The choices were mine to make, or so it seemed to me at the time. Pick a major. Decide on a career path. Figure out where to apply to graduate school, and where to go. Find a mate for life. The potential consequences were vast. And I felt lost.
How was I supposed to know where to find the door with my name on it, the portal to a satisfying life and the fulfillment of my potential and hopes? I couldn’t have named an older adult whose path I would willingly have committed to follow, or whose life I would have chosen for my own, at least not forever. I had no way of knowing, really, what it was like to be a middle-aged lawyer, or manager in a business, or professor. How could I choose to shackle myself to any plan to become one of them, especially when I didn’t know what I was going to be like years down the line? I felt like I had far more information when it came to choosing a brand of toothpaste than I did in shaping my trajectory.
And so, whenever I was forced to choose, I made the choice that committed me least, even in small things. When people asked if I could participate in an event, I said probably, not yes. In personal relationships, I made no promises. I elected the path through graduate school with the most potential branches. I imagined that one day, certainty would descend upon me, and I would know who I really was and what I wanted, and I would gain the power to choose, and to commit.
As my friends began making life commitments all around me, I began to think I was badly broken, or born without some crucial gene. Sometimes I’d read books or watch movies where the main characters faced life-determining choices, and circumstances conspired to illuminate their paths and set them free, and I’d experience an agonizing lump-in-throat, tears-welling-up sense of futility, because circumstances were not conspiring for me.
Those years of struggle seem distant now, though I treasure their memory, since they are the primary source of whatever wisdom I have. If you’re like I was, you may have to live through your own years of hedging and doubt, because no words from me could fully awaken you to the reasons you can’t find your real home and your real path.
But here are the words I might send back in time to myself if I could: You are not broken. Your sense of being lost is completely understandable, and it’s OK. The choices you face are not easy ones, regardless of how easily and quickly some people may want you to make them. Your future happiness does not depend on being certain today. But understand this: The real barrier to your making commitments is not a lack of information. It’s not external to you at all, so you won’t overcome it solely by gathering data about your options. The real barrier is that you’ve internalized some deeply problematic notions: that you have a lifelong obligation to fulfill other people’s hopes and expectations for you; that your own instincts and intuitions are not trustworthy; that your real life has not started yet; and that making commitments necessarily means giving up the possibility of continuing to grow into some better, happier, more complete version of yourself. Give yourself permission to live, see yourself as fully alive, trust yourself, indulge yourself, know yourself, and promise yourself that you will always be open to self-discovery. None of these things will fully dispel the pain and ambiguity. But they will help you make a start.
Here are a couple of stories from my own process of making life choices: one professional, one personal.
--David Hoffman
Co-Create UMBC is a blog for and about UMBC, written by David Hoffman and Craig Berger from the Office of Student Life. Join the Co-Create UMBC group on MyUMBC. Like Co-Create UMBC on Facebook. And follow David and Craig on Twitter.
