No one receives more than 24-hours in a day.

Then again, even if we did have more than 24-hours in a day I’m sure some of us would wish we had more time. Then, we’d work ourselves toward exhaustion.

Throughout the year, I asked myself a lot of questions. “Am I happy?” “Am I working hard enough?” “What should I be working on right now?” I think I both over reflected and under reflected at the same time.

I knew one thing felt certain; I did not have a definitive answer nor would I get one. But throughout the last few months, I had to learn to feel comfortable in not knowing what direction my actions toward creating a life for myself would actually take me. I just had to hope for the best.

No one offers a full-proof guide on how to live life as an adult. The beauty of living in your early twenties is that after years of imposed structure, the responsibility of deciding what to do is tossed back to you. Some find it stressful, some find it freeing.

For the first time, you get to decide who you are or the person you will become in life. I find this aspect quite frustrating. As a young-twenty-something in Black skin who is also queer, how much do I actually get to decide about myself? How much will these identities limit me or grant me? After all, we are all blessed with perspective.

Our experiences inform who we are but there’s plenty of new experiences that could define who you become. I had a lot of experiences this year, professionally and personally. I began my New Year in Chicago after a break up over a virtual situationship that never was.

Then, I refocused. I wrote several articles a week for an online news magazine. I freelanced like I never did before. I commuted an hour and a half to Madison from Milwaukee for work, often living on an air mattress for work. Then, I just stayed in Madison.

Then, the summer came around. finished Jane the Virgin and caught up on the first four seasons of Superstore. I found myself enjoying directing guests at Target toward the iPhone chargers in the electronics section. Target became my “happy place.”

I still felt distracted, like I wasn’t doing enough. I didn’t even have a plan. Instead, I found myself filling time and collecting a paycheck with no actual apartment or a place to put my stuff so I went back home to Milwaukee again.

Not even a block away I received a phone call from my current workplace. After several interviews for communications positions in Milwaukee, I returned to Madison to callscreen and produce a live morning radio show while continuing to freelance.

Currently, I love it but I still feel like I could be doing more. I want to do more. Like I said, there’s never enough time.