Stop fighting and figure things out

Hands up - the search for a direction

My entire life I’ve struggled to know what my purpose is. Whenever I imagined my future it was never my career I pictured. I didn’t lie awake at night dreaming about a job title - I was picturing dinner tables, growing old with friends and a house full of people I loved. But the one thing that I was never sure of was what I wanted to spend 90% of my life actually doing. 

Growing up I never really excelled at anything in particular, but I was okay at enough things to come across as somewhat capable and not raise any flags. In the end, I was able to get by at school by having my hand practically glued to the ceiling from the age of 15. On paper, everything looked fine, but underneath I had no idea what I was actually good at, or where any of it was leading.

This struggle extended beyond pure capability. Even the things I enjoyed I couldn’t commit to. If I was to gather all of the ‘stuff and things’ from hobbies past it would fill a house. I’ve tried music, painting, poetry, bouldering and filmmaking, just to name a few. My obsession with plants lasted long enough for me to gather over 70 at its peak, but not long enough for me to have kept most of them alive, or learned any really useful botany skills. After a while, it stopped feeling like curiosity and started feeling like proof that I couldn’t stick at anything long enough for it to matter.

If there’s one thing that has remained constant and reliable, it’s the unreliability that any new passion will last out the year. All of this resulted in me feeling pretty directionless and overall lacking in confidence about any big life decisions. 

How do people just KNOW what they want to do??

Stop fighting, you’re just NOT that mysterious

There’s been a recurring theme throughout my life when I meet new people. Oftentimes they have an impression of me as being somewhat elusive and maybe even “cool”. I use that to mean “mysterious” or “edgy”. This impression is almost always shattered. Whether it happens in a few weeks, days or even minutes of us talking, it is inevitable. 

I remember dating a boy when I was 17 and him literally saying the words “You’re not as mysterious as I thought you were.” Now, obviously, as a teenager this was potentially the worst thing someone could say to me. I grew up in the era of Skins, Tumblr and manic-pixie dream girls. 

Every representation of the “cool” girl in film and tv was someone who left things unsaid; someone who had an inner world that others weren’t privy to. She wasn’t loud, abrasive or in-your-face. To be mysterious, intriguing and a bit aloof was absolutely something I strived for. 

But the reality is, I’m just not that mysterious. And more importantly, trying to be was exhausting.

The past few years have been really eye-opening for me. I’ve grown into myself a lot more and have tried to stopped fighting so much against who I fundamentally am as a person. 

Who is that you ask? Well, I am an above-average-in-noise-level, relatively bossy, overly opinionated, ex-in-denial-extrovert. Essentially the antithesis of mysterious. I’m basically an open-book - the kind that starts talking before you’ve even decided if you want to read it.

The self-proclaimed glue

Alongside my not-mysteriousness, I also have a love of spreadsheets and an aptitude for organising my impossible to organise friends into one room at one time. My bossiness and Excel skills have come in handy many times when dealing with a group of people who want to get together but don’t want to be the one to send out the invites.

In simple terms - I am the glue. That’s not to say I’m single-handedly holding things together - everyone shows up in their own way - it’s more that I'm the one who can’t sit still long enough to let plans stay as just ideas. For a long time, I didn’t think this counted as anything. It just felt like me being a bit bossy and overly involved. But being bossy and overly involved has actually ended up being quite useful.

More often than not, I’m the one who organises the holidays, flagging flight prices (which inevitably change by the time anyone actually books), sorting out accommodation and dealing with the landlord. I message the group chat in the weeks before, to see if there’s anything people want to do or see. I even make a spreadsheet of all our flight times so we can coordinate car-shares. 

I would often be the one who invites our friends round for a potluck so we can all get together. Cleaning the flat, buying candles for the table and creating a playlist to set the vibe. Despite the fact that I usually end up being completely burnt out before we’ve sat down and end up being fairly grumpy all evening (because now there are actually ten people in the flat), I really value this time. I value my friends and my community. And of course, none of it would work if people didn’t actually want to come - the effort only matters because the relationships are already there.

Over the years this has helped me maintain friendships even without us being in the same location. Even after moving cities, I still have a core group. We still get together when I’m in town. We still go away on holidays. We still care deeply about each other and the distance is purely physical.

The funnel - leaning in to the things I’m already good at

So how does this all connect? After feeling confused and stuck for a really long time I started to evaluate the things I’m actually good at. I created a mental list of my strengths, and began to really think about what these things are good for. Not in a big, life-changing moment, but by noticing the patterns I kept coming back to. I call this the funnel.

That’s not to say I’ve just abandoned trying to learn or improve myself. But by filtering out things that aren’t true to who I am as a person, I’ve been able to thrive in environments that align with my character, instead of constantly fighting to fit into a box that I’m just not the right shape for. At some point it clicked that the things I’d always brushed off as marmite personality traits were actually skills.

This is essentially how I ended up setting up Flos with Cath in 2022, and how we’ve continued to grow it. I like organising things and I love getting people together. I love creating spaces that feel easy and accessible. Every event we do I want to feel like you’ve been invited round for a cup of tea and a gossip (even if that cup of tea comes in the form of a vodka red bull at 2am in Stereo). Something informal and a bit DIY, but ultimately a space where people feel like they belong.

It’s no surprise that I’ve ended up working in communications alongside putting on events. The good thing about being un-mysterious is that I’ve had many conversations with many people and have been able to develop my skills in the word-department. I’ve had a lot of practice, basically. I like sharing stories and I like writing them too.

By leaning into my strengths - talking to people, organising them and trying to make them feel noticed and valued - life finally feels like it has some sense to it. It turns out I didn’t need to find one thing I was exceptional at. I just needed to recognise the things I’d been doing the whole time.

When I picture my future now it doesn’t feel so scary. I feel like I'm on my way to figuring things out. And most importantly, it doesn’t feel like I have to be anyone else to get there.