Honesty Pants

Greetings, earthlings. Sarah Wyckoff, here, tuning in for a filter-less monologue and a night out on the town dressed up in my honesty pants. If you feel like the transition from student to employed college graduate is similar to the chaos that ensued when God went all linguistic (or the more politically correct term “diverse”) at the tower of Babel, this is for you.

Fact: the “real world” happens differently for everyone. Some people shoot up from their batman sheets when they are eight years old and proclaim to the world, “I want to squash people for a living! I think I’ll be a lawyer!” while others watch too much Alias and decide covert operations of the CIA will be their life contribution to a safe society. Some people marry their college sweetheart the summer after graduation or move to Africa while others marry rich and have babies and upload pictures of their child’s potty training victories on Facebook in one hand while cooking a mean pot roast with the other.

I am not that girl. (Although, I have contemplated becoming a gold-digger but mostly for the fact that Kanye West already provided me a theme song).

On this multiple choice test, my life is D: None of the above.

Now hear me out: not one option is better or worse than the other. Just different.

So that is why I am writing – because whatever this has been for me (I won’t know until hindsight which is still 10 years out . . . so hold on tight), it’s been different than I expected. Mostly because I expected it to be easier. And God is laughing heartily at me. HAR HAR HAR. HE HE HE. HA HA HA. To which I look at Him and say, “Too soon, bro. Too soon.”

This past Wednesday I drove to Tulsa for what I thought was a marketing/public relations interview. After being sent on a wild goose chase around Tulsa, I realized mid-interview that this was not for a marketing/public relations job. Rather, I was interviewing to be one of those people who stand in the middle of Sam’s Club and ask intensely focused, slightly dangerous mothers if they would like to try a sample of the latest weight loss tea.

*FacePalm*

I’m sure by Christmas that story will be funny. But December is eight months away and I grocery shopped at Sam’s Club last week. Too soon, bro. Too soon.

After the interview, I met by brother and sister-in-law downtown for lunch. I was a push past frustrated and a shove past tender and my eyeballs were trying to fight back tears. The morning’s events felt like life came and knocked the wind right out of the little resolve I had left and then continued on to give it a purple nurple just for funsies.

So instead of laughing at the hilarity that is my life (why should I expect any different? I have had birds poop on my head during afternoon runs . . . something like this should come as no surprise), I ate my chicken quesadilla and held back tears like a toddler who just popped a tire on her pink tricycle. I should have been laughing, brushing it off, thanking God that I can still eat my feelings via bread and cheese and sour cream and not really worry about fitting into my jeans next week because my young metabolism is still kicking some serious butt.

(Side note: I don’t care how desperate you are Careerbuilder.com is NOT the answer. Even when Canada doesn’t hire you. Twice. ‘MURIKA!)

All of that to say, I want to tell you the things I know to be true:

The past 3 months have been difficult. I’m talking like painting a fence in the Oklahoma summer heat kind of difficult. Of course you know every rail will be painted at some point and the sun will tuck itself into the bed of nightfall – but even knowing all of that doesn’t make the sun any less hot or the job any easier or the day go by any faster.

It’s not life or death, just something easy to complain about. And trust me, I am a professional complainer – mostly because my voice really carries and I have no filter. I’m the loudest wandering Israelite in the desert. Moses would have hated me.

The reality is that trying to find a job post-fiscal cliff is the 2013 version of the Hunger Games. And yo girl is DEF not on FIYYYAHHHH. The odds have never really been in my favor, either, simply because math and I broke up in middle school.

But then the real recipe for Shakespearean tragedy is as follows:

“I don’t want to do what I have my degree in” + outside expectations + “I’m HOW expensive?!?!” + an idealist brain + I DON’T KNOW?! = indescribable confusion that will probably lead me to some kind of expensive mental disorder in my late thirties if I don’t calm myself down and have a cookie.

I call this period of my life the “don’t-put-your-identity-in-what-you-do” preliminary practice round.

But God, in His graciousness, has loved me enough to let me see the depth of my pride and impatience and critical spirit and selfishness. The flesh inside me is U-G-L-Y and this girl sure as heck ain’t got no alibi.

God has shown me too often I act out of fear and not because of faith. I quit doing the important things like praying and writing and sharing when it all takes a turn uphill or the weather gets bad or the wind changes directions.



But the word that has really emerged like a phoenix from ashes has been Persevere.

Stories like Jacob wrestling with God in Genesis 32: 22-32.

Or the story of the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15: 21- 28.

I want to become a woman who perseveres in prayer despite how silent God seems. I want to become a woman who chooses to anchor herself in God’s character and promises and word even when life feels less like a Sunday afternoon nap and more like OIAWWERKNANDSFLKJASLKJDFLKJLKJALKJS. I want to show up even when the world tells me to go home. I want to be like Abraham, who against all odds, chose to hope and believe.

I want to become a woman of sincerity, someone who looks outward instead of inward because focusing inward makes me selfish and defensive and immature. I want to make it a habit to choose joy NOW – exactly where I find myself. Smack dab in the chaos, in the ‘I have no clue’, in the you-have-got-to-be-kidding-me moments.

If I don’t choose joy now, I would be a fool to believe I would choose joy later when I have the cushions of independence, a furnished apartment, a 401K, or a man on my arm who tells me I’m pretty and thinks I’m the most hilarious human being on the planet (which is undeniably true, but that’s another time).

None of those things are wrong in and of themselves, but they can become a cheap substitute for something greater God wants to do within my heart.

So right now, from where I sit, I’m finding that this circus of 20-something is exactly that: a circus. It’s chaotic and unexpected but mostly it’s an opportunity. It’s an opportunity to grow and struggle and fall and laugh and BECOME.

I’ve been so stir-crazy and pent-up and freaked out over the past couple months that I haven’t allowed the transforming work of Christ to change me. Ever since college graduation last May, it’s been more about surviving and less about surrender and sanctification.

Joy, I’m finding, is a grace-driven effort and daily decision to be at peace with uncertainty or heartache or those ‘you-have-got-to-be-kidding-me’ moments. It doesn’t play the ‘if only’ or ‘when I have’ game. It chooses the Now over the Next every single time. It fixes its eyes on the cross and remembers it’s all been paid for – the ugly inside of me, the ugly going on around me. Paid for. Jesus plus nothing really does equal everything.

I have realized the importance of surrounding myself with friends like Joanna Chapa, Jessica Perrault, Jordan Crosson, and Katie Mount who remind me that today, I don’t have to be me twenty-five years from now. I want to live in the freedom of that. I see in them the greatest thing about true friendship: true friendship will tell you the truth about yourself, ask the tough questions, shake your shoulders and square them toward the cross. Love leans in when you get ugly and refuses go anywhere even when crap starts to fly across the room.

I believe one of Satan’s biggest weapons is to get us to live in the past, in the future – anywhere but the present. I say this because I believe the present gives us a taste of eternity because when that day comes, we will be outside of time. All we will have is the moment we find ourselves standing in. We become dangerous for the kingdom when we are mentally and emotionally and physically present. We become dangerous for the kingdom because we are wholly available to the needs of those around us.

I want to live my life that way. Surrendered to the moment no matter where I am. “Having it all figured out” is a mirage - an illusion of water that keeps us running from what God longs to teach us in the desert. It’s a falsehood people polish up on Facebook. I refuse to put all my eggs in the basket of the future. It’s dangerous and unhealthy and robs me of the depth offered within the hours of Today.

So these are my confessions. I don’t know where you are in life, but I hope you find comfort in my ramblings if you are just as dazed and confused as I am. But most of all, I want to extend an invitation to you.

Join the circus.

I am the ring-leader of the 20-something circus. I do not ride the struggle bus, I drive it. But today, we have an opportunity to choose joy. Let us choose gratitude and tell grumbling to go home.

Let us be the first ones to stand up and proclaim “I DON’T HAVE IT ALL TOGETHER! YEEEHAWWW!!!!!!” because chances are, there’s someone else out there who really needed to be reminded they aren’t the only one.

Let us make peace with the uncertainty, persevere when the trail turns uphill.

But most of all let us pray even harder amidst the silence.


P.S.- I WILL BUY A KING-SIZED SNICKERS FOR THE FIRST PERSON TO FIND ME A JOB IN MANHATTAN, KANSAS. READY SET GO. THANKS IN ADVANCE.