Tag: confusion

104b – dreams, neurodivergence and the need for rest

People keep talking about dreams all the time. Or so it seems. People tell me how proud of me they are and how inspiring it is that I’m following my dreams. I don’t even know what my dreams are, though. To live a creative life? Yes. To spend more time with my art, with myself, with people I love? Yes, of course. To not be doing too many things that I don’t want to do? Yes, indeed. 

Financial privilege and in general— privilege— aside, I don’t feel like I’m living a very good life. My relationship has been hard work, lately, and career stuff weighs heavily on me too. Do I want to be a writer, or a musician, or nothing at all? Am I really just afraid of hard work or am I not able to tune into my gut and figure out what I want? Or hell, even if I don’t know what I Want, am I able to at least know what I want next? 

Having freedom and privilege makes me feel like I’m supposed to do something with it. I don’t know if I want to. In certain moments, yes, I do want to do something that could be useful to someone (even if that someone’s just myself), but in other moments— I really just want to rest. 

I know I’m definitely some sort of neurodivergent, and vocalising that more loudly and more frequently has come with its own set of challenges. Now that I’m more in touch with how easily I get overstimulated and tired, there is a need to also accept that it makes sense to need the amount of rest and alone time that I tend to need. But society’s voice is stlll way too loud. 

It tells me that I’ve had my “year” of rest and now it’s time to get back into work and productivity. A month ago I tried writing a goodbye letter to this “year of rest” but it wasn’t enough. I don’t think I’m ready to get back to work. Not the trad 9-5 kind anyway. I’m talking to some people for part-time work but none of it comes with pay. Sure, I can afford that for now but at some point I won’t be able to. Well, I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Or like six months before we have to, I guess. 

I’ve been considering art school or music school more seriously since, well, all of yesterday. Talking to Y made me realise how suppressed this desire has been, in me. Yes, last year I did consider it seriously, but then I did some research which convinced me thoroughly to not go ahead with any of that at this point of time. Even now, I don’t think I want to go to school right away. I just want more motivation to work on the things that I do want to work on. I do want to reduce TV time and gaming time so I can feel more energised. I do want to eat better, exercise more, but I feel like these wants are still outcome oriented. Is that okay? I don’t know. I don’t know if I can just eat better SO that I feel more energised. That kind of thinking is not motivating enough for me. But I do want to find some way of getting over all this, because otherwise I’m just denying my body what it needs. 

Anyway, I think that’s it for now. Going to try out a couple things to summon some energy! Happy October, folks xx 

037b – priorities and restrictions 

My conflict with work and what I want to be doing (for work) has gotten stronger since around a month. I tried some product work for a few weeks which unfortunately made me realise that’s not an option that’s much better than my current (engineering) role. And since I’d told myself that I’ll try out as much as I can in tech itself before deciding whether or not to jump ship, the realisation has been (mildly) unwelcome. I think I was hoping to like this more, in which case I wouldn’t have had to go through a harder process of potentially switching fields.

But the reason I started writing this today is the thought around “focus”. I’ve been wanting to buy a keyboard (piano) for a while because I’d started learning it around a year ago, but when I moved I didn’t bring it with me, and until now I haven’t had the free time to really think about this. But I recently realised that I’ve been pushing off buying one because lately I’ve started caring more about being focused. Because I’ve been thinking that if I do want to pursue any form of art as a career, shouldn’t I be focused towards it? But then.. I think, if pursuing art as a career means restricting myself in all these ways, is it even worth it?

Of course, my “focus” assumption could be wrong. Or the way I’m going about it. I probably need to talk to actual people who’re pursuing art to know more about this. Ie whether they find themselves restricting themselves in some ways in order to be focused with their job / career. But if the assumption isn’t wild, then it’s worth taking a step back.

I think freelancing (where you get to experiment with different kinds of jobs from time to time) would be really cool. Of course, at a cost – potentially, conventional success (??) but maybe that’s a cost I might be okay with. 

Anyway, I just realised I haven’t posted for over a month but writing right now made me feel good. It’s good to have some of the things that almost always feel nice, helpful and safe.

Some updates since I last shared a post:

  • Finally had a first session with a new therapist (scheduling was being an absolute pain) and I like her so I’m going to do a few more sessions. But so glad that this is kicking off again. I haven’t had a regular therapist since February and it’s been well, not ideal.
  • Recently started getting into painting a little bit and it’s been a blast. Thoroughly enjoying it.
  • Winters hasn’t completely taken over yet and I’m so grateful, hoping for a similar trend throughout November. 

Anyway that’s all folks. If you have advice related to my career confusions, let me have it!