You would think that after 9 years of private school and attending mass my whole life, there wouldn’t be much for me to learn anymore. I’ve been on 14 retreats. It would be easy to assume that, hey, I know what faith is about and how I act isn’t going to change much. People never change right?

Au contraire!

I went on a retreat with St. Joseph’s lifeteen earlier this month, and honestly the week before it was a nightmare. I wasn’t excited for the retreat until the day of it. I had been so swamped with work and school for about a month, and I had some drama with a few friends to top off my frustrations. I was far from the Lord. I didn’t miss church or anything, because it is a habit of mine to always go, but I was really fighting to keep myself and my relationship with God in check. I was a wreck psychologically. I had dug myself into a deep hole the exact day before my retreat.

This retreat dragged me out of the hole I made and picked me right up. As a dedicated senior, I had agreed to do one of the talks. My role was more so to help the younger teens have a fulfilling experience than to focus on my own, and it’s one of the reasons why the retreat impacted me so much.

My talk was titled Day By Day, and in it I was supposed to talk about how to live the Catholic faith daily and maintain a relationship with God. In creating that talk, it made me truly analyze how I was living day by day. Although I was going to mass every Sunday, went to confession often, and prayed consistently, I realized that I was missing some very important things.

This retreat showed me I was missing a positive attitude and passion for my faith. I was holding onto an attachment to sin. I had become content with some of the bad habits in my life. I had stagnated, and after stagnating- I was moving away from God.

It is like this retreat has washed away the dirt from my eyes. Yes, I am still the same person with the same personality and a lot of the same habits (that I am working on), but my perspective has immediately changed. I was so happy while living out my faith passionately in adoration and confession, I noticed that I want to feel like that all the time. My priorities were completely reordered this weekend. I was reminded that I need to be thinking about eternity… Not just the here and now. Heaven is the end goal and I need to be doing whatever I can to get there. Discomfort now is incomparable to spending forever with Jesus.

My vision had been so clouded by all of my other responsibilities. I was stressed and overworked by my classes and my job. While my focus was on my to-do list, it wasn't on Jesus, and while my emotions were being bullied by overwhelming stress, I was mistreating the people around me.

This retreat reminded me that we are on earth for such a short time compared to spending eternity with God. It is important to work hard, but if I have to put an assignment or errand on hold in order to do something God is calling me to do- I will do it. One grade will never compare to having a passionate encounter with God and the people around me. This idea is becoming more and more clear to me. It is hard to apply in our fast paced lives at the moment, but if I have to remind myself every hour that God is the most important thing, I will.

Until I stop having panic attacks about what people think of me... Until I stop staying up at night worrying about grades... Until I stop stressing about the next paycheck... I will continually remind myself that God is above all. This retreat has been a break through for me. I can't thank God enough for breaking through my complacency.