Virtual Breadcrumbs

I Can Do Anything, So How Do I Choose?

As a child and teenager, I was always very good in school, although I was better in humanities and social sciences than I was with math & science, particularly in high school.  I was one of those kids who was told that their talents would allow them to do practically anything later in life.  My husband had a very similar childhood.  We’re both very intelligent and hard working people.

But we’ve both had a particularly difficult time figuring out where we fit into the world since high school and college.  We both took teaching certifications in our best subjects  - mine is history, his is English - and then figured out that a passion for the subject doesn’t really make teaching all that fun, particularly for required subjects like ours that students don’t usually have much interest in.  I’ve even gotten better at math, and taught it as a tutor, which is something I never thought I would do.

But when you grow up being told that you can do anything, it makes it very hard to find direction.  I’m a lot more academic and book-smart than the rest of my immediate family, so they didn’t know what directions to send me in.  To my mother, teaching was what I should do, but I found it incredibly frustrating and unfulfilling.  I like following politics, but don’t want to be directly involved in a field that I regard as very deceitful and juvenile.  It doesn’t have to be, but it is, particularly here in America.  My uncle is very intelligent, but his passion is law, which I have never had an interest in.  That lack of direction has made it very hard to discover a career that I’m good at and find exciting and fulfilling.

What I’m discovering is that I’m being drawn towards economics, liking the math in it.  I do really well with statistics.  It was the exception to my relatively poor math performance in high school.  I was good in physics in high school, and miss it.  Physics taught me that I could be very good at math if I could see a practical application for the skill.  I would fail a Pre-Calculus test and ace a Physics test on the same subject a few weeks later.  I think STEM fields are fascinating, and read a lot about biology, cosmology, and astrophysics.  But I was never groomed for a STEM career, and I have no idea if I’d be any good at it.  I have this nagging feeling that I might be if I can get better at problem-solving and theoretical math.  But its something I’m very afraid of taking a chance on because I’m already in my late 20s, and I’ve had to formulate and abandon about 5 different career plans thanks to our recession and pitifully slow recovery.  And I don’t know whether to pursue economics, especially political economy (which I have very strong opinions about), or whether I’d be happier in a STEM field.  And I have no idea how to answer that question.

Every time I think I’ve found something to pursue, something else catches my eye.  My mother was right, I can do pretty much anything, provided that I’m motivated enough.  I didn’t really get Algebra 2 in high school, but I retaught it to myself as a tutor and now it makes perfect sense.  I’ve been thinking of relearning Pre-Calc and tackling CalcAB just to see if I can do it.  I’m about 85% sure that I can.

But when you can do just about anything, when you have a very wide range of unrelated passions, how to do you decide what the one thing to do is?  In nearly 27 years, I’ve never figured out the answer to that question.