Survival and Self-Discovery

Nine months ago, I was proudly able to say that I took what life threw at me and I thrived. Right now, all I can honestly say is that I've survived.

I've survived a quarter filled with too many obstacles, too much to do, too much stress, too many breakdowns, too much heartache, and too much at stake! I really can't say that I thrived. My grades didn't tank (thank goodness) but it's definitely an A- kind of quarter instead of an A/A+ one. This is a quarter when I had to say, "I give up, I can't handle this," far too many times. Instead of tackling problems head on, my workload and stress level got to the point where I had to keep pushing things off, hoping that Future Christine would be able to handle them. (News flash: she couldn't either, a lot of the time.)

Looking back on the past couple of months, I can say that I've done plenty of things I'm not happy with and only a few that I can truly take pride in. Some of these things may come to define me, since that's something I've realized over the past two weeks: I am who I am, but that person keeps on changing. I halfheartedly told a friend this weekend that I always just kept pushing onwards towards my goals and ignored personal development, hoping that inner growth would just happen on its on. To some extent it has, and I'm happy with the person I became in my first three years of college, but all those years of ignoring my personal development finally caught up to me. I'm finally at a point in my life that is not just a crossroads academically (with my law school apps and theses), but a crossroads personally. Like it or not, I've realized that I don't know who I am anymore because I'm at one of those points in life where my decisions, actions, and beliefs every single day will shape who I become in the next stage of my life. It's terrifying trying to figure out who you are and shape your character at the same time. I know that I have to take the next few weeks to discover who I am right now and who I want to become... because to be honest, I really don't know. And of course, while I figure that out I'll be trying to finally finish and submit those law school applications and honors theses.

Other than that... happy holidays to all of my readers, Merry Christmas, and I hope you're enjoying the last bit of 2013! Here's to hoping that 2014 will be productive, inspirational, and not quite as life-changing as this past year has been!