Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze?
Big decisions come with big risks. I ask myself two important questions before I take the flying leap.
Well, shit. I’m the oldest person in this room.
It’s my 30th birthday and I’m sitting in my first course on my first night of graduate school. I don’t know why I had the expectation there would be a greater number of people close to my age, but it turns out the only other millennial in the room is my new professor.
I’ve never been agitated about my age; as I turned 30, I did not cringe or resist or throw a “29 again” birthday. I did, in fact, throw myself a party, but I fully celebrated leaving behind the insecurities and poor decisions of my 20s.
But in that moment, as I looked around at the abundance of 22-year-olds who were cliqued up with friends from their undergraduate years (which had ended just one semester ago), I felt 13 again. And I don’t know about you, but for me, my 13th year of life was not memorable because it was fun. It was a time of awkward isolation; and just like that, 17 years later, I was right back in it.
Though I was quite literally at the beginning of my journey as a graduate student, there was a safety net I had already assembled within myself, and I fell into it in that moment when those youthful insecurities swarmed me. And not just in that moment, but time and time again in subsequent years, did I rely on that unshakeable truth within me when I felt like I could not possibly read another academic journal, or write another page, or sit through another three-hour lecture.
What I have come to believe about myself, and what kept me going throughout my time as a graduate student, has proven to be an integral root system that continues to push me forward when I’m feeling like I’d rather just quit everything and watch Netflix.
Going back to school for my master’s degree in English and writing was, in large part, about literally going back to school. I wanted to be back in the classroom, interacting with people about literature, completing assignments, learning, and I wanted the degree. It was an idea I bumped up against for almost a decade, but the timing never felt quite right, until the spring before my 30th birthday, when I decided to finally apply. At the time, I was having fun in my career producing a morning radio show, but I was also painfully aware that something was missing, and it nagged me incessantly—until I pulled the trigger on graduate school.
When I committed to Seton Hall University, something clicked into place. I knew that graduate school would be the stepping stone to my next landing place, even though I wasn’t quite sure what that place looked like yet. But this essential part of the journey was about taking control of the direction of my life and building something that is wholly mine.
You might be wondering why, at 30, was I finally attempting to gain better control of my life?
Well, to be quite honest, I had spent many years thinking I was already driving the bus! Throughout my 20s, I had my own apartments, steady jobs, and some healthy, loving friendships. But it was also a reckless evolution, punctuated by too much partying and a lot of intense focus on relationships with other people, mainly romantic ones, instead of cultivating the one that I have (or at the time, didn’t have) with myself. That’s why, at 25, when I found myself dumped and single for the first time since I was 16 (read about that here), MY WINGS DID NOT WORK. I was shoved from the nest and, splat. Face, meet ground.
So for me, and perhaps some of you, getting back to school (or any type of learning environment) was the next step in gaining control: a step that was both crystal clear, but also, rather foggy.
Author Cheryl Strayed wrote in her most recent newsletter (read it here), “That both things could be true at once—my disbelief as well as my certainty—was the unification of the ancient and the future parts of me. It was everything I intended and yet still I was surprised by what I got.”
There will be times when you have to proceed even if there’s only the shittiest quality light leading the way. It might even be completely dark. But if you have developed a trust in your intuition, you’ll be connected to the inexplicable belief that you’re on the right path. As Cheryl explains, it’s something both inconceivable yet makes perfect sense.
If you’re paying attention, doors are cracking open around you all the time, but you have to quite literally kick them open. Then you have to step inside. Then you have to figure out what the hell you’re going to do with everything you found behind that door. And that’s only until it’s time to open another one…and on and on it goes. Because if you’re willing to move through discomfort just as much as you relax in success and joy, your life will continue to both challenge and surprise you.
Your curiosities could lead you to the biggest achievements of your life. They could also lead to some epic failures. But I’m sorry to say that the cliché is true—you might just learn more from failure than immediate success.
But potential outcomes aside, when it comes down to making the decision, I focus on answering two important questions that allow me to connect directly to the place within me that knows me the best. After years of practice, I’m able to identify if I’m about to do something that’s going to needlessly deplete my resources or, even if there are periodic moments of questioning my own sanity, it’s ultimately adding to the life I’m building for myself.
1. Am I operating under the illusion that this action/decision alone will change my life? It’s true that some decisions on their own make an impact, and yes, deciding to go back to school did set some changes immediately into motion. But for the most part, those things were trivial: my schedule changed, I had to give up social time, I lost a lot of sleep. If I wanted graduate school to actually change my life, then I had to commit to completing all my school work, making an effort with professors, and decide on a plan of action post-graduation. Had I not considered those factors, I’d be graduating with nothing more than a piece of paper and a extra-large student loan bill. So, when I’m about to make an investment, financial or otherwise, I have to ask myself if there’s a hidden expectation that the choice alone will change my current circumstances. If I treat it as an isolated decision and fail to consider the necessary supplementary actions, there’s a good chance that absolutely nothing will permanently change.
2. Why am I doing it? It sounds simple, but if you’ve ever had to ask yourself this question in the face of a big decision, it can be quite disorienting. Disorienting, but necessary, as I have found that without a “why,” it’s hard to do just about anything difficult—where else does the desire to persevere come from? If it exists, I don’t know about it. This applies for a number of challenging scenarios, from writing 20-page papers, to choosing not to contact a friend who violated your boundaries. And you should probably make sure that “why” is directly connected to you—your wants and needs—and not anyone else. Because eventually, if you are doing it for something or someone external, you’ll either burn out, or find yourself face-to-face with some wicked resentment. Identify your why, write it down, and come back to it every time you think your big challenge was a big mistake.
In that same newsletter by Cheryl Strayed, she also writes, “when I say you don’t have to explain what you’re going to do with your life I’m not suggesting you lounge around whining about how difficult it is. I’m suggesting you apply yourself in directions for which we have no accurate measurement. I’m talking about work. And love.”
Though I did come to my own big decision about school at a classically pivotal age, it really wasn’t about that number at all. It was about looking at my life, knowing that I wanted something bigger, measuring what it might take to get there, and acting on what I could in that moment. And from there, as I allow myself to take chance after chance, I know that I’m expanding in ways I never would have conceived just a few years ago.
That’s what school is and has been for me: expansion. I didn’t fully know that until I was already taking my courses, as it needed to be seen up close to be understood, but my nagging intuition wouldn’t let me escape the curiosity until I indulged it entirely. And now, on the other side of the degree, I’m continuing that expansion with this newsletter (and more fun things to come). I have no idea where I’m going, but who cares? The ride is shaping up to be fucking beautiful.
There will always be practical concerns, but sometimes, you have to leap. You need to go flying through the proverbial air, limbs flailing, snot and tears streaking your face, fear pulsing in your heart, in order to create something that is still unknown, but completely yours.