One Moment of Calm

Sometimes all it takes is one moment, one deep breath to put everything in perspective. Usually my life is dictated by fear: of the unknown, of my past, of judgments from others. So it was hard for me to finally say fu** the fear and just do what I thought was right.

I recently decided it was time to leave my counseling graduate program behind. For months I agonized about what to do, went over it session after session with my therapist. Thought about how I didn't want to be constrained by the American Counseling Association (ACA)'s ethics code. The ethics code says that I have to try and stop someone who wants to die by suicide, yet its okay for me to not try to stop someone who wants to die by euthanasia. Now who the hell am I to tell someone, a client who had the courage to share with me that they want to die by suicide, that people with terminal illnesses who are suffering and want to die makes sense, but your suffering is so wrong that I have the right to constrain your freedom, to actively try and stop you because your suffering clearly isn't rational or doesn't make sense? How I thought that diagnosis was an ideological state apparatus, a hegemonic tool to take people who approached the world differently and use a diagnosis to ascribe an identity of marginalization on them to coerce them to go toward what the privileged (middle to upper class, heterosexual, white, men) think of as normal. Yes, being a therapist/counselor was not something that I could be. I would literally have to give up everything I believe in (my Buddhism and my philosophical anarchism) to be a counselor.

I'm sorry but counseling isn't worth giving up who I am. I may be very flawed and I may be a hot mess, but I like who I am and I refuse to change for anyone. I change when I decide to change and not a moment before. If you don’t like it, that’s too bad because I never asked for your opinion and I don’t need you in my life. Four classes away from graduating and being able to apply for licensure and I decided that it was time to go. I realized that it didn't matter if other people thought I was crazy. I didn't care if other people agreed or understood my choice. I did what I did for myself. It was time to move on, to do what I wanted, to be free so I did.

I don't regret my choice, and I never will. I will never want to be a counselor, the cost of becoming one is far too high. My choice was the right one, for me. Sometimes you have to try things in order to know they are not for you. This was one of those times. I honestly don’t regret my time in the program, I learned so much about myself and about the person and things I refuse to be. So I took a deep breath, calmed myself and then told my advisor I was ready to go.

It took about 6 weeks to finally get the ‘good luck with your future endeavors’ line, but when I received it all I felt was immense relief. It felt like a heavy weight was lifted off my chest. No more conversations, no more back and forth, having to justify my statements or explain them. I am so happy be able to say that this was a moment in my life where I did what I wanted and I didn’t care about the consequences. This is the first time in my life I did something without a plan in place first. This is a moment I’ll always look back on with pride.

I still don' t know what I'm going to do. I think I'm done with school (I've been hiding in graduate school for five years because I didn't want to grow up). I finally am ready to say goodbye to my old ways. To be a grown person who stands on their own two feet and makes their own way.