Education vs. Career (BEDS 020)

My stance on university has always remained the same: take courses you're interested in, and find a job later. Education first, career second. I haven't failed to notice, though, the value society puts in the career you have after.

I'm not naive enough to believe that wanting a good job is not a motivating factor for attending university. In fact, if I'm being completely, 100% honest, it's a big reason I reapplied. It's a common reason, and an extremely valid one. If you want to be a lawyer because of the big, fat paycheck you'll get, I applaud you! (Mostly because I find law extremely dull and confusing, and I would never, ever, pursue it.)

But I hate--hate--when the topic turns to what I'm going to do after school. I hate that so many people view the lack of an intended career path as a downfall, a weakness, a liability. I resent all of the condescending thoughts that my degree is useless, or that the courses I'm taking will not benefit my future.

This year, I decided to take Japanese. It had no relation to any of my major requirements. The credit probably wasn't going to do me many favours on my transcript. But I took it in my first year, I liked it, I was good at it. I wanted to increase my conversational skills in the language, so I registered for the course.

Of course, I ended up dropping it after the first class, but that's another story entirely.

When I first started my degree, I hated it. The courses in my major were too broad, too general, too....bleh. I had no interest, so I dropped out. But the longer I'm here, the more narrowed the classes get, the more I like them. The more I'm interested. The more I actually care about what I'm learning, as opposed to the piece of paper I'm going to get afterwards.

I may have been prompted back into university with the possibility of a better job, but I stick around because I am invested.

The things we discuss in class are things that pique my interest. I'm taking a course in Canadian comics, with books on the syllabus that I'm genuinely excited to read. I'm taking a popular literature and film class, and on the very first day we screened Inside Out. (Even more impressively, I managed not to cry.) I'm taking a class about fairy tales--FAIRY TALES. If that's not the literal most perfect class for me, I don't know what is.

Even though school stresses me out, and I breathe a sigh of relief every time a break comes along, I am genuinely happy to be here. I am genuinely excited about what I'm studying, about (some of) the papers I'm assigned to write. And that's how it should be.

Sometimes you need a degree to do what you really want to do--but, as I've said before, I have never been one of those people. So right now, all I care about is being challenged, thinking critically, and being exposed to new perspectives that I wouldn't have seen otherwise.

At least that way, I'll have some pride in the piece of paper I get at the end of it all, instead of disappointment from not getting the career I set my mind on.

Until later,

- Justyne

A Bad Combination

I am very, very bad at concentrating. I'm not sure when I first realized this; if it was a sudden epiphany or a sort of slow realization over time. But it has become clear to me how frequent my pauses mid-action are; how often I drop my pen or let my fingers hover over the keyboard, allowing my eyes to switch to Facebook or Twitter or the mere air around my workspace, my mind thousands of miles away from the current task.

In the past, I've enjoyed calling myself a "Master of Multitasking", which in reality means that I enjoy having half a dozen Chrome tabs, a Word document, and a sketchbook open in front of me and pretending that I'm getting stuff done. I hated focusing my energy on only one task at a time, mostly because I thought that allowing my brain to jump from project to project at whiplash speed would be more productive than trying to focus on just one.

Pro tip: it's really not.

By nature, I am a very ambitious person. If  I get an idea for a new project, I don't want to wait the weeks or months to finish whatever it is I'm currently working on--I want to start it now. I have so many things that I want to do, and I want to do them all today--not tomorrow, next week, or next year...today. I hate the idea of having too much free time because, hello, that's free time that I could be using to DO things! When I dream, I don't half-ass it--I go all out.

When I first decided that I wanted to be a writer at age nine, I didn't just want to be published. I wanted to be best-selling, creator of a hundred books and a franchised series, complete with movie and TV show adaptations of my stories. I always figured I'd go to college, sure, but I always thought I'd go just for fun, because I'd already be set for life with a successful career. Duh.

Turns out, though, that an abundance of ambition alone is not enough to accomplish anything. When you pair it with my utter lack of ability to concentrate, along with a bountiful supply of laziness, lack of motivation and crippling fear of the unknown, and you get a very, very bad combination.

It's scary--and often discouraging--to think about how many of my projects I could be done already if I had learned how to properly apply myself. How many new projects could I be working on? HOW PRODUCTIVE COULD I REALLY BE? We'll never know. And it sucks being constantly aware that, in some ways, I've already disappointed my 9-year-old self.

I've tried so many times to dig myself out of this hole. I wake up early, work my way through my morning routine as a Super Motivated Person, convinced that today is the day that I change everything. I have become an expert at creating a Master Plan, so clearly fool-proof that it absolutely cannot fail.

But the problem with making a Master Plan, with making such a large and daunting to-do list, is that I get overwhelmed. I get so overwhelmed, in fact, that I throw it all to the side, leaving it up to Future Justyne to sort out while I distract myself with Sims or Netflix or literally anything else.

Past Justyne is a real bitch. Present Justyne doesn't want to turn out the same way.

It's hard, trying to focus on one thing. I've never liked the idea of taking baby steps--I'm far too impatient. The only way to break this trend, though, is to do just that; to narrow my focus, shorten my to-do list, force myself to focus on one thing at a time. It's hard, but it's necessary.

I fumble. I screw up. That much is still the same--but if I don't forgive myself and move on, then who will?


Until later,

- Justyne