Dreams

[cjsmith]

This must be "midlife crisis".

A LiveJournal friend asked what people's dreams were and how they changed over the years. Here's how I answered "what did I want to be when I grew up":

Astronaut. I "figured out" I couldn't do that because I was a girl; by the time I learned differently it was too late.

Blue Angel pilot. Yeah, still a girl.

Writer. I never really wrote anything, at least anything that didn't suck. I'm not sure what that says about me and my dreams but it probably isn't good.

Much later I decided I'd be one of those feisty old ladies who ran marathons into her seventies. So much for that.

Now I'd kind of like to be a veterinarian, but I'm not sure I want it enough to raze my life to the ground and start over.

(Plus of course the whole standing up thing. Realistically, veterinarian is not for me this lifetime.)

Computer programmer and square dance caller weren't ever really on the list. Person who works from 6:15am to some time around 8:30pm wasn't on the list. (That was yesterday.) Person with cats, yes; that's always been there. I'd like a dog some day, if I find a means of income that involves being home during waking hours.

But that's the interesting question now, isn't it: do I have any dreams? Any that are left, that is. Those I've discarded I've discarded for good reasons, and while that hurts a lot, I'm not going to change it. Do I have new dreams? Have a dog? Okay, that's one. Anything else? Is that the best I can do?

It's time to reinvent myself.

I wish it were a faster process.

Comments

[sunnydale47.livejournal.com]

You're courageous, intelligent, caring, fun, and have a lot of skills! I know what it's like to have to reinvent yourself due to circumstances beyond your control, and it's not easy. But you're diving into it. And when you figure out what you want to do, you'll be great at it!

Even right now, you're doing something productive, even if it's not your life's dream. I'm not doing anything, and it's very frustrating. I can't do the things I want to do, and I don't have the confidence to plunge into something new without any support.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a veterinarian, but my traditional 1950s family didn't think that was a good occupation for a girl, and they systematically talked me out of it. My mother's ambition for me had always been to be a teacher. I didn't want to be a teacher, but I was always discouraged from doing anything else, so when I got out of school I just did secretarial work, one of the few other options for women in an era when help-wanted ads were still segregated by sex.

The pinnacle of my life in the context of career was when I had my own aircraft sales/brokering/consulting business. Tom went with me to evaluate airplanes and demonstrate them with our clients (as a CFII he could let the clients sit left seat and do the flying, even if they weren't rated in that airplane yet). And we'd throw in 5 hours of dual if they were transitioning up. But other than that, I did it all -- finding the airplanes, finding the clients, working with our buyers, bargaining with the sellers, setting prices, and all the rest. I loved it, and I was good at it. But I got huge huge doses of self-confidence from Tom until I got to the point where my accomplishments began reinforcing it themselves.

I did have one job after I became disabled that I enjoyed -- working for GEnie, a pre-Web text-based online service. But when they folded I couldn't find another job I could telecommute to, I was too disabled to work a regular job, and I didn't have the self-confidence to start another business. The less I did, the more my self-confidence ebbed, and it's pretty low now. And I don't have any training in any field -- I was an English major.

At your age, and with your skills, with some self-confidence you can do anything you want to! Do you have an employment center like the one we have here (http://www.dllr.state.md.us/poac/), that does employment counseling? That could help you develop some avenues to think about pursuing.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Aw, thank you! It's true that if you discount the feet (and the other chronic pain issue) I have a lot going for me, and I'm very aware of that fact. I know I have a lot to be thankful for.

I'm so sorry that you got talked out of being a veterinarian. I *know* there are female veterinarians about your age, but I realize they were much more like trailblazers when they went to school than would be the case today. *sigh*. I wish you had had the support of your family.

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I realize that the support of one's family is huge -- not just in forming early career aspirations into choices, but in forming a young person's sense of self-confidence and self-worth that will affect a whole lifetime.

We used to have a great career counseling center, but it died around the time of the dot com bust. (This area wasn't too happy for a while there.) I've been to a career counseling person, but she was worse than useless. She did a Myers-Briggs on me, and even though I came out one point away from median on three of the axes, she took my "type" and the fact I work because I need the money and she said "stick to computer programming". Thanks, lady. :-) But I'll come up with something good to do, vocation or avocation. I just don't know what yet.

I could totally see you as a birding group leader or nature walk guide or something like that. Telling kids what this flower is called, telling grownups how to tell the difference between this and that bird... you're very knowledgeable and you have patience and kindness. Would it be too much on your feet, even part time?

[shadopanther.livejournal.com]

Over the years, I've wanted to be an artist, an astronaut, an engineer, an inventor, habitat restorer, and an ecologist (applied or scholarly). I still consder myself an artist, though I've not created much recently. Closest I've gotten to being an astronaut was going to the US Space Academy (http://www.spacecamp.com/) in 1989 and working at NASA-Ames Research Park (2003). Engineering & inventing mostly end up tinkering or jury-rigging things when needed. Habitat restoration and ecology is what my degree is in, but I have not managed to find a paying job in it that matches my level of experience. --- So instead, I found myself doing web design, system administration, and network administration because it was what needed to be done. (And at present, I'm thinking web/sysadmin/network admin may still be my most feasbile best paid option for my current skill set. I even had an interview for such recently, but the company back-tracked and decided they were not going to hire anyone right now afterall.)

For me the hangup on the pilot-route for being an astronaut is I'm 1 inch too short, but I think I'm just as glad not to have signed my life away into the military.

You have my sympathy on the useless career counseling person. I've gotten the run around from some of those as well, both when I was in college, and since. For whatever I do I know I have: a good spatial aptitude, a good mechanical aptitude, I'm creative, I have a high reasoning ability, I can be detail oriented, I can manage to see the big picture, I can translate between technical jargon and lay-speak, I'm adaptable, I can learn-on-the-job, I'm good at reasearch and database searches, I have a science (biology etc) /art /econ /geography (gps & gis) background. I figure I can work indoors or out, but I'm developing a preference for working indoors (mostly), and the ability to telecommute would be quite nice. I enjoy engaging my brain and having some level of responsibility, of making a difference, improving systems or proceedures. I like design and restoration. I can draw, write, layout, administer, coordinate, teach. ....and with all that, I'm not quite sure where I fit, but I'd like to find a better, more engaging, better paid fit than where I am now.

As for the nature walk guide idea you mentioned to sunnydale47, I think the amount of use of feet might depend on where one worked. The docent work I did at Elkhorn Slough (http://www.elkhornslough.org/) had a lot of walking & was all volunteer. I enjoyed telling people about the plants and animals and participating in the oak woodland and other native species restoration programs, but volunteer doesn't pay the bills.