Career Expectations

I've always been fairly academic and through grammar school I unquestionably accepted the life path that seemed to have been predetermined for me. Study hard, go to university, graduate with a good degree and launch your career in the chosen area, probably law in my case. It never occurred to me that there were alternatives. The dissatisfaction I felt with my work experience, detailed in my earlier post, bothered me, and, somewhat rebelliously perhaps, I decided to study languages instead of law at university.

The language studies took me to Nicaragua, where I lived for almost 4 years, set up a business, married and had a daughter. Although I enjoyed running the business, I had to return to the UK (more about that in future posts!) and I chose Northern Ireland as my family were living there. Six months after arriving I received a letter informing me that I had been successful in a tough graduate programme and had been offered a post in the Northern Ireland Civil Service. "Finally!" I thought to myself "It's the career I've been waiting for!"

Three years later I found myself desperately unhappy at work, separated from my husband, bankrupt and with two small children to care for. Things just hadn't worked out the way I had expected. I began to consider how I could find a job doing something I enjoyed and looked into International Development. I began a Masters in Development Management but struggled to keep up with the studies and the cost. Jobs in the sector were scarce and required experience.

Then I read "The Art of Non-Conformity" and one particular sentence really struck me:

“You don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to.” 

I think it was then that I realised I've been trying to conform to society's expectations by thinking only in terms of a "career path". I don't need to wait for the elusive dream job, I can start doing what I want to do right away. This realisation was a moment of liberation for me, liberation from the pressure of "the career" which has been bearing down on me since the age of 14, perhaps even younger. 

I'm going back to the hope I had when I was a kid, the days that I used to tell people "When I'm grown up I'm going to travel the world in a camper van and write books". The long lost inspiration is coming back and I'm so excited to see where it takes me. It might not be a camper van just yet, but the world is once again my oyster.