Discovering A Different Path to the Same Destination
Nohemi Arreola (right) and her younger sister Perla (left) are part of the first cohort of the Wayfinder Program at Calvin University.
When Nohemi Arreola was in her senior year of high school, she had her sights set on college.
“I had plans to come to Calvin,” said Arreola. “I was really wanting to get to that step, but life and my choices took me down a different path.”
Fast forward eight years and you’ll find Arreola on a Wednesday evening sitting with a group of 20 other women in an upstairs room of the Women’s Resource Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan. They’re taking a class through Calvin University.
“Back then I was just young and trying to find a job that made money to live. It was a selfish mentality, which is common [at that time of life],” said Arreola. “So now coming back to Calvin as a 26-year-old woman, I’m coming in with different goals, coming in with a different mentality, and just this drive.”
In that eight-year gap since high school a lot of life happened, which would ultimately shape Arreola’s “why” for college, making it drastically different and far deeper.
Feeling stuck, unworthy, and alone
She had her first child a few months after graduating high school, ended up splitting from her baby’s father shortly after, leaving her homeless for a time, which caused her to almost lose custody. While all of this was happening, Arreola was working through layers of baggage and trauma from her childhood, growing up in a home where she never felt good enough. Her life was spiraling, and she turned to substance abuse and self-harm, attempting suicide multiple times.
“I truly don’t think I’m supposed to be here,” said Arreola. “Year after year I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. I couldn’t even make goals because I didn’t feel like I could do the work. I felt so stuck, so unworthy.”
She recalls waking up from comas alone in hospital rooms, with no parents or friends in sight. It was in those moments, she was reminded “at the end of the day it’s me and God and God’s love, and I feel God with me every night,” said Arreola.
Experiencing freedom, love, and community
“So now that I’m here and have defeated those odds I want to use my power, my drive, and my voice for the voiceless for those hurting out there who I know just need a little encouragement and love, which is what Wayfinder did for me,” said Arreola.
The Wayfinder Program, which Arreola is a part of is the state of Michigan’s first Clemente Course in the Humanities, which is a transformative educational experience for adults facing economic and social barriers to higher education. The program is offered off-campus in a neighboring zip code to the university in direct partnership with several community organizations. Arreola is discovering just how formative and life-giving of an experience it is being a part of this community of learners.
“We’re loved here, there’s no doubt about it. We feel the love,” said Arreola. “We are showered with gifts, we’re showered with affirmations, we’re given that oomph that souls so desperately need.”
“I don’t feel tired coming here after a long day of work, after teaching my son all day,” said Arreola, who homeschools her son and who now has three children. “I’m so excited to get here and see these women because I know that they have also led their lives with false beliefs and other people’s opinions about them that they’ve let drive them for so many years. And I feel like we’re all on the same page here and we’re waking up to this truth and this light in us that this world so desperately needs.”
Dreaming bigger
Arreola is now dreaming bigger, aiming higher, and going beyond her previously held limiting beliefs about herself and her future.
“I’m ready to challenge the status quo in every area of our community,” said Arreola. “And if I can’t do it, then I’ll at least speak the ideas or write them down for professors to read so I can be led in the right direction.”
When Arreola completes the eight Calvin-credit Wayfinder Program, she thinks her next step is the one she hoped to take eight years earlier.
“I’m the first in my family to graduate high school, and now I’m going to college. I want to complete that too. My next step will be hopefully through this program to find a mentor because I really don’t know where to go with all this passion that I have, and I think there are many different degrees that I could get,” said Arreola. “The experience here at Wayfinder is giving me the support and confidence that I need to keep going. I’m just so grateful for that. It’s what I needed.”
Interested in receiving more information about the program or want to apply to be part of a future cohort? Learn more about the Wayfinder program.
