I'm twenty-two years old with a bachelor's degree and like many people my age - and older and younger - I'm not sure of, well, quite anything, really. If I go on my Facebook, I see friends getting married, pregnant and / or with kids, a home, a career, the usual things that causes existential crises within this millennial age group. It's nice to see all these wonderful things happen to others, and hey, if you worked for what you got, be proud.
I try not to compare myself to others because generally I find that to be a waste of time, but what I do question when I look at my friends is, what's my drive? In comparison I'm on cruise control and (seemingly) everyone else in the world is in the fast lane. I look at my age and I get mad at myself for not doing enough, particularly during the summers of my college years. If I could go back in time, I would force myself to realize how hard saving money is; unexpected situations happen quite frequently and sometimes you don't have a safety net. You have bills to pay and sometimes you need to go to the hospital / doctor, and have all the expenses that come to that. I'm trying to save up for a car here! I'd be going hard in school, learning how to have a drive and how to hustle, but it'd come to a screeching halt during the holidays due to burnout.
Some people, particularly in my family, are trying to help by saying: "You should be doing (this)," or "You should be doing (that)," and while I appreciate these efforts, it doesn't actually help; it makes me feel worse. I have to be the one who discovers my own path and where I need to go, and setting up a timeline where I need to be doing this and that only adds to the dread I already feel. I don't do well with passive-aggression, and I don't do well with one 'urging' me to do something they want. I'm constantly thinking of where I need to go, so chances are, I've already thought about it.
Maybe I'm putting too much pressure on myself; I have a job and plenty of interests to keep me busy. I may not be where other people are in their life but I still have my youth, which counts for something, right? Maybe I'm doing this to myself because of depression and anxiety, which is another can of worms to open. To my family reading this that may not have known that detail, surprise! I'm still the same girl you've always known, just with a few mental illnesses (people really do look at you differently when they find out you have 'issues' - my brain just functions in a way that neurotypicals don't experience). No, I don't want to talk about it, but yes, I'm finally taking the steps to talk to doctors about it. All I need is for you to not treat me any differently than you already would and to still love me (this goes to friends or any future people I meet).
I have a constant feeling of dread that is sometimes easy to ignore and other times impossible to, that hangs above me like that metaphorical cloud you always hear we depressed people talk about, because by this age my brothers were in one stage in their lives, my friends are in another stage, and I'm more or less somewhere in the background watching them reap the benefits of their success. I don't know what to do with my life, who I am, where to go, how to do any of this right, but if I know one thing, I want to do it on my own terms. The best times of my life (thus far) were in my college years, where I had to pack up everything and move across state where I knew absolutely nobody and was basically stuck there to live with my decision. It was one of the toughest experiences I had put myself through but it turned out to be the best and the most awarding because of what happened during those four years.
Maybe that's something I need to do again in order to find myself.