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Day One Hundred Thirty-Four:  Where do I go from here?

As my friends and I hopefully approach our final year of undergraduate degrees the common conversational habit of everyone I know has been,”So, what are you thinking after graduation?”  It makes my heart speed up and my eyes gloss over.  I have about a billion answers to that question at the moment…  But, atleast I have any answer, right?

I want to do so many things.  I don’t think I’m ready to just jump into a job for the rest of my life yet.  I want to…live a little bit.  One very blazing option on my mind right now is to just get a steady job for a bit, take six months, make some money, and then head out and find myself again abroad.  The other step would be to get some graduate school under my belt and then continue that journey.  What most likely will happen is a little bit of both.

I think with the applications for graduate schools looming at the end of this year it is becoming more and more clear that what we all thought in highschool is not happening  The people who took a fifth year will be familiar with this.  I truly believed that at the end of highschool I would graduate, spend four years at university, then get my masters and then teacher’s college, then find a job, get married, live a life. 

Now that idea is laughable.  University undergraduate degree’s in four years are becoming less common, and then going straight from your undergrad to a graduate degree is even less so.  Everyone graduates at different times and the houses and apartments that we rent don’t always look picture-perfect like on Friends (the tv show).  Travel is a reality for me now.  Travelling the world has become accessible, realistic, approachable, even plausible this year if I wanted to.  Similar opportunities have risen in the past little while that I never thought would be possible for me.

I have fallen in love with writing more so than before, and writing in a more public setting, let it be online or potentially for the stage.  Working with people on stage has also been re-ignited, which leads me to believe that starting a public program for working with people onstage might not be out of reach.  Could I get paid for it?  Maybe.  Is there a graduate program for starting your own company?  Seriously?  Can someone help me do searches, please?

I have plan A’s, B’s, C’s, through to J’s and K’s, possibilities out the wazoo, I just need the time to get them all done.  I have the motivation to apply for grants and research possibilities.  The drive to work for a year and then head out for another year.  Why do I have to choose which one to do first?

Would it be easier to just get all of my school done before I go travelling?  Or will there be job prospects after school that are deadlined opportunities that will halt my traveling  prospects?  And what if I go travelling first and then lose my drive to keep on with my schooling?  Too many negative what if’s.

Atleast there have been some break through’s with potential degree’s for after graduation, which makes me want to apply for finishing school and then travel.  Who says I have to have a final job right after school any way?  Who says that job may not give me the opportunities to travel either with the work or on holiday? 

I think I am more hesitant to take time off from school because I am worried about three things:  What if I get into a job and I like it so much I want to stay?  What if I like work and never miss learning?  What if I never find a job?  These three issues all lead me to believe that that graduate program, whatever it may be that fits with me, is what I should be focusing on.  The only thing is making sure that it jis the right one.

I remember when I was in my first semester of second year and I felt that Guelph was not the right school for me, that English was the wrong program, and that I had made the wrong decision.  Now, almost two years later, I believe I have corrected myself on all fronts.  The city and campus are beautiful and welcoming (despite absolute shit busses), the teachers are incredible and have impacted me in ways I never thought possible with professors, and I am smarter than I believe in my chosen Englihs and Theatre fields.  What I am worried about is in a shorter, more condensed and stressful environment, will these revelations happen in a graduate program setting?

I think the solution to all of this is to start setting goals.  Really researching program sna dmaking sure that what I am looking into suits me.  Looking at possible job prospects and where I want to live when doing these graduate programs and making sure that that is what I want.  What do I want?  What does anyone want?  I have these amazing idea’s about helping people and about trying my best to inspire people to do their best, and to help people achieve things and feel good about themselves, it leads me to believe I should’ve done a double minor in Psych and Theatre, instead of a double major, but everyone finds the negatives, right?  20.20 hindsight.

I am determined to fin the right fit though. I am not pressuring myself to figure out what I want to do in the long haul, or if even one thing is possible for me in the long haul.  Ideally I’d start my own, travelling company that may not pay amazingly and may not be reliable and steady but focuses on helping people and allowing accessibility to shine through in all aspects.  I would love to do some sort of finishing school in the research oflearning and how people learn to read.  I don’t know wht I’d do with that exactly though.

Now I’m rambling and I’m getting frustrated with it all.  I just want to know what to do.  Why doesn’t anyone help you with this?  I’ve tried for so long to get to the point of potentially finishing school forever and then bam, back to the drawing board for trying to figure out what to do with my life.    This has been one honest rant-fest.  I just want to be positive about all of this.

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