Real Life Conversations: College, Transitions, and Delicious Ambiguity

College and the transition out can be a difficult one – a thousand questions, resumes, and loans due becomes a pressure cooker that can turn even the pinkest of college grads into something burnt. I know, as I experienced what felt like years roasting on the burning coals of the “real world.”

Below is a real, honest back-and-forth between a college senior and myself as we sort through college, transitions, and delicious ambiguity.

THE COLLEGE SENIOR

Paul,

College is an interesting place. The social pressures here are crazy. Every social action is under a microscope, or so it seems.

I have wonderful, amazingly beautiful, and fun roommates. I have lovely classes. I am blessed to be numbered in the top 5 % of the world’s population. The Lord has given me life, hope, talent, and creativity. He has given me Love.

And yet, sometimes things are not so simple as I transition to leave what I have called home for the last four years. I just feel like I have a million questions, fears, and doubts. Most of all, I have been feeling lonely. And slowly, I am realizing that maybe that is what the Lord wants of me right now, to sit in the rhythm of loneliness. He, after all, probably has felt lonelier than any of us ever could.

Things are good, and weird, and life is just that.

Thanks for listening as I sort this out.

ME – THE TWENTYSOMETHING

Sara,

I wish I could have expressed my thoughts with this kind of clarity as a senior in college. As I neared the collegiate finish line four years ago, I also began seriously wrestling with those HUGE doubts, fears, and questions of where am I going, where is God and how is he involved in this life?

And while those questions aren’t easy, they are GOOD. God will meet you in this place of difficult questioning. He’s not your Aunt Edna, blushing and changing the subject when the conversation turns the slightest bit uncomfortable. God’s not as easily offended as we make him out to be. So ask away just make sure you keep your ears open to hear what he has to say– even if it’s something you didn’t quite expect.

THE VOID OF LONELINESS

This place of questioning can and will be a very lonely place. Sometimes painfully, undeniably, unrelentingly so. But you’re right, there’s something of strange importance that takes place in us when we are stripped of all the things that used to keep us company.

But don’t allow loneliness to become isolation. Don’t pull your head inside your shell thinking only you can protect yourself. That’s a mistake I made for far too long.

No, invite a friend or two over for dinner. Talk, laugh once or twice – even if it’s forced, and before the meal is served you might just notice they’re chewing on the same questions you are. And at that moment of honest conversation, you will see light in the dark and dusty corners.

DELICIOUS AMBIGUITY

“Some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity…” – Gilda Radner

So here you are, in this time of certain uncertainty, this season of delicious ambiguity. As the water rushes over your head and as you feel this might just be the time you actually drown, let me be the first to assure you that you won’t. No, in the end you will find a better way to breathe.

Paul