Did you know what career you wanted when you were a kid?  I remember hearing friends say they wanted to be teachers and my thought was always: “Yuck, the last thing I want to do is teach when I’m a grown up!  I can’t wait to graduate!”  My favorite parts of school were P.E., music, art, and recess.  Sometimes I liked language arts.  

        At age 17, I had a big shift and decided I loved the positive energy of young children, so I did the unthinkable and decided to become a teacher.  I taught after school, kindergarten, preschool, dance, tutored kids in English and Spanish.  Meanwhile, I juggled managing an apartment complex, occasional choreographing and consulting with a local dance company, parent coaching and between jobs worked the occasional office job planning events, running background checks, and handling data entry.  I haven’t exactly done just one thing.

Can you relate? 

In the “personal” section of your resume, have you ever felt limited in keeping it to just a few hobbies or interests?  If so, hello fellow Multipotentialite.

        I’ve often struggled with this lack of expertise.  On good days I like to think of myself as a renaissance woman.  When I’m not so on top of my emotional A-game, I feel like the “mediocre at lots of things, expert at nothing” type.  

        Having graduated from yoga teacher training 3 days ago and currently having a personal monthly income of approximately $0, it seems like it’s probably time to start bringing in some revenue.  While yoga instruction is definitely something I’m excited to pursue, I have a feeling it’s not the only job I want to pursue.  So a big question: what else and how do I figure that out?

        Tonight I encountered a thoughtful Ted talk by career coach and fellow multipotentialite, Emilie Wapnick, that shed some new light on this consideration.  Emilie encourages people to be honest about who they are and follow their inclinations, whether as a multipotentialite or specialist.  She explains that both are valuable in the workplace.  She offers some much appreciated street cred to those of us who don’t want to pick one job for life.  She explains that this hopping from one place to another creates “Super Powers” of: adaptability, rapid learning, and idea synthesis.

So if you too are wondering: what do I do with my life?!?  Maybe grab a copy of the perennial favorite What Color is Your Parachute? , listen to Emilie Wapnick’s tedtalk, do a little journaling about your skills and interests and see if you find some intriguing parallels that offer a lead or two.

Best of luck to us on our journey.  Cheers!