Free

Here in Jerusalem, I'm 7,000 miles away from nearly everything that was familiar to me before January 3. And it's marvelous. Being here is teaching me what is truly valuable to me, what I need and what I don't need to feel like I am myself. I am so spoiled, living so richly, and I'm just hoping that if I do this right, this place will change me. I'll return home still being who I've been able to become here without the gravitational pull of Provo nor the signals of my decades-long hometown interfering with my attempts to be independent and grow.

Living here has taught me just how sheltered I am in my home county, with my high school friends. Life is good there, and has been good to me. I loved it, and love it. But I am learning that there is so much more, and there is likely so much more expected of me to learn; things that I cannot learn and experience within the bubble that I've spent so much of my life sheltered under. Being me, free of expectations, is scary, but also a relief. I have the chance to live free of the demands and obligations that too often feel like a snare back in Provo. I'm free of the BYU culture, I've escaped most of the Mormon culture. Yes, I am living insulated here, but it's an insulation of only 100 people. We are our own microcosm of the larger Utah county culture, and we get to decide what that means.

And most importantly, I can be entirely selfish here. I came here for me, and I get to choose how to grow, how to serve, and how to experience. I've shed the trappings of my old life, and I get to choose which to pick up again when I return. I'm surrounded each day by friends, by the Holy Land, and by new experiences. Though I felt alive in Provo before, here I feel more alive, like I'm living in HD, or like I'm "color T.V.", as Ayman would say. Life is rich here, and I can only hope, pray, and try to learn how to continue to live a part of this when I've gone home.