I
was raised a Missouri Synod Lutheran, courtesy of my mother. I was raised with
a strong Protestant work ethic, courtesy of my father. Both of those influences
fused me into something of an overachiever, although only for those things
where I felt I had a chance to overachieve. Academics were one area. Sports
were not.
Until
my senior year in college, my life followed that overachiever pattern. Set
goals, achieve them, surpass them, and then set new goals. As a college freshman,
I set several goals, and kept adding to them.
By
the middle of my senior year, I had achieved or overachieved everything. All the
positions, honors, accolades, recognitions – I had captured them all, including
being the managing editor of the student newspaper for my final semester – the position
that ran everything in the paper except the editorial page. I had the power position
on the paper, likely as powerful as any student office on the campus.
Nothing
was left. Nothing.
I
crashed and burned.
I
kept working; the work ethic was too strong for that to stop. But I crashed.
Everything I had accomplished seemed meaningless. Everything I had done seemed
like wasted effort. Meaningless. Chasing after the wind.
What
I didn’t know was that I was careening, wildly careening, right into the arms
of God.
Through
what seemed a strange series of circumstances, I landed one night in a
conversation with the director for my college’s Campus Crusade for Christ chapter.
I was angry, believing that I had been taken advantage of by this man’s
organization, which seemed to preach one thing and practice another.
We
talked, possibly for hours. I don’t remember how long. But by the end of our
conversation, I found myself in God’s arms. I had become a story – the story of
the second chance.
This
wasn’t an opportunity to reinvent my life. This was a transformation of my
life. In a matter of minutes, I understood that everything had fundamentally
changed.
About
11 p.m., I found myself in the newspaper editor’s office. He was working late.
He asked me if I was okay. “Has something happened?” he asked. And I nodded. “Everything
happened,” I said. “Everything. And I can’t explain it.”
The
story of the second chance didn’t begin and end that night. If I have learned
anything about my life, it’s that the second chances keep coming.
Fourteen
years after that night, I had a career crash and burn. Same pattern of
overachievement; same result. It happened again 10 years after that, and then
11 years after that.
And
each time brought an opportunity for a second chance.
I
can say this: had not that second crash and burn happened, I would not have
written a speech that changed an entire industry.
Had
not that third crash and burn happened, I would not have spent nine months as
the communications officer for an urban school district in extreme crisis,
learning that a lot of people think differently than I do and they all don’t live
in nice, comfortable suburbs, and that some of their children attend schools
with 110 percent turnover – annually.
Had
not that fourth crash and burn happened, I would not have had published two
novels and a work of non-fiction. I would not be a weekly columnist on poetry.
I would not be an editor and writer for The High Calling.
Four
stories of second chances. And each time, something changed, something was
learned, and something was realized.
Something
was being grown inside of me.
What
was growing, what is growing, is less of me.
The
High Calling has a
community linkup this week on finding new life – and discovering second
chances. If you have a story to tell about your own second chance, visit The
High Calling for details. The deadline is tonight.
