by Lauren Reed

At the end of a semester, I’m always ready to run back to my apartment and sleep off my finals. After a few days, though, I snap out of it and finish tying-up loose ends of the year. One of those “ends” is to reflect on my internship with the Center for Faith and Vocation. My internship, as the CFV’s Interfaith Liaison, let me interact with all the faith groups on campus, connecting them to each other and the CFV. I attended events, blogged about them, and sent lots of emails to support the groups. Judy asked me to reflect on how my work has related to my own life. This threw me a little. When writing for the CFV, I feel guilty deviating from what I see as “the important parts” of this internship so my instinct is to be academic and leave my personal life out of it. But when I think about the Center, its crew, and what they stand for, I realize that it’s silly of me to think that way. The CFV is one of the most individualized places I’ve ever been. The purpose of the House is to see each person as an individual with unique problems, situations, and needs. And the people who work there are good at it, which is why I’m about to reflect upon this internship and my personal life. Well done, Judy. Here I go.

In the dance world, we often talk about making ourselves into “well rounded dancers.” There’s a misconception (especially among younger dancers) that you should focus all your energy one style of dance to be the best. Ie, if you want to be a ballerina, it doesn’t do you any good to study ballroom dance, you should spend that time practicing ballet instead. I’m not saying that this is the way most dancers (especially those at Butler) think, but for some dancers, it is. For a dancer to limit himself or herself by only studying one style is silly because, one, there are very few companies that do exclusively one style and, two, you get a much richer experiencing by learning a little of everything. The same thing can be said about having more than one passion. A dance major’s academic schedule is packed and doesn’t usually allow for other activities so we often get stuck in a cycle of dance class, homework, and sleep. This internship has helped me set aside time to find meaning outside of dance because I get to work with people and learn about religions- two things I love. Don’t get me wrong. Dance is my calling. But there are days (as there are in any profession) that make me want to get out of the dance studio and having something else to turn to keeps me grounded. While it makes my schedule busy at times, this internship helps make me a “well rounded person.” When I’m able to invest in something that really calls to me, it gives me meaning outside the dance world. I’ve found that this semester at the CFV.

Maybe this is because of my structured background in dance, but I had a hard time adjusting to this type of work. I’m used to work that involves punching in and sitting at a desk for a prescribed amount of time, producing some tangible results. At my other jobs, numbers matter. X attendees to an event is a success, anything less than Y means I did something wrong. Every time that I bring up my nervousness about numbers, the gracious Judy has tried to get me to shift my thinking. My role, Judy says, is to extend an interfaith invitation to everyone and if no one responds, no problem; I’ll just ask again the next week. To be honest, this is the kind of work environment I would choose if I had my pick of them all. I suppose I’m just surprised I landed such a perfect gig. Go Blue House! I’m so lucky to have been able to do the good work of the CFV. I’m really looking forward to next semester when I’ll get to come back and learn more about our campus faith groups.