Week 6, The Adolescent

Mark Twain once said:
 "The two most important days of your life are the day you are born, and the day you find out WHY".

One of the things that stuck with me this week was the ways in which an adolescent comes to identify what possible careers they are interested in, and begins to move toward those goals. I know that in my own experience, at least, that this process begins early and continually gets reformed as the adolescent both figures out their own skills and explores possible career paths. I know that my own path towards becoming a nurse began with first wanting to be an astronaut (at age 5), a veterinarian (at age 10), a teacher (at age 15), a mental health counselor (at age 20), and now a nurse, as I'm turning 25 this week. Sometimes I still feel stuck somewhere between specification and implementation, trying to best prepare myself for a career that will be both fitting to my personality and skills, as well as emotionally fulfilling to sustain me to retirement. This journey to find what I'm supposed to do feels like it has encompassed my entire life, and I know for certain that I wouldn't be seeking this career that I am so excited for, without those other steps along the way. Although the text discusses these topics within the framework of the adolescent mind, I feel that this career discovery journey continues well into adulthood, if not all of adulthood, as so many return to school later in life to pursue different career aspirations. I think of myself at age 18, and I know that there was no way that I knew myself well enough to say what it is that I wanted to do for the rest of my life. Just my ramblings, but a perfect topic to highlight some important things in my life right now.