…. when it comes to choosing a career path, life is like the Cheesecake Factory. Most people go to the Cheesecake Factory for its cheesecake, but what I remember most about my first dining experience there was not the cheesecake, but the menu. This is no ordinary menu. It is spiral bound. There are 167 food items to choose from and that’s not including cheesecake. When they handed me the menu, I felt like I needed an hour just to read through my options.
How was I supposed to pick just one? Should I have what everyone else was having? Even if I questioned the waiter incessantly before deciding, how would I know I was choosing the right thing? When the food arrived, everyone else’s decisions looked better than mine. What was in front of me, now that it was mine, didn’t seem that appetizing. Who knew dinner could be this challenging just because of so many options!
Do you get the analogy? The twenty-something experience is full of limitless choices with no guarantees and constant opportunities for comparison to everyone else. Today’s young adults have been exposed to an expansive life: the experience of other cultures, endless entertainment, and new forms of technology have made possibilities seem limitless. New businesses, new career paths, and new entrepreneurs keep multiplying. Yet as options have expanded, so have anxiety and indecision. TOO much possibility has become paralyzing. “You can do and be anything you want” has become more of a pressure-cooker expectation than motivational advice.
So what’s a twenty something to do?
You don’t have to read the entire menu …
*photo using Canon G11 @ Satoo
*Article taken from :
“For Twenty Somethings, Life Is Like the Cheesecake Factory
By Christine Hassler, author of The 20 Something Manifesto”
