Feeling Your Way: The Joy of Not Having a Plan

words by: Charlotte Harris design by: Constance Cua

Last summer, my best friend and I decided to hike the Anglesey Coastal Path. We didn’t do much research, we didn’t book any campsites and we didn’t do a single hour of training. Our preparation only extended as far as a trip to Sports Direct and a quick look at the top attractions for Anglesey (be warned, there are very few). She knew how to speak Welsh, and I knew how to put up the tent. We were out for an adventure.

On day 1 we found ourselves, at 5pm, sat on the beach of Beaumaris wondering what on earth we had done. The only campsite within walking distance was closed, the sun was setting and we were impossibly far from home. But, and here’s the important bit - things worked out. Over drinks in the nearest pub we talked to locals who pointed us towards a beach we could wild camp on. The next morning we looked out at the rising sun, washed out our dishes in the sea and set off for another day of adventure.

That holiday was one of the best weeks of my life. There were moments we thought we were about to be kidnapped, or to fall off a cliff, or to fail miserably at finding any decent spot to sleep before nightfall, but we felt alive. We made it sixty miles on foot in total, and I cherish the memory of every last step.

From that holiday, I came to something of an epiphany about how I wanted to live my life. I know, bit cringe, but at least it was North Wales, rather than the clichéd daddy’smoney South Asia trip, that I ‘found myself.’ I realised that sometimes, no plan is the best plan. Saying yes and seeing what happens can lead to great things, and as someone who’ll be graduating next year with an English Literature degree (a subject found time and time again in those notorious lists of least-employable and lowest-paying qualifications) I’ve found this mantra to be a particularly helpful one.

Obviously, a general plan for your life still has its value. We all know the person who decided to take a gap year three years ago and has never quite found a proper job or left their mum’s house since. It’s not that I don’t think we should plan for the future at all, but more that we should think openly and enthusiastically about it. Make your younger self proud and do those once in a life time things that you can bring up at dinner parties when your sixty and boring. There’s so much out there for young people to go out and do before settling in to the steady life of a 9 to 5. You can go abroad for a few months to work or study or volunteer, you could start a jazz band, write an awful novel, or you could even run to be the Mayor of London. There’s something so special about thrashing about in life and living through that struggle on the path to being an interesting and well rounded person, so don’t forget to write character-building silly little side quests into your five year diary.

So let’s start spending a little less time on Indeed searching for that one and only graduate job in insurance, and go out for an adventure whilst we’ve got the time. In the immortal words of Ferris Bueller: ‘Life’s pretty short, if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.’