Motivation...

Of all the things that I've been thinking of lately one of the things that has been most prominent has been my motivation. What is it, where does it come from, what is it pushing me to? Do I even have the right type of motivation to get me to where I want to be?

So for those of you who don't know, here is my goal:
I want to work with kids, teenagers to be specific. But not just your typical everyday teenager. I want the ones with problems, and not the 'I'm not popular, I don't get what I want' type problems. I want the real bad ones, the ones no one else wants, the ones who everyone else has given up on. Those are the ones I want to focus on, those are the ones that I want to help and encourage and bring to a better place in their life. I believe that adolescence is the only other time in a person's life (besides original basic development) that you can have a deep impact and change a "troubled kid" for the better.

So motivation. Here we go:
I remember being younger, maybe 8 or 9, and seeing the movie Renaissance Man with Danny DeVito. I loved the movie, but it wasn't until I was older and in high school that I finally realized why. DeVito's character is supposed to be teaching a small group of army soldiers how to comprehend. Instead he ends up reading Hamlet with them and explaining it all to them. However, before we get to that part, he tells them to write an essay about why they have joined the army and these kids come back with some of the saddest stories I had heard until that point. One talks about how his kid sister was killed, another how she never really had a home. DeVito's character during the course of the movie reaches them in a way that I want to be able to reach kids. He changes their lives, shows them that there's more to life than what other people tell them.
Two summers ago I interned at a group home for teenagers in the court system. I was assigned to one of the girl's houses and I became quite close to them. Their stories were awful, but I will never forget Jenna. Her parents didn't want her. It's as simple as that. Her parents just didn't want her and so she became a problem child in school - getting into fights, smoking on school grounds, stealing, cheating, etc. Finally a foster family decided that they wanted to adopt her. At the same time that this decision was made, it was found out that two of the main caretakers in the house, whom she had actually grown close to, were leaving. This hit her hard and so she began acting out. Because of that, the foster family decided a week before adoption that they couldn't handle her and didn't want to adopt her. I cried that night. I still remember her running into the house, and into her room, slamming the door. I was sent in after her as the main caretakers talked to the foster parents. She wasn't crying, she never cried in front of people. I sat on her bed and just waited until she decided it was time to talk, and when she did she finally cried. She was hurt so badly. No one wanted her and she didn't know what to do or how to be in order for someone to love her. It broke my heart to pieces, and still does even today. I think about her often and I send up a plea to St. Jude to take care of her. I hope she hasn't ended up in jail or worse.
I watched Dead Poet's Society and was so inspired by Robin Williams character and the way he impacted the lives of those boys. How he inspired them to pursue their dreams and own ambitions. "Oh Captain, my captain." He showed them the world was more than what their parents said or that the school let them see.
Nebraska passed their safe haven laws to include kids all the way up to 17. In the first few weeks, of the 10 kids that were dropped off at hospitals, only 1 of them was a toddler. It breaks my heart when I think of that. Teenagers remember that, and don't know how to deal with it, and so turn to peers who don't know how to handle problems like that any better. Foster parents get burned out and many a time people just don't know how to handle these types of things.
Bang Bang You're Dead, another movie where the only person who really cares about the "kid at risk" is one teacher. That teacher says "when you label a kid at risk, you've just created a kid at risk" "why don't you decide who you are before someone else does" and other such inspiring quotes. You listen to what Travis Adams says in the videos he creates in the movie and you hear a teenager crying out for someone to help, to listen, and do show that they actually truly care. But one person is not enough. Teenagers need a support system in order to function in today's society and they aren't going to get it solely through the school. They need more.

So there it is. My motivation. I believe in the achievements of all teenagers, regardless of their past history. They just need a little encouragement, a little love, a little guidance. Someone who actually cares about what happens to them (and when I say actually, I mean a real, solid, true caring).

It's hard. Keeping my motivation in mind is hard what with everything else that is going on in my life. And then I'll lay down at night and these things will flood into my mind and I'll get lost thinking about what I should be doing differently, what am I not doing that I should be doing. I think about the what ifs. What if it's not good enough? What if I can't get the right training? What if I can't do it, what if I'm not strong enough to handle these kids? What if I never make it? What if this isn't what I'm suppose to do despite my obvious want to do this?

And then I think of Jenna. And of the stories of the other kids at the group home and I get up the next morning and go to the class I hate, and I come home and I do homework and I study for hours on end. So maybe my motivation is working, but I'm just getting tired of the seemingly endless setbacks from schools and my own professors.