Twenty to Thirty — a decade considered

I don’t remember turning twenty. I had a pretty bad case of ‘drunk all the time’. I do remember being pretty certain that it was going to be a pretty solid decade, and that I was going to be a big success. I was smart — school told me so. I nearly failed in grade 11 but balanced it out in grade 12 because dad cut off my weed money. So I was smart, but impulsive, with an addictive personality. But precocious boys succeed right? I’d quit my job at the bank to run gigs and tours full time. Perfect job for a loud-mouthed, heavy-drinking dreamer.

After three years of partying, rocking out, and taking off my shirt in public, I was left with $400, a fairly unreliable van and half a university degree. My transcript included one non submit semester where I failed all four subjects, because I just didn’t go to the exams. Me and my best friend realised with a week to go that you couldn’t ‘cram’ a law degree, (we’d literally done zero work), so we decided to buy 8 liters of cask wine and hide out till exams were over. That was a fun week, but a bad decision.

Over the years I’d just managed to pay the bills putting on gigs and helping a local street zine with distribution and advertising. I wasn’t rich, but I was doing what I loved and (barely) making a living off it. That year we were negotiating with an investor who wanted to give us lots of money to do what I loved more. But I got cocky, and overreached, and lost all our capital on a run of terrible metal gigs, and the investor pulled out. I later found out he put his money into biodegradable coffins. In retrospect it was a much better investment.

I think I was about 23 by then, and boy was I down. I was broke, my van smelled like newspapers and spilt beer, and a mechanic told me I’d be lucky to get to Mackay. But I was broke, sick of the town I grew up in, and desperate to break orbit. Around this time I’d started to see a girl, who has since become my fiancée, and probably one of the most important, and stabilising, parts of my life. I said, “I’m going to Melbourne, are you coming?”, and she was like, “yep”. So we set off with $400, a few gigs booked, a couple of boxes of cask wine, and a van.

It took us about three weeks to get down the coast, where I learnt that you can’t just park your van and sleep anywhere, (especially when you pull up next to a barbeque and run a power cord into your van and watch cartoons till 2am). Also rural country pubs don’t like skinny little emos playing weak covers of cold chisel. But they will pay, no matter how uncomfortable the previous four hours have been.

We broke down in Mackay, then again in Serena. An old man walking past told me to get under the van and hit the starter motor with a rock, while Chloe turned the ignition. That got the van going. By the time we rolled in to Melbourne the van would overheat when it was idling, and gush break fluid at the lights. It sounded a bit like a hovercraft — but by then the novelty of that had worn off.

The last trip the van did was from the dilapidated flat we lived in in Caulfield, to the call center where I spent the next few years of my life. I remember arriving in Melbourne thinking I’d get a job instantly — maybe as an executive something or other — I’d had my own business for Christ’s sake. Yet the only place that would have me was a call center. BUT! For the first time I was earning a steady wage. I was cold calling selling telephones, but I was a ‘responsible adult’. I bought a real car that didn’t smell like much and shone, and we had a two bedroom flat. But I was fucking miserable.

The future seen by 20 year old me, of a decade of success, a high flying music executive with great abs, had not been realised. I was a middle management nobody at a call center that sold telephones. And I just couldn’t shake the belly fat.

When I was 25 I turned a corner. Or slowly merged into the exit lane would perhaps be a better analogy. I didn’t know where the exit led, but I knew the highway was taking me nowhere good and I had to get off. I tried switching to another call center, (selling health insurance — really?!). At the same time I got into university in Melbourne (I’d tried for three years straight, and been knocked back because of my failed semester when I was younger).

I was working 12 hour days — 8 hours at the call center — 4+ studying. I would wake up and work till I fell asleep. Every day. I knew I wasn’t going to survive this, so I eventually found another job, where I worked part time, and this was the first job I’d had (ever) I remotely liked. It was still a call center, but they had a website too, where they needed a bit of writing. Informative little pieces like “How to choose your home broadband”, and “What would happen if Google stopped working?” It wasn’t much, but for once I could see a world where I didn’t have a phone strapped to my face. I’d started trying to see myself doing something different, and believing I could. Beyond that, I said enough was enough and I started putting the work in to change it.

I spent two years there, working more and more with the website, and writing/ doing marketing for other websites, whilst doing university nearly full-time, sometimes more. I was studying law, and watching that show with the handsome cool lawyers. I really wanted that suit, that fancy job, that vindication that came with getting a job in the city. I wasn’t going to be the failed musician or the call center guy, I was going to be a successful person, that did success.

I did finally graduate, and just like high school, I made up for a bum start by graduating with honors. But I’d also seen the industry and saw that I didn’t enjoy it, and I didn’t fit in. I managed to barely scrape an interview at a major firm, through my boss’s connections at the website, but when they saw my transcript they were like ‘oh cool, let’s get this over with’ (that failed semester again!). Also, I’d stayed up till 1am practicing behavioral questions which turned me into an exhausted robot, plus when they asked me if I had any questions, my carefully planned question — “Why did you choose this career and what’s been your journey here?” — (meant to impress the senior lawyer I was talking to), fell on deaf ears, as I was talking to a level one HR rep that was like… “uhh… I studied HR and now I work in HR”.

I hadn’t got my honors at that stage, and I totally get why they didn’t hire me. It’s pretty competitive and I didn’t look good on paper. I also cut my super long hair, but kept this ridiculous quiff. I’m not 100% sure but I was probably also wearing a suit from an op-shop. That being said, I’d still love to stroll in with my results one day like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, and be like, “you coulda had all this”, but life rarely hands you that sort of closure.

So I was stuck, I’d finished my degree, mainly to prove something, but I didn’t want to be a lawyer. Really all I wanted to do was make stuff and be creative and play with gadgets, but I didn’t know that yet. However, out of the blue, a start-up I was doing some work for offered me a job managing their marketing. They’d gotten funding and they went in to big boy mode. Over two years I went through an insane rollercoaster as we grew, stumbled, opened in other countries, got shut down in others. I got to do a ‘bizzi-ness-trip’ in an ‘err-e-plane’, and I bought a real suit from a proper shop.

It was really hard work, I didn’t know what I was doing at least half the time, and the other half I was probably wrong. But I was kind of living my fantasy — I was working in the city, I was a ‘young professional’ but I could also wear jeans and sit on bean bags. As a caveat to all that, I was slowly realising that ‘marketing’ was basically sales times a billion, and I didn’t really dig it. But while I was there I started playing with virtual and augmented reality software, building little games and experiences because it was hella fun. I’d discovered an outlet for a part of me that hadn’t been satisfied since I’d been involved with music, I’d also discovered the golden thread between it all. Creation and storytelling.

Two years ago I got made redundant (a law trained hipster that fucks around with gadgets all day doesn’t make for the best marketing lead) and started freelancing. I was writing copy (words) for businesses, but at least I could focus on the message and the story. I was helping put together websites for people but at least I was making something, and I got to fuck around with computers. Most importantly I was using about half my time to learn more about developing in virtual reality and just new technologies in general. This year I got to carry out another goal, which was to travel. I worked everything out with clients so I could work remotely, and since March I’ve been to twelve countries, with about a month in each one. On that trip I’ve picked up work doing virtual reality development, and worked on technology projects that tell stories in a really cool way.

I’ve also been bone tired, scared, worried about money, had panic attacks, had to come off my anti-depressants (they don’t sell Pristiq in the UK or Europe) and had a few ridiculous benders (not advisable on a Pristiq come down but oh well). I learnt to scuba dive whilst recovering from mushrooms, ridden on the roof of a tuk-tuk, yachted around the Philippines, and seen just a huge amount of old walls and castles.

Something that has always been a common thread through my entire experience was the idea that I wasn’t good enough, that I’d failed, or fallen short. In some ways it’s been a blessing, because it’s always driven me to do more, make more, be more. But in other ways its lead to a lifetime of doubt, anxiety, stress and over-work. At any stage in my life I can’t remember sitting back and thinking, “yep — this is going pretty well, you’re doing pretty well for yourself”, it’s always been, “what am I missing, what needs to improve, who’s doing better, how can I work harder?” I know this isn’t unique for me, and I’ve been lucky in being able to channel it into a fairly (retrospectively) satisfying and (arguably) productive life.

As I’m turning thirty, I still feel like I’m behind where I need to be sometimes, I feel like a faker, who’s superficially proficient at a lot of things, but not excellent at anything. Who hasn’t stayed in an industry long enough to master it, who’s still playing catch up on my failed semesters, businesses, and personal projects. Who hasn’t worked hard enough to win, but still managed to burn lots of bridges and personal relationships along the way. I sometimes still feel like I’m waiting for someone to come up to me with a trophy and say, “you did it, you did life right, your friend’s parents who thought you were a bad influence have been notified that you are, in fact, a good boy”.

But at the same time, I’m hitting this decade with something I never had, a self awareness and understanding that has helped me temper the fear. I’ve done therapy, I’ve spent a lot of time getting to know myself and my head and the way I think. I’m able to label negative emotions and thus not ‘react’ to them. I’m confident enough in myself, and my abilities, that I can enter the decade with a focus, an idea and a dream, and not overcompensate because I feel like I’m behind, and end up working myself into another nervous breakdown.

I’m also entering it with a lot of pride in myself. Pride, but not the cocksure arrogance of twenty year old me. Pride in what I’ve done, not what I think I should be able to do. I have worked really hard over the past decade. I’ve worked really hard to build a career that satisfies me, but I’ve also worked really hard to become the kind of person I wanted to be when I was a kid. I try and learn and grow every day. I try and share what I think with others in an authentic, open way, and learn from them in turn. I’ve worked really hard to figure out exactly what kind of value I want to bring to the world, and set myself on a path where I do that every day. I’m hitting thirty, not feeling like I’m behind, or that I haven’t gotten far enough, but excited at where I am, and how far I have to go.