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to dream or not to dream

hope even in the midst of it all

By Kimberly O'BrienPublished 3 years ago 6 min read
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“College is the key that will open all the doors to success and fulfillment of your dreams.” “Only through a good college education will you be able to land your dream job.” These are the statements that guided me throughout my years of high school. What I should have been told is that the hard part is getting into the right college and declaring the right major, the harder part is getting through college and paying for it, but the hardest part is actually landing your dream job after college, especially when you have no idea what your dream job is or if it even exists. I followed all the steps that I was supposed to. I graduated high school with honors, received multiple scholarships, went to a good university, and graduated only one semester late. I thought to myself “the next step is finding the dream job...or at least a job that I’ll enjoy.” Little did I know that only two months after graduating, a worldwide pandemic would wreak havoc on the world as we knew it. People would begin to lose their jobs, their homes, their lives. We would be quarantined inside our respective spaces for months, anxiety-ridden, fearing what the future would hold. Covid was an unknown, unexpected curveball thrown into the mix and unfortunately, we could not ignore the chaos it entailed and the struggles that would follow even a year later.

That brings me to the present day. 24, jobless, in debt, and wondering what the world has in store for me. My car is almost as old as I am and is an actual risk to drive, but I can’t afford a new one with zero income coming in. Luckily my parents don’t mind me staying under their roof for as long as I want (have to.) The time has come for my student loan payments to begin. I only racked up $14,000 worth of debt which is a minuscule amount compared to some. But that number hangs over me like a gray cloud full of summer rain. No job, deathtrap of a car, $14,000 worth of debt, global pandemic making everything that much harder...not how I expected my early post-grad years to look like. It may sound like I’m complaining, but I don’t mean it to. I understand there are people out there who have it way worse than me. People who don’t know how they are going to feed their children or how they’re going to pay rent. I have it easy enough.

But I can’t help but look back on all the years where I dreamt about my twenties and what they would like after graduating college. I let my imagination run absolutely bonkers. When I was young, I had a little black book where I’d write poems, and my dreams, and my daily confessions. I’d let my imagination run wild in my little black book. I believed in everything that the black book contained: my hopes. I imagined myself working in NYC (let me first tell you that I’m from a small town in Florida) for a magazine, as an intern first of course, but slowly making my way up to one day write and share my words with the world. I wanted a Carrie Bradshaw-esque life. But we all know that all that glamour and luxury only comes easy to someone with money, experience, and someone not in their thirties. I dreamed of flying to London and working in a publishing house. I’d have roommates who enjoyed reading just as much as I do that I could go to the pub with after work and I could occasionally hop on a train and explore the many countries Europe has to offer. I also imagined running a non-profit for mental health to give everyone access to therapy and resources because everyone deserves it. It’s a cause dear to my heart, helping people with their inner battles and traumas work to find peace. I could be a light in someone’s dark.

I guess you could say I watched way too much TV growing up. I most definitely romanticized the life I thought I might one day live. Was I realistic in my dreaming? Probably not. But I grew up hearing my parents say “you are special, you can be whatever you want to be when you grow up.” My teachers always said, “the sky is the limit.” Now here I am, “grown-up,” and without a clue. My parents live comfortably but even they have dreams that haven’t been fulfilled. They are always playing the lottery in hopes of winning an absurd amount of money that would allow them to retire to Costa Rica and live the island life. “We’d make sure you were all set too, honey. We wouldn’t leave you without making sure you were taken care of financially too,” they tell me.

I think about money and what it would be like to receive an ample amount just like that. My parents certainly encourage my daydreaming. I think to myself: “what would I do if I was suddenly given a significant amount of money?”

Surely the very first (and responsible) thing I’d do is pay off my debt. $14,000 (not including interest) no longer hanging over me. I’d have a clean financial slate. What a dream.

But then what? Finally get rid of the car that has tried to kill me not once, but twice already? If I had a new car then I wouldn’t feel scared out of my mind to drive it and I could stop looking for remote jobs and start looking for in-person jobs. I could put 20% down on a brand new, reliable car that I could keep throughout my thirties. That’s a sound investment...right? It would only take, lets say, $20,000 to feel more free and able. A fresh start. That’s an adult (and kind of boring) way of looking at things, right? I guess I don’t know what it means to be an adult yet besides the fact that being an adult means nothing is easy and everything is worked (hard) for.

A struggle; that’s what being an adult seems to be.

When I was younger, I truly thought adults had it all figured out. That they knew it all. I’ve slowly come to realize that no one has it all figured out.

Should we stop telling children that they could be anything they put their minds to? Should we stop selling the college equals success and therefore happiness idea? Should we stop dreaming about what we would do if we suddenly came into loads of money? Maybe dreaming is meant for sleeping. Maybe our daydreams are meant to keep us entertained, keep us hopeful. And maybe it’s time for us to come to terms with the fact that there is no exact formula to having it all. That having it all isn’t even realistic. That having the things that you need is all you can really strive for. Maybe the sky is not the limit, maybe just having a roof over our heads is enough.

What I know, is that I’m still hopeful of a dreamy life...I just don’t know what that looks like yet.

I still have that little black book, and I think I always will because the little girl who used to write in it had a beautiful imagination. And what is life without beauty? What is life without dreams? What is life without hope?

humanity
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About the Creator

Kimberly O'Brien

creating and dreaming my way through life while admiring the beauty of it all along the way

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