I'll admit that I thought the quiz was a little silly while I took it. The questions were all would you rather be an (a) or a (b) - type things with a few questions about how you prefer to act/react when your peers don't accept your ideas or when a discussion is taking place. Nothing that would lead me to make a biased answer based on my conceptions of what a sensible person should act like. Consequently, I thought I was pretty honest with myself while filling the quiz out. Here's the thing. The quiz results came up, complete with character analysis and list of potential careers; and my heart sank a little when I didn't see "doctor" on the it. My second choice, (I'm a psychology major), was on it, as were a few other things that I have vaguely considered which I find interesting but doubt that I have any actual talent for (Actor, Journalist/Writer . . .that sort of thing), and a few childhood fantasies (Archaeologist). But not Doctor. Why would I make plans for four years of extra, very difficult (and very expensive!!) education for a career that apparently doesn't fit my personality? I started thinking yet again (I've been doing this a lot the past few months), about all the times my parents and older siblings have recently asked if I'm sure that this is what I want.
Of course, I went back and re - read the character analysis because obviously, something in there must have been wrong. Never mind that it seemed to fit the first time I skimmed through it. I must have missed something. Suddenly, "preferring to work in an environment with minimum interpretation and unexpected change" sounded a lot more like an insult. Doesn't that make me boring and/or fundamentally lazy and unwilling to meet challenges? ( I would just like to add at this point that this proves the quiz and its results are B.S.. Minimum interpretation?!! Clearly, whoever made this thing up has never observed a diagnosis - clinical or psychological). Other than that part, everything else seemed to fit, but their analysis also sounded to me like the kind of person a doctor would need to be. I mean research - oriented and structured? Sounds like any medical professional I ever met. So I read through the list again. Carefully. And there it was, right above professor and psychologist: PHYSICIAN. Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh. The surge of relief cannot be described concisely enough to fit the time frame I am working in. A minute after that I felt just a little amused with myself. None of the questions in this quiz could possibly be valid measures of personality, so why was I even tempted to rethink my career choices based on it? Of course this made of think of how easy it is to be swayed by the world and just how important it is to protect against that. The end result being that I remembered this post and this poem. I've been trying to figure out who/what I want to be when I grow up. I think this is it (at least some of it):
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!**
- Rudyard Kipling
**Replace with: a Woman, my daughter; an Adult, my child; Complete; my searching-pre-op offspring. Whatever it takes.
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