The Art of the Quarter Life Crisis

For those of you who don't know me (cough*Julianne's friends/coworkers*cough), my parents decided to go to Florida for the month of January. Then, for about the past two weeks, my brother was on an international trip to Romania, Maldova, and Hungary. For me, this translated into an excessive amount of alone time holding down the proverbial fort.

Now, being an introvert, I'm no stranger to alone time. I typically love it, actually. However, for some reason, this time I found myself evaluating my life. Good news bad news time.

Good news: I have a loving family and friends, two cats, and a Masters degree.

Bad news: My life doesn't measure up to anything I ever hoped for myself.

If you had asked me when I was 18 (eleven years ago....omg. Excuse me while I breathe into a bag for a minute), I would have told you that my primary goal was to be married before I was 30. I'm not kidding. That wasn't just one of the items on the list, it WAS the list. It was the litmus test; being married by 30 meant that I was normal. That I was lovable. What can I say? I have very few life goals. Not to mention that at the time I had NO IDEA whatsoever what I was going to do with my life in terms of education and career. All I knew was that I didn't want to be alone.

Good news bad news time.

Bad news: I'm alone.

Good news: It's not actually that bad (most of the time). Turns out that I haven't collapsed under the weight of my unrealized dreams of matrimony. On the contrary, I've gotten pretty tough. I mean, I know how to reverse the door on my clothes dryer, clean out the crap from my dishwasher, and I barely cry at the end of most RomComs.

This isn't to say I've completely given up on the idea of getting married/making babies, but it's no longer this idea that sustains me through the lonely moments. The bad news is, I don't have all that much to sustain me through these moments except my own daydreams. That's perfectly adequate most of the time. But sometimes, when I'm completely alone and it occurs to me that I'm lecturing the characters on British TV for making terrible decisions (I'm looking at you, John Paul Rocksavage), I find myself sort of...waking up.

And that's when I realize that I'm doing NOTHING with my life. I'm waiting around for something to happen. And it never does, so I just disappear back into my own imagination. But here is the thing: I WANT TO LIVE.

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I want to travel the world. I want to meet weird people. I want my life to add value to the lives of others. I spend so much time being afraid of making a misstep that I don't go ANYWHERE. So here is what I'm going to do. I'm going to start walking. In some direction; any direction. Even if it terrifies me. Even if it means that my life is upended. Because I refuse to lead an unlived life. I've got nothing to be afraid of. The worst has already happened. I'm single at 29, and unless something really crazy happens in the next year, I'm going to be single at 30 too. So what?

I choose to move forward. I choose to be of value to the world around me. I choose to create dreams that don't revolve around unrealistic expectations. And if, one day, I DO get married (big "if"), it will be because I met a super cool guy while doing something that breathes life into the world around me. And if I don't, MY LIFE WILL STILL BE GOOD because I chose not to give up on myself simply because my life didn't look at 29 the way I thought it ought to back when I was 18.

The art of the quarter life crisis is this: Changing direction when you realize your life isn't going where you KNOW in your heart it should. Good news bad news time.

Bad news: That's friggin' terrifying.

Good news: I'm doing it anyway.

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