At some point, I think I was lost.

A flashback to early 2000s shows a couple of kids surrounding another dull, silent, little girl as she draws on the back pages of a Strawberry Shortcake-covered notebook. She doesn't speak throughout that short period - her focus has been solely drawn toward what she is doodling: Son Goku, from the hit anime series, Dragon Ball. Beside her is a boy, also drawing the same thing. It is a competition. Who will draw Son Goku the best?

Majority of their classmates vote for the little girl as soon as the pair finishes. Two or three vouch for the little boy. Then and there, it is settled. The little girl is the best artist in their class. The boy? He comes a close second.

Fast-forward to a few years and the dull, silent, little girl is flourishing. She has gained many friends, is pretty popular, and does consistently well in her academics. She still draws. In her grade, she is considered one of the best artists. Many surmise she will be a great architect. Others insist she should at least go try and become a professional artist - ones who paint and make a living out of it, and do exhibitions in both high-end and hole-in-the-wall galleries and museums.

The little girl from the early 2000s is suddenly thrown into becoming a teenage girl in the late 2000s who many people think is an interesting subject to an age-old topic: who will she become in ten years? Will she be a well-known artist? Her teachers believe she will become a wonderful engineer. Some classmates tell her she will do teaching well. Others say she would make a great something.

Something. What is that?

No one bothers to ask her, "What do you want to be in the future?" Even if they do ask, the girl won't know the answer. She has been fed too much she will become assumptions in the past few years that the great expectations on her have left her in shambles. She will settle with answering what people expect of her... which depends. If you believe she'll become an artist, she will answer that she wants to become one. If you tell her she will do well as an engineer, she will tell you that she wants to become an engineer.

And when she asks "What do I want to be?" If she tries hard enough, even ten years into the future - the present - the answer will always come back to "I want to do many things."

She's been made to believe that she can do many things when in fact, she can't. She will come off as ordinary, never extraordinary. Average, maybe dangling between average and below average. Eventually, she realizes that she is lost, but she is already too far in, her future feels bleak.

It is like riding a boat in a fogged morning, unable to see the direction she is steering herself to. The vision is bleary, but her feet are still touching the ground and the only way she knows to move forward is exactly that: just move forward.

And so she tries. And if she fails again, there's no other way around it. She'll try again... until she finds that purpose. That direction.

The goal.