Graduate

 I am officially a masters of science graduate.

This is something I have been working towards being able to say for the past 6 years of my life, the first time I realised sports psychology was a field I was able to study. Since that moment I had this exact path planned out. I was going to complete my BSc in Psychology and then complete a MSc in Sports Psychology. From that moment, I pushed myself academically, I worked as hard as my mental health allowed me and I was never taking no for a definite answer.

I have never been "naturally smart", I would put in 110% of what energy I had into my studies for a long time, but would never reach the highest grades, unlike my older brother who would get top marks with little to no studying. I had to work what sometimes felt like ten times harder than him just to even match his grades and it was always so tiring. In class I was always one of the smart ones but I was never a stand out. Sometimes it was hard to deal with, I was putting in all this work for what sometimes felt like nothing, but when I finally found what I wanted to do none of that mattered to me anymore. I knew the grades I had to get to get to each step, and through many mental health difficulties where I felt like I couldn't go on, I somehow kept going and kept going. I can't count the amount of times I nearly gave up. And maybe for a moment I should have. I probably should have taken a break, allow myself to recover from so many education burnouts and so many mental health downfalls. 

But I didn't.

 And I'm not going to say that this moment was worth it, because in truth this is not the moment I expected it to be. I expected to be excited looking for PHD's or thinking about training to become a chartered sports psychology. I expected to have left my job and be persueing what I love. But I'm not. I'm still at my part time supermarket job, no idea what I want to do. Scrolling on job sites for hours on end at 5am and making myself anxious that I will never find something that I love the sound of. Any time I do I'm not qualified. It makes me wonder what the point of this was. I pushed myself so hard in my MSc because in truth, I didn't feel like I belonged there. I was surrounded by so many hard working, intelligent people and I was barely afloat. I was working night shift two nights a week whilst trying to juggle the hardest academic challenge I have ever experienced. And then it became juggling these whilst in the middle of a global pandemic. It became somehow even harder, I was doing everything alone with little guidance on alot from my lecturers, so many missed emails or key information from lecturers about essays because I was working so much on a different schedule to everyone. It became doing a research project all alone with little guidance, and it not coming out as well as I had dreamed. 

But I did it.

I made it.

It may have not been the experience I had hoped, but I made it.

I was doing workshops, case studies, endless presentations, so many interactive things that I could never have done a few years ago. I was writing essays I was genuinely proud of when I handed them in and even though it took a few to get into the swing, I was getting good marks. I learnt so much this year and as cliche as it sounds I learnt alot about myself. Not only that, but I met some amazing and hugely intelligent people, both my coursemates and lecturers. The year flew by, and I finished an academically challenging year.

I officially have graduated with merit in my MSc in Applied Sports Psychology.