Crossroads

I did a lot of thinking about things today. Which is to say, I procrastinated doing some things that needed to be done, but I still did a lot of thinking.

I have a job. It's really just a job. I'm not really happy, but it is flexible and it did get me closer to my family, which was one of my goals. I'm on the verge of having two Master's degrees, which I thought a lot about today. I'm scared that they may be of no use to me whatsoever - especially the second one. My friend in Maryland sent me a link today for job searches for Instructional Design (my second degree), but I'm not optimistic right now.

I did a lot of thinking about what I really want to do with my life. Sure, teaching is important. But, I never really thought about it when I was in college and how much I might want to do something different. I've enjoyed teaching for a number of years, but it has it's downside. I'm not unrealistic or naiive enough to think that another job would be perfect without problems - all jobs have problems. The difference is: are they problems that you can live with, or things that drive you nuts? Right now, some aspects of teaching drive me nuts.

So, back to what I want to do with my life. I have something I want to try, which I'm too scared to put down here. Why? Probably in case I fail. The good news is: I won't have to leave my current job to do it, and my current job will give me flexibility to do it. I will have to wait a few weeks until I can really pursue it - I have one more class to finish and it will be done in two weeks, and I also need my real computer (not the laptop - which belongs to my company) to start this little "project".

Surprisingly, this was something that I thought about doing a very long time ago, when I was maybe 10 or 11 years old - possibly even younger. Now that I think about it, I was younger. I didn't really think about teaching as a career until I was in 8th grade - so I would have been 13 when I thought about that. So, maybe what I wanted to do at a younger age is really what I was meant to do? I'm not sure. How do you know? What determines what you will do in life? Is it predetermined? Or do you just keep jumping from career to career and hope you land in one that you like? It's scary. I think my fear stems more from the possibility of failure. However, I know that I will experience many a rejection if I really try to do this - so, maybe being prepared with that in mind will actually help me somehow? If I know rejection may be imminent, then that old "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again" thing will be true for me. We'll see.....