In my second semester at uni, I attended a class. I decided to give it a trial run in the spirit of expanding my knowledge and trying new things, but also because I knew it would be very similar to my undergraduate classes, and wasn’t sure that’s what I wanted. Anyway, I went and it was, as I thought, very much like my undergraduate course in the sense that it was a business/management module, only that it was more specific and at a more advanced level. But I stuck that one class out, and half way through, the lecturer asked us all:
“So now you are all postgraduates I want to know what your plans are for the next few years, let’s say five years at least”....and then went round the class asking everyone.
I have to say, some people really have their lives planned out, but I’m not one of them. I come from a very non-planning background, where everything can change five minutes before it’s supposed to take place and I’m normally left disappointed – so experience has taught me not to plan too far ahead, unless it’s some sort of organised big/small ticket buying event thing.
I have things in my life that I definitely want to do, but no plan, no time scale for them to be completed in – yet anyway. And these ‘where do you see yourself in five years time’ questions, well I avoided them like the plague and if I’m forced to answer, the answer is always ambiguous. I’ve avoided them because
1) I’m tired of being disappointed and let down and
2) I have this fear that in five years time I will still be asking myself the same questions.
Luckily for me, there were others in the class that were not quite sure what their plans were, some of them, like me, were just happy to see where life takes us, and others were just not sure. But most knew exactly what they wanted to do, and it got me thinking. When it was my turn to answer, I said something along the lines of ‘work for a NGO but not entirely sure which one or doing what’....did I mention I give ambiguous answers?!
I wondered if the lecturer was looking at us all and saying in his head what he really thought of our plans, like ‘oh yes, she’ll do it’, and ‘don’t think so’ – he never did say what he thought of our plans, but we got the impression that he wasn’t impressed! I got this impression because he followed up by saying how we all needed to sort ourselves out fast because in a matter of months we would be asking ourselves the same questions, and if we didn’t know now, it may be too late....yeah right...
And now I've reached that point, the matter of months he was referring to are here, and I only vaguely have an idea of what I want to do, but I have an idea, so now it's time for me to see if I can make that idea develop and become reality. I've started it by writing this post!
What I’ve learnt is that it's better to try than not try at all, and I won’t be disappointed because this time, I’m not relying on others to take me, I’m relying on myself. I’m making plans and goals that are about me, focused on me, achievable by me.
Keep reading, F x
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