Thoughts from Training, Etc.

Sometimes it’s the goodbyes that I remember the clearest.

I’ve been six times, and the years blend together like the long summer days of a Tennessee August. Hard to sort out in your mind where one ended and the other began. But when I think back on those six goodbyes, I can see snapshots of them all pretty clearly if I try.

The first year I remember shaking hands with Slavik and saying “baka.” I remember that because I later wondered if it was improper to say “baka” instead of the more formal “das vidanya,” and it ate me up all year until I realized it wasn’t that big of a deal, and people like Slavik don’t hold it against me even if it was.

The second year was the year I cried because Katya left without saying goodbye to me. So Anya called her and let me talk to her on the phone, and I just remember standing there in Anya’s room crying like a fool because I already missed Katya and it was occurring to me I wouldn’t see her again for a year.

Years three and four are less defined, but they were both years in which I didn’t want to leave at all, and we drove away in the big van while I looked out the window and waved all the way down the road.

The fifth year was quite an ordeal, because I had been living my life in Karachaevsk that summer for 64 days, and I didn’t feel 100% American anymore. I remember distinctly Tanya’s voice when she said about me, “Ona oozhe nash” – “She’s already ours.” Yes indeed.

And then this year, which was only about two weeks ago but feels like two months. I was so ready to get in that van that I was antsy. Yearning for home, which, like all of my blog readers know, doesn’t last long once I actually get home…but anyway. I was talking to Olesya, who had been telling me all day, “Jordan, poechali damoi v karachaevske!” – “Jordan, let’s go home, to Karachaevsk!”

“Stay with us at our house for a year!” she joked. Tanya from the Rehab Center stopped her:

“She has to go back to school in August. She’s a college student, Olesya!”

“Yes, but she’s like our daughter. I should just start telling everyone I have a daughter who studies in America!” Olesya said.

I was filled with joy at that. “Da, ya tvaya dochka,” I said with a smile.

And she made sure I knew I was going to be staying at her house next year.

I don’t know why I write this, or why it’s on my mind today. It doesn’t tie into anything else, and I have no polished reason why it matters. It just seems to me that when people say goodbye they say what they really mean, what they wanted to say all along, what they need you to know. And I hold the sweet words and tears of my Russia goodbyes very dearly, because they create a discontent in me that propels my future back in their direction. They are part of the reason I go back to say “hello” again.

(Please take a moment to notice how often I use “Russia” as an adjective. No, “Russian” does not suffice.)

Today while I was sitting in a hard plastic chair in the Maddox Grand Atrium listening to various Belmont leaders talk about being leaders, I wasn’t thinking about Belmont much. I mean I was thinking about what they were saying about Belmont, but I was applying it to the context of Russia and what I do there, because I can’t quite turn off that Russia voice in my head. They talked about community and what it means to be individuals with core values and come together to form a community with core values. I thought about Russia. They talked about conflict within communities and the fact that squashed, ignored, or unaddressed conflict will kill the community. I thought about New Life Church. They talked about buriers to leading people. I thought about my pastor in Russia. And I could see that the things they were saying were true and accurate and profound because I have seen them and heard them and tasted them, except not in the context of Belmont. Yet. Which makes me excited for this coming year, because if I have all of these experiences and principles to draw from, and I am only one person, surely that room was full of leaders with passions and opinions and experiences that inform them as well – and what an exciting community we have the ability to create because of that. I may have a lot to say about foreign missions and leadership in that context, but Daniel was in Fresno this summer and Carter was in Houston with Mission Year, and those are just a couple examples…

So I’m not turning off my Russia voice this week as we engage in leadership training here at BU. It’s the voice I have to bring to the discussion. And I’m so grateful that Belmont is such an active, moving, caring, inspiring university that actually has core values and allows us as student leaders to have different core values, but come together to advance the causes Belmont stands for.

And since I’m in training this week to be an Immersion trip leader, I’m hoping to find ways of integrating my Russia experience into my Immersion experience, and vice versa. It occurs to me that I am significantly more mission/ministry-minded than the average person, because all of this Immersion talk just makes me ask myself HOW that experience will fuel and change my ministry in the future.

But that’s cool, right, that I (ethics major that I am) need to constantly bridge the gap between the world of concepts and the practicality of wind-and-water ministry? I hope that’s a good thing. I hope it’s not just obnoxious for both the people around me who like to live in the world of concepts AND the people who like to live in the world of logistics.

Hoping this makes sense.

This post is a conglomeration of the past three days of my life.

Anywho, kudos if you have read this far!

One last thing. Since we’ve been discussing core values this week, I’ve been slowly thinking about my lists – yes, lists, because I’ve created two: one of my current lived-out core values (I think), and one of the core values I wish I lived out. I put these up here because I want feedback from the people who know me best. Do these look accurate to you? Did I miss some? Am I lying to myself about what I actually value? Are my “wished” values Biblical? I don't know. I'm throwing it around a little.

(They are somewhat in order with the most valued at the top, but loosely. Also, I use the word “worship” as the general “responding to what God has done,” not singing…)

What I want my core values to be:
Worship
Love
Ethics/Justice
Service
Wisdom
Communication/Community
Generosity
Consistency/Commitment
Influence
Positivity
Integrity
Growth
Trust
Order/Organization
Productivity
Health/Fitness

What my actual core values are today:
Ethics/Justice
Worship
Health/Fitness
Order/Organization
Influence
Consistency/Commitment
Productivity
Service
Wisdom
Growth
Positivity
Integrity