Tuesday, March 20, 2007 | by nathan

breaking a promise to myself

I know I said I wouldn’t think about it until I graduate, but I have a lot of time to think this week, as I am on spring break - which means little when you work 27 hours a week at another job - but I have come to two very important conclusions about any future education attempts I might undertake. They are as follows:

1) I will never again attempt another degree just because I think it would be useful to me professionally. What does this mean? Never, ever again will I expect education to transform my current professional unhappiness. Luckily at the moment I am not professionally unhappy - at least not in the sense that I hate my chosen field - and so this is not a problem. I do not, however, want to spend the next thirty years of my life working at a desk job just to pay the bills. If ever I return to school, it will have to be because SCHOOL is what I want to be doing for the foreseeable future, not because I think it will help me make more money or rocket me up the career ladder. People at work ask me all the time if I’ve considered law school. Right after I tell them the next bus for Hell is leaving in ten minutes and that they should be on it, I tell them that while I would probably love law school, I have no desire to practice law or to undertake any of the myriad of careers one can have with a J.D. If I go to law school - or divinity school, or go get a Ph.D. - it will be because I want to be taking classes, teaching undergrads, researching, writing papers, and staying up late into the night reading. It will not be because I think it would be cool, one day, to be a college professor or ACLU lawyer or whatever.

2) I will not undertake more education until I have whittled my current student debt down to 0. Once I graduate, provided I get a job I like, I can have this done in a few years according to the plan I have made for myself. I am willing to put off more school until this is done, because right now I have a very large number hanging over my head, and I don’t like having it there, and I REALLY don’t like the thought of it getting any bigger. Also, the next time I am a student, if ever, I do not want to feel pressure to work as much as I work right now, and even though I could have my student loans deferred, I’d just as soon not even have to think about it. Also, after a few years working in my current field I should have a good sense of whether or not I want to continue on course or return to school. No decisions will be made rashly, and that is A Good Thing.

For now, I have a lot of homework, work, and thesis to catch up on, so I’ll leave you with that.