The Cycle of Peace Corps

            During training, PC covers what they term “The Cycle of Vulnerability and Adjustment.” There are graphs and tables to help you chart the various cycles throughout your service. I shrugged it off and chased my own thoughts down the rabbit hole when the topic was presented on numerous powerpoint slides. Yeah, training was difficult but I thought everything would be great once I got to my village. I’d be on my own schedule, teaching people, integrating into the community, learning the language (piece of cake!), and sailing through my 27 months of service on gleeful wings of rainbow joy. Or so I thought.

            Recently, I dug up those handouts on the cycle of vulnerability. And, you know what? It’s pretty spot on. I'm in my 12^th month of service, labelled “Acceptance.” This is when your mid-service crisis strikes. You are struggling to fit in, reflecting on your failures, becoming withdrawn and disappointed, attempting to overcome loneliness, and becoming lackadaisical in the pursuit of work.

            Reflecting on this, I’d say PC is pretty close to the mark. Lately, I’ve definitely been struggling with being here, with feelings of ineffectiveness and uselessness in my village. Almost like I’m merely existing here and not being a productive, contributing member of society. I don’t have a lot of contact with other volunteers so looking at graphs and tables reassures me that others are experiencing this same thing (PC had to acquire these statistics and information somewhere, right?) Even if I feel like I’m a terrible volunteer and that I’ll never accomplish anything during my service, at least I’m not alone in these feelings and thoughts.

            The life of a PCV isn’t easy. It’s really tough. We struggle with keeping our spirits up when, for the tenth time in a week we’ve been told we don’t know Tonga/Bemba/Nyanja/other random African language or that we don’t visit our neighbor/headman/school/village that’s 20 kilometers away enough.

            But, looking back at the graph, it suggest that PCVs will begin to feel normal between months 11-15 and that the pace at which projects occur will increase. And for every forced smile in response to not sweeping your yard correctly there are twice that many genuine smiles. So, since PC has seemed to be right on target for each stage of the vulnerability cycle, I’ll trust that they’re right about the whole normality feeling kicking in soon and ride out the storm of my mid-service crisis knowing that it happens to everyone. Even those who though their wings would always be dry and lifted towards the skies.