Grad School Dropout
A year ago, I started on an adventure that I believed would change my life, open doors of possibilities, and make me more well-rounded as a person - grad school. It happened pretty innocently enough, I got a wild idea one Saturday morning to look at online Christian colleges to see if they had any Master's degrees I was interested in. Grand Canyon University offered a degree in Biblical Studies with an Emphasis on Youth and I was very interested in that. I started to fill out what I believed was a bunch of questions to create an online account with them so I could log on in the future. A few minutes later, as I was wondering about all the questions, a screen came up that said, "Congratulations! You have submitted your application for grad school" or something to that affect. *Gulp* What had I gotten myself into?
The next couple of weeks consisted of filling out applications, many phone calls, and (what seemed to me) door after door opening that made me believe I was doing the right thing. Trinity Lutheran School, where I was teaching 2nd grade, had just gone through a lengthy process of becoming accredited through a Lutheran organization. While that was great news for the school, one drawback was the stipulation that all teachers had to be Lutheran. As the only non-Lutheran on staff, I was given the option of either joining the church or finding a new job. The school had several months to fulfill those obligations and it was decided that May 2013 would be the end of my time at Trinity. Wouldn't you know that I was on track to graduate from GCU with my Master's Degree in May of 2013. To me, that was just further proof that I was on God's path for my life and I jumped in whole heartedly.
The GCU program only allows you to take one class at a time, each class lasting several weeks and filled with weekly papers and other assignments. The first class came and went, I got an A and was very impressed with myself. My second class came along and while it was more challenging than the first, I still pulled an A and I began to think, "Not only will I get a Master's Degree but I am going to pull straight A's in every class!" Then came my third class and I hit a brick wall. I had other things going on in my life, things I had committed to before grad school came along, and I found myself panicking at times, thinking I wasn't going to be able to keep all the balls I was juggling up in the air. GCU allows for students to take up to a 2 week break between classes and I decided to take such a break. At the end of those 2 weeks, I would be finished with my other commitments and ready to jump back in to my classes. Wrong.
After looking ahead to the class I would be taking next, I realized I had absolutely no desire to continue on with the program. The class content didn't interest me at all and I dreaded the idea of going back to the schedule of working all day and then spending evenings and weekends doing research and writing papers. I made the decision to drop out of the program and haven't regretted it once.
In the months since, I have come to realize a few things about myself and the experience. For one, I didn't really want to get a Master's degree. I have told people over and over since graduating with my BA that I didn't want to go back to school and I meant it. What I really wanted was people's approval. Since I was a little girl, I have always believed deep down that I was not worthy of people's love on my own as a person and had to do things to earn it. The choices and actions of other people left a mark of unworthiness on me so deep that even now as an adult, I am constantly wanting to make others proud by the things I do. I have a constant need for approval from those close to me and I thought achieving a Master's degree would definitely make people proud. Most of the time I don't believe I have much going for me - single, no idea what to do with my life, 31 and still not invested in a career with potential for growth , and living paycheck to paycheck. (Let me clarify the single thing - I am very content being single and truly believe it is God's will for me at this time, it not for my entire earthly life. At times though, I find myself wishing I had men interested in me that I had to turn down because of wanting to be single...sometimes the fact that no guy ever seems interested makes me think God wants me to be single because no one believes I'm girlfriend/wife material.)
Even today I have a longing to know that in spite of my being a grad school dropout, they are still proud of me. That's my achillies heel - striving for approval from humans (as my friend Gabby would say) instead of finding my worth in Christ. I have a Savior that loves me SO much that He died on a cross meant for my sins. He longs to have a relationship with me and not just here on earth but forever in eternity. That is where my true worth lies, may I try each day to remember that.
The next couple of weeks consisted of filling out applications, many phone calls, and (what seemed to me) door after door opening that made me believe I was doing the right thing. Trinity Lutheran School, where I was teaching 2nd grade, had just gone through a lengthy process of becoming accredited through a Lutheran organization. While that was great news for the school, one drawback was the stipulation that all teachers had to be Lutheran. As the only non-Lutheran on staff, I was given the option of either joining the church or finding a new job. The school had several months to fulfill those obligations and it was decided that May 2013 would be the end of my time at Trinity. Wouldn't you know that I was on track to graduate from GCU with my Master's Degree in May of 2013. To me, that was just further proof that I was on God's path for my life and I jumped in whole heartedly.
The GCU program only allows you to take one class at a time, each class lasting several weeks and filled with weekly papers and other assignments. The first class came and went, I got an A and was very impressed with myself. My second class came along and while it was more challenging than the first, I still pulled an A and I began to think, "Not only will I get a Master's Degree but I am going to pull straight A's in every class!" Then came my third class and I hit a brick wall. I had other things going on in my life, things I had committed to before grad school came along, and I found myself panicking at times, thinking I wasn't going to be able to keep all the balls I was juggling up in the air. GCU allows for students to take up to a 2 week break between classes and I decided to take such a break. At the end of those 2 weeks, I would be finished with my other commitments and ready to jump back in to my classes. Wrong.
After looking ahead to the class I would be taking next, I realized I had absolutely no desire to continue on with the program. The class content didn't interest me at all and I dreaded the idea of going back to the schedule of working all day and then spending evenings and weekends doing research and writing papers. I made the decision to drop out of the program and haven't regretted it once.
In the months since, I have come to realize a few things about myself and the experience. For one, I didn't really want to get a Master's degree. I have told people over and over since graduating with my BA that I didn't want to go back to school and I meant it. What I really wanted was people's approval. Since I was a little girl, I have always believed deep down that I was not worthy of people's love on my own as a person and had to do things to earn it. The choices and actions of other people left a mark of unworthiness on me so deep that even now as an adult, I am constantly wanting to make others proud by the things I do. I have a constant need for approval from those close to me and I thought achieving a Master's degree would definitely make people proud. Most of the time I don't believe I have much going for me - single, no idea what to do with my life, 31 and still not invested in a career with potential for growth , and living paycheck to paycheck. (Let me clarify the single thing - I am very content being single and truly believe it is God's will for me at this time, it not for my entire earthly life. At times though, I find myself wishing I had men interested in me that I had to turn down because of wanting to be single...sometimes the fact that no guy ever seems interested makes me think God wants me to be single because no one believes I'm girlfriend/wife material.)
Even today I have a longing to know that in spite of my being a grad school dropout, they are still proud of me. That's my achillies heel - striving for approval from humans (as my friend Gabby would say) instead of finding my worth in Christ. I have a Savior that loves me SO much that He died on a cross meant for my sins. He longs to have a relationship with me and not just here on earth but forever in eternity. That is where my true worth lies, may I try each day to remember that.
Comments
Post a Comment