I have never been set on a career path. I was not one of those kids who was all “I’m going to be a doctor when I grow up!” and actually went through with it. I flirted with a million different options. As a kid, I thought about being a vet, a journalist, a teacher, a cat breeder*, a lawyer, a psychologist, a singer, a writer, an actor, an agony aunt, a mother. As I grew up, I culled many of these options (realising I dislike kids way too much to actually want anything to do with them) and thought of more possibilities. But before I knew it, school was telling me I needed to make a decision so I could go the university that would help me ~achieve my dreams~! I knew I didn’t want to study medicine, or engineering, or architecture. But I didn’t know what I actually wanted. Panicking, I decided to study towards a double degree, in Law and in Arts.

I discovered fairly quickly that Law was not for me. I hated the lectures, I hated the assignments, I hated the readings: I hated the very essence of it. Friends noted I didn’t seem like myself. My family tiptoed around me. I quit after the first semester, because I was an emotional mess. One paper did that to me – I couldn’t bear the thought of how the rest of the degree would affect me. I decided my mental health was more important than a qualification I wasn’t even all that interested in anyway.

So I focused on just one degree, a Bachelor of Arts. I still didn’t know what I wanted to do with it, but the Arts subjects were perfectly suited to my talents and interests. After a couple of weeks, I realised that a BA was right for me. I was happy in what I was studying.

Despite being happy in myself, I am aware that others are not. I am constantly bombarded with negative opinions of my course of study. Because only “lazy” people study Arts. That we “don’t do jack shit” and “just waste studylink money”. That we ”will never find jobs”. That “anything other than Science is a waste of time”. That BA stands for “Bugger All” because BA courses are “so much easier than all the real courses”.

There is so much negativity directed at Arts degrees. But why should anyone care about my studies? I don’t care about what anyone else studies (bar my friends, because I care about them). I am doing Arts because it fits in with my interests. I like my degree. I like my subjects. I am sorry if you do not like yours, but I don’t see why that means anything in relation to me.

If anyone tells you that your area of interest is “not as important” or “a waste of time”, then that person is a judgemental douchebag. You don’t need that sort of negativity in your life. No one has the right to criticise choices that don’t affect them. This goes for everything else, too. If you don’t want to or didn’t go to university - so what? It is your life. Ignore those people who want to diminish you. Do what makes you happy.

*I still may go for that one.

Barring The Horrors, OneRepublic is probably the most important band to come into my life. I first heard them when I was fourteen and just beginning my musical awakening. A friend played me “Someone to Save You” and I was instantly taken with the piano, then his voice, then the melody, then the utter perfection of the lyrics.

I bought their album “Dreaming Out Loud” and thought every song was incredible. After buying sheet music for their songs, I finally learned to play songs on the piano that I actually enjoyed. “Apologize” was one of the first songs I performed in front of a crowd. “Come Home” remains one of my favourite songs to this day because of its heartbreaking simplicity and beautiful lyrics:

I get lost in the beauty of everything I see
The world ain’t half as bad as they paint it to be
If all the sons, all the daughters stopped to take it in
Well, hopefully the hate subsides and love can begin
It might start now
Or maybe I’m just dreaming out loud

OneRepublic’s lyrics are what really hooked me in. I read them all, and became more and more convinced that Ryan Tedder was a lyrical genius. When “Waking Up” was released, I loved it upon first listen. If I need a motivation boost, “Marchin On” is there for me. “All This Time” is one of the few outright love songs that makes me feel genuinely blissful. Despite going through a period of not listening to them, I was still excited when “Native” came out and instantly fell in love with “Feel Again” – when I was coming home from Ed Sheeran’s concert, my friends and I sang along to it and that feeling of elation is unlike anything I have experienced before. Currently I’m loving “Counting Stars” and “Life in Colour”, and I think it’s amazing how OneRepublic managed to stay ~modern while also keeping their sound.

I love revisiting OneRepublic’s songs because they transport me back to special times: when I first started appreciating music, my first performances, feeling inspired by Ryan Tedder’s words, remembering good times and making new memories. They’ve never toured NZ but I’m hopeful with the release of “Native” they’ll finally add us to their list. Seeing OneRepublic live would be incredible. But my ultimate dream is to talk about words with Ryan Tedder. I’ve constantly admired him for the past five years and the thought of getting inside his head would make my life.

If you’ve never listened to OneRepublic, or heard anything other than their singles, I cannot recommend them enough. Their songs have so much talent, excellent musicianship, feeling and meaning behind them – I guarantee you’ll find one you love.

My response to all of these questions is crippling fear and silence. Indecision rules my life. I have changed my degree twice, my major four times, and still I’m not sure I’m doing what I want. More than once I have just not had dinner because I couldn’t decide what to have. My ineffective response of “I don’t mind!” has irritated many a friend of mine. I cannot for the life of me make decisions. It doesn’t matter how big or how small – the thought of making a decision debilitates me.

Right now, I am struggling to decide between whether to finally move out of home and enter the world of flatting, or to spend all my savings on an overseas exchange. I feel so stupid for struggling with a decision like this. Either option would be wonderful. Both would give me great experiences and both would leave me incredibly poor. But I cannot decide because whichever I choose means that I miss out on the other. And unfortunately, FOMO rules my life much more than I would like it to.

I wish I had a better way to aid decision making than writing a pros & cons list. Inevitably, this list will have an equal number of pros & cons and stress me out further. Sometimes I wonder if it would be easier if I just decided to flip a coin for every choice.

Knowing me, I wouldn’t be able to decide which option goes with heads and which goes with tails.

PS: I recently added “Bucket list” and “Favourite posts” tabs to this blog; if you check them out I promise your day will maybe be mildly more interesting.

I could totally do with some more new music so if anyone’s got any recommendations for me, hit me up!

• Have a playlist of calming songs to listen to when you’re studying/stressing out, like this one. Pretty much all the advice I give has something to do with music, but that’s because music makes literally everything better**.
• To-do lists. I have entire notebooks dedicated to my to-do lists and I live my life through those lists.
• Reward yourself. When studying, I read one section and then, for example, watch a few youtube videos. If you spend all your time purely studying, you will lose it.
• If you’ve hit the study-brick-wall, just stop. You won’t take anything in at this stage and would be better off sleeping or eating.
• Have a standing event with friends. If every week you have something to look forward to, like a lunch date or movie night, it helps keep your insanity in check. And along those lines -
• Make Mondays enjoyable. Every Monday I buy myself a coffee from the nicer, more expensive coffee shop on campus. My caffeine addiction is so strong that the thought of it really helps get me through the morning, and the caffeine itself gets me through the rest of the day. Having something to look forward to on an otherwise crappy day makes it bearable.
• Sleep is your friend. All nighters just make you miserable and incoherent. Try to limit them.
• Remember: it doesn’t matter. This may seem slightly contradictory to everything ever, but it’s true. If you do badly, if you fail, if you don’t finish – the world will continue turning. If you do well, awesome! If you don’t, learn your lesson and move on to the next thing. And if you don’t learn your lesson, that’s okay too, coz you’ll have plenty of opportunities to learn it again.

*read: middle-of-the-night hysterical sobbing at assignments that refuse to complete themselves.
**seriously, name one thing that good music does not improve.

I like wonderful things, and as a patriotic New Zealander, I like it when people from my corner of the earth do things that are wonderful. Dave Baxter is one such man. Not only is he the main man behind Avalanche City (check out this song), but he also released an ep around Christmas last year. As I watched tonight’s episode of Vampire Diaries, I noticed that the first song playing was off that ep, and it reminded me that I’d never shared it here. It’s a collection of beautiful songs and it’s also free, which is like the best thing ever. Download it at his site here and devour its perfection.

EDIT: it seems the website is no longer available but hopefully it’ll be back soon! Even though you can’t download it there anymore, I still recommend you check out this song off it because it truly is lovely.

The Script, incidentally, were amazing. I was not sold on the opener whose musical style was essentially the complete opposite of what I like. But when The Script came on, I forgot all about that and just lost myself in their songs. There’s no way I can pick a favourite moment* because they played all but one of the songs I was dying for: no “Glowing” but they did play “I’m Yours” which I wasn’t expecting so it totally made up for it. It left me with that indescribable high that only live music ignites.

But with the glory that was their concert came the realisation that I have nothing coming up. With summer truly over, the weather turning damp and bitter, the burst of musicians coming to my far corner of the world has dried up and all I have to look forward to is exams, southerlies and new seasons of questionable TV shows.

I have decided the cure is to embrace the lack of foreign musicians gracing New Zealand’s distant shores. I’ll go ice-skating when it’s freezing, drink more tea than is necessary, actually save my money instead of blowing it on overpriced shows, go to local bar gigs and fall in love with another band.

Preferably local. Or at least, constantly on tour.

*although Mark getting a note reading “I heart the bald ginger” was rather spectacular.

*a fireplace would be more picturesque, but hey, you can’t have everything.
**incidentally, I’ve never liked the word “pleasure”, but I really like alliteration so again, hey, you can’t have everything. Right now enough feels fine.

• tidy my room
• find relevant articles for my psychology assignment
• read said articles
• study for my psychology test on Thursday

Things I have actually done today:

• watched two episodes of Vampire Diaries
• lip-synced to truly awful pop punk for an hour
• let my cat in through the window 4 times
• told my cat I love him 12 times

I seem incapable of doing any work while at home. Actually, it extends to when I’m on campus too. When I was 16 and super bored in Eco class, I created a superhero called RATMAN* and so whenever I’m in a tedious lecture, I draw RATMAN and he expresses my inner monologue:

Perhaps it wouldn’t be quite so bad if I were a great artist and had legible handwriting (it says “cares” not “caves” – I am well aware that my handwriting is appalling). Unfortunately my creative talents lie in music, and it’s hardly acceptable to bust out a piano in the middle of a lecture.

In other news, I am seeing The Script live in a week an a half and I am super excited! I’m also skipping a day of uni in order to see them, so basically my life is me putting literally everything ahead of my degree.

*he hatched from a flamingo egg and is blind in one eye but has the ability to fly. He uses his powers to save those in need, while on a quest to find his real family.

(The song referenced in the title isn’t actually in this mix, but you should totally check it out – “Colors” – Barcelona)