Update on the week… and existential questions

I am wrapping up a long week of therapy with a someone caught in the middle of one of West Africa’s many civil wars. I won’t say more about it here, except to add that it has been an invaluable learning experience for me. Because transportation is difficult and expensive, and because Karen is the only psychologist in the region, people can only come for one or two weeks. Rather than the weekly, 50-minute sessions that are common in the States, we meet for 2-3 hours at a time, sometimes two sessions a day. We do a lot of work in a short time period. This seems to work well given the parameters.

I feel like my time here is going very, very fast. I have been here for over three weeks. Laura, the other intern, is leaving at the beginning of next week. Rob will be here in just over a week. I will head home in one month’s time. Time is passing quickly. I wish I could stay an additional month or two (with Rob here of course). I am just beginning to feel that I “get” this population well enough to jump in and be useful. I also want to spend more time at the refugee camp and continue to learn more about mental health work with Africans. So many things! I guess some work will have to wait for another trip.

Being here makes me ponder the well worn question of what I am going to do with my life. It is impossible for me (for most people I think) to be a witness to suffering and need without some kind of thoughts about continued involvement. I don’t think I could have these kind of experiences if I didn’t have the sense that this work is part of the larger picture for my life. I am building on a foundation that has been under construction in me for many years. If only I had a copy of the architect’s plans! I know the foundation is deep but I don’t know if it’s a skyscraper, or a bomb shelter. I keep going on trips, each time with my heart open to some kind of sign, some kind of voice from the heavens that says “THIS IS IT. THIS IS THE THING FOR WHICH YOU WERE CREATED.” I don’t understand why this has not happened (I say this ironically because I don’t think it works this way at all).

Rather than drive myself crazy looking for my life’s call written in neon lights, I am borrowing from the contemplative tradition and simply asking myself: “What did I do today that was life-giving, that I loved? What did I do today that was life-draining, that I did not like?” The answers to these questions have led me (over and over) to return to places like Africa and Central America. There is something in the eyes of Ghanaians, Salvadorans, Guatemalans… something about the dusty streets and colorful fabrics… something about the determination to live peacefully, happily, in strong relationships, in spite of, in the midst of (poverty, injustice, war)… something about this place is life-giving to the very core of me.
And the tears come.

What does it mean that I am moved? In this moment I am moved, but what does it mean for the next moment and tomorrow and next year and ten years from now. These are the questions I try not to ask. I just exhale and rest in the fact that this moment, right now, this press of the keyboard means something and that is enough.