Just As You Are
JAYA is a Laguna Hall event at Vanguard University where the Freshman girls are invited to take a week to embrace the person that God created them to be. As an RA, my experience with Jaya was much more profound this time around. As opposed to my own freshman year JAYA experience, I got to see this particular week from the outside. I had the opportunity and privilege to walk through this week with about 25 girls and see the effects of stripping away all the things that we most commonly hide behind. Things such as make up, fixing our hair to look a certain way, and dressing to impress. However, there are also things that were focused on that were much greater than just surface level. We challenged the girls each day to give up something that they find their identity in. For some, they felt the pressure to act a certain way or to even create a fabricated relation with others (or even themselves) to please God.
This year was amazing. As I also walked through the various challenges myself, I found some days more difficult than others. It's so easy to get caught up in the here and now, and forget who we really are and who God created us to be. Make up and looking presentable is by no means a bad thing, but I learned that if you are using it to cover something deeper, you may have a problem.
Stay Beautiful,
Megs
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