When I was younger, I can always remember when people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I always said: “I want to be a nurse." That was my safe answer, because I never was qualified to be able to answer that question. Then, when I was 18 years old and expected to choose my career path I would be on for the rest of my life, I gave the same answer. I became a Certified Nursing Assistant, and I was good at it. The reality of it was, I was exhausted with the job, and with the career field, not because of the field, but because I hated it.
It was then when I began to realize I needed to be realistic in what I want to do. Becoming a teacher had ran through my head on numerous occasions, but I always swept the idea under the rug, why? First, If you hadn’t realized, teachers don’t make a lot of money. They give more hours than the pay is worth, so who in their right mind would want to do that? Second, I was surrounded by teachers, and high school all the time and that was the last place I wanted to end up. Third, I thought that becoming a teacher meant I was settling for something less than extraordinary, that I wouldn’t be able to change the world in that medium.
It wasn’t until I was a sophomore in college and had already changed my major twice until I realized that teaching actually was where I should be. When I came to this realization, it was like a giant slap in the face. I had looked at my High School English teacher for four consecutive years, thinking “I want to be like her.” Not even realizing that being an English teacher was a huge part of being like her. That being like her meant I maybe I wasn’t making the most money, but what I get from the job is worth more than money. Being like her meant that after High School, I would miss the atmosphere, and coming back wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Being like her meant that I would be able to change lives, just as she changed mine.
I was born to be a teacher, but I refused it for as long as I could. Now that I have had a major wakeup call, and I’m living realistically, becoming a teacher is the best decision I could have made. If you had asked me when I had turned 18 what I wanted to be, becoming a teacher would be the last thing on my list. I never had the drive or the spirit for it since I was a child, but now the tables have turned. I strongly believe that all of my life I was born to be a teacher, it just took a little longer to dig it out of me.
