You Majored in What? by Katharine Brooks Read Free Book Online

placed her pool-playing activities on her Wandering Map because it was a significant part of her life, but said it was “kind of silly” because she certainly didn’t plan a career as a pool hustler, even though she joked about it always being a good fallback plan. But when she was asked, “What have you learned from playing pool? What do you have to know or understand to be good at it?” she was quick to answer. “You have to think on your feet, you have to strategize constantly—both your own moves and the likely moves of an opponent—you have to stand up to men who think they’re better than you, and you have to hold your own independently in a competition when no one else is rooting for you.” Hmm. Sounds like pool playing is not a bad skill to have. Danielle then began to look at the rest of her map and quickly discovered other areas where she had to think strategically both in her favorite classes and in her summer jobs. She realized that she had a powerful talent she had never appreciated. Danielle is going to start pondering ways to use her strategic thinking in the workplace.
    Although their maps aren’t included, here are two more examples of the knowledge they can uncover.
• Angelina’s map illustrates the challenge of being pulled by two disparate entities—another pendulum attractor. Her mother is Italian and her father is Armenian. Their respective families did not get along particularly well, so Angelina grew up viewing the two families in separate boxes, virtually unrelated to each other. She loved both sides of her family but because of the constant conflict between them, she tended to judge each one based on the standards of the other. After completing her Wandering Map and noting the many family-related activities she had placed on it, she discovered that family influences were strong. She started to think about what she had learned from each side of the family. Both sides had actually encouraged strong, loving ties. From the Armenian side of the family she learned the importance of hard work, of responsibility and keeping your word. From the Italian side of her family she learned the importance of enjoying life, taking time for eating and sharing conversations, and appreciating beauty. She realized that she was a blend of these two cultures and could use the strengths of each in the workplace. Angelina began to feel much stronger and less torn by the differences in her family. She learned to make use of the gifts she had acquired from each and to understand how different cultures could conflict and yet, if given the proper mindset, could learn to value differences and get along. She’s going to think about this newly discovered aspect of herself and see how she might parlay it into a career.
• Rachel discovered that her themes were writing, travel, imagination, ethnography, and enjoying change. Even though writing was a strong theme, she decided she couldn’t be a journalist because she found the structure of journalistic writing too limiting. She prefers the ethnographical style she learned in her anthropology major, which allows creativity and can delve into the unknown and unseen—two themes she finds fascinating. She doesn’t know yet how all this will tie into a career, but she suspects something interesting is just around the corner.
    Congratulations! You’ve now completed the whole Wandering Map process. Did reading about other people’s stories help you? Remember, this map is designed to help you identify key themes, skills, interests, values, and other important aspects of your life, but it is not meant to point you directly to a career. If you find career-related themes at this point, by all means feel free to pursue them. But if you don’t see a career path from your map, don’t worry. You have been mining for gold, and you have already uncovered nuggets even if you aren’t sure how you’ll use them or what their value might be.

    Your Wandering Map is just the start of