It has been three years since I last blogged. Due mainly to the "interesting" accommodations (and village) I endured during a year working at a slightly unethical Korean university, I developed critical health issues that could have ended my life journey completely. Instead, it is my world journey that has indefinitely been put on hold, but that in and of itself has become a new journey.
One of the common personal narrative prompts I assign to the students whom I tutor is "Describe a turning point in your life." My students are young (middle to high school aged), and many of them have yet to seriously consider this issue of their life journey. Most students cite their experiences transitioning from Korean school culture to American school culture - a big change in any child's life, to be sure.
As adults, however, it becomes more challenging to mark the points where our journey changes course. One journey ends, and another begins, right? Or do we walk on the edges of parallel journeys? As adults, we tend to categorize our experience into boxes: LOVE LIFE, FAMILY, CAREER, FRIENDS, BELIEFS, ETHICS, etc. These boxes, however do not actually exist. A journey instead comprises of several "trips" that intersect and weave together into long stretches of time and space. They cannot be separated into convenient categories of experience.
My journey of late has been more desert than oasis, but I have learned something - endurance. You never knows how strong you are until you have had everything important in your life taken away. Lovers, careers, friends...POOF! All gone in a blink. What is left to live for? On the surface - nothing. Dig deeper, though, and you will find that if you just KEEP MOVING, you will learn to endure. In the desert, it is best to run over the hot sand so that you do not get burned. If you run far enough, you will make it to the next oasis, but you need to keep running, even if you are "running on empty."
My current journey began during the summer of 2007.
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