When I Grow Up...

When I grow up I want to be a teacher, a doctor, a nurse, a firefighter, a policeman... This is along the lines of what you will hear when you ask a child what they want to be when they grow up. When I was asked that question, I often answered I don't know maybe a teacher? I just want to help people. Well here I am a Junior and college, I am majoring in Psychology and minoring in Human and Family Development. But what do I want to be when I grow up. As everyone else in my major begin applying for graduate school, doing research and devoting every waking minute to the program I think, is this what I really want? To be stuck in school, and having it own me for the next 4-5 years?? Not really. Honestly I want to be done with school as soon as possible! But then I think to myself. Well if you don't continue with school what are you going to be? With such a competitive market out there, there is not much you can do with a bachelors degree is psychology, I have to do more schooling. Maybe I should have thought of this before I picked my major, but I didn't, I picked my major because I thought it was interesting and because I wanted to help people, more specifically be a counselor and help people overcome their problems. The type of counseling I have wanted to do has varied, from marriage and family, to marriage and family with an emphasis in military and helping spouses and children survive deployment, cause I know it was easier to survive a deployment when I had someone going through it with me. Then I thought school counseling would be ok too. I could help young lives find direction. But I really don't know what I want to be. I just want to help people. The more I ponder on what to do next, the more stuck I am. To me, success is not measured on how much schooling you have or how much money you make. If you tell me you have a Master's degree I don't see you anymore successful than a mom with 5 kids who has been at home raising them. To me she has a Master's too, only she did not sit in the classroom to get it, she earned it through years and years of trial and error, and her reward is much more sweet, and pays more than any Master's degree does. As as I ponder the roles of the mothers I know, my mother, aunts, grandmothers, and friends I think, wow what a job! Isn't the job of a mom helping people? Changing lives, and molding them to choose the right and be God's children? Maybe what's best for me is to be a mom, to help people that way. I don't know, maybe I will never decide what I want to be when I grow up.