Senior year is filled with the question I dreaded the most: “what are you doing after you graduate?” Or better yet: “where are you going to college?” I often avoided the question. I always looked up to the seniors as I went through school and thought about how old and grown up they seem. Little did I know that when my senior year came, I would not feel llike I had my life figured out! Stick with me here, this blog will not end all sad and confused!
I did really well in school and therefore I felt there was even more pressure on me to have everything figured out and go to college, and not “waste my potential.” Additionally, as I went through middle school and high school, I grew A LOT in my identity in Christ. I slowly learned (and am honestly still learning) how to answer the question most asked senior year. I still don’t know exactly what I want to do, but I know exactly who I want to be. I want to be a daughter first. A daughter of the One True King. I learned to be OK with saying I wasn’t sure yet. I learned to enjoy every moment of high school that I had left.
So graduation rolled around and guess who still had no plan for her “future”? All I had planned was a missions trip to the Dominican Republic over the Summer. You bet I used that as a buffer! I definitely did not do the “norm” senior year and I am so blessed to have friends and family surround me. Everyone had opinions as to what I should do next and most of them pushed me toward college. I thought college was a lot of time, money and effort and I still wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I didn’t want to go away to college with no goal. Don't get me wrong, I don't think college is bad at all and if God calls me back to school, I want to be ready! But, there are so many other options out there as well. As you can see, many career paths were floating around my head and still are.
Side testimony! Freshman year, when I discovered rank was a thing and that all the students loved to gossip about it, there was a lot of subconscious pressure put on me because I was ranked 4th at the time. I remember riding home on the bus (and I can even remember the stop sign we were at) when I felt God lift the pressure off of me and say, “You are more than a number.” As high school went on I grew tremendously in my identity and learned my identity should not be wrapped up in how well I performed in school.
As the summer after freshman year came to a close, right before I was about to panic because all my friends were heading off to college and I was still enjoying this summer phase, God moved things into place. In about 1 or 2 days I had my next year planned, well… God had my next year planned. I was offered a full time job where my mom works AND Brian Connolly offered me an internship under his Faith Like Birds Ministry! I remember driving home from the meeting I had with Brian to talk about the details of the internship and realizing how everything was falling into place. I was taking a friend, Harper, home and she asked me what I was going to be doing now that I graduated and I explained to her that I think it all fell into place right now! I went home and told my mom I think the job is meant to be right now because the hours I work and the hours involved with the ministry could not have lined up more perfectly!
Four months into the internship and I feel like I have learned so much already! I’m so thankful for this opportunity and am overwhelmed by the way God has used me to already fulfill my heart's desire of bringing hope to the hopeless! All of this to give Glory to God because my life is not my own.
We are all on a journey and I am learning to enjoy each step of the way. The most important thing is my relationship with Jesus. Everything flows from it. I am learning to enjoy the pauses in life, the waiting, the movement, and how to keep my heart open to where God is leading me.
-Esperanza Trevino - Host of 'My Heart' & Intern for Faith Like Birds Ministries
Comments