Part 3: Self-Knowledge

Now, I don't pretend to know anything about the second half of life. I'm not there yet. If you look at things in terms of years, I guess around 35 you'd be reaching the top of the mountain, so to speak. So, I still have a good seven years to go. Seven more years to keep "buliding my tower", to keep searching for my identity, and further define my place in the world. These past three years in Montreal have definitely been full of that.

We came out here in order to explore and further form our identites as individuals and as a family. At the end of this time, I'd say we definitely got what we were hoping for. However, I'd also say that such things did not come at the rate or in the quantity that I myself originally hoped for. I think Lauren might say something similar for herself. To give a personal example, self-knowledge was something I avidly pursued the entire time we've been out here. I've continually been thirsty to know who I really am and what I am to do in this life, and I've hoped that this time in Montreal would provide the answers I was looking for. I've pondered quotes like Howard Thurman's, "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive" And then later Frederick Buechner's impossible yet awe-inspiring line, "The place where God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." And I've asked God, really? Is that really true? Is there such a place for me in this world?