in limbo
in seventy eight days I will turn twenty two at around four in the afternoon, the exact minute is yet to be confirmed. I have recently been feeling that inevitable feeling most postgrads feel in their early twenties when they finish academic work and are thrust into a purgatory - a constant stasis between what is and what can.
When I was ten I wanted to be in the olympics so I started running and running fast. I also did archery, tennis, ping pong and taekwondo. when I was 13 I wanted to be an actor so I’d record myself acting and I signed up for drama and theatre (I also did A level film as films enamoured me entirely.) When I was 15 I wanted to a youtuber so I started a channel and consistently posted, amassing what to me was an impressive almost two thousand subscribers until someone in my year group found it, showed everyone and I deleted it all and never looked back (currently regretting.) Now at 21 I have never been more unsure on what I want; I seemingly want it all and not at the same time. I have friends who are still in education, working towards greater academic achievement, friends who are fulfilled in career oriented jobs, friends that drive, friends with their own home, friends in hospitality scraping gum from under tables. I have friends who have children, friends with no interest ever in children, friends going through breakups, friends who signed up for marathons, are travelling South East Asia for months at a time and some friends who are simply trying to get by.
My early twenties so far have felt like this infinite crossroads, an overarching, overbearing butterfly effect that one choice I make will thus determine my next few years which has cooerced me to live somewhat timidly. Not one of my friends similar, we all branch from a similar root. I, however have been feeling in limbo for quite some time now. The definition of ‘In limbo’ is this: .
“an uncertain period of awaiting a decision or resolution; an intermediate state or condition.”
It also just so happens to be one of my favourite Radiohead songs, where Thom sings about his isolation, confusion and anxiety he felt whilst thrust into the success post the release of Kid A in 2000, his feelings of writers block whilst being moved from city to city on tour. My favourite lyric from the song being “I’m lost at sea, don’t bother me, I’ve lost my way.” Where, in my humble and open opinion (I am no music critic nor do I know Thom Yorke) he candidly expresses the feelings of isolation post such huge successes, having lost his way. In an interview he did a year after the songs release, Thom said he had lost all confidence in terms of his songwriting ability and found it hard to differentiate between what was good or bad.
This intermediary state that the song divulges into I have been riddled with since July of last year, having graduated with a first in Journalism, no immediate job prospects and quite frankly a flickering flame of love for writing, media and creativity which had kept me passionate for all these previous years. Instead, like so many, I found my eyes burning from staring at screens, reading rejection after rejection but mostly never hearing back. When I was ten, nobody could tell me I wasn’t the fastest. When I was thirteen, nobody could of told me I wouldn’t win an oscar someday for I would simply brazingly laugh and swat such a daft idea away. When I was fifteen this unknown feeling of doubt swarmed my insides and dismantled my self belief. Something to do with the fact that one day I should own a home, a car, a family, a steady job made me hesistant evermore in exploring such creative endeavours because they now seemed fruitless, timewasting and futile at best. Yet there is something in me still that believes I will still make it, I often think its the little girl in me who always believed I would be a star no matter what. The days now all mould into one where I am just in a state of living, “awaiting a decision” and I am more than eager to get myself out of this self made limbo.
I remind myself I am still young, I remind myself many didn’t peak until years after me, I go to sleep reciting quotes such as “comparison is the thief of all joy” to not riddle myself with dissapointment that I am not where I want to be or worse yet bitterness that others are exactly where I would like to be. I attempt to not speak down on myself, my decisions, the way things have turned out though I often find the little girl within me dissapointed that I am not where I wanted to be at this time of my life. Though I experience this inevitable limbo, I find I cannot sink into it. Whilst tempting, whilst easy and inviting, I remind myself some other dodgy quotes (I am simply a soppy quote machine) such as “nothing changes if nothing changes” and therefore my time spent in uncertainty is not forever and I am not bound by this darkened stasis. As a girl with neverending goals, I have found it incredibly hard to not see the shame in where I am, however, as a girl with many, scary goals I remind myself of all the versions of me who I can be and that is the beauty of reflecting within the limbo and navigating through the stationary. Without standing back and embracing the time for reflection, accepting the inevitability of feeling in limbo, we might never see with such clarity, and without isolation and loneliness we would never get ‘In Rainbows’ in 2007 (Radiohead’s second best album.)