Hello and welcome to Story time. I am working on a story about choices and life decisions and I want to share these story and my experiences with you. Every now and then I am going to upload a new chapter....I know I talk to much again, lets get this started!

About choices and life decisions

Inspired by uncle Bill, thanks for your help!

Decision over decision

What shirt do I want to wear? What do I want for dinner? Which car do I want to buy? What haircut do I want? Where do I want to live? Do I want kids and if yes, when?

Life is full of decisions. I think our whole life is one big decision. A wise man once told me, that every single decision, everything that happens has impact on our lives, in a good or a bad way.

What do I want to study? Where do I want to go in my life? Good question isn’t it?

That’s where I stand right now. That’s the question I have to ask myself every single day. Imagine most of your friends are going to university already….but what about you? Nothing. Literally nothing. I mean don’t get me wrong at first that feels sooo good. All your friends have to work or get up early to go to school and you can just wake up whenever you want, do whatever you want. Doesn’t matter. Watching Netflix, reading, eating, sleeping. But after a few weeks you recognize that that’s not the way, that you can’t go on like that, that you have to do something.

Let me picture it:

One day you go in your car, you don’t know where to go, you only have an idea where to go, but if you can make it there…nobody knows, you just start driving. After a while there is a red light. Of course, you stop. I mean it’s a red light, right? You wait and you wait but the red light stays, it just won’t turn green. That’s exactly how I feel right now. I stand at the red light and it won’t turn green, I can’t go on.

I was never good at making decisions. Where do you want to go for Dinner? I don’t care, you decide. Where do you want to go for vacation? I don’t care you decide. Even if I have to make a decision that affects me, I ask people to help me make this decision. I know that that’s not how it’s supposed to be but I am just so bad at it. The thing is I am afraid to make the wrong decisions. I don’t want to think one day: What would have happened if…?

As a kid life is easy. You come to this world and what do you do? Cry, poop, eat, sleep, repeat. Then you grow older, you go to Kindergarten, meet friends, learn how to speak. Primary school: You learn how to write, how to spell, how to add numbers together. Highschool: You learn stuff you’ll never need again! But the thing is, you know what to do. You wake up every day, you have breakfast, go to school, meet your friends, come home, do your homework and then you have free time! I mean don’t get me wrong you have to study for tests every now and then but in general it’s an easy life. Now after high school or even before, you have to think about what you want to do after graduating high school.

For me, easy decision. Travel! I went with some friends to Australia and New Zealand after high school. Before that I worked, so I could afford that trip. That trip was worth all that money and I can only recommend doing a cap year after Highschool, so you have the chance to experience new things, other cultures, how to survive without your parents. After half a year, I went back to Germany.  But what doing after that?

I don’t know. I am not ready to move out, to plan my life, to study and decide what I want to do for the rest of my life!!! I mean when I was in grade nine, teachers started to ask us what we want to do and I always wondered why do I have to think about that now? Graduation is so far away, I have so much time….No you stupid young me, you don’t have time!!! Time flies. You study something, you work, you are getting old and then you die! You don’t have time. I am a bit drastic here but it is, how it is.

Now back to the beginning. Decisions, my biggest enemy! But you know what, a wise man once told me (Yes the same wise man I talked about in the beginning) the worst decision you can make, is to make no decision at all! Ok got it but what happens if I make a wrong decision? - There are no wrong decisions. Of course, there are!!!! What if I decide not to go for my dream and study something safe? There will come the day I regret it and I don’t want to regret my decisions because I can’t turn back time. I only have one life to live and I want to make the best out of it.

I have to calm down…because another thing I learned from the wise man is, that it doesn’t matter what you study or what job you do at first, most people study something and do something totally different in the End. You always have the chance to change your job because with years comes experience and wisdom, so you learn different things you can use for different jobs. Some people are 40 and go back to school because they want to do something different.

Think about it, you study, you get a degree, you go in your first job and after that, nobody cares about your degree anymore. After a few years of working, people only care about what jobs you did before and how good you were at those jobs, so don’t stress out!

The five-year plan

Have you ever heard about the five-year plan? No? you should! Ok let me explain it to you…no let me tell you a story: I graduated Highschool with 17. After that I went to Australia and New Zealand, because I didn’t want to go to university yet. Lucky me, we have friends in the USA.

Let me introduce you to uncle Bill, the wise man (LOL). He is my dads colleague and one of his best friends, so he came over to Germany a couple times. I know him since I am five years old!! Can you imagine? Technically I know him my entire life! That’s why he invited me

over a couple times but all these years I was still in school, so I couldn’t go because you don’t

want to fly 10 hours, pay half a fortune and stay only 1 or 2 weeks. After Australia and before University I thought it’s the perfect time to come over. I decided to go there for three and a half months. The plan was to do an internship at the company my dad and him are

working. As we all know, nothing goes as planned: Visa issues. Result: I have an observation visa. Means that I can just observe and shadow but I can’t work and they can’t pay me but anyway, I wanted to go! Let me tell you a secret: I actually write this story while sitting at the company office in the USA. I am in the middle of my trip and I learned a lot so far. During my trip, I have to write applications and I have to think about what I want to do. That’s why I have several interviews with people from different departments to learn more about all the different jobs in a company. And of course uncle Bill and I talk. On our way to work, lunch time, at home. I told him that I am not sure what to do. So we had “the talk”. Sounds more intimidating than it really is. It was a talk about the five-year plan.

“Close your eyes. Imagine we are five years from now. You are 24 years old. Where do you live? Do you have a boyfriend? Are you still at school? What job do you working at? Kids? Are you happy?” I answered all his questions. I answered just to give an answer I wasn’t

really serious about it. But now I know, I should be serious about it. He told me that even companies have a five or even ten-year plan. You need to have a plan, a direction where you want to go.

For example, when you go on vacation, you know where you want to go but sometimes you can’t stay on one route because there is an accident or bad traffic, so you have to go a different way but the destination is still the same. Do you understand what I try to say? Maybe you have a goal and you have a way how to get there but sometimes you have to adjust the plan or even the goal. Sometimes you get a better opportunity, so use it!! Take every chance you get in life!

If one door closes another door opens.

I bet you have heard that sentence more than once in your life. I mean, if one door closes, another door opens or the same door opens again, I mean that is what doors do right, they open and then they close again.

The question is, what is behind those doors? Why do I want to close one door and open another one? Maybe because I hope that there is something better behind the new door, maybe a new opportunity.

Sometimes you choose to close a door, but sometimes you don’t and other people close that door for you, even if you don’t want that door to close. After that a new door opens, maybe you don’t choose that door, you’re not sure about what’s behind there.

Could be, that your door is still open but another door opens too. Now its your decision if you want to close your old door and explore the new, maybe the better one. If you never try you will never know. The wise man told me to be flexible about that. That is what you always need in your life: flexibility! Ok I know I talked a lot about doors, know you are confused. You should be. I used the door to show you how life is. Every decision you make has an impact on your life. Every decision you make could change your life completely. Let me give you another example, it’s a German metaphor and I am not sure if I can translate it that way but I’ll give it a try. Imagine you are on a sailing boat. It would be perfect if the wind would come from behind the boat all the time, right? But nature does not do what we want. Sometimes, its calm outside and you can’t use the wind to go straight forward, so you need to be patient wait for the wind to come back. There are times on a sailing boat where you can’t go straight, because the wind comes from different sides, so you have to drive your way around to reach the destination even if it takes you longer. Be flexible.

I talked a lot about life and decisions, open and close doors and being on a sailing boat.

I don’t want to bore you, that’s why I want to tell you a story. A story from a little girl, from a little town with a big dream.