Listening for Purpose The Institute for Leadership and Service

Faith, Representation, Community, Organic-ness, and Genuine-ness . These are the themes that arose during my conversation today with Fox Wilmot. Fox’s campus experiences have led him to the intersection of faith and teaching in ways that speak simultaneously to the intentionality and spontaneity of our journeys in purpose. Fox has been a leader of SweetWine, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia and Boxing Club, and participated in the CAPS fellowship among other things. Through these experiences he has come to the conclusion that we do not live in isolation. Though we live simultaneously in multiple different circles, the impacts of each percolate throughout our lives. Consequently, our singular personhood is a representation of the multitude of different groups of which we are a part. We talked about the impact this can have on our behaviors, and the importance of being able to show consistency throughout all facets of our lives, not only for the sake of an outward image, but also for our own personal equilibrium.

Today I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Dr. Carolyn Whittier, the assistant vice president for student life. Over the last 12 years, Carrie’s vision and direction have helped to reform what it means to be a student at Valpo. Our conversation was incredibly rich and touched on just about every element of calling and purpose you could think of. Though we talked about many things, there were a few threads that were constant through it all. The first one that came up was family. Carrie’s passions for education and fraternity and sorority life, her calling to live in the Midwest, and her desire to achieve were all traditions that were handed down to her by her parents. These traditions profoundly influence the choices that she makes every single day. One way they do so is through her calling to live her authentic life and encourage others to do the same. To me, this was the most salient theme throughout our episode today. This calling has shaped her career, her personal life, her interactions with students, and has quite literally become the standard by which she lives. I left our conversation wondering what the world would look like if everyone took the initiative to do the same.  Thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy this episode of Listening for Purpose.

Today we talked with Essence Roberson about youth service week, the upcoming series of events hosted by Alpha Psi Omega, the mens and womens service fraternity. Essence has been the president of APO for the last two years, and has also been heavily involved on the E-Board of BSO, the Black Student Organization during that time, in fact, she was one of our guests during our episode with BSO from February. Our conversation mostly revolved around the upcoming Youth Service Week, but we also talked about intersectionality in identities and about the difficulties of managing the transition from college to life after college. Essence emphasized the importance of passing down knowledge as one way of leaving college well and brought up the transition of expertise between old and new executive boards as one crucial example for that process. Thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy this episode of Listening for Purpose.

Today we talked with Hailey Morse who is a freshman Meteorology major in the sustainability scholars program. This program is one branch of the Uplift Valpo initiative, and it aims to help students to think about the world through an environmental lens regardless of their field of study. In her short time at Valpo, Hailey has already become involved across varied areas of campus. She was the Co-Chair of choreography for the Christ College first year production, she is a member of Hooked on Tonics (HOT), the campus acapella group, and she is a regular attendee of the Candlelight evening service. She, like Sarah Martin, introduced me to a new conception of calling. Hailey discussed calling as something that you don’t understand until the calling has been fully realized. This is interesting, as it indicates that we know when we are called, but we don’t necessarily know until we get there. This feeds her initiative to try everything available to find what she is called to do. Thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy this episode of Listening for Purpose.

Today I talked to Adam Monnette who is the first person who comes to mind when I think about a campus leader. He is the president of the University Programming Council (UPC), Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity, and the Honor Council, but his leadership extends far beyond his formal roles. Adam has participated in a service trip each spring during his tenure here at Valpo, this past summer, he spent over 500 hours with the red cross as a fellow for the Calling and Purpose in Society fellowship, or CAPS, and he has sought to open up opportunities for those who may not have found their place on campus yet. Despite having accomplished all of these things, Adam claims that he is still looking for his place in college. We talked about many things from the importance of communication and community in leadership, to the difficulties of imposter syndrome, to a couple tips for finding one's place on campus, but throughout it all, the theme of searching was very present. No one’s life is complete in every way. We are all still seeking something, whether it be a group to fit in with, opportunities to grow in our career or major, or even just a friend to cry or celebrate with.  Thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy this episode of Listening for Purpose.

Sarah Martin is a first year Christ College student at Valpo who is exploring what it means to pursue calling and purpose in a collegiate space. We talked primarily about getting involved and getting out of one’s comfort zone, but we also talked about the distinction between calling and purpose. Sarah struck on a key idea that I wish we would have explored more, namely that there is a difference between the implications of calling and those of purpose. Calling is present oriented. We feel a calling now, something is attracting us in this moment, however, purpose seems more eternal. It is the idea may be that we are predestined to work toward a goal or accomplish some task. This distinction is something that we might gloss over at somewhere like the Institute for leadership and service, but for many others, it can have huge implications on the way we think about our intentional activity in the world.