Why "Finding Your Thing" In School Is So Difficult

Are you trying to figure out what you REALLY want to do with your life? If you are not thrilled with your classes and extracurricular activities, it is easy to feel clueless about what you excel at.

You are not alone. Millions of students graduate from high school, go to college, and get their degree without ever figuring out what they REALLY want to be when they grow up. Yeah, some have a vague idea and others settle for majoring in their favorite subject. But few can tell you exactly what they want to do for a living and have a plan for making their dream job a reality.

So why is it so hard to find your thing while you are still in school? It would seem that school would be the perfect place to discover what you love and start developing the skills and knowledge you need to do well in your chosen profession. In fact, many parents assume that is what their kids are doing all day in high school and college. But the reality is much different.

Based on our experience ...

1 - It is unlikely you will find "your thing" in high school. Schools were never designed to help you find a profession. That was traditionally supplied by your family and life situation. In the Middle Ages, whatever you were born (a serf, a knight, or a king) that became your profession. So schools, when they became wide spread, focused on teaching the basics everyone needed to learn -- how to read, write, work with numbers and reason. Colleges were established to teach noblemen the literary arts and create centers of knowledge. As modern schools evolved, they focused on transferring the basic knowledge every member of society and citizen needed to know.

Today, schools and teachers are overwhelmed with teaching an ever growing list of academic subjects and basic life skills. There is little time leftover to cover career planning and provide a working knowledge of the business world. Career days and counseling just scratch the surface of the career options out there and often focus more on choosing your next school than on finding "your thing". Schools just were not designed to help you find a cool career.

But don't just take our word for it. See if this holds true for you and your school. Ask yourself the following questions:

How many people graduating from your school have found their "thing"?
If they did find it, how many have a clear, solid idea and how many had only a vague dream?
Did any have a detailed plan for how they would create their future life and career?
Or did most just assume they would go to college or a vocational school and develop the plan there?
Did your parents and older siblings find their thing in high school or college?
Did most of the people they went to school with figure it out there?

2 - Your parents and teachers will probably not be much help in finding "your thing". Unless your parents have found their own thing, or are trained in spotting and nurturing potential -- they may not be able to give you much practical help.

Finding your potential is like teaching someone how to ride a bike or tie their shoes. It is almost impossible to teach someone else if you can't do it yourself. Many parents, teachers and mentors were never taught how to discover their own potential, and so lack the skills, knowledge and insight they need to help you find yours. Often the few that did figure it out feel it was more a matter of chance or luck, and so are often not able to give you much guidance.

And let's face it. Your parents are busy running around at work all day and your teachers see between 30 to 300 students a day. So unless someone makes spotting your potential a high priority, you may hear more about your curfew and how well you are doing in class than how to find the work you love.

So, see if this is true for your parents and teachers.

Have they found their thing or bliss and are they following it?
If so, can they tell you how they did it?
If not, are they still looking or have they given up trying to find it?
If they have found theirs, can they tell you how to find yours?

3 - If you do not find "your thing" in college, you will probably choose your major and profession based on the classes you liked. This is what happens to many students -- they use their classes to decide what they like and don't like and choose a major based on the classes they got the best grades in. We think this makes as much sense as shopping for souvenirs while your cruise ship steams out of port -- you are getting left behind and you do not even know it. Every year, college career counselors are swamped with students who have to choose a major and do not know which one to choose. Or trying to figure out, now that they are ready to graduate, what jobs their degree qualifies them to apply for.

Using classes to window shop for a career is not, in our opinion, a smart move. Classes assignments often bear little resemblance to how you spend your 40 hour a week on the job. Just ask a few recent graduates how much their job differs from college life and what they studied in school.

So, see if this question holds true for the adults around you.

How did most of the adults you know choose their college major and profession or trade?
Are most of them happy with their choice?
Which do they most forward to -- Monday morning or the weekend?

Now look ahead in time.

Question: What happens if your school never offers a class that you love? What if no one spots your gifts and talents?

Question: How are you going to choose a career if you have not discovered your thing in life?

4 - Unless you find what you love, you will probably play it safe and follow the path of your parents or your generation. If you do not consciously choose to find and develop your thing in life, you will probably follow in the footsteps of those around you. Why? Because it feels safer and more comfortable to follow the known paths of those around you than to strike out into the unknown. Plus, some gifts and talents are genetically based and passed down the generations.

If you want to end up where your parents are or your generation is heading -- then staying on the same path makes sense. If you want to blaze your own trail into the unknown, then you are going to need skills and knowledge to map out your own path in life. Unfortunately, these skill are not taught in most schools.

So, take a moment and think about this.

Question: First, do you like where your parents and relatives ended up? Do you want the same kind of life?

Question: Second, do you like where your generation is going and do you want to be part of the crowd?

(Both of these are serious questions and there is no right or wrong answer. If your parents are doing what they love and are living an extraordinary life - by all means follow in their footsteps! The same thing applies to your generation -- if the herd is going in the right direction for you, keep up with the pack!)

So What Can You Do If You Want To Find Your Thing?

From our experience, the first step is taking responsibility for finding your thing. No one else can do it for you, although your parents and teachers can help. In fact, once you have some clear ideas, your parents, teachers, career counselors and life coaches can focus on giving you the things they are best at -- support, advice and opportunities.

The second step is finding a process that will help you quickly figure our what "your thing" is and what you really want to be when you grow up. And that is where this web site and our tools come in.

We want to share with everyone how to find their potential (aka their thing or bliss). So we outline our ten step process and give detailed information about how to discover what you love to do (aka your dream job, career or business).

If you take the time to explore our site, you can figure out the work you love using the online information we provide. That is our gift to the world and donations support our web site. For those who would like some more help with the process, we are publishing a series of tools to walk you through each of the ten steps.

The Next Step

You can take the second step by reading about ...

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Why "Finding Your Thing" In School Is So Difficult

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