Wednesday, December 30, 2015

What a Journey It Has Been

2015 was the fourth year of my participation in the OneWord365 exercise. My first word was ACCEPT, then it was REST, followed by RETURN and now JOURNEY. It never ceases to amaze me how the word I feel I am given applies to my life through the year. Being a woman of faith, I believe that God gives me the word as something for me to hold onto and focus on as I work towards becoming the woman He has created me to be. 


The word this year was JOURNEY, and a journey it has been. As I review my previous blogs about this word, I'm not sure my life is much different than it was a year ago, while at the same time, I feel like my life has changed in so many ways personally, professionally, and spiritually. The professional area is a bit simpler, yet huge changes continue to occur as I travel the clinical social work road. As I look back on that path, I remain in awe of where I have come from to stand where I do. As a returning adult student who was able to earn a Bachelor of Arts in Social Work degree, followed by a Masters in Social Work degree, then three years later receive my state license, and now having a sole proprietor business license, I am currently in the process of becoming a professional limited liability corporation. I ended up leaving the job as an emergency room hospital social worker, even though I absolutely loved the job, but my business was too busy for me to emotionally and physically handle both. Over the past two years, I have been applying to insurance companies, requesting that they be willing to pay for their customer's ability to receive counseling from me and to have confidence that it is in their customer's best interest that my treatment be an option for them. Wow. Did I really just say that I can provide services to people that may be in their best interest? Something I find myself speaking to with my clients on a regular basis is the difference between arrogance and confidence. Per Merriam Webster Dictionary, here are the definitions:


Arrogance - an insulting way of thinking or behaving that comes from believing that you are better, smarter, or more important than other people.



Confidence - a feeling or belief that you can do something well or succeed at something; a feeling or belief that someone or something is good or has the ability to succeed at something; the feeling of being certain that something will happen or that something is true.

What I read into these definitions is that arrogance is stepping on others or putting oneself over them, while confidence is knowing that you do something well not conditional on the ability of others. Through this professional journey, I have learned that I can have confidence that I can do my job well and help many of those people who walk into my office or who come to me for help and that does not mean I am arrogant. Do I still struggle with that confidence? Absolutely. I'm sure that will develop with time.



This leads to my personal world. There are people who have known me well for most of my life who tell me that they are not surprised that I am a clinical social worker/therapist, as this role goes hand in hand to the person they have always known me to be. While I have not always been a therapist, I have always been a helper; offered an ear and a shoulder to those who need it; and displayed grace and mercy to people around me. While these are humbling words, I hope they are part of the legacy that I leave. Now fast forward to a few close and personal relationships that have gone south over the past few years. These relationships include family and friends who have said that I am no longer family and/or that we can no longer be friends. One of the things thrown at me in each of those conflicts was that they did not feel they were able to have a face to face heart to heart out of belief that I will turn it into a counseling session. These words were so incredibly hurtful to me, as I try to leave work at work and not keep my therapist hat on outside of the office, even though it is not always successful. Part of my journey this year is the realization that these words thrown out at me were spoken out of their hurt, frustration, and insecurity not my behavior. What this journey has taught me is that my helper personality is just that. Part of my personality. Part of who I am. Just because I carry the title of clinical social worker/therapist does not minimize my character in my relationships with others. While the words still hurt, I am learning to not give more credit to them than they are due. I can learn to have confidence in my character traits, attempt to accept myself, and become the person God has created me to be.




Part of becoming the person God has created me to be is the spiritual portion of my journey. While I said previously that I left the hospital due to it being too much for me to handle both my shifts there as well as my private practice, there is an additional reason I made that decision. That is that I felt like God has been calling me more into ministry. I had the opportunity in October to join thousands of other people at Saddleback Church in Southern California at a conference about mental health and the church. Fortunately I was with a few others from my church family who all care about the role the church has in awareness, advocacy, and help for individuals and families who struggle with mental illness. To say this was a wonderful experience would be an understatement. When I started my private practice, one of my top goals was to be a resource for the local churches. When people need help, they frequently turn to the church and churches, all too often, have fallen short of the much needed help. My belief is that therapists can help fill in that gap, especially when they are clinicians who are also Christians. I still don't know where this call to ministry and mental health and the church will lead, but I do know this will be a pretty amazing part of my continued journey. God has also blessed me with a church family and Christian friends with whom I am able to develop much closer relationships. Those who will hold me accountable, who are there if I need someone to talk to, and who are like-minded in belief. Those who know they can contact me for help or support, to meet for a cup of coffee (or hot chocolate since I don't drink coffee) to talk, cry, grieve, etc. I guess part of what I am saying is that I am learning more about how to become the person God has created me to be. Part of this journey has been learning to identify where I stand and what I stand on.



As well as philosophical introspection on my life journey, this year has included a lot of literal traveling. 2015 was rang in on a vacation with my best buddy and is ending on another winter vacation with the same friend. I had the fun experience of traveling around the western part of the U.S. on many road trips. The word "journey" has re-ignited my enjoyment of traveling. I sure hope I can continue this trend. My "boss" has shown herself to be pretty encouraging to me by allowing me to take some serious amounts of self-care. Self-care that encourages me to "do life" intentionally, not just let it happen. Scripture encourages us to take a Sabbath on a weekly basis, modeled by God after creating the world and by His Son while here on earth. I have realized that taking time away from work and from life is a great way to rest, recoup, and focus on what I believe God has planned for me. This year has been what I believe to be the start of a lot of healing and continued journeying to accepting myself and my limits, resting in God, and returning everything to God until He gives me back what He wants me to have. I'm not completely sure what 2016 holds for me, but if my suspicion is correct, it could be another year of many changes. If you enjoy following my story, stay tuned and we'll see what happens together. 


  • all contents (c) 2015 Laura Inglis