Leaning in to Our Restless Hearts: Why Two Emotional States Can Coexist
By Therese Burch
While driving home on a random Tuesday night in college, I felt a deep sense of gratitude for the moment I was in. And it wasn’t a feeling of ecstatic joy or a heart warming feeling of love, it was more of an appreciation for the conflicting emotional state I had been in and a recognition of the deep value of this season of life.
I just started my senior year of college. And while the past week has been full of sweet reunions and exciting new beginnings, I know I’m not the only senior that was surprised by strong conflicting emotions. I love college and I love my school. I want to enjoy every moment of college to the fullest extent. The spontaneous late night adventures. Living in an apartment with my closest friends. Taking thought provoking classes and learning from incredible professors. While I have experienced some of the greatest joys in college and I deeply desire to cherish my last year in school, I have been surprised by the inner desire to move on from college, to begin my vocation, and to discover the purpose that God has intended for my life.
In the past week, I’ve been confused with myself for having these thoughts and beaten myself up over the fact that I am starting to feel ready to move on. I’ve been told that senior year should be the best year yet and I truly want to enjoy it to the fullest extent and not wish it away. I have been confused by the conflicting emotions and have not known how to deal with both the want to live in the present and the desire to move on to the future.
I came to the realization, however, that it is not only okay to feel both emotions, but that God intended for the entirety of life to be a coexistence of these two states of feeling. If we were to only ever desire our current season of life, we would be perfectly content with where we are and we would never progress towards our true home in heaven. God placed a desire on our hearts for complete happiness, a desire which nothing in the earthly world can fulfill. As C.S Lewis writes, “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” The itch to move on to the next season and the desire to find a greater purpose in life is therefore not only part of God’s intentional plan but a necessary emotional state that we must experience in order to become saints.
I have begun to think of the emotional tension I am experiencing in my senior year as not just something to acknowledge as natural, but as a true gift. God has given me a small glimpse of what the entirety of human life should be: an experience of beautiful and meaningful moments on earth while we constantly long for and strive every day to eventually reach our true home and everlasting happiness.
I hope I never ever become complacent with where I am in life. I hope I always experience the inner longing for more just like the desire I experience for a life and a larger purpose postcollege.
I hope I use this desire to grow in my relationships with God and others, and ultimately I hope that this strong desire gives me the grace and the strength to get to heaven.
What a gift. To be able to recognize God’s intentional plan for humanity and his perfect will in allowing us to feel a tension between emotions. I keep a quote from St. Augustine above my bed as a reminder of this: “Our hearts were made for You, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in you." May we constantly remind ourselves of the gift of a restless heart. And may we constantly go to God with our restless hearts, for it is only through him that we will one day find eternal rest.
