The Fig Tree Dilemma

The Fig Tree Dilemma

By Ollie

I’m in my 20s, I work in the city, and I live at home. After graduating from uni last year, with my plans shaken up, I felt clueless. You’re supposed to feel empowered when you finish a degree. Like all those years had amounted to something and you could step into the real world guns blazing. But no one warns you about the other side—the rejections, the constant comparisons to friends, the quiet uncertainty about whether you’re enough.

Now I’ve found a job I like, which gives me purpose and structure. But sometimes I still wonder if I’m missing that “something.” I’ve searched for it in friends, relationships, and a social life. They come and go, like glimpses into alternate lives I could’ve had, but never last.

The fig tree poem by Sylvia Plath often comes to mind. Each branch is a different possibility—a writer, an artist, a husband. The longer you wait, the more figs fall out of reach. Yet at the same time, being this age feels like having endless time. Time to mess up, to drift, to take the scenic route. Caught between waiting for life to start and worrying it’s slipping away.

After uni, I imagined a “complete” version of myself. knowledgeable, thriving friendships, maybe even a relationship. Today, I do feel more capable and more myself—but not quite “there.” There’s still an itch I can’t scratch.

I’m happy for my friends when they achieve their goals, but there’s always a flicker of envy. A whisper: when will it be my turn? And yet I know they’re not as sorted as they seem—it just looks that way from the outside.

Purpose, I’ve realised, takes different forms. It doesn’t have to be one big thing. I’m single, but I have freedom. I love painting, reading, travelling, and spending time with friends. Those things matter too.

Time, though, is complicated. Some days it stretches endlessly—like when I wasn't working, with whole days to fill, feeling like adulthood was far away. Other days it feels like it’s running out, especially when I see people buying houses, moving away, or getting engaged while I’m still at home.

And living at home is its own metaphor. During the week I’m commuting to the city, working, then back home for tea at six, walking the dog, collapsing on the sofa. At weekends I become “myself” again—out with friends, visiting people. Stuck between adulthood and teenager. It’s comforting, but also limiting. Security, but also a reminder I’m not fully independent.

If you’re younger than me and reading this, here’s what I’d say: no one ever fully knows what they’re doing. But with every year, you do grow into yourself. Life isn’t about following a straight path—it’s about making your own. You’ll always feel torn between wanting to be older or younger, further ahead or back where you were. But the truth is, you’re already moving forward. Progress is progress, however it looks.

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