My Life Plans

I'm Not Where I Thought I'd Be:

I can't be the only one who feels like this.

I'm 22, still at University. Still working part time so I can afford existence.

I remember a time when the idea of being eighteen seemed so far away, I could barely even imagine it. Let alone the thought of being twenty-two. It would have felt like a whole lifetime away.

And yet, here I am, turning twenty-three in just over a month. And what have I accomplished?

Not as much as I thought I would have, to be honest.

I've always been ambitious, I've always had dreams. And, I used to have the drive and motivation to reach them. Or, at least, believe I could reach them if I tried.

I wrote my first novel at 12. It was horrific, still is. I still have the file, saved to OneDrive. I wrote prolifically throughout my teenage years. Many inspired by conversations I had with my friends, or games we played, or ideas that I had that I felt compelled to write about.

And I always thought I'd be established by now, that I'd be earning money from my writing and be able to make plans around it.

I'm staying afloat solely due to my job as a receptionist - and whilst I love my co workers dearly - it is not what I want from my life.

I want to be able to earn money from something I love, a creative passion I have laboured over and striven to complete. And yet, it is almost reaching the point where I feel that that is more impossibility than I first imagined or conceived.

I am failing.

So, Guess I'll Keep Doing It Then:

I am, for lack of a better word, idiotic. Not in a damnable way that'll see me cursed to a terrible life - I desperately hope - but in a lovable and fun way.

I think, I guess, my friends think I'm grand.

So, I'm going to take that idiocy and keep writing. I'll try get the motivation to continue writing, growing the portfolio and backlist and trying to succeed.

It's funny that I no longer feel like success is a certainty.

Being an adult sucks.

Now, enough about me, I want to talk a little bit about people like me.

Because I know you're out there, feeling something similar.

The world is falling apart around us, as we try find some stability and sort out our lives so that we aren't falling apart with it. And, it's tough. It's exhausting, and strenuous and brutal.

A friend of mine got her dream job, but still works seven days a week at two jobs. She does it so she can afford the basic necessities, and still have enough money to have a stable and enjoyable life on the days she has off. My sisters are in their second year of University, and they're both struggling with the life-balance of work and university and finding some enjoyment from life.

There seems to be very little *reward* for being alive. We study at school. We work at a job to pay for more study at university. And then we work, until we are too old to really enjoy everything life has to offer, and then we die.

What a shit deal that is.

I wish I could declare "That won't be me!" And that I have some dastardly plan to try make sure I enjoy everything I can from my life.

But, I cannot. And I do not have some dastardly plan. I have a hope, and I am quickly losing the motivation to see it through.

Time will tell if I succeed or fail with my ambitions. And for all those out there that feel like the world is nothing but looming darkness and despair, I understand you too.

Thanks for reading,

Hamish