Conflicted yet confident: Junior strives to find path in future

Ten years from now, some of my current teachers will be retired. My peers in the Class of 2018 will be doing anything  from living in the Bay Area with infants on their hips to halfway across the globe to exploring the uncharted depths of the world to discover revolutionary findings. But me? I have no idea.

2027 is just three years shy of my 30th birthday, and that sounds distant and unimaginable. My mind can barely decide what I want for lunch, let alone devise a 10-year plan. I’m constantly conflicted as to what I want for the future, and I often imagine different versions of my older self.

Some days, I see myself bustling around in a hospital after graduating with a bachelors of science in nursing, saving lives and meeting new faces every day. Then, a switch goes off in my brain, and I picture myself on a movie set, finally directing my first blockbuster film following my acquisition of a bachelors of arts in film production degree at a competitive Los Angeles film school.

Yes, those two careers are polar opposites, I know. The hardest part about being interested in nursing and film isn’t that they’re wildly different from each other but that I see myself fitting in both of those roles. Helping people and creating films are my two biggest passions.

Soon enough, I will attempt to listen to myself and figure out who I’m going to be.

Here’s what I think so far: Maybe I’m married, but hopefully without kids. I have vowed to never live anywhere but California.

But just because my home will be in California does not mean that I will not travel the world. I will have gone on a safari in Africa, face-to-face with a lioness and her cubs. I will have rowed in a gondola underneath the bridges of Venice, gazing up at the clear blue Italian skies. I plan to trek to the top of the Eiffel Tower and witness the twinkling city of Paris. Hopefully, I will travel to somewhere cold, maybe Iceland, to stare out into the night at the Northern Lights, the most beautiful sight of them all, in my opinion.

I will have learned how to live. Instead of holding back and staying in my comfort zone, I will be a person who has a hunger for adventure.

No, I may not know what colleges I’ll apply to, what major I’ll pursue, what job opportunities will await me or if I’m even going to be here in 2027, but one thing’s for sure: I will not hold back on what the world has to offer me.