Nobody likes to say goodbye. That final farewell leaves an ache and emptiness in the pit of your stomach like no other. When I say goodbye to people, it is always with the hope or belief that we will be reunited someday. Sometimes I know when that day will be. Other times, I leave realizing that we might never cross paths again. And then there are the times and situations where I am not saying goodbye to a person, but to a dream or period of life.
In college, we step into a period of life where we are constantly saying goodbye. I don't know for sure whether or not this period of life ever truly ends, but the more technological and industrial our world gets, the more goodbyes we will have to say. The easier transportation gets and the more access we have to other parts of the world, the bigger our dreams and the more connections we make to people and possibilities. Saying goodbye has become something we can no longer escape from.
Learning to say goodbye is something that I am currently coming to grips with. I see possibilities in situations and people, but the possibilities tend to branch outwards from a single choice. They wait behind a single decision. These decision are not ones that I want to make, but ones that I am driven and forced to make by my belief that there is a uniqueness and beauty behind humanity and I want to impact it.
Currently, I am trying to decide between two dreams, and learning to let go of one of them. On one side, I could purse a practical life, and on the other I could live a life that I find a deeper satisfaction in living. But I cannot, at this point, choose both, nor do I desire to. So I am learning to say goodbye to one of these, and the answer is not entirely clear. While I wish that one of the choices were clearer than the other and that one door would be open wider than the other, its not true. Both doors are wide open and neither door condemns me to a life of unhappiness, or tells me that I will be happier in either one. So, I must choose and say goodbye to one of the dreams I have held on to for a long time. Possibly, I am saying goodbye for only a time, but even more likely, it is a final goodbye, and my life will branch open to a different world of possibilities when I step through the open door that I choose.
As a Christian, many times I hope that God will reveal Himself behind either door, and then the answer will become clear, but the truth is that God is present with me now, and behind both doors, waiting to lead me towards His best. Now this is not to say that God doesn't know where I will be in five years, or that He is not leading me every step of the way, because I believe He is doing all of these things. I am speaking of a world where God is present in all things and even if I make the wrong choice God is in it and can redeem it.
Saying goodbye hurts, whether you are saying goodbye to a dream, a goal, or a person. When you say goodbye, you are leaving a piece of you behind. Whatever it was, you poured yourself into that person, dream, goal, or idea and you cannot leave a piece of yourself behind without feeling the empty hold that is left behind of what could have been. But thankfully, I believe that the hold left by the farewell can be filled by my Savior, and my Heavenly Father can lead me towards better things I haven't yet imagined, bless the effort I have given and use the piece I have left behind for His glory.
