A Mid-20s Crisis
cover image by VICE UK
tl;dr: I feel self conscious and like I have no place in this world
Basically this blog post will be a massive dumpster fire of what I’ve been going through. It’s one of the more honest posts I’ve written in a while. And yes, more honest than my experience with Vush. I’m going through a lot, and this blog is here to really give you the ins and outs of it all. I’ve been stuck in this weird transition period of post-undergrad/pre-career and amidst that whole COVID thing, I’ve really been struggling to find my feet. Transitioning into your mid-twenties is difficult when you’re trying to establish a career for the first time, and also trying to manage your friendships with people who are all at different stages in their life.
“Only successful applicants will be notified”
I have been facing the competitive job market for the past year and a half. Slaving away at cover letters and applications, all specified to each particular job. Imagine a job application asking you to pitch them three story ideas, without the guarantee of a reply? Talk about disheartening! I have applied to almost 100 jobs (yes, I keep an updated list on my desktop), and have probably received only 10 rejection letters, three interviews, and pure silence from the rest. You keep 20 tabs open for three days, trying to work up the effort to apply to each job. Your centrelink jobactive account keeps screaming YOU HAVE 4 DAYS TO APPLY TO 50 NEW JOBS. “We won’t be progressing with your application” “We have found someone better suited” “We will keep your file on hold”. I may as well start a gallery wall admiring all these gross displays of automated rejection. Why should I pitch three stories for a company that doesn’t care about me? Why should I provide examples of PUBLISHED work when the work I have written in my down time is just as admirable? I’m tired of being a slave to LinkedIn, Indeed, and Seek. I believe I am worthy of a job. I believe I meet the required skill set. I will not be a dumpster for rejection.
I am stagnating. I’ve been in my current job for over three years. I feel like I’m trying to grow in an environment I've outgrown. And that’s not to say I don’t like the job, I do. It’s the first job I’ve had where I genuinely feel like I’m good at what I do, and I genuinely believe the company wishes the best for its employees. But the potential I have is so much more than what is currently being utilised. Why is it taking so long to be accepted into a position where I can finally thrive? It’s been over a year since I graduated with a degree in sociology and social media, what do I have to show for it besides a rolled up piece of paper sitting in the same drawer as my sex toys? It’s embarrassing when you’ve been telling everyone “I won’t be here much longer” for over a year now. I feel like such a failure.
Every day is the same, and I’m shocked that I’ve only begun to experience this AFTER the shitshow that was 2020. I feel like I have been the passenger in my own life for the past six months. Things are happening and I'm just allowing it to continue. I’m living an existential groundhog day.
“I’m here for you”
As mentioned in my yearly recap, 2020 really tested my friendships, and 2021 seems to be no different. I feel like my support networks have slowly been crumbling. I’m becoming so out of touch with the people around me and I feel as though there’s nowhere I really “fit in” anymore. I’ve gotten to a point where with my friendship groups I feel like I’m on the outside looking in. An extension of the group if you will. Constantly talking about xyz with others and then not getting invited to xyz. That being said, I don’t even know what groups I identify myself with anymore. I am pushing myself away from others. Or are people pushing away from me? I look back on every behaviour I’ve displayed no matter how minor and think “was that where it began to go downhill?”. I’m trying to stay out of gossip. I’m trying to be a better version of myself. I don’t know where I belong. I don’t know who I can rely on. I have never felt so alone before. I feel like the only people I have are my roommate, my mum, and fuck even my manager.
“You’re a bad bitch!”
I’ve become so out of touch with who I am. My strong sense of self has crumbled. My self esteem has crumbled. I feel like every facet of me that I was once confident with has crumbled.
Leesh once said to me “the only way you know you’re growing is by experience extreme discomfort” and FUCK I have been uncomfortable for a long time. I am having to reteach myself that it’s not my problem how people react to me being myself. That I’m not here to make people comfortable. That I’m not here to shrink myself for people’s consumption. You won’t believe the cognitive dissonance involved with constantly being told “Gabby you’re the most confident bad bitch I know!” yet being single, stuck in the same job, and completely defeated by constant rejection in every aspect of my life. I’m a sad bitch trying to live a bad bitch. Faking it until I make it.
Anyway, that’s enough being sad for the blog. I see my psych in two weeks (for the first time in three month might I add) and she’s in for a field day. I am a work in progress and I will continue to unapologetically accept a life of growth and improvement. I will end this blog with things I am grateful for.
I am grateful for my mum
I am grateful to be able to pay rent
I am grateful to have kept my job throughout covid
I am grateful that I have created a platform for myself
I am grateful to live in Melbourne
I am grateful for the friends that I do see trying to make an effort with me