13 Nov 2019 | 2 mins

When I hear the phrase now or never, two things come to mind. Number one is that Halsey song I was obsessed with in high school (jury is still out on how cringey that makes me). Number two is the gag-inducing cliché that I’m sure literally every teenager on the face of the planet has heard at some stage in their life. But really, who actually takes it seriously? I know I sure as hell didn’t.

For me, high school was one big waiting game. I knew that once I left, I would be in the real world with the rest of my life ahead of me. I would be an adult, a badass who could do whatever I wanted. I would sit in Maths class and daydream of all the possibilities that awaited me after graduation. Planning trips for when I got my Ps, imagining all the cool things I would do once the pressures of homework, studying and teachers were lifted from my brown and white striped shoulders (yes, my school uniform was fricking brown and clearly, I’m still scarred).

But then I got my Ps and never went on any trips because taking time off work was ‘too hard’. I turned 18 and, much to my surprise, my life wasn’t magically together. I started uni and there was no one yelling at me for ‘forgetting’ to hand in a Biology worksheet, but there were assignments to be submitted three minutes before their due date and lectures to be watched. So, I began to imagine all the adventures that would await me when uni holidays began.

You can probably see a pattern forming…

Because the harsh reality of life is that something is always going to be in the way. Whether it’s school, uni, an apprenticeship, full-time work. Life doesn’t pause. You’ll always be waiting to get to the next stage, to take that next step.

But why not now?

Don’t wait till you move out of home to get that tattoo or dye your hair that crazy colour. Take that road-trip with your friends and go to that wild musical festival. Heck, tell that person you have feelings for them, apply for your dream job. What do you have to lose?

Life sure as hell isn’t slowing down for you to hit that next milestone, so make the things you want to happen, happen. It sounds so cliché, but it’s true. Because sure, daydreaming about the future is all well and good. But when you spend too much time caught up in thinking about the future, you’ll never find it in the present. It’s kind of ironic, huh? It actually is now or never.

Words by Charlotte Graham