As Christmas approached, my family was continually asking me what gifts I wanted, but I found it difficult to come up with a list. I felt so grateful for everything this year has given me, so I didn't feel like there was anything else I needed. JYLA is a huge reason why I feel so content with my life right now. Around this time last year, I was working on my Episcopal Service Corps application, and although JYLA was my top choice, I still wasn’t 100% sure about living and working in LA. I was considering making the safe choice and joining the service program in North Carolina, so I could be much closer to home. However, I ultimately decided to push myself out of my comfort zone and move all the way across the country for JYLA, and that was the best decision I’ve ever made.

Living in LA is a dream come true, I feel so blessed to be working at Open Temple, and I love all of my housemates and see them as family.

Gratitude has been a pretty important theme for me these past couple of months. I take a walk every day to get some fresh air and exercise, and even though I take roughly the same route, each time I’m overwhelmed with wonder and gratitude because I still feel so lucky to be here. I keep thinking about how, if I could go back and tell year-ago Jayne what was in store for her, she would be in complete disbelief. JYLA has opened so many doors for me, and that’s a big part of the reason why I feel like my life has never been better than it is right now!

~ Jayne​

Recently, everything just feels really hard. A lot harder than things used to feel. The thing is, I know that this year has always been hard - but now it feels like a different kind of hard. I feel like I’m constantly analyzing everything that I experience and trying to find some deep, groundbreaking meaning for it all (kind of like in all of those dystopian society YA novels), where there can be a beginning, middle, and tidy, satisfying end. I know that won’t happen, but wouldn’t it be sick if it did?

I continue to feel so lucky to be where I am right now. I feel so lucky, however, that it almost makes me angry. I don’t think that was the exact wording to describe how I feel, but it’s the closest I could find. If I were to break the emotions I have been feeling most recently down into a nice little pie chart, they would probably be happiness, sorrow, anger, and fear. I put happiness first because I want to make it very clear that, overall, I am happy! I’m happy to be where I am, happy to get to do something I love every day, happy to feel like my family and loved ones are safe, and happy about so many other things. The other emotions are present in a way that they always have been - sad for people who are suffering, angry at people who don’t care, scared for everything that the future holds - but also in a way that is new, given the current circumstances.

I have a hard time putting all of those thoughts and feelings - thoughts and feelings that I have constantly but don’t exactly know what to do with - on to paper and then sort of just leaving them there. But that’s what I’m going to do here, because I don’t really have anything else to add to them at the moment. I am, however, going to write a banging conclusion that summarizes this reflection and what I hope I communicated, because that’s my favorite part of writing a paper, so here it is:

Overall, I am in the best place, both location wise and mentally, that I could be right now. That’s not to say that everything is good and awesome and perfect, because it is very clearly not, but I feel grateful to be experiencing all of this while surrounded by people who care about me, about our community, and about doing everything they can to make things better.

~ Caitlin

Jubilee Year has tested my capacities in all aspects. I’ve learned about patience and adaptability while being here and friendship and communication have become essential in my life as adjusting to a new environment with new people can be so hard.

This year, I have learned so much about friendship. I can honestly say I’ve never expected to be surrounded by such awesome people who support and listen to you when you are feeling under the weather, homesick, or simply exhausted from working hard. I love my housemates - who have become my friends - and I love my students and coworkers!

A few years ago I bought my first succulent in a cute little pot from a pottery sale on my college campus. I didn’t know much about plants at the time but it caught my eye and I knew that succulents were easy to take care of so I brought it home. I quickly became invested in how this little plant was doing, and it slowly started teaching me my first plant lessons.

I added a few more succulents to my collection over the next couple of years. I never did a lot of research on how to care for plants but I did pay a lot of attention to them and googled things when I had concerns. Some time about a year ago I became much more invested in my plants and started researching house plants. The more I learned, the more plants I wanted, and the more plants I bought, the more I wanted to learn. I eventually started propagating my own plants which was both a fun adventure, and a cheaper way to have more plants. By the time I was getting ready to move to LA for Jubilee Year I had built up quite a collection of plants. And I realized that their transition to a new home and a new life was going to be just as complicated as mine. 

Mountains, beaches, different towns relating to different regions around the world, and all the glamour Hollywood has to offer. When first arriving in LA it appeared that there was a new adventure waiting for me around every corner, and for the first month it felt like a constant go, go, go. But then, something happened. A change started to emerge in my settings. Where excitement once held dominance, routine now became the new king.

I first became aware of this shift when riding on my bus route to and from my service site. In the beginning I would do everything in my power to ensure that I got a window seat. I would look around all the wonders of LA and think, wow, this is where I live now, how is this even real life? Now a days, however, when I look at all the studios, and all recording labels, I no longer feel a wow moment happening inside me, instead the thoughts of “same old same old” appear. 

When I became aware of this switch I instantly began to think there was something wrong with me. I mean for pete's sake this is Hollywood babyyy. Everything, and everyday is suppose to be this grand journey that will be a story of a lifetime. So why was it that all of a sudden this adventure started to feel, well, ordinary.  I began to panic, did this mean I had tremendous commitment issues and I would be doomed for the rest of my life? 

The answer to that question, is 100% absolutely no. In fact, I was only experiencing a very real and natural process of living somewhere outside of my comfort zone  for the first time. What I did not realize in the moment was that my everyday life wasn’t becoming dull or boring, but was instead becoming my routine. My astonishing surroundings weren’t becoming anything less than that, but instead were becoming familiar. My new adventure was starting to become my life, my world, and my home. What I realized is that it is our mindsets that make our surroundings. That instead of thinking that the adventure is now over because I am starting to get the hang of life here in LA, an entirely new chapter of my  story is just now beginning. 

~ Serenity

In the words of Cornel West, I went through schooling, but schooling also went through me. And, from what I can tell, also made a mess of things. I came into this year with the intention of post-graduate searching— searching for creativity, searching for purpose, searching for the Rodell that exists outside of educational institutions.

My search for creativity became a search for God— in fact, maybe all searches lead to God in one way or another. And God always seems to ask that I allow myself to be bigger, to search with a wider scope, to ask questions with weight I can barely manage. 

Recently, I started drinking coffee in the morning again. I wish I could give you some cool explanation for why I stopped, like I was testing my body’s ability to function without caffeine, or maybe taking part in some trendy new cleanse, but I can’t. The truth is, I stopped drinking coffee because, up until a few days ago, I didn’t know how to work the coffee pot in the house, and was too embarrassed to ask one of my housemates to explain it. Silly? Yes. Irrational? Maybe. Coming into this year, I believed I was prepared for the unfamiliarity of everything. I anticipated challenges like figuring out the bus routes, learning to live with 6 people I had never met, and all of the other things you would expect when moving to a totally new place. What I didn’t expect was for a coffee pot to be the first enemy I would make in my new home. There is something about being in an unfamiliar setting that can make even the most basic of tasks feel like a challenge.
 
As it turns out, there are plenty of new challenges waiting for me, both inside of the house and out. Each and every day I encounter people and places that are still unfamiliar to me. The difference between these encounters and my coffee pot story, however, is that there is no real problem to be solved. Sure, it would be nice to one day just decide that I am comfortable and know everyone and everything that there is to know in my new home, but that’s not really the case. Instead, I get to treat every day as an opportunity to continue getting to know my community. I won’t lie, at times this can be hard. Some days I want nothing more than to run back home and hide in the comforting familiarity of my childhood bed. But as the days pass and I look back on everything that I’ve done in three short months, I am able to consider how far I have already come. Every time that I learn something new about one of my housemates, discover a new favorite place (there have been many new “favorites” so far), or recognize a face at one of my service sites, I am reminded that this is where I am at right now. For one year, this is my home, my community, and my life. Of course, there is plenty more work to be done- more relationships to develop, more places to see, and more transit lines to memorize- but I have time. 

~ Caitlin

If you were to live a day in the life of Hannah Webster, you would quickly realize how much joy and excitement she has for life. You would constantly find yourself day-dreaming and thinking of any and all possible experiences life has to offer…

Whenever I find myself embarking on a new journey, I am filled with an incredible sense of excitement and passion. Social justice and Sociology has always been something I identify well with. This is probably the top reason I am super pumped about this upcoming year of service. I love taking on social work opportunities as well as adding the communities that could use some more attention. I am eager to participate in activities that enhance my understanding and passion for social justice initiatives.

I am also very passionate about growth. I think one of the most important things that people can do is to get out in the world and learn about the different possibilities that life has to offer. Educating oneself is such an important tool for moving forward and interacting with one another. That is why I get so excited to experience a new opportunity. It means that I will grow and learn so much about not only myself, but also the rest of the world. To me, that is one of the coolest things our journey on earth has to offer. If we chose to, we can move forward and gain more understanding.

It’s been 9 months since I started living in intentional community and serving as Volunteer Coordinator at a refugee resettlement agency here in LA. Working a 9-5 job and coming home to a wonderfully supportive group of housemates has allowed me to slow down, reconnect with myself and develop a spiritual life.

​People often ask 20-something year olds what they want to do with their lives: they’re often asking for careers, categories in which they can place us. I do not know if I see myself fitting into a specific career, but I know the spirit I’d like to live my life in. I want to create spaces of communion: spaces where people don’t have to feel isolated. Spaces where people can find love. Spaces where they can receive and give spiritual companionship. If anything, I think recognizing how I want to live my life is far more important to me than choosing a career.

As much as my time with EUIP is about professional and spiritual development, I have also been diving into my own creative development. This has been a process of learning how to love my ideas, paying close attention to the world around me, and of course, finding inspiration in other artists doing incredible things. Here’s a couple artists that have been influencing me over these past couple months: 

As I brisk-walk out of my house this morning to catch the 8.12am bus to work—which is always a few minutes late or early, never on time—I am very suddenly seized with anxiety: I need a hobby.

I had spent the morning slowly letting myself wake up. I sat cross-legged before the tall mirror on my bedroom floor, gazing at the reflection of the mess of furnishings—perfectly scattered form—in my dimly lit room, starkly—but not intrusively—eclipsed by the outside trees swaying in the mellow morning sun, peeking through the kaleidoscope colored stained glass windows above my cupboards. They invited me to sit and watch them. So, I did for a little while.