Lost

After an exhilarating and inspiring month in the Philippines, weeks of idling about the house while occasionally helping out with chores, and a short and sweet convocation ceremony… I feel like many other recent graduates do: utterly and helplessly lost.

Not only am I in between jobs, but I’m also in between interests, I’m in between practicality and spontaneity, and I’m in between apathy and banging my head against the wall in stupid, self-harming defeat.

I thought that I wanted to work in the project/program/event planning and coordination aspect of the non-profit sector. I thought that I wanted to work with youth empowerment and leadership education. But now? Now I’m feeling so bland and meh about all of that. I guess I’ve finally acknowledged the well-known fact that young people such as I will go about life from job to job. We’re the job-hopping generation. Permanence will probably no longer be the rule but the exception. But, realistically, do I want to job-hop? Or, will I consider job-hopping as the only way to keep a steady flow of experience and income?

Another key player in this conflict of interests is the one thing, the one profession that I’ve kept in the back of my mind for as long as I can remember: writing. Oh, how I love writing and creating something that others would enjoy. I’m emotionally attached to writing, you can say. I think that’s why I’ve kept that passion locked away for a while, at least for three-quarters of my university career. I thought that I should have tried being more practical in my studies and so I strayed away from writing creatively. The result was a bit of a mess (on which I’ll elaborate in another post).

This love for writing was rekindled after I had made an in-the-moment and quite random decision to take an Introduction to Creative Writing course as an elective in my final year of university. I wanted to actually enjoy one of my classes, so I thought that this 2^nd year course would fit. After the first class, I was so incredibly thankful that I had made that decision. The prof had said some really inspiring words, and I could tell that my fellow classmates were feeling just as vulnerable and as eager as me.

But anyway, flash forward to about a week ago: I get my final assignment, my portfolio, back. And to my astonishment, I got an A+ on it! I honestly can’t remember receiving such a high grade since second year. But this was probably the most significant assignment for me, because it was more personal. Creative writing in general is very personal. So I read through the comments, and the prof seemed to love my work. She even said, and this is the golden cherry on top, that my short story is publishable. Can you believe that? Wow. It definitely made me think of how I could get it published. I mean, I believe in it enough. I’m worried, though, that like with my other work, I’ll be proud of the story for a while, and then I’ll forget about it, and then I’ll end up hating it. And there’s the obvious obstacle of me finding a publisher who will actually want to help me with my story.

So, there’s the “in between interests” part. It made me think that I should explore my interests more, even though I had thought that I was past all of that. I guess this whole “self-discovery” aspect of post-secondary (or even post post-secondary) life goes on for a while, huh?