wavyarms: (Respect Me)
From that anonymous meme...

when did you discover what you wanted to do with your life..and what were you like in high school?

In high school:

I was much less comfortable in my body. I didn't do very many physical activities, and I just didn't have the relationship with my body that I do now. I wish I had - my advice is to do sports, do dance, do something that gets your brain and your body talking to each other. This began to change in college when I took up crew, weight-lifting, and later, the martial arts.

I was more shy. I didn't think of myself as a people-person. I didn't have any faith in my social skills. I didn't know how to interact with the opposite gender very well, and as a result, heaped some small amount of abuse on their heads. (Some of them deserved it.)

In general, though I was the same somewhat zany person, I was more insecure, and had much less faith in my overall fabulousness, though I had a great amount of faith in my brain power.

Anyone who knew me then should feel free to jump in! ([livejournal.com profile] pisicutsa, I'm not sure we need the food stories again, though!)

Discovering what I wanted to do with my life...

well, I'm not sure I have, yet! I think you're asking about career, though. After college, I did a lot of random things - worked computer tech support, temped, worked at a bike shop, biked across the country, earned a black belt in taekwondo, thought about becoming a blues harmonica player, thought about teaching English in a foreign country, taught some high school physics for a couple of months. When it looked like I might be working for minimum wage at a bike shop, my parents finally intervened. My dad sat me down and told me to consider 3 questions. What are you good at? What do you enjoy doing? How can you most benefit the world around you? The intersection of these questions is the direction to go. So I sat down and considered, and the intersection of those questions for me was to go for conducting. So I did - and so far, I still think it's a job I'm well suited for. Only time will tell!

I would say, though, to someone in high school now, don't worry about what you want to do with your life ultimately. Now is the time to try things. It would have been a miserable mistake for me to go to a conservatory - only people who are unshakeable in their conviction that they will be professional musicians should do that. Ending up at a small liberal arts college where I could try lots of things was the best possible place for me. So take that class, try that job, go on that trip, play that game. Most of the people I know didn't find their path until several years down the road from college. There's nothing wrong with taking your time and trying stuff out. After all, why not?

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June 2013

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