Faith & Life Inspirational Message

A couple months ago I spent some time with a group of students in the process of discussing various careers.   Part of what was at stake was helping them think about this before they graduate.   Too often a college student thinks that a particular major leads to a special job.   Sometimes this is true.   But more often than not, there is no direct corollary between our major in college and the careers we wind up pursuing.             I am certainly not against a student choosing a major in college.   As a matter of fact, most colleges require that major to graduate.   What I do want to question is the assumption that certain majors lead to certain careers.   It is more involved than that.   And perhaps there are times when luck has a role to play.   What did happen in the discussion provoked me to start thinking about the whole phenomenon.        ...

If the first fundamental human question is “who am I,” surely the second question is “what should I do?”   In most cases these two questions are inextricably tied together.   What happens with one question affects the other one.   However, we can only talk about them one at a time, so this reflection piece gives focus to the question, what should I do?             The first thing to realize in this question is the focus goes on the verb.   In the other question, “who am I,” the focus was on the subject---on “who.”   But in this second question the focus clearly shines on the verb---“do.”   The implication is everyone should do something.   Not doing something is, in effect, doing something, i.e. doing nothing.   This tells me that human beings are essentially designed to be somebody and to do something.   The only questions are who am I as a somebody and what should I do, since I have ...

Recently I spent some time with a group of students in the process of discussing various careers.   Part of what was at stake was helping them think about this before they graduate.   Too often a college student thinks that a particular major leads to a special job.   Sometimes this is true.   But more often than not, there is no direct corollary between our major in college and the careers we wind up pursuing.             I am certainly not against a student choosing a major in college.   As a matter of fact, most colleges require that major to graduate.   What I do want to question is the assumption that certain majors lead to certain careers.   It is more involved than that.   And perhaps there are times when luck has a role to play.   What did happen in the discussion provoked me to start thinking about the whole phenomenon.          ...