My Why...

           When I tell people I am part of the Peace Corps I get a variety of responses. They range from, “What’s the Peace Corps?”, “Oh hey, I served in the Peace Corps too!” (This tends to lead to a very long PC lengthy discussion about our services), to “I wanted to do that and then life happened”, “Tell me about it, I’m thinking about doing something like that”, to “That’s so cool!”, but the most common one is a single word, “Why?”

            I began to get really annoyed with it, until I realized I didn’t always know the answer to that word myself, and then I began to self-doubt myself. Why did I decide to move across the world, give up everything I was familiar with, leave my home that I have lived in for 22 years and my friends and family, and start my life in a new and very different place, teaching kids 10 years older than what I’m used to, adjusting to brand new food, language, and over all way of life with people I am not sure whether I will like or not. When you think about it like that, you probably think I’m crazy, and I began to think that as well.

            Before I came I thought about my reasoning a little bit, but having visited home and having to answer that question a lot more, I began to self-reflect about my decision and the experiences I have had so far to answer that one word, “Why?”

            Everyone in my group, in Peace Corps, and in general people that travel all have their reasoning’s. So here is mine: I want to leave the world a better place than how I joined it, I want to change people’s lives, and I want to experience the world in a deeper way than just viewing it from the outside.

I am not going to say that me coming in and teaching for 2 years is making the world a better place, that would be way too self-righteous and would give myself and organizations like Peace Corps too much credit. Yes, there are ways in which I think Ethiopia could develop and become more effective, but in no way is the way I think better than the way they think. My community functions and has many things that I wish my community in America could learn from. I merely think that if I can help even one of my students realize their abilities and worth, help my neighbors improve their English to enhance their job getting abilities to support their families, or even just spread awareness of America and what it’s really like to Ethiopians, than I am improving the world, even if it’s a tiny ripple.

            I am a teacher, which means I automatically change people’s lives because of the nature of my work. Education is a personal thing to people, and most people have many stories both good and bad about their education and specific teachers, whether they changed their lives for the better or worse, all educators have the ability to touch their students’ lives. I just decided I wanted to touch lives in a place unfamiliar to myself. To get myself out of my comfort zone and see what else is out there. Since being here that passion has grown to really extend to my female students and helping them realize their full potential in a country with many gender equality issues still in place.

            When I grew up everyone around me also grew up in New Mexico (for the most part). Not that that’s a bad thing, New Mexico is a beautiful place. But I never felt like I truly belonged there, I have always wanted to travel and see the world. Recently my PCV friends and I had a hilarious discussion about what we would do if we won the massive Powerball lottery. While most people would buy houses or cars, we all wanted to travel. My life goal is to fill passports with stamps. I do want to settle down and have a house and a dog and kids and a husband and all that jazz, but that doesn’t mean I can’t experience and explore the world. That being said, I wanted to experience the world outside of “the tourist” mentality, outside of hotels and recommended restaurants, outside of relaxing and easy tourism. I wanted to experience a different culture and world from inside, being able to tell funny and sad anecdotes from the people themselves, not just see an attraction and eat some food and pretend I know the place when I leave on a plane.

            I still don’t have a clear and concise answer to those that ask me this question. My answer tends to change with the day I have had, what mood I’m in, and how philosophical I’m feeling. But I do know that my idea of experiencing the world, learning about myself, and touching people’s lives will always hold true. I will probably change my answer continuously, especially when I get home, as my full service will be done and I can bring what I learned from there.

            I have found it challenging but rewarding to have to answer that question of why I am doing this. On my hard and frustrating days, which have been a lot closer and more frequent recently, I have to remind myself why I am in fact doing this. So on the days where you want to give up what you are doing, whether that be a job, a hobby, or a relationship with someone I want you to think to yourself, “Why am I doing this?” and remind yourself why you started that in the first place. There were obvious benefits, or else you would not have gotten yourself into it, so remind yourself of those so that you can continue on your journey to get the most out of the experience, because sometimes the answer of “Why?” is the most important part of your strength and conviction.