjoy what I do, it has slowly eaten away at my dream and my passion. It wasn’t always like this for me. Throughout junior high, high school, and college, I traveled the world. I told stories. I spoke in front of thousands of people…I was a traveling story teller. My life was built around relating to people, helping people, encouraging people to be hopeful and ultimately help them fall in love with being alive…fall in love with themselves…who they had been, who they are, and who they were going to be. I thrived on watching people’s countenance change in front of me from hopeless to hopeful – sadness to joy.
In my mid 20’s, I suffered damaging trauma and was no longer able to be and do what I had built my life doing. I tumbled into dark depression and began retreating from society. I gave up. Completely.
A man reached out to me and gave me a shot at becoming a graphic artist in his company and I took it. I’ve been with him ever since, learning, growing, and evolving into the career I have today. As the years pass, I’m still haunted and troubled by the events that brought me here. I am grateful for what I have and the opportunities that were given to me but decades of fulfillment were taken from me and I grieve for that stolen part of my life.
To lay it all out on the table, I want more. My daughter was born and I adopted her in 2011. She’s 7 years old now. She is my drive to do better…to be better. I promised her birthparents that I would work for the rest of my life to give her what they couldn’t and I will…but there’s so much more that I want to give her. There’s so much more that I want to teach her. Our conversations at dinner revolve around business plans and brainstorming ideas to create opportunities for us to “travel, go on adventures, and help people”. That’s us. I haven’t been able to do that in the way that I want at the job I currently have so I have been researching, planning, and working on creating a job for myself so we CAN do these things. I figured, if I can’t find one out there that exists already, then I’m going to have to create it.
Fear is a monster. It has held me back for so many years. Even now as I type this, I think about finally taking the step to make our dreams happen and how I’m going to pay the bills and put food on the table. All I can hear in my mind is “you take the steps and leave the ‘hows’ to God”. It is daunting and I am afraid. I am reminded of how I wanted to be Indiana Jones…
I suppose now is my chance. But what next? WHAT DO I DO? I’m terrified.
I feel scattered. Do I stay at my job and work on building something new? I’ve been trying to do that for years. Do I quit my job and use my time to build something new? How do bills get paid? How do I take care of my kid?
How do I trust that the great God of the Universe is going to be there when I take that step?