Life...All these Options!!

Okay...here's my situation...

Right Now: I have a job paying $10/hour - I'll be getting benefits within the next 2-3 months but I don't really like what I do - basically a desk job where I surf the internt literally ALL day...business is slow, but let's just say that there's no chance I'd ever get fired for what I do right now...I both work and live with my dad and this is the driving motivation for doing something new...not that we dont' get along, but you understand...

Possible Plans:
One
I quit my job, sell my car, backpack around Europe and try to discover what I want to do...hopefully find a job there, where I hope to be in the future regardless...

Two
Start application and testing procedures for becoming certified to teach, begin my Masters, move out when I've got enough money from my job saved, after working for a while as a teacher in a high school go for my doctorate and eventually work in a college atmosphere, either teaching or researching...move to Europe when I'm old and gray haired...

Three
Stay where I am, hope I get my benefits, save money, get my Masters, move to Europe and find a job....

Four
Get a new job out of state, and work work work until I can develop a reputation in my field and transfer/move my job overseas....

I'm so confused...anyone who's been in my shoes have some advice?! My passion is cooking, but I don't have the money to go to the Culinary Institue of America and get a degree, which has been my ultimate dream in life...so I'm going to have to settle with doing that on the side and somehow utilizing my BA in Anthropology (minor in German) and do something for a Masters...I just have no clue what to do next, but at 22, I don't want to waste any more time...

[Edited on 9/27/2004 by EnronOutrunHomerun]

YOur in the same sorta situation i'm in... i live in AUS and work a #ty desk job at AUD$20/hour (USD$14).. the money is ok seeing as i have no qualifications and mt job is really cruisy... but i want to study and live overseas and travel.... i live out of home now, but for financial reasons i'm gonna move back in with the folks to save/ pay debts so i can do the things i want in life... I'm 20.

Do you have to go to this cooking institute to be a chef in the USA... here in AUS you could just get an apprenticeship and after 4 years you could be a fully qualified chef...

Life has too many options... but go for what your dream is buddy... you'll regret it if you dont

Originally posted by specialasianX
Life has too many options... but go for what your dream is buddy... you'll regret it if you dont

Yep...that's why I'm worried about doing the wrong thing...but I guess whichever choice I make, it will all come together in the end...

You don't have to attend a culinary school to become a chef...basically the cooking world is split into those who have only on-the-job experience, those who have had an apprencticeship, and those who have had schooling...I've just been stuck on the CIA ever since I visited their New York campus a few years back - but at a little over $100 grand for a 4 year degree when I've already got a BA...just doesn't make too much sense and costs far too much money...

I'm glad to know there's other people out there in the same situation though - probablly more than I could imagine, but sometimes when it comes to making those big descisions, you often think that you're the first person to have to deal with it given all the middle-men in your way...

Hey there. Same situation here, I'm 22 since august, and feel like I have reach a turning point in my life.

PIssed at my job, but have some kind of the same "immunity" you have (works for my ex-brother-in-law, I know I could do basicly anything and not get fired). Pays good, but there's almost no job to do, I count my self lucky when I can do a 30 hours week. And I really want to quit that job, starting to really hate it and it's driving me mad at times.

So the choices for me are either:

1- Going back to school

2- Slaving away at crappy jobs all my life

3- Joining the army

So basicly I've been stuck on that dilema for about 6 months now lol...
Good luck dude. I'd like to advise you on what to do, but I can't even #ing figure out what to do for my self, so...

Originally posted by m0rbid
...I'm 22 since august...

Me too...my BD is on the 14th...

Yeah...I hate knowing that I can pretty much do what I want, b/c I've had enough "real jobs" before that when I'm not doing anything I feel like I should be - that manager-lurking-over-the-back feeling......

We'll all make it through...gotta think positive...just a pre-mid-life crisis....

There is only one place to go. Go forward young man.

Well, if you want to come to Europe, I think its better that you do that while you are young, mainly for 2 reasons:

1. Its easier to find a job while you are young, and its easier to work harder, if necessary, while you are young.

2. If you do not feel good in Europe, its easier to go back home while your young.

I do not know what more I can say, I work for the same company for 12 years and I live 100m from where I work, but because of my laziness I do not think of moving.

Also, I like my work.

Those are some good points...luckily I've lived in Europe before for a little over three years, so I know that's where I want to be...the whole time I was there I missed certain things about the states, but when I returned I could think of nothing for a solid 6 months but of all the more beautiful things there which I had left behind and the small things I missed before were insubstantial...

Obviously, with only a few days having passed after me posting this thread, I still havn't figured one way over another, but as Jonna suggested, whatever I do, it will be carried out in a forward momentum...I'm thinking about taking the teacher certification route, as that seems to be the best option for me right now...

[edit on 9/29/2004 by EnronOutrunHomerun]

Originally posted by EnronOutrunHomerun
I still havn't figured one way over another, but as Jonna suggested, whatever I do, it will be carried out in a forward momentum...I'm thinking about taking the teacher certification route, as that seems to be the best option for me right now...

That is actually what I ment in a round about way. IMHO the best momentum by which to travel forward is in one's younger years. What I mean by this is the older you get, the more security becomes an issue and the less chances you can take. The more you get set in your ways and things become too comfortible to make any drastic changes. The use of the word 'Forward' is more in the sense of evolving to your fullest/happiest with what work you are going to be doing for the rest of your life before you get locked in the thousand things that you need to worry about concerning your future.

I will be thirty in a few months (*tremble*) and I need to be much more concerned with things like: When will my car fall apart and I'll need to buy a new one? When will I finally have enough money to buy a house? Am I saving enough for my retirement? I can't really afford to take a chance like changing my profession nor do I have the energy that I once did. I guess that 30 is around the turning point where one's priorities shift or become clearer for another stage of your life.

Roll the dice. Take the chance that you might find the perfect career/job/work for you or atleast one that is better then the last before your priorities shift and it becomes more problematic to take that chance.