i don't know, and i don't know why

17 and 5 months

I don't know what I'm doing.

And I get that that sounds generic and typical for a senior in high school. But this feels different. I feel like I'm lagging behind, and everyone tells me I'm normal because it's too late to make up my mind. Everyone knows what's happening in their lives; my friends know what school they're attending, what major they're pursuing, hell, even what dorm they are living in, and I don't know what I'm doing.

I've had hundreds of dream jobs in my life, hundreds of hopes that deflated with the realization that I don't know. I genuinely, hopelessly, terribly, don't know what I'm doing, and I don't know how to change that.

And as I sit here in bed, I'm staring to wonder, is this my fault?

Was there something I did in my meager 17 years on this planet that screwed up the rest of my life forever?

Because this is not a new feeling. I don't think I've ever felt in control of a situation In my life. I've always relied on other people; on their dreams for me, on their hope of the college I attend, on their religion. I've settled into this well of self doubt because I never trusted myself to make the right choice. I never followed my heart.

Even when I thought I was being creative and original, thought I was following my passion, I wasn't doing it for myself, I was doing it because I wanted to spite my parents. I wanted them to feel bad for failing me, when in reality, i was just failing myself. It was my own lack of motivation and individuality that forced me into thinking that my only option was to reject their love in hopes that it would fuel the fire of progress underneath me, and help me finally understand.

But it hasn't.

I'm still lying here, collegeless, dreamless, hopeless, waiting for a dream to find me instead of figuring out how to capture a dream.

Why am I like this? Why am I dreamless and soulless and passionless. Why do I have a quiver full of rage with an arrow aimed for my heart?