Life Behind the Story

Before I talk about some of the developments in my life and part of the process of the whole “silver to gold” philosophy being formed in me, you might like to know that at one time I was a very serious bodyboarder, Yes, it’s like surfing but we lie on our bellies with a foam board instead. Unfortunately Microsoft Word hasn’t yet identified this as a sport, but let me tell you it was my life and I still love it. Baywatch video (yeah, I am the one in the water with the green jersey and the red board, can't believe I'm showing you this but here you go). Please don’t ask me why I moved to the most landlocked city in England where there’s no waves though or else I might cry; you’ll find out soon enough.

I’ll start the story when I was 22 years old. Less than a month after I graduated from a California university in 2000, I moved to Mozambique, Africa for six months to help the poorest of the poor. This was just after they were hit with the devastating floods. My time there was life changing to say the least. While living at the orphanage as my base, I had the opportunity to help teenage prostitutes get off of the streets, feed the poor, offer prayer, and care for orphans. I was also a part of organizing several medical clinics into the refuge camps as well as helping to plant a church. The joy I saw in their lives even when they had so little was a beautiful sight.


I moved back to California the end of that year and prepared to go back to Africa to give my life for the poor. Because of various circumstances, I ended up staying in California and developed and designed an intensive five week discipleship course with about fifteen youth from my church which turned out to be life changing for many of them. One of these girls about six years later said the following when we were talking one night: “Don’t settle for silver when God wants to give you gold.” Those words were powerful and struck me deeply. Maybe because I was in a situation where I needed to let go of something that was holding me back from more in my life or maybe it was the fact that she had spoken my own words directly back to me. What she said had been my saying for years. I challenged so many people to not settle for less than God’s best in their lives with those words and to hear them spoken back to me made them come even more alive for me.

Throughout the next couple of years, a story had been forming in my heart that I fully believed would empower and encourage people to pursue their dreams at all costs, to not settle for silver when they were meant for gold. So I zealously printed 2,000 copies of this little story, formerly known as From Silver to Gold: An Adventure from Freedom to Abundance, and passed them out for free at a rally in San Francisco in 2003. I didn’t realize at that time though that there was more of the story to be formed. At that point, the story had no dialogue and no characters; it was a rough sketch of what was later to come.

Throughout the next few years I ended up transitioning into a career with Starbucks coffee. I grew in the company and enjoyed it very much while on the side continuing to develop my little story. I took several writing classes off and on and attended a few writing conferences. All this was for the purpose of shaping my story. As I continued in my Starbucks career, I always knew there was something else I was supposed to be doing after my time there. I knew deep down I was meant to be involved in teaching or training, whatever that might look like. I also had this growing desire to study in England and I knew that to teach I would need a PhD. The one thing that always held me back from pursuing more education was the money thing. It took me several years to pay off my school loans from my undergraduate course and I was not looking forward to being in debt again, thus I put off returning to school…for six more years!

As the story continued to form in and through me over the years, sometimes I would move forward to try and get it published, only to get rejection letters. Nevertheless, I continued working on it off and on. I realized though that if at the heart of this story is an encouragement for others to lives their dreams, that I have to be living mine if there is to be any integrity in the story. If I am not living my dreams, if I am settling for silver in relationships/careers/etc. when I am intended for gold, then who is going to listen to me, who is going to believe that the story has any integrity. So as a result of trying to stay true to the heart of the story and to maintain my integrity, in 2007, I quit my job, sold my car, said goodbye to all my friends and family, and let go of my comfortable life in California to go on an adventure to England.

Now that I am in England, I am back in school and pursuing a PhD and enjoying it. The transition I faced the first year away was hard but now after that time, I feel more connected here and have had some opportunities here that I never would have had back in the OC. In the summer of 2008, I got to be a part of leading a team of students whose job it was to welcome new international students to the university through a week of fun events. I also ran my first ever half marathon then as well. Currently, I am a part of leading a group through my church that does free healing prayer right in the heart of the city center here.


I really do believe that there is something beautiful, maybe even supernatural in taking risks, in following one’s heart, in pursuing one’s dreams. I encourage you to not give up on whatever your dream may be, even if it seems like it is taking forever. If you stay on its path and keep moving towards it, eventually you'll get there, some quicker than others. Well, that is all I have to say for now. So this is me and what I’m about. Thanks for coming on this little journey with me down memory lane, hope you enjoyed the ride.
Jen