I sat in my marketing class two Thursdays ago feeling totally content because it was the only class left of syllabi week. I was especially happy because I knew that I wouldn’t be switching around my schedule this semester, the way I have in the past after reading over syllabi.
It’s hard to pay attention in the 4PM class that stands between you and the weekend, so I naturally drifted away with whatever thought on my mind seemed most interesting to explore.
So there I was, 22 years old and in New York City writing for a magazine or website.
This time a year ago, I was questioning my journalism major, questioning areas of my personal life, and calling my mom crying about once a week.
When I tell you that I now have a sketch drawn in my mind of what my life will look like after graduation and I am feeling happy in many aspects of my life, it’s a pretty sweet thing.
A lot can change in a year blah blah. That’s a small part of what this post is about; I am writing this because I am no longer lying when someone asks me what I want to do “when I grow up.” My career aspirations will certainly morph into new ones over time, but right now things seem clearer than they have throughout my past two years of college!
To clarify, my dream to move to NYC post graduation and work for a publication that makes me excited to write is not something I came up with in my two hour marketing class. It has been developed over the last year starting with me creating a blog, disliking my classes, disliking the blog, recreating the blog, choosing better classes for this semester, pitching ideas to a campus magazine, etc. All of these dizzying little actions have led to me sitting in my current journalism class feeling EXCITED to do the work and HAPPY in my major.
I want to write for the lifestyle or entertainment section of a magazine or online publication. I want to write about things that excite people the way that the prospects of this career excite me. I want to learn how to write words that leap off the page, even if they are “fluff” journalism pieces about the newest trend. Fluff in one person’s eyes is the sparkle in another’s.
The realization that I don’t have to report hard news and I can instead write about the interests of a particular audience was liberating. If you don’t feel that same sense of liberation, I challenge you to find it and to not let people discourage you from indulging yourself in it.