Chloe J Sayers

“Make your strengths extraordinary rather than making your weaknesses adequate”

I recently heard this quote in the context of leadership development. It is the mantra of StrengthsQuest, an asset-based personality test. As a two time veteran of the test and the training program, I appreciate the sentiment. And I’ve largely followed that advice in my own life. I fine tune what I’m already good at, and ignore the parts of me that I have deemed hopeless.

But hearing the strengths leadership methodology stated so simply made me think. Have we killed the Renaissance Man? Is the world so specialized now that there is no value in being decently good at everything?

I’ve been told to be a T person. Choose one thing to excel in and stay shallow in other skills. It is the hallmark of the marketable college grad and the individualized American.

What do you think? Is the focus on strengths to the exclusion of areas of development destroying the well-rounded person? Comment below and share your thoughts!

Adventure, God, Travel

Following the Pact

When I was young and foolish, I could not get my mind around traffic jams. Why were we just sitting there? Why don’t the first cars just move already?

Nowadays, I still don’t understand all the dynamics of a highway, other than a slight decrease in mph
creates disproportionately high increases in road rage. But I realize it isn’t as simple as a large block of cars, moving at the same speed. There are entrances and exits, merging highways, adverse weather, the occasional deer.

Not to mention drivers’ personalities and motives. While some are perfectly content to putt along, 10 mph under the speed limit, others seem to see driving on the highway as a real-life version of Frogger and get sick thrills from merging at dangerously fast rates, for no apparent reason. Some are rushing to an important meeting, others are dragging their feet in getting into the office. One has a sick spouse at home that they can’t wait to get back to, others have a sick spouse at home that they are trying to avoid for as long as possible.

I’m none of those. I’m a copy cat driver. I slow down when others do, speed when everyone else is, take the detour that the majority of cars are taking. This works decently well on the highway.

But I have a tendency to do so in real life too. We’ve been talking a lot about abiding in Christ lately at my internship. One of my key take-aways was the foolishness of comparing ourselves to other branches (believers) instead of the vine (Christ). I don’t know where they are going. I don’t know there personality, motive, experiences. I definitely don’t know what God has planned for them. So why do I spend more time trying to mimic the growth or avoid the pitfalls I see in others rather than nourishing myself?

Driving like that would end me up in Houston instead of Lancaster. Living like that means I miss out on my own journey and end up exhausting myself just spinning my wheels.

Travel

How To Survive A Lecture-Based Conference

You open up the obligatory “Schedule of Events” A quick scan reveals that all you were hoping against will be your reality for the next few days. Hours of lectures. A break-out discussion. More speakers. If they’re feeling crazy, maybe even a panel discussion or two.

I’m very confident that we weren’t designed to thrive in these settings. Yet it is a necessary part of the Summer of Growing Up and so I have compiled a survival guide in case you find yourself in such a predicament.

How To Survive a Lecture-Based Conference

Pretend that you have stumbled upon this odd gathering of two-legged creatures by accident. Take detailed notes on their habitat, diet, behaviors. Compile into a log journal–including the peculiar sounds they keep making.
Make friends.
Develop your doodling. I had to graduate past my trusty triad–the heart, the balloon, and the square house–in order to not appear completely disinterested. Instead, trying organizing your notes in creatively graphic ways and transform interesting soundbites into typography.
Eat as much of the delicious food they provide as possible. No portion control, no regrets.
Explore! If given the time, do some adventuring wherever the conference is. My favorite way to do this is to do a few investigative morning runs. You get your bearings, find neat things, and don’t feel so sluggish during the 23rd keynote speaker.

Adventure, Maturity, Travel

Riding Solo

In this Summer of Growing Up, I have officially accomplished one of my many goals. You’ll be hearing about the rest later.

I successfully completed my first road trip by myself! This may not sound that impressive, but given my affinity for getting lost, the mere fact that I made it to my destination within a five hour window of my intended arrival time is something that I gleefully celebrated.

Even though I wasn’t able to indulge in my favorite activity of car sleeping, it went by quickly. I became proficient in radio channel changing, food sign scanning, and meaningless merging.

Next Growing Up Goal: Surviving the Wild Topography of Lecture-Based Conferences

Stay tuned for more adventures!

Always,
Chloe

Adventure, Marriage

Three Sixty-Four

In three hundred and sixty four days, I will be marrying my fiance. It is hard to believe right now, when we are literally a world apart and the future is as unclear as it always has been.

And 364 days is a lot of days. Yet I am excited by the possibility engendered in each one of them. On one of those days, we will decide where we are living. Another one will mark the decision of whether my business should be continued. There will be job interviews and decisions. Apartment and housing contracts to be signed. A million and one wedding details to cement.

I’m told they will go fast and I hope they do. Yet I plan to savor them too. Ready or not, here I come!

Adventure, Change, Life Lessons

Cereal and Salads

Cereal. Salad. Salad. Cereal. Salad. Cereal. Cereal.

With an occasional injection of coffee, that nicely sums up my diet from the past few days. I’m not complaining though, I am honestly just very happy to know where food is located and when I can get it and where I’ll be sleeping tonight.

Over the past two weeks, I’ve slept in 7 different places. I have mastered the art of living out of a trunk of a car. Looking back, it really was an adventure. During my most dramatic moments, I felt homeless and rejected. It felt like an over-privileged extension of the poverty simulation.

Confused yet? I’ll clarify my references. This summer, I am interning with HOPE International, a Christian non-profit providing financial services to the poor across the world in a Gospel-centered way. When I first arrived in south central PA, I attended the HOPE International 2014 Leadership Summit. It was a great time of getting to know the staff, the other interns, learning about HOPE and God and life, and getting thrown into a simulation where I was feverishly making paper bags and giving out hugs in order to provide for my family (a group of 5 HOPE staff partners and staff). It was an intensely emotional 30 minutes and gave me a very small dose of what it feels like to be trapped in poverty.

Needless to say, my home hopping of the last two weeks comes no where close to the kind of entrapment and powerlessness that millions of people experience worldwide every day.

This is a post of gratitude. I am so thankful to be working with such a genuine and effective organization this summer. I am also blessed with the surprise of a very good part-time job that allows me to do things I love and get paid for it. I am living with some incredible young people that are constantly giving me examples of how I want to live and view life and I even have a closet all to myself now.

So long, suitcase living! Hello, breakfast munchies and leafy greens!

Until next time,
Chloe

Writing

Pretending to be an Insomniac

I’m not, though. Rather, I’m quite good at sleeping. I used to practice putting my brain to sleep at bedtime when I was little, and now it seems to turn off all on its own most nights (and most days it seems too). Exciting things can put me to sleep and boredom can put me to sleep. I’m probably closer to being a narcoleptic than an insomniac.

Yet tonight, I will fight sleep and I will win for a while. I am afraid of what dreams might contain and want to hold onto reality a little bit longer.

I have nothing profound to say. Nothing of value or intrinsic worth. Which is why I haven’t posted here in such a very long time. The good thing is, I’m pretty sure I’ve disappeared off the blog sphere world and I doubt this will reach many eyes, let alone minds.

Not that my life is meaningless. It is brimming with significant events and lessons but I haven’t figured them out yet and don’t feel like this is an appropriate place for such half-thoughts.

And maybe that is why I won’t sleep tonight. This blinking cursor mocks me with the thoughts I’m too scared to write. I’m constantly searching for distraction but the world around me is in temporary death and will provide none.

About Me, Change, God, Life Lessons, Maturity, Writing

I Didn’t Know

I have officially written as many drafts here as I have actual blog posts. The fact that this blog has has over 10,000 views also seems remarkable. Yet what really caught me off guard when looking back through this blog’s history, was that I started scribbling thoughts here 5 years ago.

I don’t feel like I am old enough to have been doing something for 5 years. I’m sure some hobbies can claim that longevity, but in my mind, I started blogging when I thought I had something worthwhile to say which is when I thought I had achieved some standard level of maturity and adulthood.

5 years ago, I was a freshman in high school. I knew nothing. But I also knew that I knew nothing, which helped a lot. I knew that I was the product of society and my school system and The Town and my family. I didn’t do much about it, yet I knew it.

But there were a lot of things I had no idea about.

I didn’t know that I wasn’t going to be an engineer. I didn’t know that I was much weaker in some ways than I thought. I didn’t know how many people that I would see die. I didn’t know how much brokenness there was in this world and how little I could do about it.

But I also didn’t know how much of a help I could be if I looked beyond myself. I didn’t know about the sleepless nights and tired days. I didn’t know how writing would simultaneously save me and destroy me. I didn’t know that God was truly my only Savior. I didn’t know that I would go to a Christian college, or even that I would still be a Christian at this point. I didn’t know about the incredible friends and memories I would find here. I couldn’t have anticipated the amount of mental strain I would have to learn to overcome. I didn’t know that I would see lives fall apart and God piece me together.

While I’ve never put much stock in who I am, I have an inexhaustible source of confidence of what can I can do. Even so, alone, I am nothing. With God, I am still nothing but I am with God. Being able to say that is more astounding than 5, 10, or 15 years of life-changing experiences.

Maturity

Fights with Strangers

Something I will never understand is the inflammatory comments on YouTube videos that never fail to start a fight with a stranger. Who do you think you are that people actually care about your opinion about a song? Except evidently people do care, because they respond, and re-respond, and get into entire debates about the merit of an artist that no one cares that much about in the first place.

Then I realize that I am staring at my computer, reading these absurd comments from people who have nothing better to do than write comments and I am someone who clearly has nothing better to do than read those comments. Yet I do have better things to do, like use this public platform to rant about a pet peeve that is mostly irrelevant.

About Me, Friendship, God, Life Lessons, Writing

Things Don’t Make Sense

To my rationalist mind, the worst judgement that I could pass on anything or anyone is: “That doesn’t make sense.” I’ve caught myself saying that a lot lately. For something to be good, it must be logical. Unfortunately, this rules out a lot of the best things in life.

Like love, for instance. Love doesn’t make sense. It is irrational to put someone else’s needs in front of your own. Likewise, emotions don’t make sense. They are messy and pointless, but they are what make people real.

War doesn’t make sense. Fighting with swords instead of words doesn’t make sense. Unfounded hatred doesn’t make sense. I don’t make sense.

I contradict myself daily, whether in word or in deed. I have unrealistically high expectations for myself and circumstances beyond my control and expect the world to fall into my preset categories and calendars and it never does. Some days I want to smile for no reason at all, and other nights I feel like crying into my pasta salad. And that doesn’t make sense at all, because according to my calculations, happiness is supposed to be circumstantial and pasta salad doesn’t need anymore salt and it really isn’t sad at all.

The world doesn’t make sense. It never has, and the stubborn desire of one 19 year-old girl won’t change that. The world is broken, which doesn’t help this confusion, but so am I. We must learn to live in this broken, senseless world regardless. Stomping my feet and scowling at the surrounding nonsense doesn’t help anything.

You know what also doesn’t make sense? Friends that love you when you are unlovable. Loyalty that lasts through the test of time and trials. A perfect God that loves an imperfect people. Beautiful sunsets that fall every night on a world that doesn’t deserve them.