This week’s Indie Ink Challenge came from Major Bedhead, who gave me this prompt: What would you change if you could turn back time? You can’t change the course of history but you can change something that may affect a lot of people or just yourself.. I challenged Andrea with the prompt Write a requiem to a lost conscience.

There’s not much that I would change with regards to my life.  I generally try my best to live without regrets, and to learn from all my mistakes – and there have been quite a few of those along the way.  However, if I were to do it all again with the knowledge I have today, I think I would attempt to change one simple thing that I think would have made a huge impact on my life.

When I was 19 years old, I went straight from high school to university – and have struggled ever since to decide what exactly I want to do with my life.  I started off my tertiary education in a Science Honours Non-major degree at the University of Waterloo and then switched after a year into Environmental Chemistry since I had to choose a major in order to graduate.  I never finished this degree due partially to my clinical depression and partially to lack of interest and confusion as to if this really was for me.

I then went into Interior Design, and most recently into Architecture.

Yes.  I’ve been studying for a long time, which is why I would like to take a bit of a breather before I go back – if I go back.  Certain members of my family are pushing me to go back immediately and do a Masters in Architecture – but to be honest, I don’t know if I want to reach that stage of the Architectural process….do I want to become a registered and licensed architect?  That will mean at least 4 or 5 more years of schooling and then exams and then a specific amount of hours of lectures etc. per year to upkeep my qualification….it’s a lot of work and a lot of time for someone who maybe doesn’t have that much time to spend concentrating on a career if I want a family.

What I would change when I was younger is that I would take a year, maybe two to do what I want, to relax and to clear my mind…..and at that point I’d be able to figure out what direction I want to go in.  I would like those years to be on my own, maybe traveling, just figuring stuff out without the influential pressures of family, friends and the society I grew up in.  It’s something I’ve never had the opportunity to do, and something that I wish I could still do.

I believe in that time I would have better figured out a direction for my life, and made up for the 10 years that I’ve just spent in various schooling trying desperately to find my niche.  I would be closer to the point in my career that I crave for presently and would not have as much questions in me (as a 32 year old married female with no kids)  with regards to how much I can forfeit in my career in order to have my family.  At least I would have started my career earlier and the forfeit would not be quite as risky.  At least with more experience in a career I’d have more options to switch out of it if I wanted to.  At least I would have enough savings at this point to go to the UK with my husband and look for a job there while he attends school.

At least, at least, at least….this is why I try not to look back on my mistakes to figure out how to change them.

In the end , wishing and hoping and praying that the past was different is irrelevant and is a complete waste of time.  We cannot change the past.  The best we can do is accept it, work with the consequences to create a better future for ourselves.  In a sense, the fleeting era of the present is a bit insignificant  until it becomes the past, when it becomes history engrained into each and every iota of our beings.

If you are religious or spiritual (as I consider myself to be) you would agree with me that God does take care of you – maybe at a different pace or in a different way from what you chose, but he does care.  Maybe this situation I am presently in has occurred because He realized that at this point in my life, I need this year alone to figure out my wants and needs.

My husband is safe in another country and I am here by myself  (feeling slightly miserable), but the advantage is that I am able to live on my own terms without worrying if he is okay, if he’s eaten, if he’s worried about me.  I miss him terribly, but as I’ve stated on Twitter and IRL to my friends – this year I am regrouping myself to become someone better, to figure out who I want to be and to become that person.

This year, I concentrate on me.