The Real World?

Yesterday I graduated Magna Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theatre with Concentration in Dance.

Should it feel like it went fast? Because it doesn’t.

If you’d asked me six months ago, I’d have told you my plans were to move to New York the day after graduation. Then everything changed.

Over the course of the last ten or so weeks, I started realizing that I didn’t want what I thought I wanted. The problem with being an artist is that everything seems to inadvertently complicate itself. I realized these last couple of months that my life has been very complicated the last four years.

And I’m exhausted.

So I’m not moving to New York. I’m not pursuing a career in acting. At least not right now. It may happen eventually, but right now I feel my dreams are changing.

And what’s all this everyone keeps saying about “the real world”? Were we not living in it before?

Last time I checked, I’ve living in an apartment or house on my own paying bills and managing my living space going on three years now. I don’t totally support myself; I have help from my parents, but I know plenty of people well into their thirties who still get help from their family. That’s how family works. You help each other.

For me, there’s no shame in asking my family for support because I work very hard to take care of myself and my life. I can only do so much though.

Maybe I’m hopelessly optimistic, but frankly, I think the real world is very overrated. I’m not frightened, because I know I have help. I know what I want from life. How and when I get there is yet to be determined.

Wherever I end up, I know this: I will never “settle”. Even when I’m married and raising children in my comfort of my very own home, I will continue to stretch my wings and fly. I will remain vibrant in the face of hardship. I will learn, I will challenge myself and I will allow my life to keep changing in accordance with God’s will.

Nothing is ever set in stone; we are never really still. Our place in life changes by day, by minute, by moment.

So why should we settle?