A Dynamic Mentality

Happy December, everyone! I’ve been so busy this past week, which was why I had LITERALLY no time at all to keep you guys updated on the next big thing! So I apologize, but I’m here now, so let’s talk!

Lately I’ve been doing things that plays roles in planning ahead. I’ve signed up for courses in Spring 2018, continued on my process of applying to colleges, applying for scholarships, among other things.

In the midst of all of this, however, I sense a familiar wave of emotion that kind of washes over me. Fear, if you will, of the future. The same fear that just paralyzed me and played an integral role in my depression the first time around. That same fear of the future, which made me realize that I would be going from a place where I knew where everything was and who my friends were, to a place where I didn’t know any of that and therefore, I would have to learn to do that all over again.

Learning new things and doing something different doesn’t always have to be a bad thing. It could be a positive experience for you. You’ll never know until you make that first step. I used to accept change with such grace, but what part of my anxiety and depression has affected was how I perceived change.

Now, big changes affect me, but that’s normal, right? People are affected in one way or another to big changes, like moving to a new city and going to school. For me, if I want change to happen in my life, I need it to be small and gradual. Of course, in this fast paced world we live in, nothing ever comes small or gradual, it comes at us the size of a train going 150 mph.

But I’ve learned that we cannot be afraid of that change. We must accept it and learn to face this fear, embrace it, and live our lives. The future is in another dimension, it’s something that we prepare for. Why should we be fearful of it? We spend years preparing for a job that we want, we take all the courses necessary to be able to do all things in an appropriate and ethical manner, we prepare ourselves for the degree we want.

As I’ve said before, it is normal to be afraid of the future, because that fear is the same fear that helps us and motivates us. This fear is the one where you actually care about being successful in the future. Paralyzing fear, however, has been known to be detrimental for you. You care too much and you literally cant sleep because, on top of caring too much, you are also thinking about it too much. Instead of working for us, it works against us and we work for it, fueling any insecurities we may have about ourselves. In reality, you don’t have to overthink your future successes, no one is telling you to detail every aspect of your future. Only you are ingraining that into your mind. I mean, think about it, if we were to narrow everything down in our future down to a T, where does that leave the present? Where are you now? What’s even more, is if all of us think too profoundly into the future, imagine how high our stakes are.

Imagine having only one aspiration that leads you to a house, family, etc., what are the odds that it might change? We shouldn’t have to hold one general idea or one general goal and expect that same goal to be the same. For example, for many years, I’ve always wanted to be a doctor or something along the lines of the field of medicine. I would watch all these medical shows and be fascinated at the knowledge of doctors in their fields. But then in my Junior year of high school, I wanted to be a Physical Therapist, I had my plan figured out, I would major in bio then apply for a seat in the Physical Therapy program at the college that I would go to. By the time I got to my senior year of high school, I wanted to become a Physician Assistant(PA), so I toured schools looking for a perfect fit in their Pre-PA majors. I didn’t really find it. So that’s when I resorted to Nursing. When I applied to a school for Nursing, I got my acceptance letter, buuut… I wasn’t exactly in the Nursing program, I was Undeclared-Nursing, which meant that I would be taking a course that was required of all first-year nursing majors and I’d have to work my way up into the Nursing program. I ended up switching my major the second semester of that same year. The reason why I took too long in realizing that working in the medical field just wasn’t for me, was because I was still stuck in that mindset of holding one general idea about myself and my future. When I realized this, I thought to myself, “what would my life be like if I wasn’t a nurse?” “What other job is out there?”.

Fast forward to now, I am happy to see how far I have come and how this experience has led me to where I am. I’m a Communications major with a focus in Marketing and I am looking to get my MBA in Marketing, as well. My dream is to work in Digital Marketing and hopefully contribute to the overall growth of sales and provide ideas for more traffic on certain sites.

The fact of the matter is this: You can plan for your future all you want, you are entitled to how you feel about it, too, but always be open to what life throws at you. Don’t ever feel like you have one set choice. In this life, we have an unlimited amount of choices and it’s up to us to find one that suits our goals. All of this is meant to give you perspective in this life, mapping out your future is a good way to start gaining some perspective, but don’t go overboard. Enjoy your present and be open to your future.