Watercolor landscape painted by Ruch. 

Courtesy | Gillian Ruch 

 

Hillsdale College women were encouraged to broaden their horizons and take control of their stories at Curate’s sixth annual conference Feb.1 in the Searle Center.

“Your story isn’t just happening to you,” Dean of Women Rebekah Bollen said in a keynote speech. “Your decisions, your opportunities have already and will continue to shape who you are.”

Doors opened at 9 a.m., and women were greeted with book giveaways, art prints, and breakfast treats. Attendees had the opportunity to do leather stamping and create dried flower arrangements. 

The day was filled with sessions on topics covering women’s health, dating, and hospitality — giving students the opportunity to hear from women who once walked in their shoes. 

In her speech, Bollen recalled a piece of advice her dad gave her in college.

“He said that the college years are a great gift, because it’s one of the few times in our life, perhaps the only time where your calling and work is to focus primarily on yourself, your intellectual, social, moral, emotional growth,” Bollen said.

She warned that this gift can also be a problem. 

“It can distort our view of reality,” Bollen said. “We can become so self-absorbed, focused on our journey and our own needs, that it can start to crowd out our responsibility and respect for others. We can begin to believe that the world orbits around our own desires, preferences, and dreams.”

Gillian Ruch ’24 created a watercolor print that she thought best fit the theme of this year’s Curate conference. She said her painting was inspired by her time in Scotland.

“I love to walk in fields and just let my thoughts ramble,” Ruch said. “When I see a horizon line, where the sky touches the rolling hills, my inner and outer vision changes and I see things with a new perspective.”

Living in the Chicago suburbs doesn’t allow for many opportunities to let your eyes look off into the distance because buildings fill the horizon, according to Ruch. 

“Unfortunately, we’re not all shepherdesses in Scotland gazing out over green pastures and getting perspective on our life all the time,” she said. “In my own little painted fields, I wanted to capture that feeling of expansiveness I’ve experienced after cresting a hill on my hikes.”

In the panel, “How to Not Be a Man Hater,” panelists Hadiah Mabry ’20, Jennifer Lutz ’98, and Reagan Pierce ’22 emphasized the need for understanding what it means to be a woman.

“I think that the biggest problem with hating men is often coming from a place of not knowing what it means to be a woman,” Mabry said.

Lutz, a college marketing and public relations assistant, said women must understand who they are in Christ and place their identity in him instead of placing their identity in men.

“There’s no human being on this earth that can fulfill all of your needs,” she said.

In another session, “The World Awaits: Self-Confidence, Self-Discover, & Vocation,” Assistant Professor of History Anna Vincenzi encouraged women to stay open to the unexpected ways God may be calling them to pursue their horizons. 

“Going back to self confidence, I think that this is where in my life a healthier confidence comes from: the awareness that we’re fundamentally made to receive God’s love and to love him back,” Vincenzi said. “And, within that, we’re also all in the business of trying to figure out how we can best love him and serve him, and in the awareness that no one totally knows what that is.”

Sophomore Eden Ryan appreciated the restful atmosphere when she walked into the Searle Center.

“They did a really good job with the atmosphere,” Ryan said. “I felt very calm and rested even just walking in, so that was awesome.”

Ryan said her favorite talk was academic counselor Stephanie Maxwell’s “A Fresh Look at Dating.” In the talk, Maxwell said that Christians and non-Christians often use the same criteria to find a spouse: infatuation, sexual chemistry, and compatibility. 

According to Maxwell, however, these three categories alone are not enough for making a decision on who your lifelong partner should be. Other factors, such as seeing how he handles conflict and anger are a lot more telling.

“I really appreciated that she used a lot of scripture and used a lot of experience from her own life to model what she meant,” Ryan said. “It was a lot of new things I hadn’t heard before, but they were all sound, and you can just tell because they’re rooted in Scripture.”