Stopping the Waiting Game

Beside their name and age, what seems to be the first question that adults always ask kids? "What do you want to be when you grow up?" As if a five-year-old has his entire career path planned at this point. And who decided that you could only be one thing when you "grow up"? And what does that even mean? I think that we start putting unnecessary pressure on kids to figure out what they're "doing with their lives", and that never goes away. I mean what eighteen-year-old is really ready to commit to one thing for the rest of their lives? I think the statistics of how many people change their majors and how many people end up working in a field other than their major, speak for themselves. And that pressure continues once one actually "grows up". Its almost as if life is a waiting game until you "accomplish" something and become whatever your plan was to be when you "grew up". You might have some fun moments or good memories before that point, but it doesn't amount to anything significant because it is sort of the "purgatory" phase of life.

Where did this faulty perspective come from? We do it with so many things - we have everyday clothes and shoes and makeup and dishes, and we save the nicer clothes and shoes and dishes and the glam makeup for Sunday, or going out, or some other elusive "special occasion". We spend our lives waiting for that occasion to feel pretty or successful. Life shouldn't be a waiting game for any reason. Every day is a gift and every moment has the potential to be a life-altering crossroad, or to make an amazing memory. So stop putting everything on hold. Without wearing clothes out of season, or wearing a cocktail dress to the gym, wear whatever you want! Every day. Each morning is your chance to walk your own personal runway and make your own impact on the people around you. You will act the way you are dressed, so go ahead and the wear the glitter eye shadow and heels on Monday morning. The prettier you feel, the more confident you will be, and the more likely you will be to seize your day and what you want from it.

That's the last part of this mindset change. Part of not playing the waiting game is not waiting on your dreams to be just handed to you. But at the same time just because you're working at Cracker Barrel to pay bills while you're auditioning for an anchor job doesn't mean you're a failure. You still get to seize every day and every opportunity remotely related to what you love. You never know who you will meet or what might be offered to you. Live every day so that you don't have to look back and say 'if only I had looked nice that day", or "I looked awful in that picture because I didn't care that day". Have no regrets. Always be the best version of yourself inside and out and you won't ever have any.



"Walk like you have three men walking behind you." - Oscar de la Renta

"In difficult times, fashion is always outrageous." - Elsa Schiaparelli

"Vain trifle as they seem, clothes have, they say, more important offices than to merely keep us warm. They change our view of the world and the world's view of us." - Virginia Woolf