An Open Future

I feel like the name of this blog is perfect for me because sometimes I just go for weeks and months on end without posting and then I come back like HEY SO GUYS like no time's passed at all. 😅😂

But anyways. Guys. I got my diploma in the mail, like, a month ago come Saturday. Let's just say it softened the blow of not being accepted to grad school. Can't go to grad school this semester but hey, at least I can now prove that I finished my BA last semester, right?

And I'll have you know, I only cried like five times in the 7 or so hours after I found out about not being accepted. 😅😭😳😶

This made me reevaluate basically my whole life. "What now?" I asked myself. I have a mini fridge in the living room, a microwave, and a cool Ninja blender (that I have been using the entire time during this year's 21 Day Challenge a.k.a. Daniel Fast 2.0, btw). I have some money saved up in the bank, my own debit card, a cool smartphone, and a bunch of big dreams. What am I supposed to do now?

See, I had the whole next 4-5 months planned out. Go to grad school. Take classes. Hang with my best friends. Stay up way too late doing assignments and studying, drinking coffee and laughing with awesome people. Cry my eyes out during chapel services, pray like I never had before with people in my age group. All that's basically out the window for now. I have at least 6 months to do... what?

So, I basically sat down with my questions and tried to figure out what I want to do with my life. What do I want to do career-wise? There are a few things, but one thing I think would be pretty stinkin' fantastic is this: Write. I want to write. I wanna write fiction. I want to "live by my pen" as Anne Hathaway said in her role as Jane Austen in the movie "Becoming Jane." How do I do that? Well, first off, I gotta write. I gotta edit the mess out of my work. I gotta make it publishable. Next step, publish the work. Market the work. Get paid for the work. Aaaaaand repeat until I can either live off of writing or live off it and some kind of other part-time or full-time job.

Sidenote: I love my job, absolutely love it. I'm learning all these crazy things about the world of printing and web design and all this stuff, I feel like a starry-eyed kid at Disney World half the time (the other half I'm working trying to make sure I'm doing my job right and as well as possible). I just have like, fifty different ideas of how my life could go and I'm tryna get 'em all out before they make my head explode. 😜

What else do I wanna do? I wanna travel. I wanna go on missions trips, see what it's like to be a missionary, help out missionaries, do missionary work.

So what have I done about this stuff? Well for one, I've looked into some mission trips. There are too many deadlines at the beginning of the year so unless someone walks up to me and says, "Hey, I want you to come with me to this foreign country this year," then I probably won't go overseas just quite yet. I've also looked into going overseas to teach ESL. Got some pointers from my uncle, who went overseas and taught English in Korea, and there are some pretty cool opportunities that I'm looking into a little bit more. I'd need a TESL or TEFL certification and a few other prereq's that would take a little time to get done, but lucky for me, that fits my schedule for the next two years haha. Oh, and as for writing, I've made it a goal to write and publish 5 books this year on various platforms, i.e. Wattpad, Amazon, possibly Inkitt, etc.

I might still go to grad school. Or I might just go to the undergrad area to get a certificate in Apostolic Studies so I can articulate my faith in a knowledgeable way and get some experience living on my own for a bit. Or I might just skip all that, work hard, get my TESL/TEFL and move to Eastern Asia for the rest of my life! (JK, I'd miss my American people too much... I'll just pack 'em all in suitcases and take 'em with me, muahaha)

The point of this post? It's an open future for me. I've got a direction I want to go in. And I know there's a direction God wants me to go in. The trick is making sure the two are one in the same. Do I think writing can change the world? Yes, yes I do. Do I think teaching can change the world? Tried and proven, both in the secular and the church worlds, teaching can completely change the world, because it changes young people who will go on to change the world. Do I think this is something I should pursue? Short answer: Yes. Time (and a whole lotta prayer) will tell if this is the direction God wants me to go in.

'Til next time, folks!

--Sonya 😁 💖

P.S. I'mma try to get better at writing this blog, or at least posting something on this blog. Bear with me, guys. 😜