The Day My World Turned Upside Down, for the better

Today I spoke with a networking contact, Gordon Pennington, for about an hour. The conversation was unexpected, hard, and amazing all at the same time. A spirit of change rushed over me like a mighty sweeping wind, a spirit that by no other name was the power of the Holy Spirit pouring over my heart. Thirty minutes into our conversation, and for the remainder, the tears continued streaming.

More or less, the conversation went like this: Pennington asked me to tell him about myself, my career interests, and what I did this past year. So, like any normal job interview, I started trying to "sell myself," in a sense to show this man that I had something to offer. Of all people, do you think I have something to offer this marketing and strategic communications specialist? He is worlds ahead of me in terms of job qualifications. So my responses were a big mistake, or perhaps not, because they revealed to him my flawed outlook on finding a career.

Quickly into our chat, Pennington told me that if I were trying to sell him a contract with my firm from this past year, he would not be interested in buying it. My schemes were fruitless, and I felt more or less like a fool. He told me he had only a few more minutes to chat and wanted me to cut to the chase. Suddenly, I was offended, angry, distraught. I thought we were going to talk about what I wanted to do with my life, not sit down and have me try to convince him that my job this past year has made me into an amazing career woman. But, after a few words asking Pennington to talk about his experience, the conversation shifted dramatically.

Instead of informing me on how to break into the culture shaping field, Pennington told me that he sensed that I am someone who genuinely wants to make a difference in the world. He suggested that the people who really make a difference are not the people with all of the skills, but the people of reckless abandon. He reminded me that people will either fall on the rock and be broken or the rock will fall on them and crush them. He also quoted one of my favorite passages, Romans 12:1-2, reminding me that we test and approve of God's will by being living sacrifices. More than anything, he said that in looking for a job (and really just doing life in general), I should fast, and pray, and completely surrender myself to God. He suggested that I go out and "find some crazy people," people who were sold out for God. We prayed at the end of our conversation, tears still streaming. He got pretty emotional too and started cracking up at the end, saying that he was interested to see how God plans on using me. It was all pretty incredible and encouraging in the weirdest way. Pennington reminded me to lean into God and trust him with every ounce of my being; everything else falls into place as a result, and I will operate for the better in my daily life-truly living in faith.

In other news, I started reading "The Shack" today on the recommendation of a lady that I met with yesterday named Julia, who was also pretty amazing. I am really enjoying the book and just eating it up as I move quickly from page to page. Julia warned me yesterday not to try to tear it apart theologically, because it wasn't written to be that kind of book. She said it was written to be a narrative that speaks to the heart and encouraged me to steer clear of people who tried to debate and criticize it. The book is, thus far, moving my heart in a direction similar to that encouraged by Pennington-towards a place of reckless abandon. I've been in such a place before, but feel as though recently i've gotten a bit lost in the milieu. Coming back to such a place is so freeing, so invigorating, so challenging, and SO EMOTIONAL. I will post some thoughts when i'm further into the book.