When I graduated from university in the summer of this year, there were so many ‘next steps’ to complete that I never felt like I took a second to sit down and think about what I want from this part of my life. I’d already spent months juggling problems with my feet and writing essays, a dissertation, completing exams, and feeling totally disenfranchised with my university environment, so once it finished, to be honest I was relieved. Instead of taking a break from planning the next thing though, I just redirected my brain to going on holiday with my friend, spending time with my family, and the logistics of moving to a city to pursue a career.
I know that my ability to be super organised, focused, and to work like an absolute pack horse often gives people the impression that I have everything figured out, and honestly, sometimes I trick myself into thinking the same thing. It’s only really been since I’ve moved into this part of my life – away from the safety and structure of family and educational institutions – that I’ve realised there are so many parts of life where I’ve got absolutely no clue.
But you know what I’m going to say here, right?…That it’s totally okay to have no idea what you’re doing! In fact, it’s part of the fun.
I’ll level with you here though, and say that ‘living in the moment’ and not fixating on the million and one things I need to do next are not ways of living that come naturally to me. I’m a hard worker, and I’m a cup-half-full kind of a gal, but I’m also potentially one of the most impatient people you’ll ever meet. As in, I can experience a huge success on Monday and by Thursday, I’m texting my friends saying that I’m bored. But this is a habit that I’m really trying to get out of, because I’ve been given enough pep talks by drunken middle-aged women in the smoking area of pubs, to know that if I keep being this way, then one day I’ll wake up with wrinkles and greying hair, wondering where half of my life went.
(Shout-out to that brand of Yorkshire woman by the way; long may you ladies bring the flavour to the night-out.)
Unfortunately, so many of us spend a hefty amount of our time getting worked up over feeling like we don’t have every aspect of our lives figured out. I’ve had countless conversations with people of all ages stressing because they think that they’re not at the point they ‘should’ be at, but what does ‘should’ even mean anyway? Who decides what each of us ‘should’ be doing? Surely, that’s just us getting lost in social conventions and comparisons, before asking ourselves what it is we want to be doing right now and whether there’s anything we need to change to get there.
Maybe what I’ve written this week doesn’t feel relatable to you right now, but this is the time of the year when we’ve got to be extra aware of how those around us are feeling. I won’t lie to you, I love Autumn into Winter, but as much as I love watching the leaves change colour and hearing firework displays in the distance, this is also the season when many of us start to feel cold, tired, and fed up. I also know that a large proportion of my readers are British, so it’s likely that you suffer from our nation’s inability to talk about these types of feelings without aggressively cringing, and I get you; this blog isn’t that deep or existential, and still, I found it difficult to write what I wanted to say. But the momentary cringing or the incoherent sentences are better than the middle-of-the-night solo breakdown. So, if you’re feeling some type of way right now, then swallow your pride and just call your friend to talk about whatever’s on your mind; you might not share everything whilst you chat, but odds are, at some point in the conversation you’ll have a laugh. And when has that not helped to calm you down or cheer you up?
An Indelible Friend 