Written @ 9:29 a.m. on 2007-11-14
My career and my Mom
I took a career test at rocketcareer.com. It told me I should work in construction. You may scoff, but I have always thought that would be cool. Growing up a girl in the upper middle class, this was never even a consideration, but do you know what my best friend does? Construction. She went to school to study sustainable living, and even built her own house.
Here is what the test said about me. Pretty right on, I think.
-------------------------------------------
Creative & Free Form - Your percentile ranking is 90 [What is this?]
You need an artistic or imaginative element in your work in order to find the career that fits. Your powers of visualization are strong, as is your ability to see patterns and trends long before others do. Though you can be impatient with restriction, you need to master the conventions of your art in order to find the structure that gives you true freedom of expression. Express yourself you must, and if you find a career that lets you set your own schedule, so much the better. Your productivity and your enthusiasm go hand in hand, so while others may be content to work for money alone, you won't find the right job till you're in a career that gives you joy.
Practical & Down to Earth - Your percentile ranking is 86
You need work you can touch to feel at home in what you do. Your greatest job satisfaction will come from a hands-on career, whether you deal with plants and animals or machines and tools. Patience, craftsmanship, and the need to see results incline you toward careers that yield tangible results. Ideally, your career will involve movement and physical exertion--whether you're crafting a pot, designing a landscape, or painting a house. If your job keeps you out of an office and in the outdoors, so much the better. At the end of your work day, you need to receive respect and a sense of your growing power to shape the world you live in with your own hands.
Communicative & Empathetic - Your percentile ranking is 56
You need the human connection in your work to feel genuine satisfaction in your career. So, you're a natural for any of the "helping" professions. Whether in intimate one-on-one professions like counseling or nursing or in group-oriented service careers such as non-profit administration or community leadership, you'll be best place in a job that takes advantage of your innate communication skills. A career that puts you in a position to display your social skills is a necessity. You also require work that brings not just money but meaning into your life. Care, compassion, and the genuine willingness to serve incline you to positions of social responsibility. The career that fits is a career that lets you help others who depend on you.
------------------------------------------
I've been having a freak out about "What To Do With My Life", as you know. I quit the training course they were making me do for way too little money. I was sick and couldn't focus, and then thought about the repercutions of not completing the course...and decided I could live with them. They will probably drop me from that client, but I have another client already, and I can always pick up more clients. So, after talking about it with B. to make sure I'm not crazy, I gave them a big FUCK YOU.
I called my mom last night for a little counselling on a life plan. My ex hasn't paid child support since september, and I'm ok for now, but I really need to begin to build a life where his child support is just gravy, not what we need for survival. I layed it all out to her...telesales, budgets, child support...feeling like I've rounded a corner in life by gaining physical custody...
She told me to stick it out with my telesales job until P. is done with kindergarten. I have to be at the school three times a day, and with all the girls have been through, frankly, they need the stability. She told me that she would help me financially if I needed it, and to look at it as one more year of financial misery.
After that, P. will go to school all day, and it will be easy for her to go to an afterschool program for a couple of hours with her sister, if need be, and I can look for something in the 9-5 world. Maybe B. could help with afterschool care. He offered, but I hesitate to expect so much from him. She told me it would be easy to tell employers that I "stayed with my girls until they went to school full-time" instead of explaining my spotty work history.
She said spend this year "finding myself", and figuring out what I truly want to do. She was kind enough to tell me that I can do "anything" because I am smart, creative, responsible and have skills. That endorsement made me feel a lot better. I was feeling more...fat, lazy, poor and depressed.
My mom is The Best. It may be the biggest miracle in my life that my mom became my friend again in 2003. For those of you who don't know, my mother and I really had very little of a relationship when I was a child. She could be abusive, and she definately made herself unavailable. Surviving my father's alcoholism was her number one priority, and parenting fell down the list. Strike that, she was an excellent parent for appearances sake...my homework was signed, my clothes were clean, I was carted to various lessons. She was just Angry with a capital A. Now, as an adult, I can see that she was justified to be so angry, but a kid has no perspective on these things. Her rages often fell upon me. Our house was overflowing with yelling.
In 2003, she promised me that she had changed, and she not only changed...she transformed. She metamorphosed. She and my father both quit drinking in 1998, and it was five more years before I could even tentitively trust them again. My mother has worked so hard to regain my trust. I never made it easy for her. I am really proud of my mom.
Because of her, I don't fear getting older. My mom gets better every year. I wouldn't have survived my divorce without her. She has saved my life innumerable times.
Ok, I'm getting teary.
We have both come a long way.