You know what I find super strange? We ask people two days past 13 to make life altering, permanent decisions about their futures. You’re probably confused so allow me to explain, when people graduate high school, they go into college and are told to pursue the thing they want to do for the rest of their lives.
How is that even allowed? I barely know what I want to eat for breakfast, but at 17 I had to pick the field I wanted a career in forever. The worst part about this is the time of your life when this decision is forced upon you, is also the time of your life when you don’t even know yourself. How can you pick a line of work if you have no idea who you are yet?
Finding yourself is framed as an eye rolling event, only entitled to those rich, white or famous, but you’re finding yourself the moment you are brought into the world, touching, feeling and tasting the world around you. But once your hit teens you’re bestowed all this responsibility and decision making. So you decide and press on building your life and let’s say you love it: things are great, then you wake up one day and you have no idea who the hell you are nor what you really want. When you’re my age, this is called a “quarter-life crisis”, a little older and you’re in a “mid-life crisis, but before then, you’re still just figuring shit out. Sometimes you push through, other times not so much, and when you don’t you feel like it’s you who did something wrong…. when that’s not what it is.
Finding yourself is key here, just as you tried different trends with your friends in high school. You can change and discover things about your life at this moment. That might mean realizing you’ve been in the wrong major for a whole semester, realizing you aren’t in love with who you thought you were, or even that nothing you have is what you currently want. Maybe you’re about to graduate high school and you decide to take a gap year to find yourself. Though others may roll their eyes or have an opinion, all of these realizations are okay! Life is too short to spend time being, doing or loving things that aren’t true to you and if that means f*ck your 10-year plan, that’s cool too.
The bottom line is when you look back on your life, you have to be happy with it. There is no redo, you have this one life. Why be miserable? I’m not saying f*ck everything and do whatever and never grow up, but whether you’re on gap year to discover your passion, walking away from your dream job to try something new or leaving the person you thought you thought you’d spend the rest of your life with, GO! Take the risk, grow confidently and take your time because nothing and no one’s opinion is more important than creating whatever is in your heart and fighting for your happiness.