No one prepares you for this time; you’re just expected to have the right tools by now to navigate through it.
You’re expected to figure it out the way everyone else does— the way people have been doing for hundreds of years. And as much as I’d like to take ownership of this issue, I’m not sold on the fact that it’s a personal one. I’ve had far too many conversations with people at this point to believe what I’m experiencing (what I’ve been experiencing) is a matter of individual struggle and not representative of a societal fault.
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I was handheld through learning my abcs, multiplication tables, and all 50 states in alphabetical order.
When I got to high school, I was told what classes to take, what material to study, what extracurriculars I should join, what events I should volunteer at. Then I got to college. I was, again, instructed on what courses to take, what internships to apply for, what skills I needed to master in order to “get the job”.
I was always being prepared for the “when you’re out on your own in this big bad world” part of life. Every step of the way someone was teaching me, telling me, showing me, or walking me through what I needed to be a fully functioning member of society.
But now I’m here. I’m exactly where I’ve been preparing to be my entire life.
Except so many pieces of the puzzle seem to be missing, and if I’m being honest, I’m royally confused. Like big, BIG time confused.
I’ve listened to everyone more experienced, more knowledgable, and more successful than I by now. I’ve done all the work “correctly”. I am pretty much a poster child for “followed the rules”, and now I’m sitting at my desk at 10PM on a Sunday night wondering how no one ever tells you that “following the rules” might lead you to questioning what you’re doing with your life on a consistent daily basis.
How did everyone fail to mention that we might “get it right” according to everyone else’s standards but fall short when we finally create our own?
How did no one prepare us for the, “What the heck am I doing?” feelings that creep up when we’re just trying to fall asleep at night?
How was learning a song to memorize all 50 states in alphabetical order more important than teaching us that one day we might wake up and realize nothing about our current lives is supporting the highest potential within us?
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When I quit my corporate job almost two years, I called one of my previous managers and told her the news. She asked me what was coming next. What could she look forward to for me? I told her I had no idea. I didn’t have a single clue. All I knew was that I didn’t like where I was, and I couldn’t spend any more time doing what I was doing. She said to me, “Taylor, I just want you to know that I’m 45 years old, and I still don’t know what I want to do,” and with all due respect to her, that didn’t make me feel even slightly better.
I was 23 years old questioning what I was doing and where I was going and how happy I was, and I couldn’t fathom getting to 45 and still feeling the same way.
Two more decades feeling like that? God, no. I could not imagine it at all.
I responded back to my manager and said, “That’s exactly why I have to take this leap of faith right now. I may be 45 and still not know what I want to do, but I can’t get there and live with the fact that I had an opportunity to find out and still didn’t take it.”
When I told my other manager at the time that I had put in my two weeks, he asked similar questions. I remember he said to me, “I didn’t have the same courage as you do at your age, even though I might have wanted to find something more fulfilling. Now, things are a lot harder. I have a family and kids, and people depend on me. I commend you.”
I know everyone who shares similar stories with me is trying to make me feel less alone and normalize the fact that we’re all a little… lost. I appreciate the effort in trying to relate to my struggles, but I can’t help but think about the fact that feeling like this says more about our society than it does us.
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I’ve been freelance writing for the last year or so, but lately, I’ve been questioning if this is what I really want to do. It has taken so much for me to get to where I am today (please know that I’m not in any “great” position, but still), and it has been anything but easy. It has actually been one of the harder things I’ve had to do, quite frankly. The thought of abandoning what I’ve worked for over the course of the last year is hard to even conceptualize.
But honestly (sorry if anyone I work for is reading this right now), I don’t want to write for other people. I just don’t. It hit me hard in the face the other day when I was offered to take on a new project. My first thought when hearing the offer was, “Ugh.” Ugh. UGH?! Your first thought as a freelance WRITER should not be “ugh” when you’re literally given an opportunity to WRITE.
Let’s just say, that was alarming to me. A wake up call, you might say.
However, it’s deeper than that. I find myself day dreaming about the lives I could live. Part of me wants to sell everything to my name (which is not much), and move abroad. I am not meant to white-picket-fence and climb-corporate-America (and if I am, it’s definitely not anytime soon). I strongly believe I’m meant to live in Europe, but I also strongly believed that I was meant to write.
How the heck do I know what I’m supposed to be doing? There was always someone there to tell me, and now I’m here trying to figure it out on my own. DISCLAIMER: I am meant to write. No doubt about that. I’m just not entirely sure I’m meant to write for anyone other than myself.
The other part of me wants to join the Peace Corps and work in international development. I had never felt more like myself then when I volunteered in Pokhara, Nepal at the beginning of 2019. But living two years in a developing country might just be a fleeting escape from the harsh reality I’m currently staring at straight in the face.
Or… what if I’m meant to teach English abroad? Or just move to another city and try something outlandish?
If you can’t tell, I’m lost at sea in a tsunami, and I’m wasting precious energy trying to stay afloat. I don’t know where the shore is, and I’m crippled by the fact that if I start swimming in one direction and then realize, “Oh shit, I’m going the wrong way,” I might not have the energy, time, or life left in me to turn back and try again.
I know. I KNOW. I am overthinking this hardcore. But God damnit, how can I not? How can I not question what I’m doing with my life when this is the first time (I say first time, but I’ve been having these thoughts since Covid hit us in 2020) I’ve had to do the thinking on my own. No one ever warned me while I was applying to internships in college that, “Hey, maybe one day you’re going to completely question your existence on this Earth,” so here I am. Wondering what in the WORLD I should do and where in the WORLD I should go.
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I want to add that I understand we as humans are constantly evolving, and what we want might not always be clear-cut or obvious. I don’t need all the answers. That would make the journey way less fun, but right now, I at least wish I had one of them.
Let it be known that I’m also aware no one can handhold me through the emotions I’m feeling and the thoughts I’m having, but I also refuse to believe that we are all individually at fault for waking up one day (literally and/or figuratively) and realizing, “Holy cow. This just ain’t it.”
Whether you’re second guessing your career, your partner, your living situation, your daily routine, your social circle, your religion— your whatever— we all feel it to some degree, in some realm, at some point.
There is nothing wrong with, “I still don’t know what I want to do,” whether you’re 25 or 75— it doesn’t matter. But I’m just here saying we don’t give people the space or the grace early on to ponder important questions. We’re too busy spoon feeding everyone knowledge they will likely forget come the next test. That is where my problem is.
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I used to listen to senior level executives tell stories about their careers. They’d say something along the lines of, “My career has not been linear. I bounced from accounting to finance to operations to sales, and that’s how I got here today!” And I’d think to myself, “That’s bouncing around?” Try wanting to suit up and shoot into outer space and then come back down to earth and park it on a submarine in the depths of the Indian Ocean for “bouncing around”.
Okay, I’m being a little dramatic, but you know what I mean.
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If I can, I want to wrap up this long ass rant by saying one last thing:
I’m a little appalled at the lack of authenticity shown to the youth during the developmental stages of life. I don’t understand who we’re fooling. A generation of young people who deserve to know the reality of being human? That’s who? The most impressionable minds? The ones our future depends upon?
If anyone had told me that it’s possible I find myself questioning everything I’m doing at some point when the handholding is over, I might not feel so alone and alienated during this existential dilemma… “might”, though. Key word.
This feeling of, "What the hell am I doing?” is one we all feel, but I suppose this post just highlights the fact that it’s unfortunate we all have to collectively feel it alone.
That’s all I have for you today. That’s all I have for myself, too. Sending you a whole lotta love.
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