Mid-Week Deep Thoughts

Why is it that so many people my age can’t stick to one vocation? Or, they don’t feel a need to take one path, rather, explore many. Is it that we’ve been given so many opportunities that we’ve become oversaturated and overwhelmed, growing up in a world of instant gratification?

I get it. I like to dabble. I have a side hustle. I am a “multipotentialite.” See what I did there? People of our ilk rationalize, start a new movement and create labels for the once indefinable or seemingly inexplicable. I love being able to be a writer, event planner, DJ, photographer, foodie, decorator, mom and yogi. But I can’t help but wonder if it’d be better off to be an expert in one domain rather than pretty good at multiple disciplines?

I work with a lot of Millennials. Although I am on the cusp, I identify more with the Xennial crowd – closer to the Gen Xers. Millennials get a bad rep for being entitled and shirking responsibility. But I consider myself an ardent rule follower, responsible, and feel a sense of duty. Sure that might make me nerdy and unpopular, but it satisfies me. Hard work validates me. And variety excites me. But I worry that my true calling might slip through my fingers because I don’t have the self-discipline to pursue just one passion.

Maybe Sylvia Plath had it right when she wrote of the fig tree anecdote in the Bell Jar, published back in the ‘70s. Was she predicting my lost generation of people so used to immediate satisfaction that they can’t make up their minds – or does history just intend to repeat itself?

Hemingway’s post-World War I lost generation was disoriented and directionless – mine might just be a little overzealous.

Me, trying to be a photographer...