I am an overachiever.

At least, I used to be. Throughout my formative years, I grew accustomed to measuring myself according to the letter or numerical value next to my name: on report cards, grade postings outside classrooms, standardized test scores. Each positive mark hovered in the box marked “achievement” for mere seconds before it converted to a stepping stone on the way to the next task. I was goal-oriented, always moving. I was my own Tiger Mom.

Life, for me, was never something in which I was immersed; it was always something I was building toward. I was the glasses-and-books version of Toddlers and Tiaras, the girl who found safety and meaning within the walls of classrooms, the pages of homework, the approval of authority figures.

Not that all of this is bad–“oh woe is me, I worked hard and now have a successful career, nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen”–but it wasn’t until my carefully-constructed, risk-free plan fell apart that I began to realize that the best things in life? They are not reflected by grades or won through anxious clamoring. They are gifts received by an open heart willing to accept the limitations of its own knowledge and the mystery and unpredictability of a greater plan than mine.

One of the things included in that plan was a five-year stint in New York City that I never would have considered had I remained comfortably ensconced in my Bible Belt perch, had I continued being the error-free student, had my character remained pristine and my choices stellar. But the wake of what looked like destruction that I left behind in Alabama became the foundation for a life built not upon a perfect record but upon the gifts of grace bestowed throughout five years of gritty redemption.

I’m retelling this story, my story, because some of you are new here and may be in the midst of your own mess, surrounded by what appear to be dead ends and unfulfilled dreams. And my simple and loving question to you is, who do you think you are? That’s right. Who do you think you are to appraise the turmoil around you and deem it beyond transformation, to see it as The Way Things Are rather than the raw material that will make you stronger, wiser, softer, and more prepared to jump off the cliffs that lead to real love, true faith, and the You that you were made to be?

The Me I was back when life was safe and manageable would never have gone to New York–and she sure has hell would never have stood before the only boy she ever loved and tell him how she felt. (Okay, so she may have been encouraged by a bottle of champagne, whatever! STILL BRAVE!) And she never would have had the faith to wait for a full year, until the timing was right and hearts were ready, for him to come back to her and say yes. But those kind of gifts are worth every moment of harrowing grace leading to them, and so yours will be.

(Another thing she wouldn’t have been able to do? Open her heart and pour it out on a screen, behind which waited thousands of strangers, and press “post” to EG’s page. And that girl would never have known the gifts of support and encouragement provided by a favorite author and her fans, and the gifts of community and friendship promised to a heart open to the possibility of More.)