These are incredible photos.  These make me want to do something colorful like photography for a career.  

I think I need to write this down for the world to see, just so my head doesn't explode.

Clinical Psychology

Pros:

~Getting a sense of fulfillment from work by directly helping people.

~Widening the knowledge base through research.

~Psychology in general is fascinating to me.  

~I love the idea of helping people become healthier and happier.  What better thing could you do for a person?

~A variety of career options within the field:  be a therapist, teach, or research.  

~A variety of places you could work:  private practice, in a hospital, in a university, in many other places, I'm sure...

~Tons of different topic areas to explore.

~Personal growth resulting from the information you have to learn in school.  Most of the psychologists and psychology majors I've met have been absolutely lovely, fascinating people I'd want to be around all the time.  I know I would grow and understand myself more as a person if I were in this field.

Cons:

~I wonder if I could handle being around "down" to mentally disturbed people all day.

~A slight risk of physical harm from patients.

~LOTS of paperwork.  I HATE paperwork.

~Insurance, aka "Notes from the Dark Side."

~LOTS of schooling.  I'm rather disenchanted with school at the moment, but still feel like I would enjoy going to school for Clinical Psychology.  Not to mention that getting into a program is almost as competitive as med school programs.  Yikes!

~Would I actually enjoy research?  All I know is I hate statistics and often find my eyes glazing over when reading scientific research articles.  Would this improve with more exposure to the material?

~Maybe I wouldn't make quite as much money as I would with a doctorate or even master's degree in another field.  Then again, I could live quite comfortably.

Fashion Design

Pros:

~Creating beautiful things.  A colorful job.

~Improving the choices of what's out there.  This is a driving factor:  I chronically find myself disappointed with the clothing on the market.

~Potential to work for myself.

~Potential to live in exotic locales:  NYC, Paris, London, Milan, Tokyo...

~Only one to two years of additional schooling required.

~I feel like I have an exceptional amount of ideas for clothes, and am pretty creative when put on the spot, so this could really work for me.

~If you make it big, you can make well over $100K a year.  Whoo!

Cons:

~I didn't pour over Vogue magazines or constantly design clothes as a little girl.  Is my heart in it enough?

~You usually have to pay your dues before making it big, if you ever make it big.  Would I really be happy as a designer's assistant?  I'm not sure I would.  Then again, "if you never try, you never know..."

~I might have to live in a big city the rest of my life.  Not sure I'm okay with that.  Definitely don't think Shawn's okay with that.

~A lot of your success is based on luck and connections.

~I've never really followed styles--would that be a problem?  Probably.  Then again, I might follow style if my livelihood depended on it.

~I worry that most of the people I'd be around would be superficial.  I can't stand superficial people, and I don't believe that clothing drives the sway of life.

~I worry/know that the job wouldn't be as glamorous as I picture in my mind.

If you have any thoughts, please comment!

The first day of the last semester of my bachelor's degree starts today.  FINALLY.  Surprisingly, I didn't feel an overwhelming sense of dread this time.  I want to just get it done and be finished with this degree I may not use.  Over the break, I've done a little research on potential careers and I'm finding myself interested in Clinical Psychology again.  Other potential interests are being an Anthropology professor or working in Human Resources.  However, Human Resources seems to lack "color" that the other two jobs possess.  Then again, HR could pay me the best with the least amount of education, and I don't really know what an HR person even does.  More research is required.

Anyway, wish me luck on my first day.  Hope you all have a lovely week!  :)

What should I be when I grow up?

Okay, please excuse my freak-out rant.  

I feel really overwhelmed.  I feel like I need to decide today.  A lot of grad school deadlines are only 2 weeks away, and I'm at the edge of the acceptable time to ask professors to write letters of recommendation.  And I'm not sure what I want to apply for grad school in, if I should get a masters or just take leveling classes before a doctorate, when to apply, aaaaagh!  My head feels like it's about to explode!!!!  Do I do leveling courses first and then apply a year later?  And if I have to apply next fall, will I even have enough leveling classes and research experience to get accepted to the programs I really want to be in?  I also keep vacillating between things I'd like to do.  For instance, I came downstairs to research grad school for clinical psychology, but then I started thinking about Ph.D.s in anthropology, but I feel so unsure about whether I'd actually like those jobs because I've never experienced them.  And will I get to experience them before it's too late?  Like with Deaf Ed, I never worked with Deaf kids til my SENIOR YEAR, and was practically finished with the program before I realized I didn't want to do it anymore.  AAAAGH!

Edit:  Phew, I'm feeling much better now.  Still stressed a bit, but my parents and I talked and decided it would probably be the best plan to take leveling classes next fall and see what I like the best.  Then I can have more time to prepare, and not feel like I'm launching into this vast unknown.  But this time of life can be so exciting and so stressful.  I hope I can downplay the stress and mostly just enjoy uncertainties more than worry over them.

Newest career idea:  clinical psychology.  The whole Ph.D. thing is a bit daunting, but it sounds like a really neat career from what I've read and been told (thanks, Kelly!).  This is still very much in the thinking process, but we'll see what happens.  I would pick the most competitive area of psychology to be interested in, haha.

Art from:  www.art-mind-soul.com/ 003-Yin-Yang.enlarge.html .

Fashion Design Dreams

It's kind of wild, but I keep having these ideas of designs dance through my head. I've kind of stopped trying to sketch them all out, although I really should document them.

For a while I steered away from the option of a career in something like fashion design (or advertising or sales or...) because I thought that it was a bit superficial and knew I wanted a career in which I directly helped people every day. This still resonates as true at some level, but I see also how I could be really cut out for a career in fashion design or another related field:

~I love merging creativity with function (I love using my creativity, period!)
~I like being my own boss
~I don't like bringing work home with me but am happy to work overtime at the studio (I don't know if you do or don't bring work home with fashion design)
~I have all these designs floating through my mind and can even create ones with prompts (like using a specific fabric or for a particular purpose)
~I love my job at a fashion retail store
~When I walk through the mall, I will think of ways I could make clothes and purses and shoes and etc. better. Then I wonder why I don't
~I feel like if my heart was really in it, I could achieve whatever I wanted
~Fashion design is more "friendly" to me. It is easy and natural for me to sketch out design ideas and I actually do it, but the thought of picking up a paint brush makes me freeze in fear
~The idea of moving to a fashion mecca like NYC, Paris, or Milan is really exciting and doable for me
~And I've gotten some really great affirmations from people. Several good friends say they could see it really fitting. My roommate hung out with some fashion design students and said that she thought I was a lot like them

People have always said I have my own particular style, and a lot of people complement me about my wardrobe choices. I'm not saying these things to brag, but simply to try to piece together reasons why it would be a great fit for a career.

My 4-year plan looks like this:

Year 1: Take classes in sewing and maybe an Intro to Fashion Design course. Begin work on kick-ass portfolio. Graduate from college.
Year 2: Find a job (perhaps fashion or retail related) and work for a year until Shawn graduates. Maybe take more sewing and design classes. Finish and tweak kick-ass portfolio.
Year 3: Get into a prominent fashion design school like Parsons or FIT and move to NYC.
Year 4: Using my fabulous contacts made at fashion school, land a ridiculously amazing and enjoyable job.

La Moda

Today I really want to become a fashion designer. I'm excited to sign up for sewing classes to better show me if I'm truly into it. I've done sewing before in a fashion design class in high school and loved it. The only thing that frustrated me is that I didn't have the skills to use boundless creativity in my projects. I think I'll maybe get my feet wet with a sewing class this semester and see what happens. I would need to buid up a portfolio and all that jazz if I'm going to apply for schools. Fashion design would be a great way to express my artistic soul and creativity. For some reason, fashion design is far less imposing to me than painting. Already I've designed about 8 different dresses and a purse on paper. Once I get the skills I'd love to make and revamp some fabulous clothes! They have this awesome book at Barnes & Noble about how to spice up thrift store finds. That would be so much fun! Maybe I'll try my hand at it this summer.

I know I jump around from career to career a lot, but I believe this would be a perfect blend of art and practicality. I believe I would have what it takes to go as far as I wanted to into the field, and I love the idea of traveling and working with all kinds of fascinating people. It's fun to dream big and even more fun to achieve your goals!

What do you think about fashion design for me as a career?

Emo Post of the Month:  Beware

I feel raw.  I'm experiencing confusing emotions so strongly and I don't know what to make of it.  It's not PMS, either.  I don't know what's wrong with me, but I feel like I'm living in a constant state of nervous, nagging energy that won't go away.  I feel lost, with no plan that appeals for the future concerning so many areas.  I'm naturally a decision-maker and like to have goals I can work toward, but everything I think of lacks appeal.  Decision deadlines are rapidly approaching and I have no direction.  I feel like a beautiful bird with her wing feathers plucked.  I feel that it's so hard to be the person I want to be.  I think you could do much better than me.  Yet I also feel like I shouldn't have to bend my will to suit you.  I'm beautiful and wonderful and fabulous the way I am and you should appreciate it; love me for who I am.    

I wish I could make all this better, but I don't know how.  It's such a bad way to feel--knowing something needs fixing but you don't know what or how.  I feel like I'm in a meaningless, cruel, teasing maze with no way out.

Working with kids is teaching me so much about life, myself, and people.  

They've taught me to be assertive when I need to be.  Sometimes you really need to be the boss in certain situations.  You have to be to survive.

They've taught me not to care too much about what people think.  Try as I might to prevent this, there will be days when the kids are furious with me, upset, cranky, etc.  I've gotten to the point where I don't really care.  Of course I want them to be happy, but I don't take it personally when they take out their anger/crankiness on me.  I know it's bound to happen.  This makes me think I should go easier on adults, too, and not take things adults do so personally.

Kids have taught me that even a bad day has lots of good in it, and vice versa.  There are always highlights to even the worst day.  You have to focus on the highlights to stave off disenchantment at the least and at the worst, depression.  This is so true of life, yet perhaps the highlights aren't always as clear as they are in a classroom.

I've learned that I probably don't want to work with kids again.  I think I might prefer the older crowd more.  While I would consider my work right now a generally positive experience, I'm seriously wondering whether I want to sign up to do it again.  I think that if you have to ask yourself the question of whether or not you should be working with kids, if you have to think about it for any length of time, the answer is probably no.  I have to think about it a lot.  Where does that lead me?  Maybe to grad school for Spanish or Fashion Design school or something else to do with Deaf Education or some office job I don't know I'm in love with yet.  I guess I'm still trying to figure out whether or not I love teaching or if something else is better for me.

Sometimes it is a complete surprise where life leads us.

Would it be weird to you for a tattoo artist to have no tattoos?  There's this odd, if not secuestered goth, part of me that secretly wants to be a tattoo artist.  If you were getting a tattoo, would you trust a little, innocent, American pie, unpainted blondie to tattoo you?

At least I bet they get paid better than teachers!

A few other jobs that appeal right now:

1. Art professor

2. Caricature artist

3. Children's book illustrators (and maybe even writer)

4. Writer

5. Marine or rainforest biologist

6. Life coach

7. Psychic (if you can actually develop these abilities)

What are your top 8 most fascinating jobs right now?

God, sometimes I wonder if I should just cut the shit and become a career counselor, haha.  : )

Do you ever feel like no job appeals?  Like instead of working you want to just go dance around in a sunny, flower-filled field?  This is a weird way for me to feel, because usually I can think of all kinds of careers I'd love to do.  (I think I obsess WAY to much about careers, by the way.)  But at the end of the day, I think it'll feel like just a job, and it will feel mundane, and I will have visions of driving right past work into the horizon, never looking back.  

With observing a classroom, I think I've found all the reasons why I shouldn't be a teacher (I'm not assertive enough, sometimes kids jar me, I don't have the best classroom management skills, I hate waking up early, I don't like to be responsible of groups of people's well-being, I hate all the work you have to do outside of school for planning...).  But it feels like most of the good reasons of why I went into it just haven't shown up in my practicum experience.  This isn't anybody's fault.  It's just how I feel.  Part of me wonders if I'm expecting too much or if this is a product of stress, as I tend to get this way at the end of the semester.  But I had this glowing excitement going into this semester that the bottom just fell out of the first few days of practicum, and the disillusionment has stuck ever since then.  Maybe this age group isn't the best for me.  I've always thought I'd be best teaching college kids, but I'm not going to school for the things I'd want to teach college kids.  I think I would either want to be a professor of art or anthropology.

I could go on and on about all this for hours.  Sigh.  Life's complexities are often absolutely mind-boggling.

In search of the elusive "chic spot"...

A new place in town has opened that I believe would fully qualify as a "chic spot."  (!!!!)  In the past I have resisted applying to several of my own favorite "chic spots" for fear that being there so often would take away a bit of their chicness.  You obviously don't want to go hang out with your friends at the place you work.  But this place seems to be exactly the kind of place I'm looking for:  sells drinks (you make better tips this way), but also sells food (keeps the place from attracting large numbers of ravaging drunk people), and has a fun, chic atmosphere and friendly, personable staff that I can easily become friends with.  I'm not sure if the last one about atmosphere is true, but judging from the place it's located, I could see this being my ideal kind of place to work.  Another perk of working there would be that it is only open part of the week, so it would leave me with plenty of time for classes.  Wish me luck, friends, as I go to scope it out today!  : D

I've been thinking about the course of my life for the next 3 years a lot lately.  It's funny--over the last 4 months my plans have changed from wanting to be done with grad school and teaching deaf kids to wanting to get my doctoral degree in anthropology to wanting to be a zoologist to, today, if I had to choose what would happen in the next 3 years, it would go something like this:

Year 1:  Graduate.  Throw all those damn teacher certification classes to the wind and take art and French and maybe anthropology classes.  Find a job at a chic spot.

Year 2:  Wait for Shawn to graduate.  Save as much money as possible.  Take tons of art and French classes.  Research moving to France.  Keep trucking at aforementioned "chic spot" and/or find better-paying interim job.

Year 3:  Move with Shawn to France, landing a job with an environmental protection agency.  Find a fabulous art teacher or go to a top notch art school in the evenings.  Travel as much as possible in free moments.  

What's your dream 3-year plan?