My mother gave me some sound advice when I was a young teen-ager desperately struggling to decide how to spend the rest of my life.
She said something to this effect:
Find something that you absolutely adore doing. It doesn’t matter if it is riding a bicycle, playing music, or staring at the wall. Somewhere, there is a career that revolves around this. It will probably require dedication, lots of schooling, and plenty of motivation and hard work on your part, but it will pay off. If you get into a career field that you are madly in love with, something that you enjoy doing no matter what else is happening around you, then you will wake up on Mondays and WANT to go to work instead of hitting the alarm clock and swearing like you do with the job you’ve got now.’’
As it turns out, my mother was completely right. I have discovered a career field that I KNOW I will be highly successful in - writing. I don’t know exactly what I want to write, or who I wish to write for, but I am certain that I will enjoy it as much as I enjoy freelancing, writing at my own whim, now. In fact, I bet I could break into the freelance career stream - making money by writing whatever I darned well please!
Whatever the case, my mother’s advice could very well apply to you too! Find something you love doing and investigate its potential for a career field: If you’re fortunate and dedicated, you could very well land your dream job so that, when Monday morning rolls around, you open your eyes and say, ’’I get to go to work today!’’ instead of, ’’Is it Monday already?’’
Sometimes we’re not that lucky, of course, and have to settle for a different career field. However, almost every single one of us are multi-faceted: We possess multiple interests and preferences, and are talented in more than one area. For example, my younger brother is very good at doing tricks on his bicycle, pitching a baseball, and sketching artwork. He is also very interested in meteorology and science in general. He has several career options open to him already, and he is only sixteen! This is true for many of us: We are obsessed with more than one thing, so finding a career field that appeals to us should not be that big of a problem.
My final word of advice is this:
Don’t be afraid to try new things. Whether you’re fifteen or five hundred years old, there is something out there that you have not tried before. Take a few risks, make a few test runs, and explore the world around you! You might be surprised at the new and fascinating things you discover about it - as well as yourself.