His Plans

In the fall of 2021, I applied for an internship with the PGA Tour. It would be a 10-week summer program at their headquarters in Florida and you would learn about a certain category within the company. The PGA Tour is a dream company for me. Somewhere I have always wanted to work and still have my sights set on.

In February of 2022, I received a notification I moved on to the interview stage. Except it wasn’t even an interview, but a series of short recorded videos.

The morning I decided to record my interviews, I took my sweet time straightening my hair and choosing the right colored polo, taking numerous photos to test the colors. I had prepped for this for days and in my mind I was certain I would be going to Florida. God knew how bad I wanted to go as my prayers were filled constantly with this want, but He quickly showed me that His plans were different.

One question in and the power went out. Yes, I kid you not, the power in my entire condo complex went out. The Wi-Fi wasn’t working and to be honest, it felt like the world around me was ending.

Tears were flowing. My recording had stopped midway through the first question and I didn’t realize something was wrong until the spinning wheel of death popped up.

Everything was going wrong.

I couldn’t reach someone at the PGA to tell them what happened (like they would care, but I tried). The power wasn’t coming back on. Mascara was running down my face. It was not going according to my plan.

But it was going according to His.

Little did I know this is what He had planned all along. He had planned for the power outage, for the PGA to not hire me and another summer with JGAA.

I had no idea what the reason behind me staying another summer with JGAA was. I thought I accomplished everything in the summer prior. I made friendships, developed my network and gained skills outside of school. Questions floated in my mind of what the purpose was of another summer in Phoenix.

It honestly took a toll on my mental health. I wondered over and over why I didn’t get the job believing I was the perfect candidate until something changed.

I met one of my best friends Taylor.

It wasn’t the unlikeliest of meetings because God brought us together and we found out very quickly that we are practically the same person. We both love golf and Jesus, want to promote women in sports, majoring in communications/journalism and have the same goals.

But really everything about our friendship changed a couple weeks into knowing each other.

Our boss tasked me with showing Taylor the ropes to photography and uploading to Instagram, but I’m pretty sure we spent the entire day talking about anything and everything. I just remember we could be transparent around one another despite only speaking a few times prior. At the end of the day something in both of us shifted as we realized there was a friendship blossoming between all the craziness. And we just grew from that tournament on to be inseparable.

Slowly, but surely I started to realize God’s purpose in having me stay. It was Taylor. I’m trying hard not to cry while writing this because I really didn’t know His plan. I prayed constantly for Him to reveal it, and He took His time in doing so. I look back at my journal and I’m amazed at my own realization of coming to open my eyes to His plan. The open-mindedness I had and not shutting myself off because of one bad experience.

One of the things I wrote in the beginning of our friendship was “While I’m still heartbroken over the fact I didn’t get the job, I know there are cracks with light and she’s one of those rays.”

So yeah, I didn’t get the job, but I got a best friend.

I often think about what would have happened if I chose to do the interview earlier in the day. If I didn’t take so much time to get ready. Or if I chose a different day entirely. Would I have gotten the job then? Would I have not been as rattled? I’ll never know, but I don’t want to. God brought me something better in the form of Taylor and I’m so grateful because now I can’t imagine my life without her. He showed me that His plans are so much better than mine.

We push each other to be the best people we can be. Where she’s strong, I’m weak and vice versa.

We complete each other.