Back to life. Did you miss me?

It's been several months since my last entry, mostly because I could not access my blog in China. Even after I got back to Korea, I was too lazy to write. Afraid, perhaps, that I had forgotten how to.

I am finally back home in good ol' Tennessee, where the rows of cookie cutter suburban houses greet me with their perfectly mowed lawns. I am a bit disoriented and and even frustrated at not having a job, not knowing when I will get one, and most of all, not being able to do anything about it. Government jobs, think tank jobs, anything and everything else under the moon. No luck yet.

And all my pride, all my education, the little vanity I had left from my mistaken sense of self-accomplishment all came tumbling--no not just tumbling, but crashing down. I've been stripped down to a girl in a faded T-shirt, pimples, and enough energy to let out a couple of sighs a day.

It is human nature to compare and to dismay if the situation looks bleak. Since I am human, that is exactly what I did. I would look up message boards where people talked about applying to government jobs to no avail, and become discouraged by the unreal qualifications of the people who did make it through. The worst was when I stumbled across a high profile think tank website, where a classmate of mine had just been promoted to a policy analyst position. After only 2 years. Under her name was a list of 20 or more publications, all about Afghanistan and Pakistan, the two most important countries to the US at this time. You overachieving eager beaver, I scowled. It was hard for me to be happy for her when I was barely scraping by, applying to non-paid internships. I even thought of emailing her, but remembered that we hadn't ended on a good note. Who would have ever thought that would come and bite me in the butt?

But despite all these immature emotions and frustrations, I have learned, again, what it means to be patient and to wait with no real end in sight. To not know what lies ahead is one the most discouraging and exhausting feelings in the world. But this requires me, maybe against my own will, to stop relying on my own logic, intelligence, and achievements for an answer. I am broken and hungry for some peace and rest from the raging battle that is going on inside me. And when I call, He (and I mean the big G) brings times of refreshing to my soul. It is the only thing that keeps me going. (Apart from my mom's nagging, of course :P).

In His time, He says. So I wait. And I wait. Just waiting for some sign of movement.

Maybe there will be none. Or maybe in several months, years, when I have forgotten what it feels like to be distressed. All I can do now is to be obedient and continue searching for what my purpose is in life.