Sometimes I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
You see I think, a lot.
About life.
About love.
About my past.
About my future.
And a lot of times, it’s unsettling.
Growing up is hard. A lot harder than I ever expected.
I think back to when I was younger and I hear my mom telling me, “Slow down. Stop trying to grow up so fast.”
I thought she was crazy. Why would I NOT want to be a grown-up? There was nothing I wanted more.
The past few years have been hard for me. But at the same time, they’ve been a gift.
Being a young adult is unsettling. It’s unsettling in every way possible. In every way imaginable.
There’s no rule book.
And on top of that, more than 75% of what we’re taught in high school and college is pure crap. Stuff we’ll never need to know.
We graduate and we’re left to figure out the things that we DO need to know.
We’re left to figure out what our world means to us. We’re left to discover what and how we wish our lives to be.
We’re left to figure out what we want to do. Who do we want to be?
And before we do that, we’re figuring out, every day, who we actually are.
There’s nothing scarier.
But although it’s scary, there’s nothing more beautiful.
This is the time when we get to create. We get to create everything.
Our careers.
Our friendships.
Our relationships.
Our future.
How do you want your life to be? Think you have an idea? Great!
Now go and take steps every day to make that happen.
Dont’ stop until you get there.
And believe me, you’ll know when you get there.
I have a problem sharing things. Sometimes this is bad. We’re taught as early as preschool that we need to share. We can’t be selfish. Being selfish is bad.
But not now. Not when you’re a young adult. Not when you’re trying to create a future for yourself.
Make decisions.
Make decisions for yourself.
You’re the one that will have to live with them, so make sure they’re not for anyone else. It’s okay to be a bit selfish.
This time in our lives can be the best if we choose to make it that way.
But that’s not to say that it’ll be easy.
It won’t be easy.
Because as focused as you are on your vision for your life, for your future, there will be times where you lose sight of where you’re going.
You’ll question everything.
You’ll freak out.
You’ll cry in your room and eat ice cream.
You’ll hope no one finds out.
This is the time that you’ll need to focus the most on what you want. You’ll have to remember who you are and where you want to be.
And that’s why it’s important to create for yourself a vision board. So you don’t forget these things.
I have one. A virtual one. It’s here if you’d like to check it out.
It’s a place where I keep all the images of things that inspire me. Things that I’d love to achieve one day. Quotes that resemble my feelings about life. It’s where I go to dream. It’s where I go to think.
But most importantly, it’s where I go when I start to question my life. It’s where I go when I forget what I’m working towards. It’s where I go when I lose myself in the craziness of life.
And I find myself, again, every time.
Follow me on:
Twitter// Bloglovin// Facebook// Pinterest// Instagram
Love it! Very powerful post…
Thanks so much, Sylvia. Just some of my thoughts 🙂 Hope you’re having a great day!
Kayla, just enjoy…it goes by quickly. You are young and very bright…way ahead of the game. You will do well..Happy Sunday to you!
Thanks, Tina! Enjoying every second of it. Happy Sunday to you too! 🙂
I found your vision board inspiring and I love you shared it. Great thoughts.
Very powerful thoughts. I love your encouragements. Good job!
“And on top of that, more than 75% of what we’re taught in high school and college is pure crap. Stuff we’ll never need to know.” I do a lot of work with the Alumni Association at my university, and most of the alumni I talk to tell me this same thing. The most important things you can learn in school are not tax codes, european history, etc. Rather, it is most important to develop enduring traits such as leadership, integrity, and responsibility – traits that are valued in any profession, in any time or market.
Great post!
It’s fantastic that you are able to reflect on these experiences and write about what most of us are feeling!
Great post!
Nice blog. But if your college just taught you “crap” and didn’t teach you how to think (and apparently it did that), then you went to the wrong college or took the wrong courses. Education is what is left after you have forgotten all the “crap.” You are a thoughtful person who expresses herself well. You obviously got something out of college that you may not even be aware of!
I actually just started doing this EXACT same thing on Pinterest for the same reasons. 🙂 Great minds think alike!
But I’ve been trying to think about where I want to go with career and life, and what is it that I’m working towards, and having a visual board has helped me picture it. I created a board called “One day” with all the things I’d like to achieve in there, and it’s really helped me set my goals that I can work towards. I’ve also heard a few studies that those that right down their future goals (or in our case ‘pin’ them) achieve them in a significantly higher rate than those that don’t.
Side note – absolutely love your blog. I’m a Gen Y as well and half of the time I feel like you’re transcribing my exact thoughts in your posts!
Second side note – saw this infographic about Millennials/Gen Y-ers that I thought you should check out. http://www.forbes.com/sites/mattmiller/2012/07/03/why-you-should-be-hiring-millennials-infographic/
That is a really great Forbes article! I actually got an internship because one of my previous employers saw that I was such an active tweeter. For my current internship I spend a lot of time updating a non-profit’s social media sites and all the time I spend on the internet has not gone to waste because I now manage their website as well because I’m so familiar with how these things work.
Great article, Kayla! It can be VERY scary to realize “oh sh*t — I’m responsible for 100% of my life now…” But sometimes we need to pause and realize that all our experiences have brought us to who we are –invaluable lessons. So then when things become tricky again, remembering that “there’s a lesson in this….” will help us open up to a new perspective and I think, gives a little bit of fuel to overcome the challenge before us.
Know that you are only in control of the decisions in your own life not the results or reactions. It took me 48 years to realize that & lots of worrying/bargaining.
Reblogged this on amyunjaded and commented:
So true!
Hi Kayla! I wanted you to know that I nominated you for the Versatile Blogger Award. Check it out! http://versatilebloggeraward.wordpress.com/. Keep up the great blogging!
Thanks so much, Monica!! 🙂
A lot of truth in this post. A vision board is a great idea. I need to make time to do that. Thanks for following by the way 🙂 .
I like to read your blog because it shows me that young people have an energy and enthusiasm that older people like myself forget having when we were young. Your blog is energizing. Great read.
Absolutely agree that you do need to forget the notion that life is defined with a set of rules to follow for success. I think the discovery that the rules just don’t exist is causing a lot of distress among your generation. Just because you go to college doesn’t mean you’ll come out, land a six figure job, and own a home just like the one you grew up in within the year. But that’s no reason to move back into your old room and play Xbox all day. It usually takes a lot of hard work and life in a dingy one-bedroom apartment for a few years to be able to call your life your own, but once you go through it you can truly start to be an adult.
The idea that you should be selfish though is not correct. Successful people are extremely giving of their time and energy. They help others out in their careers and their lives. They are the ones who are always there at church events helping out. They are active in professional societies and civic organizations. Once they start to become successful, they are the ones always giving a donation and sponsoring events. They build up an army of ambassadors out there, ready to tell people what helpful, generous people they are, patronize their businesses, and recommend them for work that comes up. They are lifted by the tide, not propelled upstream through their rowing.
I can totally relate to everything you say, I’m also 22 and I think way too much.
Hi! I’m about to begin my own website and was wondering if you know where the best place to purchase a website url is? I’m not even sure if that’s what its called? (I’m new to this)
I’m referring to “http://lostgenygirl.com/2012/07/08/random-ramblings-on-being-a-young-adult-the-importance-of-vision-boards/”. Exactly how do I go about acquiring one of these for the website I’m
creating? Many thanks