Making Your Own Path

“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it's not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That's why it's your path.” 

~ Joseph Campbell

Right now, because of the coronavirus pandemic, many people are finding that their lives look very different than they expected. Whether it’s high school seniors who missed their graduations, professionals losing jobs they believed were secure, or adults in nursing homes who can’t see their loved ones anymore, everyone’s life has changed.

 

For a long time after I got sick, I was upset about the way my life looked. While I was still in college, my life was not what I thought the college life was supposed to be. I spent most of my time in bed: after class I would do my homework from bed until I fell asleep. I missed many campus events, barely saw my friends, and I certainly didn’t go to any parties. There were days when I was so frustrated this reality that I would cry just thinking about what my friends were doing.

 

Unfortunately, it didn’t get any easier once I left college. When I spent my final semester off campus on medical leave, I missed so many events I had dreamed of for my senior year. It wasn’t just the major events, it was the small things: the ability to be a senior advisor to the club I had directed for a year, the weeknights studying in my suite with my friends, spending late nights in the library finishing my thesis research.

 

Even after I graduated, my life still didn’t look like I thought it would. I always thought I would get a “good job” where I’d make a lot of money and live on my own. If I didn’t do that, I would spend a year hiking the Appalachian Trail while figuring out what I wanted to do with my life. Instead, I returned to the farm where I had worked previous summers to work part-time while spending most of my free time at doctors appointments.

 

Today, my life still doesn’t look like I imagined. I thought I would have a new job by now, or be hiking the Appalachian Trail. Due to coronavirus, I cancelled my trip (read more here), which while upsetting, I know was what I needed to do.

For the first time in a long time, I’m grateful my life doesn’t look like I imagined. I love my job- I love spending time with the people I work with, playing word games as we work or discussing our newest recipes with the fresh vegetables. I love mornings at the farm- how still the air is before a hot day, the way the whole world seems to be waiting for the first light of the sunrise, the way the whole sky turns pink when it finally rises. I love the work we do- I love working in the dirt to grow delicious food that I know is feeding people who enjoy it. I love spending my days outside. I love having free time to meditate, to read, to take online classes, and to write. I love living at home- spending time with my family, getting to see my friends from high school, and saving money for the future.

 

Beautiful moments at the farm-fresh beets and garlic flowers

I don’t know what my life will look like a year from now, or even three months from now. But for the first time, I’m not worried about it. I trust that I will find a way to live a meaningful life that I enjoy. I believe that I will find a way to pursue my passions and find joy in every day. I don’t want to look back on this year and realize that I spent the whole time wishing it was different. When I look back on this year, I want to know that I appreciated my life as I lived it.

 

I no longer feel pressure to have my life follow the classic “plan.” I don’t need to get what other people consider a good job. If everyone did that, nobody would ever do anything extraordinary. If I spend my whole life trying to follow an already existent path, I will never get to discover my own journey.