Posts Tagged ‘learning’
In Ten Years
In ten years time I will look back again just as I did in the post preceding this, but what will I see? The scary thing is that what I will see will be entirely dependant on me. It will depend on the choices I make, the determination I show, the commitment I have and the dedication I prove. At the moment I can dream and I dream that I will fulfill my goals of:
- being a professional singer
- learn to speak a foreign language with proficiency
- have a family
- travel the world
- be happy
Whether these things come about though is dependant on my choices, determination, commitment and dedication. If I keep these dreams at the forefront of my mind and apply myself without excuse then there is no reason why I should look back in ten years and be disappointed with the life that I have chosen to live.
I feel old. I know I’m not but I definitely feel it. I’m 28 years old and I am starting university today. I am going to be surrounded by 17 and 18 year olds who are going to University for the first time. Some of them will probably be in my course. That is a ten-year difference and for some stupid reason it makes me feel like I am too old to be going after my dream and studying singing.
I also feel old because my friends are suddenly going through that stage of getting married and having kids. I’m married but kids are a few years off for me, or at least I think so. There are other things I want and need to do before I can effectively dedicate my time to a tiny human being. A part of me though is aware that if I want to have children this is probably the best time for it. If I wait too long I will simply be too old.
It’s ridiculous I know, but there is no denying the feeling is there. I look back on some of the choices I have made in my life and wish I had taken a different path. Then there is that voice that reminds me that if I hadn’t made those choices I wouldn’t have done some wonderful things, like met and married Ben.
Then there is Hazel. She is a 70 something year old who just graduated from university. I wonder if she felt silly or old when she was studying alongside these young kids. I’m sure that in her eyes I too would come under that classification.
Maybe I’m just making excuses to try to get out of actually doing something I want to be doing. My brain does some incredibly stupid things to me some days.
In the meantime I need to just focus on Hazel and realise that just like her age isn’t a barrier if this is really want I want to do, and if I ask myself honestly I know that this is what I want to do.
People have been giving me blank stares and confused looks the past few weeks as I have announced that I have a super dooper plan for the next three years which involves a whole lot of study, both here and overseas, and no teaching.
“What?!? No teaching? But…but…you have a teaching degree! You are a teacher! The world needs teachers!”
You know what? I’m sick of doing what the ‘world’ wants so I am now off to do what I want.
“But that is awfully selfish!”
Actually no it’s not! I think it is incredibly intelligent and will make me happy. You see last year when I was teaching I felt unappreciated, used and ridiculed for the fact that I was a teacher. I was stressed out beyond belief and was having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning and functioning at an acceptable level. I was incredibly depressed and had continuous bouts of unidentifiable sickness ranging from ulcers to skin rashes. It was quite a horrible year for me.
Ben suggested that I take some time off this year.
I decided to reassess my priorities, look at what had made me happy in the past and try to focus on what I wanted my future to look like. The result was a HUGE turn around for me.
This year I have been studying music, working three casual jobs as a theatre usher and as a promo girl. I have spent every day singing, reading, learning French and watching Opera. I have cooked new and exotic meals with ingredients I didn’t even know existed before. I have gone for morning walks. I have seen snow for the first time and travelled to countries that I couldn’t have pin pointed on a map twelve months ago. Best of all, I have been incredibly happy. I have only been sick once this entire year and only for three days. I have seen and felt a difference in my manner and my outlook on life. I LOVE EVERY DAY I AM ALIVE!!!
All the changes I made this year have made me incredibly happy. Originally the plan was for this to be like a second ‘gap year’ and I would return to teaching in 2012. Looking back though, that seems like the worst decision I could make. Why go back to the unhappiness when I can continue in this new life I have created for myself?
Which brings me to now. Two weeks ago I drew up a plan for all the things I want to do and see in the next three years. It is a very long list, which I will post when I get more than a half hour break between classes and have time to type it up! In order to actually achieve these things I have to make some further changes.
The first thing to do is to sell my house.
This is a hard thing for me to do because I love my house and I love the sense of freedom, responsibility and stability it gives me. My mum said I would need it one day, well I think that day has come. If I sell my house I will be able to pay for my university fees for the next three years leaving me debt free upon graduation. That alone is a wonderful thought. It will also help me to put my first few plans into motion.
Second thing is to work less and study more.
This is hard as I am a workaholic. I don’t like to sit idle and I feel if I am not earning money then I am a constant burden to those around me and I hate that feeling. But if I want to focus on my studies than I need to commit more time to practise and research and that means creating more time for study and less for work.
Third thing is to cut back on my expenses.
I think I have been pretty good about this anyway. I usually buy the groceries with vouchers I get from online surveys. I menu plan so there is no waste at the end of the week. I buy all my clothes second hand (except underwear). I limit the use of my car and travel using public transport. I have even taken to making birthday presents instead of buying things.
With these changes I hope that the coming years will be as wonderful and rewarding as this one has been. I have had some tricky days and hard times, but the good days have been far in abundance.
In the meantime, while waiting for my house to sell, if you see me carrying a box of Freddo’s or inviting you to a fundraising event. It isn’t because I am being selfish but because I am finally following my dream and I want you to help me get there and be a part of it.
I am going to be a great singer. The journey starts here.
I found out yesterday that Universal Studios Singapore is holding their audition tour again in a month. I auditioned last year, quite successfully I thought seeing as I was onboarded but then missed out on a job. It was a really hard thing for me to do and i got a lot furthur than I ever expected I would. I was lacking in confidence when I went and did it more due to my circumstances last year than any undying passion to work at a theme park. This year though I’m not sure it is worth me going through it again.
Last year I was in a place where I didn’t want to be. I was in a large amount of financial debt, I was working at a school I didn’t particularly like, dealing with people and situations which were putting too much stress on my already stressed out mind, I was constantly getting sick and I was dealing with my own personal demons of thinking my life was heading nowhere. In twelve months a lot has turned around.
This year I am in a place I mostly want to be. I have cleared up most of my debts including my huge personal loan, I work for three different companies performing jobs that I have a lot of fun in, I have new friends at WAAPA who I enjoy spending time with and learning new things with, I haven’t been sick in a long time and I finally feel like I am headed in the right direction with my performing. I am learning a lot about who I am and I get to spend my days doing things like singing and learning French, which makes me incredibly happy.
Even though Universal is still there and will continue to be there I’m not going to audition this year. It would be an amazing job and a great opportunity but I am in a different place now. I have chosen a path which is going to lead me in a different direction to the one I thought I was headed for last year.
I am still disappointed that the job didn’t work out last year and I didn’t get to spend a year working and singing in Singapore, but I am happy that it took that moment to get me to reexamine my life and make decisions like going to WAAPA and quitting my teaching job, decisions which were very difficult but have proven to be good for me. I am much happier than I was and with a little hard work maybe one day I will get a contract as good as the one I missed out on last year.
Image taken by Ben of a very happy Emma, a huge change from the dark and stormy 2010 version.
I know it has been a while since my last post but I’ve been very busy being a “student”! Ahh that magical state of being where you constantly find yourself broke, eating crappy food often of the two minute noodle variety and suddenly finding yourself at 4am sitting in a computer lab wondering why you didn’t start your assignment earlier.
It hasn’t been all that bad, yet. For starters I haven’t had any assignments due and I have a husband who won’t let me eat badly despite my best efforts. I have found though that I am battling a different variety of, well not really “problems”, but they aren’t pleasant.
First of all I feel really old. I am the second oldest in my course, the oldest is a Chinese exchange student who let’s face it still looks pretty young, (what is it about Asians and their ability to look fifteen until they hit their mid-forties?). There are five singers in the course, one is 16 (she is a high school student who does the course part-time), two are 17, one is 18 and then there is me sitting pretty at 27. I don’t look all that much older but it is difficult to strike up a conversation with kids whose biggest achievement to date is graduating highschool and who never seem to want to talk about anything other than their school ball or the TEE.
Second thing on the list is discipline to get down to work and study. I have made a rather elaborate timetable with break times, class time and study times all scheduled in. I even have breakfast, morning walks and showering scheduled. Think of Hermione from Harry Potter and you start to get an idea of how anal I am about schedules. It is a fantastic piece of work and would work brilliantly if I didn’t keep sabotaging myself into not doing my work. I make excuses, have naps, complain about being hungry, pretty much anything can be a distraction. I’m getting better and I do like the sense of satisfaction when I do sit down and stick to the schedule it is just still getting there for me at the moment.
At the beginning of the year I had trouble getting work that would pay regularly. I worked but some of those jobs are yet to pay me (yes I know this is ridiculous). As a result I spent most of January living off credit. I am now paying off my credit cards as well as paying the new bills and as a result I now have very little money to do anything else. Work is starting to pick up now but it is that lag which is killing me. I especially hate this because I try to use my credit cards as little as possible.
It is also weird getting used to catching public transport every day. I purposely did not buy a parking permit for university so I would have further encouragement to not use my car this year. For one thing a parking permit costs $75 which I don’t have at the moment, and if I was to drive to uni without one I would either have to pay for parking by the hour or get there at 7am to get one of the free parking bays which usually fill up by 7:30am. When I was working at the school last year I tried to catch public transport as much as possible but there were days when I just couldn’t be bothered so I would sleep in and drive to school. Now I don’t have that option, if I want to drive to uni and have it not coast me a fortune I have to get up even earlier.
All in all though this whole student thing is pretty good. I am enjoying the course more than I thought I was going to. I have started to talk to people and hopefully make some new friends even if they are seventeen and can’t come to the pub with me yet. If I can just get over these tiny little “un-problems” I am having at the moment then everything will be even sweeter. It is going to be an amazing year.
Image by FightHIVinDC (flickr)
