What Do You Want to Do with Your Life?

What’s your passion in life? What lights you up? What makes your heart sing? Why can’t you just find a well-paying job doing that?

You haven’t identified your passion yet? Why not? Are you indecisive? Are you drifting without purpose? Are you stressing about your options? Are you writing down your goals and staring blankly at them each day? What’s wrong? Are you lazy?

Have you tried seeking a broader perspective? Have you driven to the beach and solemnly walked along the shore, with only the sand crabs to keep you company? Have you noticed how the crabs are relaxed yet purposeful—how they dig their little claws into the sand with no hesitation or second-guessing? Do you think it’s kind of sad that a crab knows its purpose better than you know yours?

What’s your plan, exactly? Do you want to be a writer? An astronaut? A pastry chef? An opera singer? An energy healer? A knee surgeon? Do you want to be the top personal trainer to the Hollywood stars? Do you want to just run away and become a salsa instructor in Eastern Europe?

Do you realize that salsa is super hard to learn, let alone teach? But maybe you could move to Croatia, marry a babe, and become a depressed artist who sells trinkets and T-shirts to tourists?

Do you want to do something totally daring, like jog across the United States and then write a memoir about it? You realize that’s already been done, right? Do you want to make documentaries about people who never found their life purpose and died alone? You realize that’s also been done, right?

Oh! Maybe you want to live a life of quiet desperation, pecking away at a keyboard for some faceless corporation while the clock ticks and your life force drains, and you wake up one day screaming, “I should’ve started a goddam murder podcast five years ago!”

Why is sorting yourself out so hard? Are you a late bloomer? A lost cause? A burnout? A fuckup? Are you even trying? What have you tried so far? Have you tried journaling? Have you tried hypnotherapy? Have you tried Kundalini? Have you joined an ashram and climbed to the top of a wooden pillar and meditated for five days and five nights, the rain pounding against your skin, the deep truths of your heart slowly percolating to the surface until your soul cries out, “I’ve gotta save the bees!”

Did you just think of the bee thing because you saw an Instagram reel about it yesterday?

Do you ever shut your eyes at night and focus on the silence? Do you feel the presence of your ancestors, their spirits howling across the void? Do you hear them shout, “We all figured out our shit by our late teens. Just saw your LinkedIn profile—yikes. Maybe try sticking with a job for more than fifteen months?”?

Look at it this way: Who understands you, and what do they think? Your parents? Your life coach? Your life partner? Ugh, you’re still “dating”? What the hell does that even mean? Do you honestly think you’ll achieve your dreams without someone firmly by your side? That you’ll somehow manage to become a best-selling novelist/screenwriter/style icon/beekeeping influencer/post-crunkcore d.j. all by your lonesome?

How did you make it this far while remaining so clueless and unmoored? Do you imagine that the pieces will just fall into place one day, like a game of Tetris? When do you think that’ll happen? When you’re forty? Fifty? Seventy?

Hey, have you ever thought about being one of those people who make a good living selling funny skeleton costumes on Etsy? No? Then what do you really want? What are you waiting for? What are you running from? Who the hell are you?