Together on Tuesday: The Pursuit of Happiness

Happy Tuesday, Everyone! 

Today's Topic: According to the Happiness Project, some people theorize we are happiest doing what we loved when we were kids, say age 10. So…what were you doing at age 10 that you LOVED? Are you doing that now? If so, how, and how does it impact your daily happiness? If not, how can you bring some of that back into your life?

When I first read this topic, I was very interested in the idea...but then I saw it...age 10, of all years of my life, it had to ask me to go back to age 10.  Of all years to think about writing about what made me happy as a youngster, age 10 is certainly the most complicated year for me.  Age 10 was the year that my parents separated, so when I think back to that particular year, all of my memories revolve around this major turning point in my family's history.  We went from being a family of four under one roof to being three under one roof (my sister and I lived with our Mom) and then one, my dad, living seperately under another one.  The mathematical ramifications of maintaining two separate homes meant that we went from living in a house with a large yard to an apartment with a very small yard.  It also meant that we would be moving across town from our friend Kristal, the girl that we grew up across the street from - who I had played with literally every single day since around age five.  So, needless to say, I have really had to think long and hard just to really even remember anything from that year besides the split - let alone find something from that year that made me happy enough to carry into adulthood!  But after thinking about the topic many, many times, I figure there has to be something that made me happy that year...I just have to remember it. 

It seems that by age 10 I probably already had decided that I wanted to be a teacher.  I am sure at that age I had not yet decided on the specifics like what grade, subject, etc...  But I am SURE that I already wanted to be a teacher by that age. 

Now...for the analysis...time to break down this dreamy notion of life that my 10 year-old self imagined.  Being a teacher.  Did I do this?  Well...yes AND no.  I did it...but I don't do it now.  I did get my undergraduate degree in teaching.  By college, I had decided to go for Secondary English Education.  I wanted to be a Middle or High School English teacher.  I did every last bit of coursework, (barely) survived Student Teaching, graduated from IU with my Bachelor's of Science in Education, and got my Indiana State Teacher's License.  I was a December graduate from IU, so that left me with the second half of a school year to...do...something before they really started hiring for the following school year, so I worked as a substitute teacher for the rest of that school year, and eventually was brought in to finish the school year for a Middle School English teacher that was on maternity leave.  And....CUT!  That is sort of where my teaching career ended.  During my Student Teaching (and then further confirmed when I was teaching out in the schools that Spring), I was coming to the realization that this career choice, perhaps, was...wait for it...NOT FOR ME!!  OMG, WHY DID I THINK I WANTED TO SPEND ALL DAY IN A ROOM FULL OF MIDDLE OR HIGH SCHOOLERS...WAS I SMOKING CRACK WHEN I MADE THIS DECISION???!!!  EEEK!!! 

So, after coming to this realization, I started looking for jobs in the business world.  I was VERY fortunate to end up with a company that not only provided me with the PERFECT job, training, and work experience to make the career transition from teaching to the business world - but, they also gave me the opportunity to get my MBA and they would pay for it.  This was a HUGE turning point for me career-wise.  Once I completed my MBA program, I was no longer just a girl with a teaching degree who decided to do something else, I was a girl with a Master's Degree in Business!  This has opened many, many doors for me.  This sort of provided a springboard so-to-speak for me to get to the job I have today.  As I was going through the MBA program, my Manager at the time and I decided for me to do some budget analysis type work.  I loved it.  I absolutely loved it.  So, I sort of became the 'keeper of the department budgets'.  Then after we moved to Louisville, I started working at my current company in the Portfolio Accounting department (under the supervision of fellow Together on Tuesday blogger Tish!).  Again, this was another amazing opportunity that provided me with valuable work experience.  From there, I went on to become a Compliance Officer within the company, which - was probably not the best fit of a job for me, but again, provided me with more new skills and training, and more opportunities.  In that job, I found that I really liked doing analytical type work.  I had several quarterly projects where I would take massive amounts of data, run different types of analysis, and then churn out very useful data that we could actually use for risk analysis.  As it tuns out, I also had a knack for the analytical data crunching.  Eventually, my current job as a Reporting Analyst - again with the same company - came up and it seems to be an absolute perfect fit for me.  I get am able to put to use a really great combination of the analytical data crunching, as well as the reporting of finacial data.  So, it has really provided a unique opportunity for me to have a job that rolls up and allows me to work on many of the different aspects that I found that I really loved in other jobs that I've had. 

So now that I have taken you on this really long, seemingly off-topic, tangent about all my past jobs you are probably wondering...is there anything  from that age even remotely relevant to her life now??...because it all seems to have gone polar opposite from where it started.  I am going to say YES...what??  You are reading it right now!  Remember, what type of teacher I thought I wanted to be?  RIGHT!  You had probably forgotten about that detail in all my subsequent ramblings!  I decided to teach English becaused I was good at it.  I enjoyed reading, and I LOVED writing.  See???  You didn't think I was going to get there did you??!!  Joining the Together on Tuesday blog group has given me a wonderful opportunity to get back to doing something that I have always enjoyed.  Plus, with the added bonus of having a group of wonderful ladies to get to write with, share ideas, and get to one another know better.  

And, after putting all of this down, and then circling back around to age 10 being the year that my parents seperated, while I would never say that it ever made me happy - I can say in looking back, it did provide the space needed for us to not completely fall apart as a family.  While my parents did separate that year, they never divorced.  Yes, this may seem strange to most of you.  But, the fact is, that even though they decided they could no longer live together, my parents never 'hated' or even, really disliked each other.  They just simply found themselves in a situation where they needed time and space apart from one another and in living apart, it gave them that time and space they needed to repair some of the damage and eventually come back around to being one another's best friend again.  Some time after the separation, they even eventually had standing plans to always have dinner on Friday evenings together - and yes, it was really strange and sometimes difficult trying to explain to my friends - some of whose parents were divorced - that no...my parents do not live together...but no they are not divorced...and no...they don't plan to divorce...oh, and by the way, they have Friday night dinner plans every week.  But, that was my family, and that was what worked for us and living apart was somehow what actually held us together.