As a Child, I Dreamed of Becoming…

My answer to this question was simple at first, but I must have thought about it for too long because now it is not.

Several weeks ago, I showed a classroom full of anxious overachievers a TEDTalk by a former NFL player who said that the only way to fail is to set a goal, and at the time it was amusing to watch their jaws drop and to see a mix of emotions play on their faces from humor to confusion to outrage and sometimes even to a sense of resignation, as though they’re saying in their heads, “I knew it.”

My first professional desire was arguably the purest; I wanted to be a marine biologist. Not because I wanted to conduct research, make important discoveries, and change the world, oh no, but because I wanted to swim with dolphins and get paid to do it. Fast forward and simplify: I wanted to swim, and even more so, I wanted to move through water like sea creatures did, like I was flying. What did I want to be when I grew up? Graceful, and weightless.

Well, if that didn’t become a theme.

Anyway, that changed, as it seems to for many, and eventually I decided I wanted to be a doctor. Again, not because I wanted to help people, but this time because I wanted to make a lot of money, and I wanted my parents to be proud.