At my college, I wrote and received a grant for “vocational discernment”. That was a tradition, in the past, where people tried to decide if they were called to religious life, i.e. monk, priest, nun, etc. The Protestant reformation, with it’s notion of the priesthood of the believer, altered the view of discernment to say that we are all called to something. So, I have peer mentors who are working with new students to help them discern. Well, we don’t say it quite that way, what we do say is “what are you going to be when you grow up?” And then, we add to the process by asking, “what makes your heart happy when you do it?”
A dear friend spoke at my college recently about this very subject and without us speaking about it, she used those very words “do what makes your heart happy and get paid for it”. She and I have been friends for 30 years, when she was training for the Olympic trials in cycling. Her life story is one of ongoing discernment, to find what makes her heart happy. And for her it was and is teaching. It was not her first choice but it is where the path led.
I am right there with my friend Julie Ann. I am a teacher, but I have not always been a teacher. I have practiced social work for 40 years and have had the most varied and glorious experiences. I am very fortunate. But, about those same thirty years ago, field placement students started telling me that I was making good sense to them and that I should teach social work. That changed my path and put me on a very different road to higher education.
As Julie Ann told our students, there is a best path. It does not mean that any path that leads us to love God, neighbor, and self is a bad path, for that is what we are all called to. No, my friend was making the point that if we will set aside what we want, what we think we should do or should be and see where we are being led, we will find that thing that makes our hearts happy. She also made a powerful point we all need to hear…..even when we are on that perfect, best path, totally where God wants us to be, there is no guarantee that bad things won’t happen, that there won’t be storms to weather. The promise is we don’t have to walk the path alone.
For me, that is totally true. I started to teach at a university and crossed paths with a rather vindictive department chair who decided I was not what they wanted in the department (in spite of being voted Teacher of the Year my last year in the department). I just knew I would never teach again and for 12 years, I didn’t teach. Then, the path turned and I came full circle to the place I know I am called to every day, my little historically Black college. This makes my heart happy and I get paid for it.
So, can you see your path? Looking back is the only way to see the winding path and understand all of the events that got you where you are but you cannot always be looking back. The African word “sankofa” carries the meaning I want you to hear, the notion that looking back is a good way to remember our roots and to recall our history. All of those twists and turns tell us something about God’s involvement in our lives. The path ahead is not for us to know. As my brother reminds me from time to time, whatever path you find yourself on, light your candle and follow it.
So, are you on the path to your first, best destiny? Is your heart happy? Can you see those things that led you to where you are now and the hand of God not directing you but supporting you as you discern? That is what it means to be a contemplative.
TMM