Motivation and Anxiety, the Two Sides of the Unknown
The potentials of unknown places are not only made up of opportunities, fortune, and a better life, but also danger, anxiety, and loneliness.
BY: JINGSHU HELEN YAO
“Why did you come here?” is the question that I often ask myself. I imagine that the same question hoars in the mind of many international students and new immigrants. Some started out as temporary visitors but wish to call it home, like me. Some lived here for over 20 years but still consider themselves outsiders.
Some may say they came for education or employment opportunities, some may say they came for their children, or more generally, for a better future. Whatever their answer is, the ultimate reason is similar. We came looking for a brand new place where nothing is certain, and because of the uncertainty, the unknown has the potential to be better than what we had before. That potential gave us hope and the courage to write out our future on unknown pages.
I can’t speak for others, but I came to another country for the potential of the unknown.
I like to explore and see things that I’ve never seen before, which was why I spent a lot of time walking through neighbourhoods in Scarborough by myself. It might not be wise from other people’s perspective, since I was a newcomer who traveled alone, an 18-year-old girl neither tall nor strong and those days were the hottest during the summer. Yet I was amazed by everything, the suburb neighbourhoods with townhouses that are so diverse in their style but blend in so well as a whole, the quiet street with cars or buses passing by occasionally, the children playing on the front porch of the house while their parents mow the lawn.
Illustration of anxiety/Photo courtesy of Help Guide
A large part of my exploration of Scarborough was romanticized. I had no idea that passengers were supposed to press the stop button in order to get off the bus. The first time I took the 38 alone, it drove several stops past my destination until someone else got off. Wherever I went I kept checking Google Maps on my phone because the roads and transportation in Toronto were a maze to me. I got nervous every time I needed to take the train because there’s no signal under the tunnel and I was so scared of getting lost.
The problems with language was a whole other story by itself. As a writer, being able to express myself through words is what I took for granted. I convinced myself that there will be no differences even if I switch to a different language, but that’s not always true. In class and daily life, I trip over words I don’t recognize, feelings I can’t express through English. I fear those moments because they make me appear slow and feel inferior in an English speaking environment.
Illustration of loneliness/Photo courtesy of TMF
The potentials of unknown places are not only made up of opportunities, fortune, and a better life, but also danger, anxiety, and loneliness.
The negative side of the unknown and uncertainty could strike a newcomer hard. Different food, weather, language, far away from loved ones and their support, any of these factors can make the life of newcomers difficult. I wasn’t overwhelmed by those feelings initially because the excitement and the sense of adventure covered them up. I was in a state where I believed that the unknown path could lead to somewhere brighter, and I occupied myself with tasks to further explore the unknown.
Right when I thought I had passed the most vulnerable time as a newcomer in a foreign country, it hit me hard after three years of being abroad and I am suddenly in the middle of feelings of fear and anxiety.
Similar to my international experience, I copped with the pandemic just fine at the beginning. Lucky for me, I had almost finished my undergraduate degree when quarantine first started. Planning on doing a master's degree, I didn’t even have the pressure of finding a job like many of my fellow graduates. The summer was the most laid back I had ever been and the only feeling I had to deal with was boredom. I picked up some new hobbies such as knitting and gardening, improved my cooking and baking skills, and explored the beautiful nature in suburb Toronto. It felt like a vacation.
However, the relaxing summer did not prepare me for online classes in my new degree. At the beginning of my master’s degree, I faced a new environment, a new program, new courses, and new ways of teaching. As much as I like to explore the unknown, too much uncertainty became too overwhelming and gave me anxiety that I hadn't experienced in a long time. It wasn’t the uncertainty of the outside world but my perception of the unknown that mattered the most. I started to believe that the potential of the unknown can’t lead me anywhere and I need a stable job and income in order to make a life in Canada.
Feeling related to anxiety /Photo courtesy of Harvard Medical School
Slowly, I found myself unable to focus and worrying more than necessary about events that have not yet happened. I am constantly concerned that I am in the wrong program and that it will lead me nowhere in life; I am worried that I won’t be able to find a job after graduation thus losing the qualifications to stay in Canada. I feel that I am not very prepared for living as an adult despite having lived alone for the past 4 years and fear that I am not capable of making decisions by myself.
I am constantly surprised by those who I turn to for help and guidance, who always end the conversation with “It’s your choice, after all.” It seems that they consider me as someone who should take up full responsibility for myself but I doubt that I will ever live up to their expectations.
With those thoughts in mind, I find it hard to fall asleep at night and equally hard to wake up and face a new day of work. The same feeling is reflected in my writing. I often feel stuck with my words and find it hard to enter the creative flow while writing. I experience events worth writing about daily, yet lack the motivation to put them into words.
At the same time, I keep on imagining an alternative reality where everything has gone as planned: there was no quarantine, I got into the program that I always wanted, my parents visited me at my graduation, and I transitioned successfully into graduate study. I would indulge myself in those imaginations only to wake up a few moments later and laugh at my unrealistic thoughts.
I had problems writing this article too. I had planned to write something cool and exciting, to focus on the unlimited possibility of the unknown. But I wrote and rewrote several times while the deadline approached day by day. Instead, I started to describe my own experience with uncertainty and the unknown future.
The unknown affects us by giving us both hope and fear. We struggle to focus on the hopeful part and try to be motivated to explore the unknown, but at times the fear grows too strong and we are more anxious than hopeful, yet I know the motivation is still there, and it needs patience to help pull us through our lowest points.
