We sometimes mistakingly think that life will unfold magically in a flash, or that we will be born mature and fully developed, just as Athena sprung from the head of Zeus. It would be nice if we saw clearly, immediately, our path and role, but that would take away a lot of the lessons we gain from slowly finding out or from taking wrong turns. Life is, rather, a slow process, a long conversation and dialogue, where we do not often see clearly and are always searching,  as this beautiful Mary Oliver poem reminds us:

Another morning and I wake with thirst
for the goodness I do not have. I walk
out to the pond and all the way God has
given us such beautiful lessons. Oh Lord,
I was never a quick scholar but sulked
and hunched over my books past the hour
and the bell; grant me, in your mercy,
a little more time. Love for the earth
and love for you are having such a long
conversation in my heart. Who knows what
will finally happen or where I will be sent,
yet already I have given a great many things
away, expecting to be told to pack nothing,
except the prayers which, with this thirst,
I am slowly learning.

Mary Oliver, Thirst, Beacon Press, 2006