Reflecting on childhood aspirations
Hi everyone! How are you progressing in your career journey?
I thought it would be interesting to revisit and reflect on our aspirations as a child and how our career goals have transformed as we've grown up. I'd love to hear about your growth and accomplishments and hope that this reflection exercise would help you gain clarity and motivation.
This idea came to me as I was navigating through the burn out of studying, where I experienced a loss in motivation and questioning if I was on the right path.
"What do you want to be when you grow up?" has always been a common question that teachers ask throughout my education. For me, my answers at the beginning were quite different: I believed I wanted to be a singer, a ballet dancer then fashion designer, architect and now graphic designer. It was so bittersweet being reminded that I innocently wanted to be a singer and ballet dancer as a child. My path has evolved with my growth into adulthood, taking me to gain unique experiences and skills. Besides gaining graphic design skills in my current studies, I have worked in the food industry, social media and mental health - areas I would never have predicted to explore. It's truly interesting to see how far I've come and exciting to realise that this journey is continuous. I can't wait to learn more and achieve previous goals as well as new goals that have emerged along with this reflection.
There are different ways people may resonate with this post but I hope that you are reminded of how experiences and skills have built you as you are today. It is perfectly okay if your goals and aspirations have shifted into something different - all the steps of your journey has purpose and value. We have all faced challenges and external factors beyond our control, which has only made us stronger and resilient. Changes should be embraced and our growth should be appreciated! 💛
Comments
I absolutely love this discussion.
When I was 3-8 I originally wanted to be a singer as I loved music and for a child I thought I was pretty good at it. From 8-12 I then said I wanted to be a piano teacher as I really admired my piano teacher and wanted to teach others music.
This desire to help others then shifted to mental health from around the age of 12-16 when I found myself being come to for advice and support for a lot of my friends in their time of need. This pretty much shaped my career goals to this day and now I want to be a psychologist!
But who knows where I will end up in the future
This is such an interesting discussion @cteeniee!
I always knew that I wanted to do a job where I could help improve the world in some way. When I was younger, I wanted to be a veterinarian. I loved animals and was passionate about saving the environment. When I entered high school I considered becoming a zoologist, which is a person who studies the communities and behaviours of animals. As I progressed through high school, I found I loved listening to people and understanding why they do the things they do. This naturally led me to become interested in psychology, and I have now completed a Bachelor of Psychological Science.
However, this journey has not been a straightforward one for me. I absolutely adore learning about human behaviour and the mind but have struggled with feeling confident in becoming a psychologist since it is such a long journey to become registered. Right now, I’m working towards gaining experience in mental health to hopefully get into a Master of Psychology.
I’m finding comfort in what others on this post have said and that it's okay not to have it all figured out just yet! I’m excited to see where opportunities take me and know that each step I take will bring me closer to where I’m meant to be, wherever that might be!
What an interesting topic of conversation @cteeniee
When I was younger I had no idea, I thought maybe a teacher. I also thought maybe a marine biologist. Then I thought I wanted to be a psychologist.
I started a 3 year degree in Psychology and Counselling (which I am one semester away from completing). I realised I didn't want to do psychology that much anymore, and maybe wanted to do counselling instead, or sexology.
Then I started looking into jobs I could get with my degree and looked into stuff like child protection, corrections, domestic violence work, etc... which made me question if I even want to go on to do postgraduate studies for counselling, etc, and rather just get a job in one of those fields that doesn't require postgrad as these types of jobs encompass a lot of my interests and passions.
I still don't 100% know where I'll end up, and thats ok. I'll figure it out with time and experience.
Thank you for sharing @Green_Ghost 🧡 I'm so excited to hear that you're almost done with your course although I understand losing interest in your field of study after quite some time. I felt similarly with graphic design after years of juggling it with my other priorities and starting again with my degree. If you're ever looking for some great resources that may assist with navigating you toward the right path, I suggest looking into Headspace, which you may have heard of. 🙂 I'm using their work and study support services myself at the moment and I recommend them!
I think it's great you're exploring other options, and pathways and keeping them open to align with your interests and passions. Everything is going to work out, I believe in you!
and if all else fails, for something completely different, I would also be happy being a tour guide for somewhere like a historic prison attraction in my state.
It always facinates me to hear what people wanted to be when they were growing up to what they are doing/working towards now. For my entire life, I wanted to be a teacher. So many people in my family were teachers and nearly all our family friends were teachers, it was familiar and I always had that trait to lead discussions and help teach people things.
Then when I was 13, I decided I wanted to be a performing arts teacher. I danced for 15 years and played heaps of instruments so it felt like a no-brainer. Then when I was 17 and in Year 12, my music teacher (funnily enough) spoke to me about my love for psychology and said that some of the best teachers study their topic, then study teaching. So I am studying a Bachelor of Psychological Science but am not sure if I still want to go into teaching.
It always made me nervous about me changing my mind of what I wanted to do for the future but I definitely agree with your statement that the challenges and external factors that we've faced has only made us stronger and more resilient. I am proud of what I came from and the growth I have gone through
Hey @Invictus-Ernest ! I appreciate you sharing your journey - I can tell that you've always had a passion for your interests and I get the sense that you're creative as well!
It seemed like diving into psychology was a great shift from your initial intention to pursue teaching. I find your dedication to music and dancing truly admirable! Have you considered how your interests may integrate with psychology in your career path potentially? I definitely can see how your interests may even integrate with your skills in psychology to open up exciting pathways for you to explore.
I really admire your attitude and mentality - you have every reason to be proud of your growth and accomplishments so far 🌷 Rooting for your success!
Hi @cteeniee
Thank you for this post!! It really made me reflect on how my childhood dreams led me to this point in my life.
As a child I also wanted to get into something more creative - maybe fashion or music? But as I grew up my interest kinda shifted, I am really drawn to psychology - probably because of the influence of my dad. He taught the subject and I used to always sit in his office and read his psych textbooks.
I went into my undergrad degree hoping to get into forensic psych (probably because I was listening to so many true crime podcasts back then😅), but towards the end of my degree my focus shifted a little again. I'm taking a break from uni at the moment, but I'm hoping to pursue something in behavioural neuroscience and the addiction field when I go back to do postgrad. But who knows, something else might catch my eye before then. Something I've learnt along the way is to always be open minded to new opportunities and interests 🙂
Hey there!
How you got into psychology was really cute to read 🥰 I really like psychology as well, it's so extensive and relates to so many aspects that makes the exploration process so fun - I'm glad to hear you're keeping an open mind towards it!
Side note: Have you seen or tried any of the Unsolved Case File games? I can definitely relate with listening to a lot of true crime podcasts aswell and as scared as I was, I found these games so intriguing and fufiled my desire to work in the forensic field 🔎Maybe you can give this game a go during your break! It seems like you're on the right track but I wish you all the best heading towards the end of your degree and then into postgrad! You're going to do great!
Hi @cteeniee
I love this post! I haven't actually reflected on what aspirations I had as a kid and how different they are now; it's certainly thought-provoking.
As a kid, I wanted to be either a Border Force officer or a police officer, I think the RBT and Border Force Show on the TV really influenced this. But when it came to high school, when your career advisor would start asking you what jobs you wanted to do, I had no clue. I was interested in doing Psychology at Uni, but I always doubted myself, thought I was not smart enough and too anxiety-ridden to do it. I was also just so caught up in trying to survive high school that I wasn't thinking too much about my future and what I wanted to do. I did end up studying a Bachelor of Arts with specialisations at Uni, but thought I'd go back to what I was interested in as a kid, so I did a Bachelor of Border Management. And now, I am graduating with a Bachelor's degree and three Executive Deans Awards, which I really am proud of. While studying, I also took three other courses in Tafe, which were great and expanded my knowledge and skills.
But now that I've finished my Bachelor's degree, I feel a little bit lost again in what I want to do, especially job-wise; it's a bit overwhelming and daunting trying to figure out my next move. But since becoming a Builder on here and my previous experience being a young carer and providing peer support to friends, I have been more drawn towards taking up Mental Health/LGBTQIA+ Peer Support Work, and I am considering doing a Cert IV in Mental Health Peer Work. I know the Cert IV can take me down a lot of paths career-wise, probably more than what my Bachelor's degree can, but that's okay. Either way, I think I'd like to start a career in the mental health/peer support field, it'd be so rewarding.
Thank you for doing this post! And I hope anyone reading this finds some comfort in what I've shared. We truly need to normalise that it's okay to change our minds, and it's also okay not to know what we want to do.
- Matcha_Toad 🐸🍵💚
Hey @cteeniee
Thanks so much for this post. It’s really made me think. I often wonder how little me would feel about my current career goals and where I’m at in my life. When I was little, I wanted to be an astrophysicist mainly because of the influence of my brother. Once I had a better understanding of myself, I worked out that I wanted a career where I could help people in some way. Since then, I went from wanting to be a teacher, to wanting to be a psychiatrist, to wanting to be a psychologist. Now, I think I’m pretty settled on wanting to work within the field of biostatistics/epidemiology.
I found it hard to let go of the way I envision the future and accept my limitations. It helped when I eventually worked out that the version of the future I had created wasn’t the only one where I’m happy. You learn so much as you grow up and time progresses, so I guess your previous ambitions are inherently naïve. You really can’t account for the challenges you’ll face. For me, the challenges that made me changed my future career have allowed me to become a better person so I don’t think I can wish that they didn’t happen. Overall, I’m excited to see what the future holds, but for now I think I’ll just do what I enjoy, embrace the uncertainty, and see where it leads.
