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What’s next: study or not?
Written by Sophie on Thursday, August 31, 2006
Sean kind of pushed me back into one of my endless "worrying" sessions. He told me I should go back to study. So far studying hasn’t been that successful for me. The first time I was doing nursing and I was told to quit ‘cuz my hands were too shaky. The second time I was studying science, I wanted to major in biology and they made me do chemistry and physics. I was in way over my head, I’d never done that sort of stuff at school, and another tutor told me to quit. I left that course for a totally different reason though.
Edward’s anxiety about wasting
his life in a dead end job soon
disappeared once his mind
went numb
We’ll just call her, the reason, the "evil landlady". She harassed me. She considered it her personal right to go through all my personal business. She was Chinese and most of my flatmates were Chinese. They didn’t think I had that much of a culture and therefore had to do everything their way. I got severely depressed. I didn’t wanna go to uni. I just hid in my room, even then she would come in, I wasn’t safe anywhere. The situation got so bad one of my guy friends got involved. That went terribly; he came out of it thinking I’d mislead him. Ultimately I withdrew from uni and my parents had to come and rescue me. I’ve been working/looking for work ever since. I don’t want to live with anyone else. I guess I’m scared of going back to uni ‘cuz it’d mean I’d have to live with other people again (financially living on my own would be too tough). And then there’s the fear that I will make another bad decision. What if I choose a course that doesn’t work again? What if I can’t cut it, what if I waste more money?
I’ve managed to get a temporary job; hopefully I’ll be able to start using my savings account with this job. I’m stuck between decisions. Should I use the saved money to risk going back to study? Or should I use that money to buy that brand new wheelchair that I’ve been drooling over for months? Or should I use the money to go on that holiday I’ve been wanting in the US? Common sense tells me to go study. Then I’d be able to get a better job and save for the wheelchair and holiday faster, but I’m so scared that study will be a flop and my money will go down the drain.
I guess a fear like this is something that I should just face. Depression sure makes it hard to face. I have a better grasp of myself now; maybe going to a careers councillor would be more successful this time. But then there’s always than little voice in my head that’s telling me "what if it all goes wrong". I would be happy just having a desk job, sitting at a computer all day, but even those jobs need qualifications these days. You can’t get into a job with just skills; you need a piece of paper to back you up. Should I take a computer type course? Or should I go for something like Occupational Therapy. That’s a field I’m definitely interested in, I don’t know if I can actually do OT from a wheelchair, and the course is only run in two places in NZ, drat that. I thought about doing a web design course but Sean tells me it isn’t worth it. Time will tell, I’ll probably go back to study, but probably only after a whole heap of moaning about it.
The cartoon was added by Sean, as a side comment, and was not selected by Sophie.
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7 Comments
2 On 31 August, 2006, Sophie said:
cmon, practise what you preach, stop your whinging :P
I didn’t mean that you told me to do it, you get my drift, you “suggested” I do it.
Push back. Heaven help you, girl, if you let people push you around now, they will never stop.
What do you want to do? What do you think will matter most to you in five months? In five years? Even scarier, fifteen years? Yes, they will happen.
Follow it through logically - if you keep on doing what you’re doing now, what’s the logical result in five years?
4 On 1 September, 2006, Sophie said:
I honestly don’t know what I want to do in 5 years beyond wheeling in a nice new wheelchair, preferably after getting an SCI. There are lots of things I have my finger dipped into but at this point I don’t know which one to persue.
Pick one. Go back to the one that most appealed to you in childhood. Take it. Master it.
Here’s a little exercise for you to do - take a piece of paper and write your current age on one line. Now on each line under that, add one. Say to yourself, someday, I will be thirty years old…I will be thirty five years old…I will be fifty years old.
If you dawdle, if you can’t make up your mind, if you cannot make a stand now, you will one day be fifty-one years old, with no real home, with no profession, with no life except a chair. You will feel just as friendless and poor unless you start to do something about it now. Right now.
You must put a stake in the ground. It’s your life. Do you get it? It’s your LIFE. This is all you get. If you don’t use it, you’ll waste it. It’s no one else’s. It’s not your mother’s or father’s. It’s yours. Own it. Use it. Fill it up.
When you choose, you cannot make a wrong decision. You can’t. But you must choose.
6 On 2 September, 2006, Sean said:
At the risk of making it seem like we’re picking on you (which maybe we are, but because we care for you), I have to ask:
What if you were a para?
What then? What would you do with yourself? Sit around all day and think ‘Oh good, I’m a para’? Have you considered that you just might actually get your wish? And if getting a job as an unskilled, unqualified non-disabled person is tough, getting a job as an unskilled, unqualified disabled person is next to impossible.
7 On 2 September, 2006, Sophie said:
For a while I entertained the idea of doing a computer degree at the local polytech…I didn’t know how I’d do in programming so I kinda shelved the idea. To be honest I’d be more than happy if I ended up with some computery job for the rest of my life.
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1 On 31 August, 2006, Sean said:
FWIW, I did not tell Sophie she should go back to school. I don\’t tell people they should do something or not. I merely pointed out that unskilled and unqualified people are unlikely to find long term, sustainable jobs that pay a half-decent wage, and in which they are going to be happy. And it\’s not when you turn 35 or 40, or 45 that you are at your best in terms of studying…
And Sophie, if you know that in the end you\’ll just go back to school, why not bypass the whinging? :)
Yes, it\’s scary. Very. I know. As they say: \”Feel the fear and to it anyway\” ;)