decisions

do you ever wonder if you made the right decisions? I mean, not just the little decisions, the BIG things. do you ever just spend time, days even, thinking about how different your life could have been IF _______? the blank is easy to fill in. what if I had done that sport that I did in high school in college? what if I had gone to a different school? what if I had gone on that date with that super nerdy, but really nice guy? what if I never started dating her?

the thing is, we all feel as though our decisions define us. in a way, they do. as a cross country runner, I will always be seen as a member of a semi-cult, a girl who is a little crazed about distance running (it really is fun. I promise.), and someone who is only willing to spend time with those on the team. I did decide to join our semi-cult.  as an engineer, I will forever be trying to escape the stigma of NERD that has been so readily placed upon my identity, and the decision to become an engineer was all mine. so yes, in a way, our decisions define us. the parties we do or do not attend make us partiers or slow movers. the sports we play or do not play make us athletic or just normal. the churches we attend or do not attend make us conservative or liberal or moderate.

but isn't there more to this elusive ME? the identity that we all strive to know; that one that is so personal that we can't even share its full extent with another person; the thing that we all are, yet no one else quite knows. ME. MY identity. do I just decide who I am? that's what a lot of people think. and yet, I don't think that's right. I don't think that the way in which we talk and walk changes our inherent identity at all.

going back to the introduction, I have often wondered if I have made the right decsion to come to Calvin College. I have often wondered whether my choice to quit soccer, the sport of my youth, to run cross country was the right decision. I have often wondered if I simply took the easiest route out of high school, following exactly in my sister's footsteps. BUT in the end, I somehow define who I am, and that puts my crazy, wandering mind to rest. I am a runner. I love it. Calvin College is an almost perfect place for me, and I don't think I could have found a much better fit. and sometimes, the easy route is the right route.

but did I choose each of these things because of who I was? or who I am? did I become a different person purely based upon decisions I made as a young, immature soon-to-be college freshman? I don't think so. the real me, the true Kay Sera, has been within me all along. perhaps these decisions just made me realized a little bit more who I am. runner. nerd. singer. does that mean that I am no longer a soccer player? perhaps. but that's okay with me.

I think that the decisions we make help us discover who we are. decisions help unwrap layer upon layer of self, until one day, the real self is known.