Most of my life, I've been constantly working towards impressing other people. Get good grades, possess that certain 'look,' set the right example, make other people proud. Just recently, I realized that I haven't been engaging in anything that really stimulates me, but rather catering to what others want and expect from me.

When I was young, I couldn’t wait to grow into who I am right now. Sometimes, I’d think a thought and would hope my older self wouldn’t forget it. I always wanted to be ahead of where I was.

I would wonder what future I would look like, if I'd ever grow boobs (which evidently never happened) or if I’d dye my hair a wacky color. I’d daydream about getting married, growing a family, and staying in love forever. I wanted these things so young because the fairytales told me so. I know it breaks my 7-year-old self to say this, but none of those things are what’s motivating me today.

I was so focused on the idea of finding “another half” or going corporate at such a stupidly young age that I didn’t give myself the option of being whole on my own, without a person or a job to "shape" who I become. At the time, I thought that's what life was about.

Nowadays, if you don’t have a clue about where you want to be in five, 10 years, you’re automatically labeled incompetent. Well, I'm at that stage where I 'should' know, yet, I am lost.

I don’t know exactly what I want, and to me that's okay, but society labels me a failure. Maybe it's this expectation of spending the first quarter of my life in school and then the next three quarters working in a cubicle that makes me feel so incredibly disposable. I find myself limiting who I am all the time. I hold myself back. I tell myself I can’t because that’s what I’ve been conditioned to think. I've been put in a position where this empty expectation is controlling my future—and I want out.

All I know is that I refuse to partake in this "American dream" of putting myself in a lifetime of debt to pay for an education that barely "guarantees" a spot in the real world. I am eternally grateful to have such an opportunity, but the way it has evolved has put us in a dangerous, programmed mindset. We're packing our real dreams in a box, replacing our brains with iPads, putting our faith into dollar bills, and dulling out any of our sharp edges. Not one part of me wants anybody else to have a say in how I spend my life, yet here I am allowing people with the power to do just that.

I don't want to be defined by numbers or grades anymore, or anyone's impressions, really. I can't conform to someone else's goals. This pressure is making me realize society is trying to convince us to kill our child self, but that's where our creativity and imagination bloomed in the first place. They know the power of this and it can do big things if we just let it.

I may not agree with what I used to want, but it surely pointed me in the direction of what I don't want. I definitely don't want money to control how far I'm able to go in life. I do know that instead of finding someone to complete me, I want to complete myself. I want to live a humble life of travel, meet new faces, and immerse myself in cultures I didn't even once know existed. Mostly everything we learn is outside of a classroom, so why force all of us into one?

The plan should be to have no plan. Why would you assume that five years from now, you'll even be alive? Live like you won't be. Maybe that will scare some sense into you. We are subject to death as soon as we take our first breath. Don't use your time on this Earth subconsciously doing what others want you to do. At that point, your free will is just another thing being collected by the government.

We have no choice to grow older, but we have the power to become anything we want to be. Don't let anyone ever make you feel like you can't give yourself what you want. You're all you have. Whether you think you can or can't, you're right.