I remember the exact moment I decided I wanted to be a performer.
I was taking my first bow under a stifling stage light. I had one line in the show, my costume consisted of a bathrobe and yoga pants, and the theater was nothing more than a hot cafeteria with a broken air conditioner; still, I felt electrified as the audience rose to their feet, applauding the company. Even thinking about that moment makes my heart drum against my chest. The adrenaline rushing through your veins while you’re on stage is what I imagine daredevils feel when they’re leaping out of airplanes or bungee jumping off a bridge; it makes you feel absolutely weightless. For years, I thought that weightless feeling would satisfy me forever…until one day it didn’t.
At the beginning of my senior year, I began to feel myself drifting away from the stage. When I thought about pursuing a career in acting, I felt afraid instead of excited. I knew deep down that I wouldn’t be able to sustain a life in theatre, nor would I want to be auditioning between working two jobs in order to sustain it. I wanted more. My thoughts drifted from the feeling of excitement that came from the sound applause to the feeling I experienced when my fingers curled around a pen. Writing became the thing that sent that electricity pulsing through me. I tried to deny my yearning for something else. I told myself that I was good at theatre, and you shouldn’t stray from the thing you’re good at. I told myself that I was selling out like all of the people I swore I would never be like, but I couldn’t deny that gut instinct that I wasn’t meant to be a performer for the rest of my life. I’ve learned that above all else, you have to trust your gut. So, I hung up my character shoes and declared an English major.
We grow up hearing the same mantra over and over again: follow your dreams and shoot for the stars. For the longest time, I felt like I was doing something wrong by giving up the dream I had been chasing since I was young…but things change. People change, and you can’t pretend to be someone you aren’t anymore. It is okay to follow a new dream if you feel trapped in the path you’re on now. If I have learned anything about college, it’s that it is all about figuring out what dream you are meant to chase. If you hear a new dream calling to you, chase that dream until a new one calls from another direction. This life is too short to pursue something that doesn’t make you happy anymore. The girl who loved performing is still inside of me, but she is so quiet now compared to the part of me that roars with excitement for this new chapter of my life.
Don’t be afraid to shut one door and open another, because you never know what kind of adventures lie just beyond the threshold.
