By Ryan McCrary
KALAMA, Wash. – The other day, my nephew asked me if I was enjoying my retirement. There’s a lot to unpack here, but so far I’ve resisted rewriting my will. 

When I left my job, I knew there would be a learning curve which meant doing some actual learning. So, I enrolled in online college courses. I took a leadership course through MIT because I wanted to get wicked smaht like Good Will Hunting (minus all the math) and I took a content and digital marketing strategy course through Northwestern. 

It was quite an experience to go through the coursework and I began flexing and using some muscles that had atrophied over time. I spent six years being educated by and 13 more employed by Jesuits. While I worked and collaborated with learners around the world – more than 26 countries were represented in my leadership class –  I was reminded about the Jesuit commitment to educating, shaping the whole person and creating lifelong learners.

As I reflected on the classes I was taking and the knowledge being dispensed and shared by my classmates, I realized somewhere along the way I had lost some of my curiosity. 

One of the things I was most struck by was the more I studied, the more I started asking crucial questions like: “why?” and “how?”. Instead of going down the internet gopher holes of who was the lead singer for legendary 80s hair band Warrant (FYI it was Jani Lane) or who was the best father/son MLB combination (FYI it was Ken Griffey Sr. & The Kid… don’t @ me) I found myself searching for ways to improve my leadership signature and how to use TikTok as a marketing device. 

Yep… for those of you scoring along at home, I just included Warrant, the Griffeys and TikTok in the same sentence. Probably a first!

Speaking of Jesuits, Saint Peter’s made an NCAA Tournament run for the ages, becoming the first No. 15 seed to make the Elite Eight. The best player for the Peacocks, Doug Edert, mentioned in an interview that he refuses to eat sandwiches. As soon as I heard that statement, I immediately wrote down six follow-up questions because my mind was blown. 

It was that moment that I knew my curiosity had returned.

QUOTABLE: “Be curious, not judgmental.” – Ted Lasso