In the third book of Daniel Quinn's Ishmael series, Ishmael tells Julie (the book's protagonist) the story of Jeffrey. He was an intelligent young man who "couldn't figure out what to do with himself." He was good at a variety of things, but didn't really want to turn any of them into a set career path. His friends and family had plenty of suggestions, but none of them really appealed to him. "He just looked at the world that was on offer to him and couldn't see a single thing in it worth having. His friends kept saying to him, "Look, you can't go on this way. You've got too much going for you. You've just got to get some ambition, got to find something you want to do with your life!'" Ishmael's point was that there are plenty of people like Jeffrey who aren't really attracted to anything in the "Taker" world of work. Most people take crummy jobs only to avoid starvation, and that's how civilization works.
I very much relate to Jeffrey. I'm not content "building someone else's pyramid," and I would love more than anything to find a way to live beyond destructive cultures. Sometimes I wonder if I even have a niche to be discovered. But I don't want to end up like Jeffrey... who saw no way out and ultimately waded into a lake and drowned himself.
The list of things I've wanted to be when I "grew up" is long and varied, including doctor, prima ballerina, skating coach, paleontologist, zoo keeper, newspaper reporter, artist, marine biologist, teacher, psychologist, and nutritionist. Now I'm convinced that I simply will never "grow up." (Call it Peter Pan syndrome, or call it I find reading Daniel Quinn and Derrick Jensen very validating and I don't want to settle for the Taker definition of "normalcy.") But until I can figure out a way to live completely beyond the dominant/destructive/Taker culture (whatever you wish to call it), there's still a need to find a vocation which will pay the bills.
Do What You Are suggests that based on my personality type (Introverted INtuitive Feeling Perceptive, or INFP --- alternately heard called the Healer, the Dreamer, and the Romantic), I'd be best as a writer, counselor, teacher (especially of English, Humanities, or Fine Arts), psychologist or psychiatrist, musician, religious worker, physical therapist, translator or interpreter, librarian, researcher, et cetera. All of these seem like great ideas, and when friends and family try to help out (again, just like Jeffrey), most of their suggestions seem to be in those areas. So what's the problem? The fact that all of these seem like great ideas, but I can't see nailing myself down to just one of them.
Because see, that's another problem: I want to be a generalist in a society where everyone is pushed to be a specialist. True, you can narrow the playing field by looking at what I definitely don't want to do (insurance, prostitution, Walmart, et cetera). But I'll be damned if there's any one area in which I'd like to specialize. A glance at the plethora of books in my personal "library" shows a wide variety of interests: physics, ecology, gender studies, Buddhism, Taoism, indigenous peoples' studies, ecofeminism, linguistics, etymology, Spanish, French, Lithuanian, Japanese, Chinese, botany, art, music, sociology, anthropology, primatology, cooking, psychology, biology, physics, chemistry, archaeology, paleontology, photography, Eastern philosophy, analytic philosophy, nutrition, zoology, just about everything from Abhidharma to zygotes. If you can suggest a field that encompasses every single one of those and more, please tell me, and I will love you forever.
Although...
...and this is really going out on a limb here...
...the way I see it, there is something that all of these fields have in common, and it's something I've been doing all along. Something that's almost too obvious.
I love to write about all of these things. Come to think of it, I love writing about pretty much anything.
But this entry is already far too long... so I'll leave my thoughts on the viability of that dream for another day.
