Sophomore Year Josh Was Even Dumber Than 2012 Josh

I’ve told this story before but it serves my purposes again. My sophomore year of college was a tale of two cities. The first semester I dominated. I got straight A’s and was accepted into a medical fraternity and had a rigid schedule where I woke up, ran to the pool, swam, ran back, hit the library, class, library, class, library, meet friends for dinner, then library again. The next semester I began questioning everything and was lost in the mess of an existential crisis. The question “Why” haunted me. Why was I working so hard, why did I care so much about the three little numbers of my GPA? Why become a doctor? To help people. Why help people? Because it’s good to help people. Why is it good to help people? And how was I helping anyone by just holing up in my favorite spot and Brill Science library, etc, etc.

A portrait of the artist as an idiot.

I barely escaped all that questioning alive, introspection can be a female dog sometimes, and moved to an A frame in the woods for the summer. I was going to do research and take accelerated physics. The first week I tried to recover. I drank jones strawberry cane soda and read a book on the deck. The book was Blue Like Jazz. It’s a good book, but nothing incredible. I sat there on that deck and read a guy deal with some of the same questions that I had been dealing with in a much more  succinct and articulate way. If I had read that book earlier, I could have saved myself a lot of heart ache. I remember when people told me to read a year earlier but I blew it off because it was too popular and I was too cool. Ever since that week on the deck of the A frame, I’ve resolved to always read everything I can about whatever it is that I’m struggling with. Wiser, smarter men and women have thought longer, written more, and dealt with everything that I will ever deal with. I needed to humble myself and realize that I was not the first guy to go through an existential crisis or to have doubts or confusion. My pride liked to think that I was paving the way into thoughts that no one had had before. I began to enjoy my pity parties and edgy thoughts because there is a certain part of society that thinks it’s cool to be sad and I bought into that temporarily.

One of my friends was recently going through a really, really tough time of doubt. He felt like he didn’t think he could on, he felt destined to die young, he felt like he couldn’t escape the pain he felt. It was really tough. What made it tougher was that he would get insulted if you tried to encourage him by showing him how other people have felt that way and there was hope. I shared from dark times in my life, I pointed to great people in history and their dark night of the soul. I even pointed to the apostle Paul in II Corinthians where he says that he despaired of life itself.

Paul, one of the biggest non-Jesus studs in the bible, planter of many churches, author of 75% of The Bible, a guy who had been bitten by poisonous snakes and lived, had been ship wrecked and floated at sea for a day and a night, was stoned and left for dead and lived, healed people when they touched the hem of his cloak, saw thousands of people saved at once from his preaching, this guy despaired of life itself. Those who despair are in good company.

I like to think of myself as being in the business of joy. I want people to have the most joy and satisfaction they can have in life. That is why I write this. Well it’s one of the reasons. First, I most write to myself. I write things I already know that I need to be reminded of. Secondly, I write that the 3 of you who read this would consider ways that pride keeps us from joy, specifically how a slowness to learn from people about whatever it is that we are dealing with can keep us the proverbial square wheeled bike. So listen to people when they are trying to help, even if you’ve heard the advice before, press into authors over 55 [or better yet, who are dead] on issues you are struggling with – for your joy.

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~ by jfoor on January 24, 2012.