Film, Fashion & the Future (is it forever?)

I'm going to rant a little.

I've often wondered what my calling is. For a long time I thought it was science. I used to walk around my primary school with a printed out copy of the periodic table and memorise it hahah. Then when I started high school I figured out science isn't what I thought it was. My idea of it was the twirly glass tubes and beakers with fun coloured liquids that you see on TV or in cartoons. Which, of course, is not the reality of science.

So where was I to go from there? I had always enjoyed writing, and in year 8 I began to really consider it a career path. I was writing in my head all the time. Elaborate stories and characters and worlds, but it was intensely hard to get it onto paper -- or more realistically to modern life -- onto a google doc page. I thought books were for me, until the stories became too big to contain into books and I decided I needed something that could be seen like film & TV.

Which leads me to where I am now.

I won't get into the gritty details, but between 2020-2023 was incredibly rough for me, so much so that I was forced to make a choice between prioritising my mental health or graduating. I thought to myself, "Well, what's the use of a high school certificate if you're not alive to use it?" and left school.

It didn't leave without a plan of course. I lined up a TAFE course for myself in screen and media (fancy wording for film) and I finished that same course a month ago~! And I don't regret it one bit! It was incredible to finally be taught in the areas I'm actually interested in, and even more incredible to come up with a short film idea and make said short film in the same year.

But as the course finished up I found myself once again wondering what my calling is. I've signed up for the next course in the same area which I'm due to start in August, but I feel as though I'm being pulled in different directions creatively. 

For one, I love fashion design. I think about it all the time. My drawing skills are slowly but surely catching up to my brain which is lovely because now I'm able to put those thoughts onto paper (after a few hours of erasing and refining). However, I feel as though my technical skills are waaaay behind; I cant yet make the things I imagine and design. I'd love to do a TAFE course on fashion! Buuuut I've already signed up for the film course :')

I guess my main issue is; Will what I choose now be what I'm stuck in forever?

Granted, I'm only 17. I keep getting told how young I am, that there's so much ahead of me and I don't need to have it all sorted out now, but I want to! I wish I had one single goal in mind of what I want of myself for the future.

Which makes me wonder, does anyone really know?

Anyways, I'll be starting that next film course in a few weeks and we'll see what happens next. I hope I figure it out soon, but I know that's probably unlikely. I'm just glad I didn't give up last year, no matter where I end up, it'll be better than where I was, which is all a girl can ask for.

O.Lovelle <3