I am currently finishing the third year of my bachelor’s degree. I am at that point now when people start to ask more seriously about my future. All those same questions everyone asked me back in grade 12 seem to be coming back. All those pesky “what’s next” questions. Back when I was 17, it was questions of university, college, gap year or trade school? What do you want to major in? What job do you hope to do? Almost every conversation seemed to revolve around those basic questions of what you are going to do when you graduate high school. Back then, I had no idea how to answer those questions. I had no clue what job I saw myself doing one day. I had applied to various schools and programs and planned on deciding based on what I got into (totally wouldn’t recommend doing this, super stressful decision). I really had no answers to the series of questions I was consistently being asked. At the time, everyone was really accepting. They agreed that I should do an undergrad degree that was not too specific and figure out what I really wanted. The fact that I did not know was okay.
Now here I am, three years later, a year away from finishing my degree. I only need a handful more classes and I am all done. Being almost done has caused some of those “what’s next” questions to come back. Except now, they are more serious. People truly want to know what’s next. I have hit a point where society has deemed it necessary for me to know what I want from life. By now I should be well on my way into a career. I should know what job I am striving for. If I tell someone I am hoping to go to grad school and pursue a master’s or Ph.D. program, they ask which programs am I applying to and what career do I hope those will lead me to? I know people are just curious but to me, these are some big and difficult questions.
The truth is that, just like my little grade 12 self, I still do not know. Maybe it stems from doing most of my degree online. Maybe it comes from hardly leaving the house for two years because of the pandemic. It is possible the jobs I have worked just have not been relevant enough. Whatever my reasoning, I still have no answers. And that is okay.
It is completely reasonable to not know what comes next. Honestly, it blows my mind sometimes that we are expected to make decisions that shape so much our lives when we are so young. Your early 20s are your time to not have it figured out. We are supposed to be doing what we want and having fun. After spending two years inside and missing out on some of the prime years of our lives, we deserve to go have fun. So, I’ve chosen to accept that I really do not know what comes next. Nobody around me really seems to have it figured out either, so I am completely content not knowing. We are young, we have so much life ahead of us. I do not want to live my life constantly thinking about what big step is next. I am just out here, I am living my life, having fun and you should too.