decide what the hell I would like to do with the rest of my life

After being out of University for awhile, I feel less pressure to decide on ONE thing. While I was in school I felt like there was this huge weight over my shoulders, pressuring me to decide on something. The first question people ask you is ‘what is your major?’ I guess that is supposed to say something about you and about where you are going. I kept putting off picking one and in the end, I chose the Interdisciplinary option. I was able to combine several of my interests into a degree. But there was still this pressure. ‘What am I going to do once I graduate??’ I think I felt like I was running out of time, that I needed to make a career for myself as quickly as possible.
But why rush? Why stress myself out deciding on what I will do for the rest of my life? I have a general plan for the next year, and some ideas about what I will do afterwards. But I no longer feel pressure to decide on something before I’m ready to.

I know these things for sure:
- I want to write, even if I never get published
- I want to travel as much as I can
- I want to make friends along the way, and keep in contact with the people who are important in my life
- I never want to stop learning
- I want to try to make a positive difference in the world, or at least in the lives of others
- I want to continually challenge myself to grow as a person
- I want to have experiences, and not be afraid of making mistakes

Maybe.
We’ll see.

Ok, so I still don’t know what I want to do with the rest of my life, but I’m trying to start making plans for the upcoming year. There are three things I want to do: Travel, write, and gain valuble work experience somewhere. Teaching English overseas seems like a really good option right now, but I’m also really enjoying this writing class I’m taking. I could do an 8 month program starting in January that would give me the skills I need to work in the areas I want to. Teaching English overseas would be an incredible experience, but the more I think about it, I’m not sure that teaching is what I want to do.
sigh One of these days I’ll figure it all out.

Well I know what I really want to do, but I’ve never found it that realistic so I’m slowly working on backup plans.
Every once and awhile though I get encouragement or praise for my work that makes me think that maybe my first choice isn’t that unrealistic after all. I’ll keep slowly plugging away at it :)

The truth is, i don’t think I’ll ever KNOW what I want to do for the rest of my life. I have a really hard time making decisions about anything. I’m always examining all the angles and just generally thinking too much. From now on I’m going to just start making decisions and going with them. This will probably end up being a goal on it’s own but I really do think it applies here. Instead of swaying back and forth between the things I’d like to do, I’m just going to pick one and go with it. The worst that can happen is that a few years down the road I’ll realize that I’m really not happy in what I’m doing. But then I’ll just pick up and move onto something else. It’s not the end of the world. I’ll just have more learning experiences and have more variety in life. And theres nothing at all wrong with that :)

So, I still have no idea what I want to do, but I’m slowly narrowing it down. My interests are all over the place, which makes it hard to focus on something, but I’ll slowly get there.
For the fall I applied to a couple programs I’ve been thinking about for awhile: Psychiatric nursing and film (I know I know, complete opposites!)
I’ve decided against nursing for a number of reasons. I find mental health incredibly interesting, but it would definately be a tough job that would wear you down after awhile. It’s another 4 year degree (I was hoping I could get it down in 3 already having a BA but that was a no-go) and I don’t know that I want to go to school for that long when I may burn out after awhile on the job. Also, another huge deciding factor was that I wouldn’t be licenced to practice in my home province – where most of my family still lives. I want to be able to work close to home if I want to.
The film program I’m still deciding on, but I’m leaning towards not doing it. It’s really expensive and after talking to former students as well as a professor there, it doesn’t sound like it’s all that practical. I wouldn’t really have a better chance getting a job after the program that I do right now. It would be really fun, but I don’t know that I want to delve a LOT deeper into debt just to have fun.
So now that I’ve eliminated some options, I can focus on some of the other things I’m thinking of doing – more on that later :)

The few plans I had just completely fell apart… Now it’s back to square one…

I have such varied interests and I’m finding it really hard to settle on one thing.
A part of me really wants to go into film. I’ve been told that I’m good at writing screenplays, and I’m worried that when I’m 80 I’ll regret it if I never gave it a shot.
On the other hand, I’d really like a stable career. I want to have a family and be able to provide for them without worrying where my next paycheck is going to come from. My current thoughts are that I’ll pursue a stable career, and write screenplays on the side as a hobby. This will satisfy both my needs :)
I’d really like to work with people. I’ve thought of being a teacher, a psychologist, a psychiatric nurse, or a psychiatrist. I’m taking a couple courses this spring that will enable me to apply to the PDP program (teachers college), and would also satisfy some requirements for the psychiatric nurse program. Hopefully I’ll start to narrow my focus a bit.