Friday, February 21, 2014

Dreams are exciting... right?

It's been a long time since I wrote a personal post, but lately I haven't been wanting to talk openly about anything until now. As of the past few months, I have been turning my dream of five years into a reality - beginning a website & non-profit organization called The Lilac Road for young women in New Zealand who are struggling with issues such as depression, suicidal thoughts, low self-esteem and everything in between. The website is up but under construction, and I have been working a lot on writing up posts derived from my experiences and inspirational women's experiences to go on it for some months now. I aim to spend at least three hours each day writing, and because I feel quite perfectionist when it comes to writing, one post tends to take over three hours long to write. My long-term goal for it is to build a Lilac Road home and retreat for young women where over a course of three months they can receive counseling and therapy to help them on the road to restoration. I also hope to one day run seminars, classes and do public speaking for young women to give them hope and encouragement through my story.
After years and years of personal healing, foundational work and preparing, I am finally beginning to turn my dream into scaffolding, actual scaffolding! I am so excited and honored that I can be one of the people on this earth to say I am actually living my dreams. It is something I want to be doing as a career, full-time, for the rest of my life, and building and seeing it into fruition has been a joy.

However, although I know that following your dreams and the calling God has given you is never easy, I didn't realize it would be as hard as it is for me now. I feel unsupported and almost belittled. When I tell my mum about this, she scoffs a little bit and tells me to find an 'actual' job. I know she is disappointed in me because I did everything a good Asian daughter shouldn't do - I moved out of home, I dropped out of University, I quit my job after three months, I don't want to marry an Asian guy and now I am starting a non-profit organization that will make me no money. I can understand how scared and worried she is for me, but I wish she was more excited that I am following my God-given passion in life.
I feel like I can't tell anyone about this exciting thing happening in my life, especially adults, because I feel like they just don't get it. Sometimes, I'll tell them about Lilac Road, and the responses I get are, 'Oh, I'm sure it will happen for you,' or 'That's a nice dream,' or 'Mmmm, that's great Jenny,' with a little hint of sarcasm. One time, I asked someone close to me if I could read an article to them that I had been writing, and that person asked immediately, 'Is it long?' That cut me deep. It's almost as if they don't believe it's happening or that I'm just a naive girl with a dream that will only last a couple of months at best. What they don't realize is that this has been stirring in my heart for five years and it is happening right now. I pictured that people would be more happy and supportive of me, but it's gotten to the point where I even expect pitiful responses like that whenever I tell them about it.

I feel so humbled that God would want to use me as a vessel for this dream He has planted in my heart. However, I also feel a little dejected about the prospect of it being a career in the sense that I have never really been money-minded. Because it is non-profit, I don't want to make money off of it and the thought of it scares me a little. Sure, setting up a shop to help run the organization is an obvious and responsible thing to do, but to make money for me, even though it can be seen as obvious and responsible too, makes me feel a little icky inside. I tell people that, and they say to me, 'But you need money to live!' It's true, I do. I do need to eat, and I do need a roof over my head. I figured though that I can find a part-time job to pay for the necessities, save as much money as I can for The Lilac Road for the future and work on the non-profit at night and on my days off. I will figure out how I can make this a full-time career later down the track, or I will just find me a rich, dying husband (just kidding!). I think that's one of the reasons some people find this dream of mine a joke. What society believes is that the success of a person depends on how much money they're making. So, when I'm working three to six hours on a post, or putting in a lot of time, effort and energy into building this website and non-profit and not getting supported or paid from it, it can send me on a little down buzz. But, like the beautiful singer Sam Smith said, 'I don't have money on my mind, I do it for the love.' That gives me a lot of hope. However, I'm riddled with the question of, 'Am I not successful or can I even call this what I do for a living even if I'm not getting a cent from it?' Because in many ways, I do feel like everything I am from here on out is going to be committed to this non-profit until God calls me home. I know what matters is that God sees my work and my heart, and His support is all that matters. It's me and Him against the world. Sometimes, it doesn't make it easier though, does it?

It's not to say I haven't been getting any support for it though. A few people have meet my need for support by giving me great suggestions, guidance and advice. Some people have even offered their own talents for free to help me keep turning this dream into reality. The support I have gotten have come from people I didn't expect it to come from, and sadly the people closest to me that I thought I would get a lot of support from haven't come through for me. It's disheartening that those people don't believe in my dreams or aren't willing to walk with me on my journey. I guess it has shown me who really are there for me when it comes down to the dirty work. I swear it's like playing Where's Wally with most of those friends sometimes.

I believe that's all that's on my heart at the moment. At times I feel like my life is a joke, at times I feel like my dream is a joke. The sad thing is, is that the only reason I feel this way is because some people in my life believed that for me. I shouldn't blame. I guess I just feel discouraged, unsupported and lacking in motivation right now. Trying to keep my eyes on God and my heart for all those young women out there I live to help one day.
Also, for those who are interested, I am back in Auckland now! I plan to stay here for six months, and then I hope to move back to Wellington and base The Lilac Road from there. I am also doing Relate, which is a once a week counseling course that takes four months and is run by my favorite teacher in the world, Chris. The things he says stirs me and gets me excited about Christian counseling, and I know the things he teaches are going to be so useful for helping young women through The Lilac Road.


Currently listening to: Latch (Acoustic) - Sam Smith

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