Slamming the breaks on life: My journey to become a teacher (Part 1)

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The @steemiteducation homework a few weeks ago asked people to describe the reason they decided to become a teacher. I knew as soon as I looked at the homework assignment that it was one that I wanted to submit. Now, if I was a better student I might have handed that assignment in on time. I really did mean to have it done on time. I wrote it in my planner and everything. I planned to do it on a Tuesday but something else came up and then one thing led to another and here we are, almost 3 weeks late. Excuses, excuses, excuses. I guess it is a good thing that I am the teacher in this situation.

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In all seriousness though, the journey to me becoming a teacher is a story that I was excited to share. Being a teacher was not part of the original game plan. When I went to university out of high school I was planning on being an accountant. It took me only one semester to realize that being an accountant was not for me. As much as I am a math geek and I love playing with and crunching numbers, I am not the type of person that can sit and work at a desk all day. After my first semester I started switching my classes and instead of getting a degree in accounting I decided to major in marketing. This felt like an avenue where I could use my outgoing personality to my advantage.

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In university, I was able to include extra courses to help me acquire a double major so I graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree majoring in both marketing and human resource management. I set out on my way to a career in who knows what. That is a true statement. I really had no idea what I was going to do now that I had graduated with this degree in commerce. I set out looking for work while I continued working at the restaurant where I had been a waiter during my time in university.

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As I searched for jobs, that to be honest, had zero appeal to me I started to move up the ladder at the restaurant. I was working more hours now and I quickly became a supervisor and was spending as much time doing supervising duties as I was serving tables. The job search started to slow down and before I knew it I was being offered a management position at the restaurant. Without even knowing it was happening, I found a career in restaurant management. A career that allowed me to use some of my best skills and attributes. The best part of this opportunity was the fact that the restaurant was part of a large chain and there was the possibility for me to move up and take over my own store one day. Things were going extremely well and I thought that I had found my calling.

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As you might have figured out by now, teaching is actually a second career for me. Although working in restaurant management was going very well, there came a time when I slammed the brakes on my career and life and virtually started over from the beginning.

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What I have neglected to mention up to this point is that I was married shortly after graduating from university and we had our son shortly after. A few years later that we had our daughter. Our family was growing and some things started to become painfully obvious to us. Working as a restaurant manager was not very conducive to having a young family. If you stop to think for a moment about when people tend to go out and enjoy restaurants what comes to mind? Nights & Weekends! So here I am at a fork in my road of life. After a few years, I am doing very well at my job and I’m approaching the potential opportunity to move up the ladder even higher. The goal was always to get my own restaurant to be in control of. My family and my kids are extremely important to me and although work was going well, I was struggling with the fact that I was away from my family so much. I wasn’t getting to spend the quality time with my kids that I had always intended I would. I had to choose between continuing with a successful career or making a change and finding a job that would allow me to be at home with my family.

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It was a no-brainer! Nothing is more important than my family and my children. At that moment I decided to start looking for something different, something better I hoped. At the same time, I knew that a desk job was not for me. I had no interest in working in an office setting. I spent a lot of time reflecting on what I enjoyed most about the work that I was doing. The things that stood out the most to me was the training and development of staff. I absolutely loved creating and running workshops for staff and then working with my staff daily to help them be the best they could be in their positions. The more I thought about it, the more clear it became. My favourite part of my job was teaching people and building those relationships through learning. At that moment I had what was both an exciting and terrifying epiphany.

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I was going to quit my job and go back to school.

I was going to be a TEACHER!!!

Created by @hansenatortravel