Time really seems to pass a lot quicker the older I get. I’ve been meaning to push an update, but with everything that’s been going on over the last few weeks, even my private journal hasn’t been seeing much action.
Last month’s points of distresses ended up being a massive time-sink for me. In the end, I followed through with attending San Diego State University and accepting the federal student loan being offered, finally entering the world of student loan debt after having successfully evaded it all this time. When it came to registering for classes, I enrolled in 16 units across 6 different courses. Using the university’s degree audit feature, I noted that my 69 units of transfer credits had me starting the equivalent of my third year at 58% completion towards my Bachelor’s and leaving only 51 required for completion—meaning that at a full-time clip of at least 15 units per semester and some infill during the summer/winter intersessions, I could potentially be done and ready to graduate with a Bachelor’s degree at the end of the Spring 2026 semester.
Getting used to having an academic workload again was a bittersweet transition, glad to have the opportunity to keep advancing my studies while at the same time resentful that my celebratory freedom from homework, exams, and that awful Canvas platform had to end up being so short-lived. It was a very “back in the car” a la *Jurassic Park* feeling.
It also didn’t help that the first few days of the semester were lost towards preparation for my evidentiary hearing in my Civil Harassment Restraining Order case. That didn’t play out as it should have, with the letter and spirit of the law upheld. Instead, I found myself at the receiving end of even more judicial misconduct and failure to uphold the law. I have follow up actions planned, some of which I’ll be forced to move on fairly soon, but for the moment am dedicating all my care and focus to my studies first. I have a lot of vested interest—personal, financial, and opportunistic—in at least maintaining if not elevating my cumulative GPA and finishing my Bachelor’s degree with a high academic standing.
Beneath all of these short and long term goals is the pressure to self-actualize, and the anxiety of having a timeframe imposed on it. If all goes according to plan and I do complete my Bachelor’s in under two years, I’m under no illusion that it’s going to be a golden ticket to a prosperous happily ever after; even professionals with graduate degrees are having difficulty finding employment. And with everything going on socially and politically, I don’t even have the assurance that the student loans that afforded me this semester will still be around in the ones to follow. All that in mind, I have it in my head that it’s not finishing the degree that’s incumbent upon me, but also optimizing myself for life afterwards.
In these short two years I’m going to have at SDSU, I’m going to want to make the most of the resources available, from simple things like making connections with faculty/students to the more involved effort of venturing on campus to attend networking and career-focused events. Both of these simple actions, like so many other personal plans and projects, require moving past my hermetic state of being. To bring this long era in my life of keeping a reserved low profile and focusing solely on the required work in front of me to its end. To start assembling an online presence, including fleshing out this blog. To start building a real professional network. To polish my personal elevator pitch and overall image.
Feels like a daunting additional set of things to do, given how much my academic workload is taking up the vast majority of my time and I’m admittedly struggling to keep pace with. But it also feels like I’m still only starting, like there’s still so much more I can get out myself. The closer I get to that ideal personal state, the easier and more manageable things should start to feel, until I’m able to once again live in a confident state of flow I remember having in adolescence.