Every single one of us has probably thought about what they wanted to do with their life. In most cases, the answer is not obvious right off the bat, but talking to people with first-hand experience can help with feeling overwhelemed. After all, all succesful people were anxious teenagers once.
The first person I talked to is my dad. He initially wanted to be a physicist, but when he was choosing his career, all of the good physicists used to get taken to Russia to work on nuclear weapons. At least thats what he told me, but I think it sounds about right. He struggled for a while, but one night, he was chopping some wood, accidentally chopped his finger off, and was so fascinated by how they reattached it, he decided to become a surgeon. He then went on to study medicine, got his degree, and started working in the Zvolen hospital. He worked there as a general surgeon for exactly twenty years before he was offered a job at a private clinic, where he specialized and only works as a vascular surgeon to this day. He also started working as an emergency call center supervisor at the same time, but he quit when he got promoted to chief of surgery at said private clinic. He´s also very creative, and has always had a side business or two going on for as long as I can remember. He told me that what he loves the most about his job is getting to help people, and what he hates the most is the tedious bureaucracy.
My uncle has also had a plethora of jobs. He got a degree in geology, and ran away to Australia in 1989, just three months before the revolution. He started working as a geologist, mostly doing the dirty work (a.k.a being stuck in the bleak, uninhabited desert most of the time), but he loved the adventure of it. Plus, he has hundereds of stories to tell at family get-togethers. My favourite would have to be this one: As a geologist, you have to travel quite a lot, sometimes during the night. Sometimes in a helicopter. Obviously, my uncle made sure that his pilot knew how to fly in the dark. The pilot told him he sure could. I think you can see where I´m going with this. As soon as it got dark, the pilot turned his whole control panel off, allegedly being able to rely on his senses better. This resulted in complete, pitch-black darkness. Imagine being crammed in a tiny little helicopter going about 170 km/h, not knowing where´s up and where´s down. Now, this peculiar tactic worked. For about two minutes. Then, surprise surprise, the pilot started panicking. My uncle was absolutely mortified to say the least. But despite that, if he wanted to land in one piece, he had to calm the pilot down. Who, mind you, was actively hyperventilating at this point. After my uncle convinced him everything is going to be okay (even though he wasn’t that sure himself), the pilot came to his senses, threw a map and a flashlight at my uncle, and told him to navigate. And by some unfanthomable miracle, the pilot managed to execute a safe emergency landing. My uncle is not too fond of helicopters to this day though. Later on, (and possibly unrelated to the helicopter incident), my uncle discovered a passion for business, got a degree, and is a stockbroker working with retirement funds now.
As far as advice goes, both of them agreed that you shouldn’t be afraid of trying new things, and know that it´s never too late to do what you love. They also both strongly encourage young people to study computer science, because that’s obviously where the future is heading. But most importantly, do something that’s gonna make waking up at 6am for the majority of your life worth it and enjoyable.
Natália Schwartzová I.A
