Friday, March 12, 2010

Final Women's Studies Reflection

Who am I?

After ten weeks (and 19 years) of pondering, it is my most sincere hope that I will never be able to answer this question with finality. By answering, I become stagnant; limit myself to the whims, dogmas, and fanciful views of a current paradigm. But that is incomplete. Who I am is not definitive, it is not singular, and it is not without fluidity. I am constantly changing, I am we, I am you, I am me, I am now, I am then, I am here, I am there, I am up, I am down, I am, I am not. All of these things are (were, will always be) true. And as long as I am asking this question, I am alive.

Where am I going?

Before, I needed to go where I wanted. Now, I want to go where I am needed. This summer, I have the opportunity to experience Uganda. But I do not see myself as going there so much as I see it coming to me. I am going wherever I am needed, and the more I acknowledge this, the more needs seem to come to me. I am going where there is injustice. To all the places I would not want to be from. I am sometimes going here; I am sometimes going elsewhere. But regardless, I am going. The where will reveal itself upon arrival.

Women's studies and my vocation:

…are inseparable. I want to live helping women. I want to create a shelter, a haven, an oasis for women who have been battered by life, bruised by its participants, and torn by the shame of their scars. I want to travel to the forgotten corners of the world and be constantly reminded that I know nothing of pain. I want to teach women and men to find common ground in their individuality. I want to have a job where at the end of the day, I am rewarded with smiles, joy and incomparable unity.

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