How I Learned I Had a Charism

Long discouraged by a teacher's thoughtless remark, Jane Korvemaker finally learns to accept and celebrate her unique, God-given gifts.

Youthful Joy 

When I was young, I loved to learn and to write. I can recall making up stories in my head and imagining how they would play out and writing them down. Often in coming home from school, I’d race to my room and grab the notebook where my latest story was laid out. I couldn’t wait to continue down the path that the story was leading me. When I would learn something new I was eager to see how I could use the newfound knowledge in my story.  

I even created my own symbolic written language, drawing complex shapes and dashes instead of words to express the ideas in my head, at least until my little brother stopped taking my writing notebooks and reading them. I felt very clever that I'd found a way to thwart him.  

How Hopes are Crushed 

In Canada as I was growing up, French was mandatory for part of high school and optional up through grade twelve; I loved learning it, so I took it to the end of high school. Being an optional class by then, we were only six students. 

Toward the end of the school year, I received a very average mark on a major test. My French teacher looked at me and sighing said, “Y’know, I don’t know why you’re even here. Everyone else here is good at French but no matter what we seem to do, you just don’t learn it. My French class is usually top of the city at provincial exams, but your mark alone brings my class average down so far that it won’t happen this year.”

As I stood there absorbing the meaning of her words my throat started to tighten. The room shrank as I felt the class’s eyes on me and suddenly I felt exposed and humiliated. I grabbed my stuff and ran out — I couldn’t leave the classroom fast enough. When I felt safe enough away, I crumpled in a side hallway, slouched over, and wept.  

Here I was taught that the love of learning isn’t good enough. In fact, I’m actually a burden to others and resented if I’m not good at it. There was no one to tell me differently and I absorbed that condescension as though it were true. 

Healing 

Through counselling, I’ve been able to see how my younger self was so impacted by such a thoughtless remark. My love for unbridled creativity dropped like a boulder off a cliff and my creative writing stopped, unless required by a class.  

Yet my authentic love of learning couldn’t remain crushed under a rock. It crawled out and continued, maligned, on its journey, a shadow of its former confident self. Though crippled, it’s the reason I started graduate studies. 

A recent ADHD diagnosis and treatment has helped things, but even more than this, through assessment, testing, evaluation, and discernment in a small group, I’ve discovered that through the grace of my Baptism, God has given me a charism for knowledge. It’s not the only gift He’s given to me, but it was unequivocally confirmed for me this past semester. And now I see that devastating encounter in high school as a direct attack from the evil one, through another person’s own weakness, meant to damage the ability of the gift to be used by me to build up God’s Kingdom. 

Gifted and Send Forth 

I may or may not be great at learning languages, but God has hand-picked a gift for me to help in his mission. I now am at the beginning of an exciting journey. I need not be anxious about what could have been: whether this gift eagerly grows or is unattended for ages matters not — before it returns to God it will accomplish what it set out to do: 

So shall my word be 
that goes forth from my mouth; 
It shall not return to me empty, 
but shall do what pleases me, 
achieving the end for which I sent it. (Isaiah 55:11) 

You too have been given gifts at your Baptism. Gifts meant to be shared with others to build up God’s Kingdom. You are precious to our Father. No gifts given are used the same — each person uniquely participates and contributes to God’s Kingdom with them. Through your Baptism you have been both called by name and gifted abundantly by God; He longs for you to find that deep-seated joy in using them for others.  

What gift do you find pleasure in sharing with others? Were you, as I was, thrown off the path by lies about your gift? Perhaps God is calling you toward healing so you can know how much you are loved by Him and can fully receive His gifts and their joy. 

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Copyright 2024 Jane Korvemaker
Images: Canva