29 May 2017

Turns out, graduating from high school doesn’t magically turn you into an adult. Crazy, right? When you wake up the morning after your final day you will still be the same confused kid who has no idea what they’re doing.

People will stop asking what you want to be when you grow up, and start asking you what you’re doing right now. ‘Working or studying?’ they’ll say and you’ll think about how you spent the past week in bed watching Netflix and wonder what the right answer is. You’ll go from being told that you’re too young to make any big decisions to trying to decide what you want to do for the rest of your life, but you won’t be any less confused.

The schedule of your life for the past thirteen years has been thrown out the window

Suddenly, you won’t have class timetables to map out your whole day or bell times to tell you when to eat or go to the bathroom. No teacher taking attendance will be waiting for you to roll out of bed and rock up to school and you won’t get a phone call home if you skip a class. No one is going to remind you about an exam coming up, and no one will constantly check-in to make sure you’ve been studying. You’ll have deadlines and responsibilities, but no one will force you to meet them–it’ll be up to you to find the motivation to get anything done.

You’ll realise that your life is not set out for you anymore

There is no solid plan unless you make one and chances are, you’re going to have no idea what you should be doing. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking you need to have everything worked out. That’s what your teachers have been telling you, right? That by the time graduation rolls around you should have your whole life sorted and know exactly what you need to do to reach your ‘goals’. But here’s the truth:

You are going to be lost for a while

You are going to be confused by politicians during the next election, and f*ck up an interview for a job you really wanted because you didn’t know how to answer the questions. You’re not going to know how to cook for yourself and cereal and pizza will become an acceptable food for every meal. You are going to forget everything you learnt in Year 12 except that mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. You’re going to say goodbye to old friends and break up with people you thought you would spend the rest of your life with.

All the decisions will be yours

There’s not going to be anyone but yourself to figure things out. Up until this point, you’ve spent your life being force fed the right answers. But now? It’s all on you. No teachers or parents deciding for you.

But don’t freak out. Even though it looks like everyone else has got their life together, the big secret is that everyone is just as confused as you are. You might struggle for a while and there will be no boundaries to guide you. The transition is hard, and there’s going to be times where you don’t know how to act or what to say. But you’ll figure it out–trust me.