The Big Leap

There are many wonderful things about setting out on adventures in life. There is the excitement of the new, the sense of purpose and possibility, the joy of following your heart and good things resulting. But there is also no road map. No handy 'How-to' Guide. No guarantee that you are taking the right path except for those little encouragements you receive along the way.

At some point on the journey you reach what feels like the edge of a cliff. These are what my husband describes as Indiana Jones moments. At these moments there is nothing you can do but jump. You have to step out, take a leap of faith and trust that what has been leading you so far has been true. That in stepping out, you will land somewhere and that place will be good.

 

 

I am most certainly in the midst of my own Indiana Jones moment. I have no idea, really, what it means to be ordained or to be a leader in the Church. Looking out over the road that is appearing before me is terrifying in the extreme. I have more fears about it that I can number from putting on a clerical collar to standing up in front of a congregation, to every little expectation people will have of me in this new role that I feel hopelessly unable to meet. Right now it really does feel like stepping out off the edge of a cliff and just trusting that my foot is going to find solid ground.

What is helping me a little is to look back at the journey I have taken. To think about the road I have taken to get here which has been by no means straight forwards but altogether wonderful all the same. I'm remembering all the leaps I made before and all the good places I have landed. I'm remembering my first tentative steps along the journey when I felt to ridiculous to even say what was brewing inside of me out loud.

I'm remembering some of the hard times I've come through in the last few years, knowing that I am still standing. I've been remembering how wonderful it feels to jump, that sense of joy when you are doing the thing you never thought you could, when you have arrived in places you never imagined nor thought you would see. And best of all the feeling of reaching a new phase of the journey and realising just how far you have come. When I think of that I feel that faith bubble up again, I know that on the other side something good is waiting for me.

And at the end of the day I suppose the nature of the journey is just to keep on it and none of us really know where things are heading, do we? So it's one foot in front of the other and in a couple of weeks one big giant leap into the unknown with all the courage, faith and trust I can muster that I will, once again, find a safe and solid landing.