I haven't written a personal blog post like this in what seems like ages. As I'm writing this up now, I realise that I have completely forgotten how utterly therapeutic and enjoyable it can be to write from the heart. So it's my personal goal to write more of these kind of blog posts up during the winter.
I guess today's blog post in inspired in part by how I have been feeling recently about the future but mostly, it has been inspired by conversations with several of my friends who have all asked in a roundabout way, is this really what your 20s are all about?
After graduating with a 2:1 in Geography in July of this year, I felt really motivated to apply for a Masters degree in Human Geography and to specialise in some of the areas I have loved most about my degree. But it was always part of 'my plan' to take a gap year after my degree before applying for a journalism course in London, to take me one step further to my dream career. Well, that hasn't worked out. I absolutely love my Masters degree and I'm really enjoying it but the fact that I have disrupted 'the plan' has been really destabilising for me and I have second guessed my decision a few times now.
Not because I don't genuinely love what I am doing but as my 22nd birthday looms nearer, I've asked myself a number of things. Should I have just applied for journalism straight away? Should I have just taken the year out and filled it with work experience placements and internships , to build up my CV a bit? Now that I haven't stuck to the plan, am I going to fail?
Failure is something which I think all 20-somethings think of from time to time. You are constantly told that your 20s are the only time you truly have in life to try different things and to take new opportunities, but how far is that really true in practice? I will be 22 when I finish higher education. I haven't travelled by myself yet beyond Europe, I haven't had time or the money to do volunteering abroad and I'm not officially qualified in journalism yet. The three things I wanted to do in my early 20s haven't been ticked off the bucket list yet and it kind of feels like time is running out.
I want to be financially stable and independent. I would love to have my own place by the time I am 25 (optimistic, but a girl has to dream). I would love to be climbing the career ladder. But I've decided to do my Masters degree just because I really wanted to do it and because I wasn't ready to give up studying, even though it doesn't appear to directly further my ambition of investigative journalism. Is it enough to do something which disrupts your plan, just because you really want to do it?
After a lot of thinking, I have come up with a series of conclusions on the matter. Yes, I haven't stuck to my plan but does it really matter? Absolutely not. Am I going to fail? No, unless I give up.
My Masters degree is helping me to develop skills which most employers lust over. Just because my current path does not mirror that of other wannabe journalists my age does not mean that I am destined to fail. I am not destined to fail because I didn't chose English Literature or Journalism for my undergrad degree and I am not destined to fail because I chose to continue my studies in Geography, rather than a Masters in Journalism.
My passion for writing about the world around me is a card which I will continue to hold near to my chest in the years to come. I hope it it a card which will land me my dream job one day as an investigative journalist. I am inspired by investigative journalism every single day; every time I leave a two hour seminar, every time I read the news, every time I pick up a book. Investigative journalism is all around me on my Masters degree.
Even though I disrupted the most obvious and direct course of action into my chosen profession, success is what you make of it. I am doing my degree for me. The skills I pick up along the way are vital tools which will help me in my given profession. As for the other goals I had set for myself (travelling and volunteering), I have the rest of my life to look forward to ticking those off. And hopefully, my career will allow me to put a tick by the travelling box multiple times.
It's important to get over a fear of failure at this age, because it's important to just let things play out and to let opportunities reveal themselves as and when they present themselves. I truly do not know what the next 5 or so years will look like. I don't know whether I will be doing a journalism course this time next year, or whether I will take the plunge and just apply for jobs in my chosen field. But I'm excited to find out. And I'm even more excited to start standing by my decisions with more conviction and to stop comparing myself to every other potential applicant I might come up against in the future's competitive job-hunt game.
Antonia x
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