Dreams

Last December, I wrote pages and pages in my journal, pouring out my heart on the idea I had of dreams at the time. It resembles a heartbroken letter to a lover whose love will always be undying but logistically, it just does not make sense to keep putting in the effort. I wrote that day,

"Chicago has my entire heart and leaving here is going to hurt more than anything." 

I wish I could say now, seven months later, that I was wrong. 

I had tried writing a post on here about what was happening in my mind at that point in time. It felt entirely impersonal. It still feels entirely impersonal. But in a lot of ways, the decision I made to change my life was  largely impersonal and heart-wrenching because it required me to give up everything that made me the happy human I was. Following my dreams was always something I had felt I wanted to do, but until I discovered Chicago and Loyola, I had no idea what following my dreams even looked like. This was the first time I had felt so called and so passionate about becoming part of that life, being my best person in every aspect of life.

"I couldn't imaging my life without going here for one simple reason: I didn't think I could actually do it."

Regrets are not something that has come with the return to my old life. A lot of pain and mourning has taken place over the last seven months, but not regrets. Part of what made my time in Chicago so special was that it gave me the space to be everything I wanted to be. My time there was full of personal growth, becoming the fearless, without doubt, adventurous, social, and independent person I always wished I was.

However, my resources had been completely exhausted and while the two majors I had weighed before entering college still remained at an equal passions and talents wise, the job market and my empty bank account tipped the scale. The looming decision brought my anxiety to levels that terrified me, rendering me completely helpless and feeling out of control.

But regrets, those will never sink in. If anything, I am eternally grateful for the woman that time made me. If I went back to that day where I had to decide where to start my college career, I'd always choose this path, 100 times over, I'd jump with my eyes closed straight to Chicago.

"Nonetheless, dreams change, they don't fulfill us like we expect them to, even if they're perfect. And that's when the real leap of faith happens."

While, yes, my dreams changed, the old one still completely fulfilled me in a way other things still haven't. Contentedness if a feeling I have become intimate with, knowing the choices I've made right now are what are shaping my future, one that I have complete faith in. My Chicago dream was perfect. But the real leap of faith is happening now, happened last November, happens every day when I wake up in a place that is not Loyola Chicago, and I have to keep leaping.