You Have a Life.

We are told as we are growing up, specifically when we are in high school, that we need a plan. A solid, well thought out plan about how our lives are going to be, what we want to major in, where you want to get a job, where you want to move, and so on, that way we don’t end up having to say, “Can I take your order?” at some fast food chain.

Here is what absolutely no one will tell you in high school: That plan that you made, that you had thought out perfectly, that you feel like is the foundation of the life you are supposed to live… It will not work out at all like you planned it. 

Life will not go according to some plan that you have written out, researched, and handed in for a homework assignment.

Why?

Well, for starters it’s a high school homework assignment. Which means you are between the ages of 17 and 18. Which means you honestly have no idea what you are doing next, and some of you aren’t even sure if what you have planned out is really what you want to do.

And you know what?

It is okay.

The truth is that you will get to college and either realize you love it or you hate it. Then 33% of you will decide to transfer to a different college. Then almost every single one of you (keyword being almost, I couldn’t find a statistic of the exact amount, but almost every person I know did this) will change your major, maybe even more than once. Then you’ll graduated college and you may realize you hate your field of work, or you will absolutely love it, or you’ll think of it as just a way to get a paycheck so you gotta do what you gotta do (that’s an entirely different blog post).

Was it in your plan to transfer colleges? To change your major? To find a different job?

Probably not.

It is okay!

Just because you wrote it once for a high school homework assignment, it doesn’t mean your future is written in stone.

Trust me, my life is completely different from what I had planned out in high school- you want to know what it was?

I was going to graduate college and become a fashion photographer. I was going to marry my boyfriend that I dated from age 15 to 21 in Disney World by the time I was 23. Then we were going to move to New York City so he could work at FDNY and I could work in the fashion industry. We would then continue on to have two kids, a golden retriever, a timeshare in Disney, have a wonderful life, and eventually retire to some beach side community where we could have our family come every year for Christmas.

…

My life right now?

I’ve been in the “real world” for almost four years and I am single, a wedding and senior portrait photographer, unable to find a part-time job, writing and running an inspirational/motivational blog for teenagers and young adults, living with my parents, planning a photo-documentary, traveling to different countries, and I now get unbelievably claustrophobic and paranoid in New York City.

But guess what?

It is okay.

Because I absolutely love my life.

Yes, there are things I would love to change.

But where I am right now is where I am supposed to be.

Sure, my life didn’t go according to the plan I made when I was 17 years old… But to be very honest, 22 years old Karen would have hated that plan. Because as I’ve gotten older, I’ve grown, I’ve changed, and what I saw as the most important things in my life are not the most important things in my life right now. What I thought I wanted to do ended up being my least favorite subject in college, and what I do now is even completely different from my “Career Business Plan” I had to write when I graduated college! And I bet you that the life I have imagined in my head right now is completely different from what is really going to happen.

And it is okay.

Because what I’ve experienced in my life, and what I’ve seen in other people’s lives, in that life tends to have its own plan. Majority of the time, life has this amazing way of being absolutely not what you planned, but exactly what you needed. Yes, bad and terrible things will happen along the way… but as long as you don’t give up, as long as you know there’s always a fresh start tomorrow… If you just continue to live every day, to keep going on your adventure, to keep chasing those dreams, and keep discovering your talents… Life will design itself the way it’s suppose to.

And it will be more than okay.

It will be fantastic.

I asked this already this week, but I am asking again…

Are you excited?

Because I really and truly am so excited.