What star sign are you?

It’s seven-thirty on a Sunday evening, I am already in my pyjamas, and my dinner has accidentally turned into a bag of unsalted mixed nuts and raisins. As I mush a raisin into one of the elusive almonds of the packet, I google Dolly Alderton’s birthday. Much like the hoards of many other millennial women, a great deal of Dolly’s musings and experiences of love and life ring achingly true. It suddenly dawned on me, as I was trying to find an ounce of evidence to confirm some further element of similarity between her and I, my field of choice naturally being astrology, I have taken procrastination to a whole new level. What is it that I would rather be doing, I thought myself, how should I be better spending my time rather than finding out if I share the same star sign with a complete stranger. My answer is writing. This is something that I have so freely declared to anyone that asks what it is that I want to do in life. In reality, the most notable writing I have partaken in thus far is some charming and friendly email correspondence regarding dietary requirements and overdue invoice payments.

Over the years, I have both asked for and being given a plethora of advice on my non existent writing career. My dissertation leader at university told me to never stop writing, a man I once dated directed me towards Kurt Vonnegut theory on the Shapes of Stories, another urged me to push through the fear and just simply start, having put off his own solo music for years. What I realise, however, is that this hesitation to write mirrors how I seem to lead the a lot of my life - I fear that I am living, or as the case may be, not living, in a great haze of procrastination.

Let me pan this melodramatic statement out a bit. Whether it be my ability to be completely consumed by the men that I find myself romantically engaged with, or the very fact that I dutifully research, theorise and ponder over all sorts of facets and philosophies of life, I somehow find myself dodging the very act of being present. I often find it easier to hide behind the notion of who I want to be, to daydream and glamorise about a life that I would like to lead, yet not actually put it into practice. The reasoning behind this sabotage of growth is tenfold - it could be driven by a fear of rejection and failure, the never ending questioning of what ifs and am I good enough. The quartet of self pity could play on, and whether any of this resonates with you or not, I feel as if we could all benefit from challenging and looking beyond our distractions. The likes of Netflix and social media act as a great barrier to this, for instance, and as much as taking a break from the extremities of life by plowing through a whole box set in a day can be cathartic and necessary, it’s knowing the difference between this and not being able to truly sit with yourself; knowing whether you have put X, Y and Z to the forefront of your life as a means to block pain or prolong feeling comfortable with who you are.

And so, as I consciously try to be present and exist beyond the white noise of men, podcasts and feminist texts, I can safely impart the knowledge that you have all been dying to hear - Dolly and I do not share the same star sign, I am a Cancerian, and she is a Virgo.