Confessions Of A Girl Trying To Navigate Adulthood

When I Luck Out

I'm a very lucky person. Very lucky. Not, "The pavements supply me pocket money" lucky no, we're talking, "I can't believe someone would give me such a high GPA this semester let alone pass me" I'm not bragging, it's all God's blessings and I'm grateful. I also think that I'm just too lucky. I look at everything I've done, every achievement and I feel like a huge fraud. I wonder what will happen when I finally run out of luck. People I know say I seem to have it together when in reality, I'm just really kind of going along with anything. When I'm nervous or don't have anything to say, I quote some smart thing I read in some book. And I get pegged for being smart when all along I'm not even sure what I even read, I get so carried away I spew nonsense motivation shit I watch on YouTube and only later cringe at what I said.

I've noticed that when things seem to get harder, I run away from them. Whether it's a hobby I want to take seriously, a book I've been trying to read, a responsibility I've been assigned or in some cases, relationships with people. If I can afford to, I completely abandon it for the next distraction as soon as things start demanding seriousness, requires me to put in some effort. When it comes to college, things seem to tie themselves up together and somehow work out in the end. I'm worried this won't last long, but what I'm worried about most is that I've gotten too used to having things my way and being able to avoid the hard stuff. What's the use in learning something or meeting someone on the surface alone? Why am I afraid to actually give my 100%? I read an article recently about something like this, and I learned that my answer is "disappointment". I'm afraid that if I quit relying on luck and decide to actually sit down and learn something or talk to someone, it'll become clear that I've only been pretending and don't know a thing. I'm afraid that if I don't keep my options open and decide to work on one thing alone, it'll be too hard and it'll backfire on me.

Living this way I realize is nothing but shallow and selfish and being afraid of disappointment is cowardly. I'm learning that there are far more greater things to worry about than those. Relying on luck alone won't take me far and it won't allow me to fully experience what it means to live. To live, my mom has always told me, is to to struggle, fall, get yourself up and try again. We've all been told this at some point but I never thought about it. As long as I didn't fail, I'd figured I'd be happy. But I'm not satisfied.

I want to learn about people around me now, take the time to appreciate everything there is about them, learn from them and form meaningful relationships with them. I want to work on my relationship with God, not just wait on Sunday mornings but be fully involved everyday of the week. I want to study my major, and really fall in love with it, learn, research and study anything and everything I can about it. I want to work harder on my hobbies and my talents. And never again be satisfied with luck alone. I want to go to bed after a long day all tired but happy with all the things I've learned and look forward to working harder the next day. All this will begin as soon as I let go of my fear of disappointment, and by God's grace I will.