Since we last spoke, dear readers, I have considered approximately 37 new life paths and determined that 16.8 of them are impractical and three of them are fucking absurd.
It’s like my brain has started speed-dating every possible future. I’m not lost, exactly. I’m auditioning identities at a speed that feels unsafe for everyone involved. This audition process is no walk in the park, my friends. It is more like a full sprint while herding cats, and those purritos are nimble.
You know what else is nimble? The lesbian urge to process a major life change by turning your house into a live-action “Sims” game. I moved my couch and called it healing. I sat down to update my LinkedIn and somehow ended up with an assortment of artificial ferns and monsteras. Life threw me lemons, so obviously I relocated a floor lamp.
This is not about unemployment. I already wrote that one. This is about what happens after the initial shock wears off and your brain starts trying to build a bridge out of personality traits, half-formed ideas and things you added to an Amazon cart at 12:43 a.m.
I am currently in my “Maybe I could do that” era.
Maybe I could get back on stage more often. Maybe I could host events full-time. Maybe I could give the podcast the proper rollout it deserves, which is my subtle and legally binding way of saying: yes, something is coming soon.
Maybe I could become the kind of person who owns matching storage bins. Maybe I could become an avocational botanist, which sounds better than “gal who bought fake plants and assigned them emotional responsibilities.”
Now that my NCA is RIP, the next phase feels less like a blank page and more like a Cheesecake Factory menu.
The gate is open. Grant it, not with low-lying fog and orchestral music, but still: open.
So, naturally I have decided to become every possible version of myself at once: podcaster, stand-up comic, interior designer, possible academic, home improvement lesbian, and woman who is banking on the idea that perfectly styling a bookshelf will fix her entire life.
And honestly? Sometimes it does. Not the entire life part. But for a moment, it helps.
When you cannot control the future, there is something deeply satisfying about controlling the vibe. I may not know what the next chapter looks like, but I can decide this corner needs warmer lighting and a succulent with “quiet confidence.” I can’t predict where my career is headed, but I can tell you with certainty that the couch was facing the wrong direction. This is either personal growth or a cry for help with better feng shui.
There is a particular danger in being semi-competent at many things. You are not an expert, but you are also not bad enough to stop. You have just enough ability to become a problem. You watch one tutorial and suddenly you are standing in the middle of your living room whispering, “I could build that.”
That sentence has ruined lives. Or at least weekends.
For creative people, this era is especially dangerous because almost everything feels like a sign. You have one good conversation and think, “Maybe I should start a media company.” Someone laughs at a joke and suddenly you’re emotionally pricing out a stand-up special. You move one piece of furniture and start referring to “the flow of the room” like you have ever once respected spatial planning.
This is where the queer part sneaks in, but not in an after-school-special way. Many queer people know what it is to revise the story you were handed. At some point, a lot of us had to look at the default settings and say,
“Actually, no thank you. I’ll be modifying this.” So maybe it makes sense that when life changes shape, my instinct is not only to panic. It is also to rearrange.
The physical space becomes a rough draft for the internal one.
A new lamp here. A new idea there. A podcast setup in one corner. A notebook full of jokes on the coffee table. A calendar with events, interviews, half-plans and question marks. A home that looks slightly different every time my girlfriend comes back from running an errand.
But beneath the comedy of it all, there is something I am trying to remember: trying things is not failure. Testing change is not failure. Not knowing which version of yourself is permanent yet is not failure.
It is a special kind of mindfuckery, but it is not failure.
We put so much pressure on the next chapter to arrive fully formed. We want the title, the aesthetic, the income stream, the announcement post and the clear lesson we can casually mention later like we were totally chill the whole time.
But maybe the next chapter starts messier than that. Maybe it starts with 23 tabs open, a shifted nightstand and a dash of faith that everything would be figured out if only the lighting were better.
I am not in a rut. I am in development. For now, the adjustments are part of the survival map. Not perfect. Not finished. But proof that I am still making choices.
And if I cannot control the future, I can at least control where the lamp goes.
Sabrina Ambra is a longtime media personality, a seasoned comedian, live event host, and mildly unhinged, but in a cute way.
Sign up for the Watermark Out News eNewsletter and follow us for more:
BlueSky | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn | TikTok | Threads | YouTube
