Psychology is such an innovative and crucial area pertaining to not only individuals but how life itself which piqued my interest in majoring in the field. I was curious to understand the cognitive functions and neurological underpinnings of what made a person the way he or she is. One of the traits close friends and strangers alike recognize about my personality is that I am empathic and a people's person. Whenever my friends have problems or are going through a difficult time in their life, I enjoy listening to their stories and just being there in the moment with them.
I believe counseling and therapy of the mind can come from something as simple as knowing one’s voice is heard and is genuinely cared for. When the time came to choose a discipline it made perfect sense in my mind to choose psychology as my major. As a recently graduated college student, it is easy to reminisce about the fear and excitement that came with entering college for the first time. As I submitted my intent to graduate in May to George Mason University months ago, I was reminded of memories from the first time I ever graduated.
Weeks before my kindergarten graduation, my teacher told us all to think as hard and as meticulously as a five-year-old could and asked us what we wanted to be when we got older. After a ragtag group of kindergarteners carefully contemplated our futures, she told us we would be going on stage on and announcing what our career goals were as we received our pretend diplomas from the school principal.
That evening, I told my parents that I wanted to be a teacher so I could help other children learn how to read books and count. I wanted to help children better understand if they had difficulty with the material or even simply lend a helping hand. I think even as a young child I had a heart for other people and their satisfaction in life.
It is my privilege to have learned such an empowering discipline like psychology through higher education. Psychology is the study of the human mind and behavior, therefore, many of the classes proposed questions ranging from “What is life?” to “How we can better our satisfaction in life?” and the ability to actually conduct research studies to further our knowledge of the cognitive aspects of ourselves.
It is amazing how much I have learned in such a short amount of time through being at a university that has provided me with endless resources, wonderful professors and a healthy campus full of other students who are just as engaged in their field of study as I am in mine. Many children, unfortunately, will never be able to have the proper schooling they deserve due to multiple environmental factors that are out of their control. Statistics show the reason why many of the children are not able to receive higher education is because they give up working hard in school due to extraneous factors that may be going on.
I would be honored to be able to further my studies in Psychology to become a middle school or high school psychologist or school counselor to have a hand in providing positive encouragements to children who may not be receiving it from anywhere else. Every child deserves to be able to find a passion that causes excitement that studying is not a chore anymore, and I strongly believe higher education is the pathway to doing so. I believe once you find a purpose in what you do, and all you do and work hard to pursue it, it is returned with peace and extreme satisfaction in life and all that comes with it.
