By Daniel

The last time I left you I was having brunch with a gorgeous girl from LA and then taking a step back from life over a beer with my mentor. These past few posts have felt like a throw back to MTV’s Diary circa 2002.  Deep insights and revealing stories all around this thing we call a quarter-life crisis. “You think you know… but you have no idea”.

This is cringing at the thought of settling, the crossroads of life direction, and of course the new responsibilities and decisions of a different life stage. Welcome to team angst,  with the unrelenting feeling that happiness may be a fish you can’t catch.

So how to deal? Sifting through blogs and articles this week I couldn’t help but see things through these quarter life lenses. Here are some of my take outs from my literary dine-ins.

Your Calling is Something You Grow Into

In last month’s New…

By Trina

We live in a world that teaches us from the beginning not to talk to strangers, and it’s not shocking that when we get older we have trust issues with our fellow humans. I am usually skeptical of every other person around me and hope they won’t try to rob or sexually assault me (that might be the scared little small-town girl inside of me). Then there are the times where you let your guard down, and some jerk store takes advantage of you – that’s right, you know who you are car fixer guy in Woonsocket, RI. On the flip side, I find it hard to trust the people I work with on a daily basis. It seems like everyone has some sort of anti-you agenda, and this planet is every man for his/herself.

That is why when I boarded my plane last night from Fort Lauderdale to Dallas I had every intention of sitting down, writing a superb LA article I had promised to Dan (hadn’t a clue what to write) and not talking to any strangers. Enter: adorable 30-something Texan blonde woman. She started talking to me about how she was a little nervous about flying. It seemed harmless enough, so I chatted to her about pretty surface level topics (weather, flying, why we were both in town, etc). After all, I couldn’t start my article during taxiing anyways, right?

by James

A year has passed since I took up my current role and those 12 months seem to have flown by without respect for my highly analysed career plans that mean I should have been promoted by now! Although, my role title, salary and office position haven’t changed in these 52 weeks, I have learnt an awful lot about working in the corporate world.

By Will

It’s 9.30 in the morning, and I’m sitting down to a greasy breakfast near London’s borough market. I’m on a health kick and I’m supposed to be avoiding foods that can set up camp in my ventricles, but the smell of bacon from the café has sweet talked me into sitting down and ordering a full english. I’ve just picked my friend Paul up from the airport cause he’s visiting me for the weekend. We start catching up over coffee and London rain.

By Daniel

Putting his beer down, my mentor changed his tone to something a little more serious.

“Corporate loves guys like you; young, ambitious, driven, and…. impressionable. They pull you in and place the whole world on front of you. You don’t realize this yet, but it becomes a shackle, a sort of ball and chain”

He brought his hands up to my neckline and closed an imaginary shackle around my throat. I looked down and envisioned an iron chain that connected to a small cannon ball on the floor.

“As time goes on they throw in some nice promotions, pay increases, bonuses. You feel good and you want more. So they give it to you. Soon, you’re married and have kids so you need to throw that into the mix as well. You have obligations, responsibility and it begins to weigh heavy on your shoulders. You don’t notice it at first, but your ball…

By Trina

I have always and will always love stories of sweeping, epic romance. As a child I was captivated by such stories mainly in the form of movies (from the Little Mermaid to the Thorn Birds). The over-arching theme was always attractive couples with a spark that never died. I dedicate a good portion of my free time to examining that everlasting spark by watching romantic comedies and fantasizing about romances. In fact, last Saturday night was an intensive night of research in the form of watching Bridget Jones’s Diary and Notting Hill (a dual-themed night: rom coms and London…pretty wild night). If my hours of study have taught me anything, it is that relationships are rarely “perfect” or “fairytale” but rather bipolar in nature. Love’s manic highs and crushing lows have given me a reality check on romance and caused me to hurt my brain thinking about it.

By Will

I was in my little grocery store the other day doing what I usually do - cruising the aisles looking for my Reese’s Cups when really I should have been knocking stuff off my shopping list. I found my Reese’s by the way - awesome. I chucked a left down to the sauces section looking for some mustard. Saw the mustard, sidled over and scanned the shelf - dijon, Grey Poupon, French’s Yellow Mustard, Colman’s Mustard (the shizzle!), wholegrain, honey, spicy, brown. I spent a good 5 minutes deciding which one I wanted. I actually picked up jars and looked at them - at one stage I compared two jars. For what? Colour intensity or something? I don’t know why I stood there comparing mustard. It occurred to me afterwards it’s because I had so much choice.

By Daniel

Work was piling up on all fronts and I was on a collision course for classic burnout. Climbing up the corporate ladder, dedicating nights and weekends to a start-up, and of course blogging in between really left no time for anything… Then, she called me.

I hadn’t seen her in years, but she was just as I remembered her.

Sunday brunch was the request and it was exactly what the doctor ordered. A dose of champagne/mimosas, taken with great conversation and a small crush. It was refreshing and fun. I hadn’t felt so relaxed in months.

As we got up to leave I felt like that first grader running around the park and hearing the dreaded bell that ended recess. Is it over already?! Yes, sonny, it is… and she went leaving on a jet plane back to LA. I’m not sure if it was the champagne or the fact that it was my first deep conversation in months. I found myself standing there asking the question what should I do with my life now?

By Trina

In college, I was really busy, pushed myself extremely hard, had a social life and always had a spring in my step. In a typical day (even with minimal caffeine), I could workout, go to several classes, put in a few hours of work and read for lecture the next day. On the weekends, I would frequent the downtown Iowa City watering holes, and I might have enjoyed the occasional 6 AM tailgate. That was then… These days (even with enough caffeine to kill a small animal) I seem to get really tired after doing less, walk a little slower and carry more weight on my shoulders. It is almost as if one year of working has aged me greatly. Maybe it is a combination of working, stress and paying bills all while trying to look fabulous or perhaps it is just adulthood. Has adulthood killed my spark? 24 hit hard, and I’m a little afraid of 25. I just feel…old.