There's an article featured on LDS.org called Defy Gravity: Go Forward with Faith. It talks about riding a bicycle, and it mentions the wondrous physics of how a bike maintains balance, defying gravity, as long as it keeps moving. This reminded me of an old blog post of mine, Riding the Bicycle, in which I said something similar.
In order to stay afloat amid the storms of life and not sink into despair, we have to keep moving in a positive direction. The good news is that if we can keep moving forward, life won't be able to drag us down so easily. There's a lot to be said for having ambitious (even unrealistic) goals and putting a considerable amount of effort toward achieving them. Even if their lofty goals are never reached, those who try to do the impossible often accomplish more than those who strive for, and achieve, what we might consider a more normal level of success.
Perhaps one of my biggest personal problems is that I'm not very ambitious. Despite the Tangled song's claim that everybody has a dream, I'm not sure that I do. And if I do have a dream, I'm not sure what it is, and I certainly don't know how to pursue it. My biggest problem with the concept of moving forward is that sometimes we don't know which way forward is. Those with dreams and goals can figure out ways to pursue them. They know which way they want to go because they have a guiding star that they can follow.
Theoretically, so do I. I have a desire to become more like Jesus Christ. I guess you could call that a dream. It gives me a whole list of Christlike attributes to develop, and I could easily make a bit of progress toward obtaining those attributes, but what I'm really worried about is real life. I'm in school right now, taking general education classes for a well-rounded education, and English classes because I'm good at them. I don't know what I want to do for a living, or how my skill at English could translate into any kind of job. I don't have any "career goals," like so many other people my age have. They have dreams about what kind of job they want to have, what kind of house they want to live in, and what kind of family they'd like to raise, and I don't.
I know I like helping people. I love making people happy. I actually enjoy cleaning things sometimes. It's something of a pet peeve of mine when I see something out of place in a supermarket, and I get a little bit of personal satisfaction out of putting things back where they belong. All of these traits add up to the possibility of excelling as a courtesy clerk, but that's not really much of a "dream." Nobody dreams of working at a grocery or outlet store, except maybe me. It'd make a great job for me for now, but what about the future? Could I work my way up the ranks in management? I can lead people, but could I learn how to run a store, to make business decisions? I'm not sure. Working at a grocery store would be a great step in the right direction for me, but where could I go from there?
Maybe I should just take life one step at a time, and have faith that God knows how to get me where He knows I should be. It just really stinks to know that He has a perfect plan for my life and I don't have the faintest clue about what that plan is or how to follow it. I'm a terrific follower, if only I could get the directions I need. Without that direction, I'm lost. I can't learn how to move forward toward my dreams simply because I don't have any dreams, so I don't know which way forward is.
2 comments:
That is a hard place to be in, to feel you could move forward if you only knew which direction was forward. I sympathize because I've been there. I find myself there again from time to time.
If I might suggest a few things that have helped me, especially in college.
1) Take classes in things that interest you, no matter how weird. I took classes in stained glass, child psychology, carillon. This scratches the curiosity itch and may turn into something you want to pursue further as a career.
2) Take classes in subjects that are important to know about today. I had a feeling I should take a class in basic electronics and that turned into what I majored in for a while. (I switched later, but what I learned was invaluable. I also met my husband in that major. ;-))
Even if you change your major partway through, the things you learn in a short stint are going to come in handy someday and give you the perspective to make wise choices and make you even more helpful to others in the area you finally choose for a career.
Finally, I recommend you buy a copy of a book called "Wishcraft: How to Get What You Really Want" by Barbara Sher. It's an old book, so you'll have to get it on Amazon, but it will be very helpful to you. (It helped me a lot when I was in a particularly directionless and ambition-less part of my life.)
It has exercises that will help you take stock of your talents, help you use your imagination to come up with dreams or goals for yourself that you can really get excited about, and it will help you learn skills for plotting the path to the goals and building a network of people to help you and creating life structure that moves you toward those goals.
This material is about 20X denser than can be imparted by a college career counselor, plus it is something you can go back to when you need it. It has really solid techniques.
You are a good follower. You have also surprised me from time to time with your leadership skills. I think what you sometimes lack is self-confidence.
Michaela has some good suggestions. In fact, I just ordered Wishcraft. I think we both could use it!
We also both need to work on spending more time with the Best Guidance Counselor. When we have consulted with Him, our confidence will greatly increase.
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