I'm eager to be sent overseas, but have come to greatly appreciate the sculpting occurring within me and my squad here at training camp. It's an essential step to not only bind us together, but also center each one of our lives back to the one who brought us here in the first place. Through laughter and tears, we have begun to chip away at the identities created for us by the lies of society and instead, have found an identity far more true and rooted in Christ. The more we lean into these identities, the more we understand the kind of being that God really is and the kind of work that he is inviting us into.

My personal journey of this has included affirmations of strengths from my teammates, the theme of being rooted in Christ, and confirmations from God that I'm meant to be here. It's thrilling to feel this connected with God, especially when you get to mobilize that with a group of like-minded people.

I've always anticipated meeting my squad. Whatever nerves that surfaced were quickly muted by the fact that I get live life with these God-fearing people for 11 months in countries I honestly couldn't locate on a map before this opportunity. My squad bonded quickly. A great contributor to that being the small size of our group. A typical World Race squad can have up to 50 members...we have 9. Initially, I was quite bummed by the size of this group. It was hard to watch name after name drop off of our squad. But now, I have come to cherish each member so dearly and am so grateful for the intimacy the size of our group allows for. There is so much more to learn about each other but so much time to do just that. I am so excited to see where this year takes us, but for now, we have one more week of training and then off to the Dominican Republic we go!