The Courage to Change
I am 24 years old.
Recently my younger sister and I had a conversation about this woman who was an end of life biographer. She talked about how most of everyone regretted not changing soon enough, staying in a job or relationship too long.
I think at any age people come face to face with the realization that the route their on is no longer the route they need to be on. I’m going to speak to my mid-20s experience, but know that this is something a lot of people still need to hear.
I think naturally the world tells you to find something and our American culture tells us be the best at something. Often times that means choosing something you have the most experience or even skill in. But what if that particular thing is not something you feel like pursuing? What happens when you hit a wall?
In a very open and transparent moment, since graduating I have been hitting wall after wall. Seemingly. God is using it. I think my problem is I look outside of God for my satisfaction, my purpose, my approval, my validation. I know tons of friends who have run into those same walls. Whether it be like me who experienced literal walls with COVID shutting the borders of every international opportunity she had sought post grad, or people who maybe experienced something scarier —walls where they thought a big wide open door would be. A wall painted as a door. A route that didn’t pan out. A route that you had been groomed for by friends and family, all your life suddenly didn’t seem like freedom anymore and has started to make you feel trapped.
A friend who’s mom had been paying for him to go to the country’s elitist flight camps all his life only to find out right before college that after finally getting up in the air he gets airsick very quickly. Right as he’s choosing his university. All the plans shift. Scholarships are turned down. He pivots.
A friend who’s been training her whole life to become an attorney, only to get to law school and realize that this is not what she imagined. What she’s been working for her whole life might not actually be the right thing? She pivots.
And me, someone who saw herself fully equipped to be a graphic designer, finally coming to terms that website design is not the route God’s chosen for her.
Have you ever come to the end of a road? A road you thought would be the bridge to all your dreams. Suddenly done.
These past two years I have been on a rollercoaster of a journey trying to reconcile my expectations with reality. I think—no I know, society sells this very linear path of success. It’s not true though.
When I was in college, I had all the grace to try new things and explore. When I graduated it’s like that freedom started to taper until at the ripe young age of 24, it has fizzled out.
If I’m honest, I am at a crossroads. I have no idea what to do next. I am a big achiever. Always have been, but I think being in school for 16 years straight has groomed that sense of accomplishment in some way.
It seems like everyone else knows what they need to do with their life but me. They know what they want to do and their pursuing it no matter how long that takes. Being in this space can make you doubt yourself. The farther you get from the last “successful” milestone, the more you start to feel negative labels crowd out the good ones. Where I use to know that I was talented, now I feel like an imposter. Multi-faceted looks indecisive in the right light. I knew that I was intelligent but began to believe that I had hit a plateau. Was I still intelligent or did intelligence leak too the longer you went without using it?
It feels like a waste, like I am a waste since I am not producing anything. It’s almost as if I had been fighting to beat an internal clock. Kyndal, you’re running out of time to choose. These past two years, I have been trying to decide where I need to go. Trying this, throwing my time and money in this direction only to find out that I do not want those things. I could push through and just do anything just for the sake of accomplishment and proving to the people around me that I am not a waste, but is that enough? I have done that and been burnt out. It is time for a change.
At 24, I am deciding a few things.
I will not live according to anyone else’s rules. No matter how angry it may make anyone else, I know being true to the heart Jesus gave me is worth it. I want to encourage you, you are worthy of listening to yourself. Everyone is going to have an opinion regardless, but their opinion is off of their experience, and God gave you the heart to live your own life. There is wisdom in this of course, but personally, I will not live a lifestyle that is lavish with accomplishment but devoid of intimacy.
One thing I have always known is that Jesus is my everything. Is it enough for him to be your only thing? You have the best thing even if He is your only thing. That’s all you need. In the midst of uncertainty, I know that He is ultimately all I need. If I cannot love Him and the people He has given me in my life well, then I am not truly living.
The big question is: Can I still be of value even if I never accomplish anything?
The Lord says yes. The world has been telling me no for the past 2 years.
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