I love disasters

I love disasters. There, I said it. Not for the destruction and action as if it was a movie. I love deploying to disasters because in those craziest of moments, I feel the most needed. I can do something as small as handing someone a bottle of water and to that someone, I made a huge difference. Disasters give me hope in humanity when I see someone who has lost everything, with a smile on their face, helping a neighbor fix their home. I enjoy working in that environment because even when the only constant thing is change, the volunteers and staff still buckle down and put the client first. The long days energize me. I wake up looking forward to figuring out how I can help. It's the most wonderful feeling in the world. You meet people from around the country, in different organizations all trying to help. It's a connection that stays with you. It's also why the Red Cross is the first place where I feel connected with the organization and its' mission as a whole and not specifically just one location. I may be 1,500 miles away but when I head into the local Red Cross, I immediately feel at home.

Dear Oklahoma...

This year more than ever, people from home are consistently saying the same thing “you should come home.” Though it pulls at my heart, what really influenced me was a 2010 Leadership Council talk at UCO. I believe it was a guest speaker but it could have been Scott "the great" Monetti. Whoever it was, they talked about being content or rather to challenge ourselves daily to not be content.

When we become comfortable we can also become stale and develop a fixed mindset. Whereas, if we pursue a life of things that make us uncomfortable or at least challenges us, we can grow. Our ideas of what the world should look like, the perception of the people and culture around us and how to handle the future will be better off when we challenge our ideas and assumptions.

Yes, I fully agree that I could be happy at home. In fact, it would be incredibly easy to live there. I’ve developed meaningful relationships with my family and a few close friends, I could quickly find a job, I know where I could volunteer and I could open a dojo. I have connections and ties everywhere in the great state of Oklahoma. It would be easy. I would be simply content but being content is not enough for me.

I want to push myself past content and see just how far I can go. 

I want to be called out for a micro-aggression and not be defensive, when just last year I heard the term for the first time. I want to discuss stereotyping and cultures with a security guard long after all the students were picked up. I want to struggle to pronounce names because I live in a place where the ones I grew up with are considered the “unique” names. I want to sit on a bus with a man seeking refuge from his country during a time of "conflict" and have a 3-hour conversation using translating apps. I want to experience life not from a bubble with a radius of my own backyard but from meeting people, living in other cultures and being open to my own vulnerability.

So dear dojo, Red Cross and every other type of family back home, know I love you and miss you dearly but understand that I am exactly where I need to be.

Sincerely,
Jenn