College Reflections

Wow where did all the time go, I'm still so young, yet I feel so old.  If you asked me about this week, my final week in college, when I was a freshmen, how would I have responded?  Coming in to college I had so many dreams about what it would be like, how popular I would become, the career I would get from it, so much passion ready to be utilized.  Well 4 years later, I'll tell you how I see the final week.  Fruition.  All the dreams I had, achieved. All the promises I'd made, done.  All my commitments, almost completed (bittersweet).

What happened to all that passion? Well it was poured in. In to what? In to everything, school, work, friends, family.  College for me has been about pouring out. It's been about giving. About giving everything for what matters most.  I'm walking out of college having made friends with some of the best people. I never could have imagined the beauty in all of those friendships.  What a privilege to serve and have so many unique and gifted friends, God has truly been kind. I hope to never stop being friends with any of them.

I look back on certain moments in college and realize ya I could have done things better.  I failed a lot in college, but God always gave me the opportunities to get back on the horse and try again.  Success defined in the trying.  I only have one regret, that I never patched my relationship with Grant. A great friendship wasted.  Needless to say, college has been a challenge embedded with failure.  But I'm happy for that failure.  It has shaped me, formed me to be more Godly, to be a better brother, a better friend, and a better human.

 College has been a blast.  I will look back with fondness on the time I spent at UCI. The sweat and tears poured out in the lab, the laughter at 926, the love in late-night conversations, the belonging brought by IV, the pain of personal growth, the thrill brought by so many adventures both at home and abroad, the discoveries about yourself and other people, all combine to make such a wonderful experience.

So here's to the last four years, they've been great, and here's to the rest of my life, will the passion never die.