Quite a bit has happened since my last post. I got sick about a week after I wrote that entry; I had to go to Mexico since I don't have insurance and the whole thing ended up costing me around $1,200. This ended up coming out of my savings acount, which reduced it by a good amount. I had planned on using that money to go to Costa Rica, but at that point, I would have only been left around $400 in savings, which I was not comfortable with at all. If any other emergency were to pop up, I would have had to slip back into debt and I was not about to put myself in such a precarious situation again.

This led to some hard thinking which made me question why I really wanted to go to Costa Rica. All the pros and cons I mentioned in my previous post still held true, but there was some disconnect in me that wasn't behind the decision to accept the job 100%. But, they wanted me. Me. It is so hard to turn down a work position since as a Hispanic Studies major I didn't have a rush of people fighting for me to work for them. I think that it shook me when I graduated and I had to settle for a job that I didn't want, because it was the only one that I could get and it was selling mattresses. MATTRESSES, people. Granted, I made mucho dinero, paid off about $17,000 in debt in 8 months and paid cash for a trip to Thailand, but at the end off the day? I was still a mattress salesperson. I felt like I was wasting my hard work for my degree staying there.

Ultimately, I thought of the Costa Rica position in these terms: there were too many things about that job that I would have to work around or change: the lack of support structure, the curriculum, the financial instability, the lack o relationships with other organizations and the fact that I had no real network down there to help me. I believe in challenging myself, but I also would like to think that in the past 4 years that I've learned something about how I thrive and what works best for me. Yes, you need to challenge yourself, but you do not need to do it on all fronts, while in a foreign country with no friends or family.

So I didn't. I declined the position. The very next day I got an application from National Council of La Raza to staff their 2006 Lideres Summit in Los Angeles July 2 -13th. And even though I only had a week to do it, I got my recommendations together and my letters written and submitted it. I guess the right opportunity really does show up, you just have to be cognizant of when something is right for you, and when you're just doing it because you think you should, or it's easy, or it sounds like something you should be doing.

And now, I've just finished my Aspiring Youth College For A Day event at Rice. I had 80 at-risk middle school students come in and experience the Rice campus, talk to admissions officers, college students and role models. It was so so much hard work, but it was worth it. For the first time in a very very long time I feel proud of myself. This is something that I dreamed of doing my junior year, and four years later, I single-handedly made it happen though dedication and the people I know. I feel like I'm being the person that I always knew I was, but had lost touch with for a while. I feel like myself again, and I feel like I'm going to continue to make a difference in the world as I discover my path. Thank you thank you to all who helped, who prayed and who believed in me.