The Mystery of Vocation

     It is my last day at home, but somehow it hasn't hit me yet. The monastery I'm entering feels very distant when I'm sitting at the kitchen table eating lunch, or sprawled on the couch with a cup of tea and a blanket, or out shopping, or watching a movie. And yet, I know I couldn't stay like this. It's similar to how I felt going to college: I don't really know what to expect, but I know I'm doing the right thing, and I know that if I didn't go I would feel like I had never really begun my life.
     It's the feeling of blooming or coming out of a chrysalis, I guess. You know it will be hard and so, so different, and it's kind of scary, but there's no part of you that wishes you could go back to the way it was before, when you were a bud or a caterpillar. What butterfly wishes it were still a caterpillar? It's a poor analogy for the romance of God drawing a soul to Himself, but it's the best I can think of. Like all worthwhile things, it will be difficult. Of course I'll miss so many aspects of my life as it is right now - I'd be crazy not to - but I think it will be the way we miss the days of our childhood, looking back on them fondly, but not seriously wishing to go back to them. Jesus never promised a life of ease; in fact, He warned us of just the opposite. But He also said, "everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life." (Matthew 19:29)

     I believe that God created my soul for consecrated life. I believe it for a number of reasons, but the predominant one is that I desire to be a nun more than I've ever desired anything else. It comes with a sense both of urgency and of deep peace; a still, small voice. I worried, when I was younger, about how I was going to know when God was calling me to a specific vocation. Little did I know that He was already calling me, gently, even then. Every little part of my personality, every one of my interests, every bit of my being is marked with my vocation. That's why answering God's call didn't feel like making a decision; it felt like making a discovery. Cracking the code - or really being shown the solution - to who I am.
     It's something people noticed in me almost before I noticed it in myself. I can think of many times when I've been told I would make a good sister. When I made a quick visit to the Norbertines this summer, I brought along a few friends, and afterwards they said they could tell how happy I was at the monastery. I hadn't been conscious of any change in my own demeanor, but they could see it in me.
     If I were to give advice to someone on how to find their vocation, I would say this: it's already there inside of you, because God knew you before He formed you in the womb, and He created you for a reason. So take an honest look at yourself, your interests, and your desires, and then give it to Him to show you what to make of it all. Pray with St. Alphonsus Liguori, "Grant that I may love You always, and then do with me as You will."