*see audio of post at the bottom
Hi There!
Undeniably, I never believed I would be writing this especially one year ago when I, in all my naivety thought I had my entire life path figure out. A 10 year plan to be exact. My sontaran stratagem was to bust my ass, get an idiotic ATAR and go to law school for 5 years. I would eventually get a well paid job as a lawyer somewhere in the inner city and live in a sweet apartment in Paddington with my partner and two dogs named Barkbra Streisand and Puppy LuPone. Even still this sounds like a pretty 'good' life. The thing I neglected to consider in all of this was whether I actually wanted this 'good enough' life for myself, or whether I simply deemed it as successful and attainable. Family connections in the industry would have made it easy enough me to fulfil this goal but upon reflection I think that in the process of making these plans I was subconsciously aiming to please others and not myself.
I recall sitting in legal studies class in high school and recognising, in my head how much more excited I was for English. When people would ask me about my hobbies or my passions, I would always answer with "I love to read and write". For as long as I could remember literature was the only thing that set my soul on fire. It was the one thing that allowed me to feel insatiable highs and the shallowest lows. At times it is all consuming and it is able to transport me elsewhere. Even when I'm not engaging in the act itself I am always thinking about it. I would even say "I can be a lawyer in the day and write books when I get home" as if being a lawyer wouldn't be my full time job. So why didn't I follow my inner child who told me what my calling was? Was out of practically? to impress other people? for security? I think it is a likely mix of all of the above. Obsessed with retaining an image that only I held of myself, I dreaded that doing the old switcheroo in my senior years would make me seem unequipped and aimless. More, I would have nothing to work towards. With nothing to work towards what would I have to stress about? With nothing to stress about I would actually have to figure out how to have a life!
I love to be in control and have always felt the desire for the highest possible level of certainty and stability. I didn't like the idea of being a struggling artist who couldn't pay their bills. I was foreshadowing an unforgiveable sacrifice of 10 hours every day at a job I didn't love just to know I would come home and sleep in an expensive bed. Upon retrospection, I find it uncomfortable how radically I enforced the idea that it is impossible to get a well paid job that isn't in a stuffy old office. I truly didn't believe it was possible. Now, I find it even more unbearable to envision a life in a corporate office in which I would sit all day dreaming and getting distracted by the illustration I want to do when I get home or the book I want to finish.
More than that, I can now deeply understand the struggle I had with my self worth and how the treatment of myself was incredibly conditional (I am still guilty and working on it). I was only worthy if I was getting good grades and appeared as intelligent and successful to those to which I deemed it mattered. A crippling anxiety around failure meant I was too scared to drive a car or find a partner for fear of doing it all wrong (I can now drive a car but I am still working on the latter). Almost every morning, I catch myself out feeling unworthy if my outfit isn't up to the usual standards. I place such high regard on my external self expression. I feel that if my outside doesn't perfectly evoke my highest self, no one will love me. If my clothes don't look vintage or unique enough they won't know that I'm an old soul who like classical rock and Alan Ginsberg. A striking paradox still exists. I panic that my outfit is too odd therefore no one will think I am cute but also fearing that if I don't wear it and do meet someone I will be showing a constructed imitation of myself. I know that my worthiness of love is NOT determined by how vintage my ruffle blouse is or how well I did in an exam, but at times I still forget.
So now what? I have left my law degree and my job at a law firm and I am studying English literature and working at a bookstore. Honestly, I could not tell you. I have some ideas I would like to toy around with and a pretty solid list of routes I could take, but at the moment I am trying really hard to just *vibe* and stop freaking out. Funny enough, a man walked up to me the other day after work and whispered "It's bizarre isn't it? You know what you have to do and you have 60 years left to do it. You are going to change the world" and then booped my shoulder and walked away. After the initial shock wore off, I chose to believe that he wasn't on shrooms but that he is a psychic or my guardian angel in human form... well why not? I might be right.
To bid ado I would like to share an increasingly fitting quote from the love of my life David Bowie who once said "I don't know where I'm going from here, But I promise it won't be boring".
All the love,
Scarlett in the sky (with diamonds)