Lost

I am lost.

I guess I could sugar coat it and pretend that it’s a lesson, or that I’ll be better, stronger for it in the end. I suppose I could wax poetic about the thrill of the journey or say there is no destination at all — that I’m simply on my way to something bigger. But that wouldn’t be honest.

Although I imagine that each of these things holds within it a seed of truth, today I am just lost. Not in the woods or even in a Neverland of my choosing, but right here… out in the open, in the middle of my meticulously planned life.

I’ve often heard that if you find yourself lost or turned around in an unfamiliar place that feels dangerous, you should do your best to pretend that you know exactly where you’re going.

It’s this illusion that is my true expertise.

Some days I even manage to convince myself, propelled forward by a cocktail of audacious dreams and inertia. Other days, like a child lost in the wilderness, I am paralyzed.

I had a map, goals, a plan. I followed most of the rules. When I took a detour, it usually made sense. I had this idea of what and who I was supposed to be and how I would get there. It hasn’t worked out exactly as I’d expected.

As an only child, I was always fiercely independent with an overactive imagination — partly due to my nature, and partly out of necessity. I did my share of exploring — in my head, in the wild — but I never really strayed too far off the beaten path.

I remember spending countless hours in my childhood role-playing what I would be when I grew up. I was never really comfortable with the concept of choosing just one thing to become. I wanted to be more. When I think back now, I suppose I always had this yearning to not just to be anything I wanted to be, but to be everything I wanted to be. They didn’t have a word for it then, but today I call myself a multipotentialite.

When the time came to squish myself into a socially defined box, I wrestled with the choice. My more pragmatic Taurean side won the day and I decided firmly that I would be a teacher. However, there was a compromise hidden within my logic. I would teach high school social studies, so I could study and teach about humans and their entire world. I would also study African American Studies, Women’s Studies, and Public Policy more in-depth… in case I couldn’t find a job teaching, which meant I could meander through adventurous courses like African Dance, Critical Media Literacy, The History of Witchcraft, and many more. Later I would naturally gravitate to community psychology and social change in my graduate work, without knowing for certain how, exactly, it was connected to the broader plan. I just knew it fit. So much for pragmatism.

I am a teacher. There’s no doubt about that. I truly loved the meticulous planning of innovative and creative lessons that would somehow manage to captivate teenagers on my best days. I was good at my job, I was a leader in the district for a time… and somehow achieved regional, and even national recognition (which is what eventually became a problem for the people I worked with and for). But even the best job will kill you if you try to do it in a place where you don’t belong.

As the environment became more and more toxic, I knew I had to remove myself — not from education or from the kids like many assume, but from that place and the toxic energy. The impact of the stress couldn’t be contained and started to spill over into all of the other areas of my life. My physical and mental health was suffering. My relationships were suffering. I was struggling with no support system… and I was losing the battle fast. It’s where I first lost my way.

So, as any lost soul would. I looked for a new path that would lead me out of what was quickly becoming a dark, forbidden forest. Or, I guess you could say, I wrote my way out.

I’d been working with educators for some time to help them tell their stories and reshape the narrative around education. At the same time, I was doing some work at the national level with literacy learning. I must have made an impression because when a position opened in the editorial space, an education non-profit came looking for me — at exactly the right time.

Needless to say, it was a frightening jump because when you’re a teacher, teaching becomes a very large part of your identity. It’s also a relatively safe profession… when they’re not trying to kill you. In spite of my fear, I took the risk. I missed teaching my kids, but I loved my new job. I loved my freedom to create. I loved my team. I loved the potential. But as time went on, my bright path out of the forest seemingly turned, leading me directly back to where I began. The wilderness can be tricky in that way. Some chaos, a venture capitalist, and an acquisition later, and I find myself unemployed and vulnerable for the first time in my life.

I don’t want to go backward, back into the toxic energy of bureaucracy. But I earned my last job by simply being good at what I do and having a passion for it. What I don’t have to move forward in that space is formal education. Even though I certainly have enough formal education, it’s not in the “right” area for where I want to go. It certainly doesn’t help that all the jobs I want are located in New York or California or Washington D.C., and no one seems to want a remote powerhouse — another thing I loved about my job. My ego, self-confidence, and self-esteem have taken a hit. I’m in a motivational rut of sorts, and I know I have to pull myself out. I keep reaching out, trying different paths, working to solve the problem. And it turns out, no matter my experience or connections, I find myself here, alone, lost… and writing my way out.