I’m directionally challenged.
Whether its ordering off a menu, choosing a pair of shoes in the morning, or deciding what color pen I want to take notes with, I spend far too much time analyzing any and all decisions. It’s truly an unfortunate weakness, as the only thing more crippling than picking the wrong choice is not making any choice, or missing the window to make a choice.
So let me ask you this: if I can’t even decide what color I want to paint my nails, how am I supposed to decide what I want to do with my life? My career?  When I ask my family and friends, they dish out the same old things I’ve always heard.
Follow your passions and dreams!
Stop thinking, and start doing!
It will work itself out, stop worrying!
Blah. Blah. Blah. These answers feel like over simplifications of a tiny piece in a huge puzzle; they’re too idealistic and full of rainbows and butterflies for me. I’ve taken all the personality and aptitude tests and analyzed the results – I know what I could do, but I can’t figure out what I should do.
From lessons during storytime in kindergarten, to the career development class I’m taking right now as a senior in college, and everything that came between, I can’t count on my fingers and toes the number of times I’ve been told to pursue my dreams while growing up. It always struck me as valuable advice, Â but as graduation draws closer and more decisions must be made, the weight of that sentiment has become infinitely heavier.
I personally know more than a handful of conventionally successful people — people with lengthy job titles, high salaries, and robust resumes — who appear to be on the top of the world. But guess what? At least 80% of them are fucking miserable. Their job satisfaction stinks, which spills over into their quality of life, which poisons their happiness. And with these very real people in mind, I find myself growing increasingly terrified of becoming one of them.
We all have our own burdens and limitations that force us to make the choices that we do. From simple decisions such as which restaurant to eat at (do we have to drive, or can we walk? how expensive is it?) to big ones like where to go to college (can you afford to go out of state? what do you want to major in? do you want to live in bumblefuck, GA or in the city?), our lives are comprised of making the best out of the hand we were dealt. Some do it better than others, but barring some obvious exceptions, the root of our struggles are the same.
But because I can’t analyze anyone but myself (and lord knows I even struggle with that), I’ll focus on what it is that makes my future so frustrating to think about. The truth is that reality forces most people to filter out some of their dreams or goals, at least temporarily, because they just aren’t feasible. There are always exceptions, but in general, most young graduates can’t look at life through rose colored glasses because they just don’t have a pair.
I used to tell my mother that I would be the best singing/tap dancing/animal-saving/lawyer around. And guess what? I can sit here today and say that if I was still passionate about that dream, I absolutely could make it all happen. With a good deal of (much appreciated) hard work and sacrifice, my parents have set me up to have nearly limitless opportunities.
I am one of those exceptions, and surprisingly, it actually kind of sucks.
This luxury, while certainly a lucrative advantage, is by far my heaviest burden. It’s terrifying to realize that you have the means to make incredible happen, so if you don’t, you flat out fucked up. There’s a very pervasive societal misconception that wealth = greed and privilege = laziness which makes it impossible to walk around without being judged by complete strangers. I don’t like to whine so I won’t continue, but the reality is that being well off creates its own set of struggles, and the struggle is really fucking real.
Everyone, whether they’re well off or struggling, content or dissatisfied, is being told to choose a path, or at least a direction. We’re all under extreme pressure as the time left to be gleefully irresponsible continues to dwindle, and big choices are upon us. We’re expected to filter our dreams down to our options, and take a step, any step, in any direction. I’ve been scared to pick a path because I don’t want to embark on the wrong journey (having a mother in HR has primed me to realize that in the business world, you can’t just job hop and still expect to be taken seriously), but I’ve been even more terrified of not picking one at all. I’m paralyzed by a fear of picking one that people can judge me by. But thanks to my Dad, I’m realizing that people are going to judge me no matter what I do or say, and for lack of a more eloquent phrase: fuck ’em.
Traveling is something I’m passionate about. I want to (and can) take a year off to travel without a plan, without a job, and without an idea of where I’m going, but it feels so wrong. It feels wasteful and pointless. It feels like it’s a step in no direction, or maybe even a step backwards when I think about returning home to people who’ve moved upwards and onwards without me. When my peers ask me what my plan is, they’re startled, mostly because it doesn’t sound like a plan at all. And maybe that’s where part of my fear stems from – I have no fucking clue where I’m going to be even a month after graduation. London, Budapest, Berlin, Normandy, Zurich… I could be anywhere, doing anything, with anybody. And that’s scary as hell.
I’ve spent nearly my entire life lecturing my friends about living intentionally; that is, I’ve always said that our choices and experiences need to be rooted in goals, serve purposes, and follow a path. But somehow, I’ve arrived at this decision which reads like some alternate fantasy lifestyle and feels haphazard. It sounds wrong and the concept makes me uncomfortable, but that’s part of why I want to do it.
It took me awhile to realize it, but not picking a path IS picking a path, and wandering the globe with intentions of self discovery isn’t aimless.
I just have to take the first step, even if I can’t see the rest of the path.
