The battle between doing what I’m ‘supposed to be doing’ and what I want to do is an ever present battle in my head. To date, I’ve been in school every single year of my life, steadily moving from one course to another, collecting certificates along the way, for what? I never knew what I wanted to do, and I still don’t. In my academics I’ve kept it pretty general, now having a degree in Business Administrations. What does that even really mean? I wonder what others who are doing the same expect. Are they content with just milling along having fun on the weekends, getting a generic job to pay the bills and fund the beer, or are they super driven to get that bank job with the big bucks to work like a slave for the rest of their life.
Neither being wrong, but neither being the answer for me. Alana wants to be a vet, and has always wanted to be a vet. She enjoys her studies and loves being challenged by her course. I can’t imagine what that feels like and it raises the questions of what should we really be doing.
For me I believe there’s two main things one should consider when thinking about this and looking to take action on it.
Firstly, be realistic. Being realistic doesn’t mean accepting your situation, it just means understanding it. When you fully understand where you are, who you’re with, why you’re there, and what you really want, you can then begin to start implementing the small changes towards your goal and before you know it every decision you make will be made with that realism in mind.
Now saying be realistic is a bit of a blasé term, but to simplify it really just means don’t make excuses for yourself or anyone else. When you stop making excuses and believing it happened for a reason you will start to come to terms with what you have in front of you.
Secondly, contradictory to the first. Dare to dream. Dream of your best life, tell people about your dream, then start positioning yourself to move a step closer to that dream. See, the problems with dreams are that they usually show you the end result. So when you wake up all motivated and go to take action you haven’t actually dreamt of what you had to do to make it happen, thus you quit before you’ve even started.
Have you heard of the saying that ‘if you want something done, ask a busy person.’ A busy person will find the quickest and most efficient way to get it done. My point being. Make yourself busy, get the ball rolling. This doesn’t mean stress yourself out, it can be just doing something very simple that you sort of like doing. Then watch the rest of your day fall into place, watch your dreams begin to become more rational and those dream actions develop.
For me, I always clean before I do anything. Need to do homework, have to clean the room. Got to start the weekend, have to clean the kitchen. Start my work day, clean my desk. It’s a simple task, requiring no thought and provides a quick reward. With that little sense of accomplishment under my belt I can then roll right into the next thing.
Thirdly? Wait, I thought you said two. Fuck it. Let your plans/dreams evolve. If you’re anything like me you would have had dreams of doing all kinds of things, and you probably also have that dream job still in your head from when you were a kid, and it may lead you to think how far away from it you are now. Shit happens, life changes, you change, let your dreams change. Now don’t get too carried away with this, but allow yourself to accept it and that you’re into different stuff now and keep it moving.
I feel being in your early 20s is a confusing time, with everyone telling you what you’re supposed to do, or judging you on what you are or aren’t doing. I just want you to think about what you want to do, and begin to start moving a bit closer to that, you’ll begin to start enjoying the work you put toward it, and that end dream will gradually evolve closer and closer to reality. It’s all just food for thought, do with it what you will, and just keep it moving.
- Ryan Ejezie