Choosing Careers :Where Have You Been, and Where Are You Going?
Choosing Careers :Where Have You Been, and Where Are You Going?
Choosing careers can be difficult so spending a bit of time on career planning is a great idea. It is perhaps not surprising that often people need help in choosing a career. You can go off and conduct some career research and review countless career descriptions but sometimes the most valuable work is thinking about your values and likes and dislikes. Part of developing a good career development plan is to spend some time reflecting on the career choices you have made to date.
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If you think that you have got a “bit of life” behind you it can be quite helpful to have a look at it and see what themes and patterns are running through it. Then you can make some career choices. You can either go on and continue the themes or make some career changes.
“Lifeline” – Activity
Take a large sheet of paper, A3 is best and A4 on its side will work, and draw a long line that will represent your life; straight or curved, it doesn’t matter, although not many of us lead straight forward lives.
Now, on the line mark all the significant events in your life; those events that caused your life to be what it was, the good and the bad. It doesn’t matter where you start; it may be helpful to mark the line into periods of five or ten years. You may want to include significant meetings with people, books you read, decisions, moves you made and so on.
You don’t have to do it all at once, add to it as memories come back to you.
Career Planning Video
Using your own symbols start to analyse your lifeline. Ask yourself and answer these questions:
• Mark those times you remember as being unhappy and the happy times.
• Which experiences happened because you wanted them? Which happened because you felt it was expected of you?
• Which were your good decisions, which not so good?
• Mark the risks you took.
• When did you have major learning experiences?
You can’t change the past; however you can learn from it. What does your lifeline show you?
• Who has been running your life?
• What has been important?
• What patterns do you see?
• What is the theme running through your life?
• What was there that made the bad times bad and the good times good?
• What do you want less of?
• What do you want more of?
• What are you going to do about all this?
Some suggestions for starting.
• Write down your present situation. Include all the important things in your life, present or absent.
• Mark those things you want to be different.
• Describe how you want your life to be. What you want to have in it, what you want to do with it, how you want to be. You can write it down, draw it or extend your lifeline into the future.
The clearer you can be on what your specific career goals and values are, and the more often you think about it and see it in your mind’s eye, the more likely it is to happen.
Here is some questions for you to begin writing out your thoughts.
- Your present career situation:
- Things important in your life/career …present/absent:
- Things you want to be different about your career
- How you want your career and life to be – what/how/etc:
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Great infomation thx
is it an Australian video?