Finding yourself 

For my first post using the ‘Wednesday weekly prompts’ as a guide, I thought I would pick an easy one. Not necessarily easy because I know exactly what I’ll say, but easy because what I can tell you is something I’ve felt as if I wanted to share for quite a while; I think it could actually be helpful.

It seems to me that everyone must feel that they aren’t really sure what they’re doing with their lives at some point. This is when I felt most lost: when all my friends had plans and opportunities and I just didn’t. At that point pressure (that I put on myself) made me feel as if I had to be sure of my life goals and how I was going to achieve them immediately. And I was only 16. 

Very quickly I became stressed to the point of panic almost all of the time when the ‘future’ was mentioned, and that’s no way to try and figure out your life. It was the first time I had ever felt physically ill when the things I wanted to be started to feel as if they were moving further and further away. 

Finding myself, as cliche as that sounds, was actually remarkably easy once I had been pointed in the right direction. My sister sat down next to me and simply told me, “The hard bit comes right before the easy, fun, ‘I’ve achieved what I want’ bits.” It wasn’t directly related to my predicament, but it helped me push out of it.

I decided that everything I wanted to be at that point was not going to come to me if I wished for it hard enough (obvious, I know) and so started proactively working to reach goals I had set myself. Small goals. Manageable goals, but still very much goals.

I wanted to be a writer, when all was said and done, so I started my blog to improve my writing skills. I wanted to be fitter, so I took up running. Two things that aren’t directly related, but worked towards the same end point.

This didn’t resolve my self doubt straight away, but it’s amazing how little achievements can make you realise you’ve put yourself on the right path. Found yourself, in fact. 

#wednesdayweeklyprompts