Since I was stuck on something to write about, I went looking through pictures...they say a picture is worth a thousand words...and this picture certainly does it for me.
2 1/2 of the 4 years of college I had, I worked for a non-profit organization called Girls Inc. It is an after school and summer program for girls ages 6-18. I started out as a teacher in the SMART Center and also helped out in the tutoring center, and eventually was promoted to the Administrative Coordinator. I loved my job...the people I worked with, the girls, everything about it. The people I met and the experiences I had during my 2 1/2 years at Girls Inc, changed my life.
In this picture we were ice-skating (if you can't tell - haha). One of the many fun things we got to enjoy with the girls. What a perfect job...you almost got to experience getting to be a kid again, but at the same time, are impacting girls in such a positive way.
There have been many times in the years since I have left Girls Inc, that I have struggled with certain things in my life, and I have to admit, have done some things that I would never have advised the girls I worked with to do. As I have dealt with some of my struggles in life, I have asked myself..."What would I have told one of those girls to do? What would my advice to them have been?" I look back at myself at that point in my life and realize that the answer to our problems is never usually too far away...it's just sometimes so hard to see the solution when you are in the middle of the chaos.
It amazes me how much you can learn from children. When I was working at Girls Inc, I was years away from becoming a mom myself yet, but I felt so much like a mother figure to all of those girls. They taught me so much, and I can only hope that I left a positive imprint on their lives as well. Amazingly, I still keep in contact with so many of those girls, their parents, and my fellow co-workers from that time in my life, and it is so fun to watch how much all of those lives have changed in such a positive way.
It sometimes saddens me to look back at that point in my life because of all the wonderful memories I had with such remarkable people, but at the same time look back with such awe at how much I have learned from those experiences and how much I have grown since then. What a gift it was to meet such wonderful people and to have most of them still in my life today.
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