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What do you want to do or be when you grow up?

TheCatWoman

I've never had an ambition, or a goal/s in life, at 63 I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up. I don't know if it's because I was never encouraged to do anything when I was a child, although I was often discouraged. If like most little girls I said I wantd to be a nurse, I was told that I wouldn't really want to that as it would involve carrying used bed pans around. A wish to be a hairdresser was met with disgust.

We had no careers advice at school, or at least not until we'd made our exam choices and it was to late to change anything. Some of the teachers said there was no point in educating us as we'd only go off and get married and have babies.

After leaving school, I was asked what I wanted to do and could never answer, I simply didn't know, I remember being told to search through a filing cabinet of folders about possible careers and found nothing, I was just overwhelmed. I think it also didn't help that a "career" was a fairly new thing, for people of my class, we's always had "jobs", which was a very different thing.

How did you find the thing you wanted to do, or do you still not know?

Do you do the job you trained for? 

Parents

  • I studied for a postgrad in HR management as I wanted to work in international development charities. I thought that was the best way as school said be a professional, so did family. I thought that was a good way to satisfy both me and others by doing something in an office that worked towards admirable goals.

    However that didn't work, I loved the organisations but hated the work so much. HR is important for making sure an employee is taken care of and an organisation can work effectively (at least how I tried to do it) but it wasn't for me.

    I now work in a role that's more like a janitor/maintenance person at a historical site. I can say, in terms of work - I've never been happier and oddly get paid quite a bit more than I ever did working in HR.

    I suppose from my perspective only, I tried to remember what I felt would work for me when I was a kid - all I remember was saying 'I never want to work in an office'. I also remember being told by others how short sighted and unlikely that was for me. After a decade and a half in HR I decided to say bull to that and went for that role at the historical site. 

    I think remembering what you wanted when you were a kid (if possible - I don't remember much aside from that!) might help, and then take a risk on something new and not sanctioned by school and family pressures.

Reply

  • I studied for a postgrad in HR management as I wanted to work in international development charities. I thought that was the best way as school said be a professional, so did family. I thought that was a good way to satisfy both me and others by doing something in an office that worked towards admirable goals.

    However that didn't work, I loved the organisations but hated the work so much. HR is important for making sure an employee is taken care of and an organisation can work effectively (at least how I tried to do it) but it wasn't for me.

    I now work in a role that's more like a janitor/maintenance person at a historical site. I can say, in terms of work - I've never been happier and oddly get paid quite a bit more than I ever did working in HR.

    I suppose from my perspective only, I tried to remember what I felt would work for me when I was a kid - all I remember was saying 'I never want to work in an office'. I also remember being told by others how short sighted and unlikely that was for me. After a decade and a half in HR I decided to say bull to that and went for that role at the historical site. 

    I think remembering what you wanted when you were a kid (if possible - I don't remember much aside from that!) might help, and then take a risk on something new and not sanctioned by school and family pressures.

Children