The Harvest

At the end of a construction project, everyone is in an utter panic.  You have to make quick decisions to meet deadlines. Sometimes the crews have to work nights and weekends to complete last minute items.  But there is nothing sweeter than having a certificate of occupancy in hand. There are closeout requirements after that, but that piece of paper is like reaching that light at the end of the tunnel.

Nearly three years ago, I started a new project. I started the job working hand-in-hand with my work mentor.  I had the chance to bounce ideas off of her and work hard details out together. But she was taken off the team to work on other jobs.

Right after she started her other projects, things got rough.  I struggled to communicate with the consultants. Our companies were working on mending a relationship with each other.  And I was stuck in the middle. Their expectations were different than I had ever experienced. They weren’t as responsive as other consultants I had worked with before.

During this time, I had also moved into my grandparents’ house.  I had left two of my closest friends behind in that process and wasn’t interested in working those problems out at the time.  I isolated myself in my grandparents’ guest room, only leaving to go to work (and returning around 9 or 10, just in time to go to bed) and to go to the gym once a week.

The late nights in the office wasn’t just because I was isolating myself from the world, but because the pressure of this project was bearing on me.

Before the first part of the project was completed, I bought my first home (insert all the stress of that process here).

And just when I thought that was over, the next two parts were well underway.  I felt really behind. I didn’t feel like I knew the next two part as well as the first because I had been so buried under that one’s pressure.  As I got up for more air, I was slammed down by being asked to mentor a new employee and two interns (who were uninterested in working).

The pressure just kept bearing down and bearing down.  And for the next year I lived under the pressure of this project.  Other projects started and finished, but this one kept me up at night.  This one continued to push me (and at times break me). I was screamed at (literally) by subs and co-workers, I was asked to step up when others didn’t do their parts, and I was promoted to a new role (both for me and the company).

And then…...it exploded.  The pressure ruptured - and I was diagnosed with two anxiety disorders.  And in the middle of my mess, the project still went on - and so did I. Part two finished right after this past Christmas.  The pressure started easing.

And now here we are...with THE piece of paper in hard for part three.  The sign to take a deep breath because it’s over.

The project that broke me is also the project that made me.  It taught me about the faithfulness of God. It taught me what hope really looks like in the darkness.  It taught me about my capabilities, but also about my limits. It taught me it’s OKAY to have limits (yes, really, it’s okay).

There was a passage, I’d read all the time.  I would read it in the moments of utter stress as I sat at my desk:

Those who plant in tears will harvest with shouts of joy.

They weep as they go to plant their seed, but they sing as they return with the harvest.

--Psalm 126:5-6

And so here I am nearly three years later, in the harvest.  I planted my seeds with tears - I also watered those seeds with my tears.  But now I harvest with joy.