a paradigm of growth

well, i'm about 15 pages and 100 footnotes into my big paper for the semester.

i'm really, really enjoying the process. i know it's just a little bit crazy, but the process of taking almost endless research and turning it into a legal argument is very enjoyable for me. i enjoy the big-pictureness of it, i think - the analysis and synthesis of many parts into a cohesive whole. i enjoy the possibility that it might impact actual lives or policy.

choosing the job that i did for the summer, the place where i'll be researching and writing the days away, is a little out of character for me. i had another great option that would have put me in the courtroom as a prosecutor for the summer. normally, when given a choice between something i would love and something that would challenge me, or between something i perceive as "easy" and something that i will be stretched in, i choose the harder path. i just always choose the hardest thing. i think somehow i have that tied to my spirituality, though i can't tell you how right now.

but somehow for the summer i found the freedom to actually go with my personality instead of against it. see... i live within a paradigm for growth. living overseas and being challenged all my life in many different ways has made me uncomfortable with being comfortable. i always want to grow and be out of my element just a little bit - with the hope that i will become a better person and more like Christ. i think i have a genuine fear of the complacency that normally accompanies being comfortable where i am. so somehow i always end up doing the hard things, or the neutral things the hard way.

i think in many ways this leads to being a more balanced person - i'm working on my weaknesses so they become less detrimental. but i think it also has caused me to not reach my full potential. in developing my weaknesses instead of my strengths i have not allowed myself to excel and strengthen my strengths.

maybe like so much of life, balance is needed. it's really good to develop and use the strengths that we have because that is who God has made us. but it's also good to seek growth and development in areas that we are weak so that as people we can be more balanced.

maybe the challenge for me this summer then, will be to put as much energy into developing my strengths as i normally would put into trying to overcome my weaknesses. there's no real reason why the growth paradigm has to be limited to just one kind of growth.