We all belong here.

I was very lucky to have received an offer for work after uni, but it was a really stressful transition.

I only had a buffer period of around a month from graduation, to starting my first proper full-time job. For the first amount of time, I was struggling to realise that I didn’t have any assignments due, and found myself with a but more freedom! But as time went by, my job became busier as I settled in.

Now, finding free time when I’m not tired is tough, so I spend my weekends doing things I enjoy! Like hanging out with my uni or school buddies or going out to gigs. "

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Plath said“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.”

And maybe its melodramatic but, how can I not feel like that.
I live fortunate enough attend university and shape my future the way I want. There is so much optimism placed on the ‘young’. But the feeling of all those options, all those figs, its crushing.
Heavier than any other responsibility.
My life.
When I graduate what jobs will I choose to do? Where will my life go?
I was promised all these opportunities but why does everyone else’s seem so much more real?
Like their life is headed exactly where they planned and I’m just trying to catch up.
When I look out on my fig tree, I see it all within sight, but I’m not grounded enough within my life to reach and grab it all. First, I had to learn a new city, then a series of new homes. If my mental energy is taken up with constantly looking at where my feet are standing, when will I look up at my tree again.

Hi, I'm Jackie I'm 18 from Vic. This is my digital artwork.

One of the most challenging transitions I have experienced has been adjusting to life with a chronic illness. I felt incredibly isolated from others due to not being able to engage in the outside world in the same way that I used to. The grief I was experiencing caused me to isolate myself further, rather than reach out to others. I didn’t know how to navigate the feelings of loneliness that came with this – it was tempting to suppress them, rather than feel them. I started using music to confront them – I found comfort in connecting to an artist expressing similar feelings to mine. A song that I loved, and love to this day, is ‘It’s Okay to Cry’ by SOPHIE.

The first initial reaction I wanted from this was the visual impact of seeing the word alone highlighted, on its own, in the middle of the sea of words; to represent the same real world feeling of being surrounded by people but still feeling alone. And then reading it in it's entirety gives you an insight into my experience at uni. I guess it did end up being a bit poetry-like but that was not the intention, just sort of happened as I was writing.