Why a Quarter-Life Crisis Is a Time to Take Control

How to avoid the trap of doing nothing

What is a quarter-life crisis?

We’re all familiar with the idea of a midlife crisis. Someone who, upon reaching a certain age, suddenly falls into despair at the realization that their life is almost halfway to game over. There’s another term for a similar sensation that happens to people in their twenties and early thirties: a quarter-life crisis. And more and more of us are experiencing this.

The difference between the two is that where one is older and more likely has more money to entertain their new frustrations, the other is probably more frustrated at their lack of financial resources. This angst amongst others (rising property prices, relationship status, career trajectory, Instagram envy) paves the way nicely to low self-esteem, constant questioning and many sleepless nights.

According to the dictionary, a quarter-life crisis is a “crisis that may be experienced in one’s twenties, involving anxiety over the direction and quality of one’s life”.¹

That’s a good a definition as any to describe the mounting fear and panic that I experienced upon entering my twenties.

My quarter-life crisis experience

My crisis came about whilst I was working at my first major role post-graduation. I studied medicine, so I already had a job lined up for me before I’d even graduated. Life was looking pretty rosy, and I was already on my way to start what I thought would be a lifelong career.

One year into it and I was miserable. For all the reasons you’ve probably heard before: long hours, understaffed, hostile working environment and difficult cases.

It was hard to shoulder the burden of my patients, keep up with my training and work under the growing pressures of a broken system. That’s when I realized that being a doctor was more sacrifice than I was willing to give. I didn’t want to die a doctor like so many of my fallen colleagues, and I could already see how everything I was going through at work was taking its toll on my health.

I made the decision to leave. I hung up my stethoscope and spent some time nursing myself back to life.

But truth be told, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I knew I’d made the right decision, my work was making me ill and though it was very hard to finally cut the cord and let go, I did so.

I just didn’t realize at that time that the most difficult decision of my life was probably the easiest part of everything that would come after it. I’d spent so many years becoming a doctor. It was all I knew.

I was ill-prepared. I was lost. I didn’t know what to do with myself. Who should I be now that I was no longer a doctor? What hat should I put on and make my identity? Cue my quarter-life crisis.

Gradually, I tried to figure things out. I took coaching courses to help me shed some light on the path ahead. It was still dark, mind you, but at least there was a glimmer of hope.

I came across so many other people on the many career courses, who like me felt disillusioned about their current career path. We all felt stuck and uncertain about the future, but clear that our current situations were less than ideal. The question was, how would we change it?

What I started doing: dabbling and experimenting

I started dabbling in a lot of things. A little bit of this, a little bit of that. Whatever I tried, I was pretty bad at which wasn’t helpful and quite discouraging.

I was determined not to give up even though it was tiring to feel like I was constantly losing. Videos like the below helped to keep me motivated and reassured me that I wasn’t going crazy.

I went to events to learn more about different career paths. Many, many awkward moments trying to ‘network’ and learn whilst it was obvious I was an imposter. There were so many times I would sit in a crowd (pre-corona) clueless because I had no understanding or context of what was being said. I arrived with no prior knowledge except the details of the invitation on the Meetup page.

Eventually, I got better at arriving solo to meetings. And I got even better at deciphering early whether I needed to stay to the end or cut my losses and leave at the first sign of a tea break.

And each time I was learning more about different career paths, my ‘Not-for-me’ pile was increasing while my ‘Options-to-look-into’ pile was growing smaller.

While I was doing all of this, I was blogging and documenting my quarter-life crisis escapades. Much the same way I wrote about my experiences as a doctor, I decided to continue to write about this awkward and confusing chapter of my life.

After starting a new role and subsequently quitting, I decided to see if content creation was an avenue worth pursuing. After all, I’d been writing on and off for 3 plus years, I was interested if I could keep it up for that length of time.

I decided to take my blog more seriously and use elements of what I was learning to create different forms of content. I wanted to continue following my curiosity and finding out about different careers.

It then made sense to share it on the internet because a) I knew I wasn’t the only one who was experiencing a quarter-life crisis and b) I had way more time on my hands which meant I could create for those that didn’t.

Starting another new project

Out of the many lessons my very expensive career coaching taught me was the power of connections so, I decided to start a YouTube channel and a podcast to interview people. I’d get guests on whose careers I thought were interesting and ask them about it.

By doing this I could find out about a whole range of different career paths without actually having to apply for a whole bunch of jobs or work experiences. It was quicker and easier and I met some awesome people in the process. Hearing personal experiences rather than reading dry job descriptions gave me much more insight and was a better way of learning about the variety of options that are out there.

Listening to people passionate about their careers and who were willing to share their passion with me, I couldn’t think of a better way to learn.

People like Giles, a former surgeon who left his orthopedic post and changed careers multiple times gave me a lot more insight into how I could navigate this ‘crisis’ better. After all, he’d been where I was and lived to tell that tale.

Was it wise to start a YouTube channel, a podcast and a Medium blog all at the same time, probably not.

The first month in and I realized that I wouldn’t be able to continue putting in all the long days and weekends, so I needed to step it back to a pace that was doable.

Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy learning new skills but it also became increasingly apparent that it would all be a very steep learning curve. Alas, I came to a point I’d come to many times before, my make-or-break point.

The Gap

Luckily, I remembered a video that I watched several years ago, a video that I came across serendipitously. It was a video by Ira Glass, a radio host and producer. In it, he described an interesting concept.

He says that we all want to create great art, but when we start anything, our work falls short of our expectations. So the quality we want and expect, or as he puts it, our taste is high but our work is clearly not, and between the two is the ‘gap’. And to close the gap we have to put in years of work and effort and practice to finally be able to get our art to where we want it to be.

However, many don’t put the work in, they come across the gap and find it too discouraging so they give up.

I decided to hunt the video down. Partly a procrastination exercise, and partly to make sure I hadn’t made it up or changed the meaning.

I’m usually the kind of person who quits early. Just as the video describes, I have high taste in a lot of things but low abilities in as many things, hence the gap.

I remember buying a 30-day drawing book that promised to teach me how to draw in 30 days and by the end, I was dissatisfied with my progress so I eventually stopped.

Going forward

The issue is that it’s easier to put the time and work into something that has a guaranteed outcome like a medical degree than it is to take up drawing. Where would 5 years of drawing lead? I don’t know. But where did 5 years of medical school lead — misery.

So the outcome of creating a YouTube channel is unclear and I don’t know where it will lead, I do know that I am enjoying interviewing people from different walks of life and I like engaging a different area of my brain.

I’ve given myself 6 months which is probably not long enough but in 6 months I’ll choose the platform that feels the most right and run with that one. Until then, I’ll keep experimenting, trialing different things, pushing the envelope a little further. I’ll keep dabbling.

Maybe in 6 months I decide I’m done with it all and if that’s the case so be it, I’ll move onto the next challenge. As Gary Vaynerchuk always says we have to try different things out and though sometimes it feels like I’ve tried almost everything, I’m nowhere close.

6 months is 26 weeks’ worth of content: managing, organizing, brainstorming and creating. It’s me guaranteeing to put my work out consistently, sometimes to no one, sometimes to two people, but I’ll be putting it out, regardless.

And as we’ve all found this year, our lives can change in a matter of weeks so who knows what will happen when I cross the 26-week mark.

If you are like me, powering through a quarter-life crisis and you’re unsure of what to do or what to try next, then just pick one thing. Pick one thing you’ve always wanted to try and dedicate a certain amount of time to it. Be prepared to be rubbish and allow yourself grace for that. Set yourself a timeline of when you will work on it and deliver it each week.

And after that time passes, you can measure how you feel about it. Is it something you want to continue? Did you enjoy it? Do you see a way for yourself here?

If you decide to leave it, then that’s fine too. That time isn’t wasted. It’s a tiny percentage of a long life. You’ve gained more than if you’d done nothing at all. The skills you have learned will come into use sometime later, it always does. Plus, you’ve also learned something valuable about yourself and can shift accordingly onto the next thing, a little wiser about who you are.

Do you need any more convincing? Or perhaps more procrastination fodder? Or maybe you’ve run out of ideas completely. Here are a few videos which may be able to help.

References

¹ Collins Dictionary, Quarterlife crisis, Available at: https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/quarterlife-crisis (Accessed: 12 November 2020).