How to Find Your Path After School | Amba Brown | TEDxYouth@AIS

For as long as I can remember, I have been continually asked a question. I'm sure all of you here today have heard dozens of times before what you want to do after

school

, but recently I've come to the conclusion that this is the most common thing. The question two generations of kids asked is now one we need to delete, it needs to be moved to the spam file and today I'm going to explain why and then replace it with an updated idea that you can delete to help you

find

your

way, but first, Can you raise

your

hand if you've ever been asked this big question?

Well, keep it up if when you answered it you weren't sure you wanted to commit to doing this forever, that's what I thought and the research backs this up. idea that most of us don't know what we want to do after

school

and why someone who doesn't yet have experience in the world after school has to commit to doing one thing forever shouldn't do it, it's stressful, yes, it is constructive, no and let me tell you that there are an infinite amount of options available and you should have the right to grow and learn, explore and yes, change your mind.

This question isn't helpful or inspiring and does nothing to help you

find

your way, so spam it instead. The file is there as it should be and here's why yes, it is stressful while mental disorders are increasing globally the World Health Organization reports that one in five young people is affected another study conducted in the US. US generational expert David Stillman found that 75 percent of Generation Z, which is today's 72 million young people, said they were more concerned about starting a career than finding a soulmate. Now these statistics not only highlight the anxiety around the unknown future, they support the idea that we need a new approach and while I just miss the edge of Gen Z, I get it, it's stressful, there really are a ridiculous amount of options nowadays.

I can feel the anxieties. I talk about it now, although that might be because I'm standing on a stage speaking in public, one of my biggest fears. From what I understand, for me the transition from high school was really difficult and now when I say difficult, I mean that not only was I worried, but I panicked to the point where I really felt like I was dying and this is not an exaggeration in In my last year of school I suffered from general anxiety and that repeated question ran through my head: what do you want to do?

How am I paralyzed by sharing this? I can see now that I put unreasonable pressure on myself to choose the perfect

path

. and make the best decision, but what does that look like? I remember going to visit my school guidance counselor, who got me the city test that concluded she should be a teacher now. He didn't know what he wanted to be, but he knew one thing. There were few things he definitely didn't want to be and a teacher was one of them. No disrespect to teachers. I knew I wasn't cut out for it and then I was sent on my way and at this point that's how I imagined it.

Life should be like that, but that's what really happened, so I finished high school anxious and confused and then decided to take a gap year. I saved up for six months by working seven days a week and then traveled around the world. 18 with my best friend and then I decided to go to university and for me university went from not knowing what I wanted to do to realizing that I enjoyed my psychology classes to realizing in my last year that I did not want to work as a psychologist, So I started researching other options and found myself working many other psychology-related jobs until 2015, when I wrote a book on

path

finding because I wanted to spread the message that, regardless of age, we are all finding our way, that first transition out of school is just the first of many and then I felt hope that my moments of feeling like I was dying at school hadn't been in vain and then I found myself working as an author.

Now it's taken me two years to say that out loud without making a face that suggests I'm not sure I'm telling the truth and those facial expressions still creep in when I think about it now, so, again, I'm not sure where continue if that career told me so. Counselor so many years ago that I would be an author at some point after school I would not have believed in the average in English and also I had a hard time believing it now, but what I know now is that it is not just me who fails and down on my path it is the same for everyone that's life here are some names you might recognize so you can see in the end how a rollercoaster has its ups and downs and it's your choice to scream or enjoy the fuss and now to the pea and spam disconcerting when we are asked this question what do you want do?, it baffles us because, first of all, it assumes that we know the answer.

In that same study by Stillman, he found that 65% of Generation Z will be employed in two jobs that don't exist yet, that's most of you. Second, the puzzling question suggests that we are choosing a path, But what about the rest? Let's break them down together. I've outlined four basic paths for you to travel, work, study or build your empire now. I don't have to do them all, but you can. I've tried them now and although I generally don't like telling people what to do and over six this may come naturally to me, but in this case I suggest you give it a try. any of that interests you at least that way you will have your own opinion let's face it watching David Annenberg is not the same as taking a gap year and looking at social media that's not exactly what it's like to go to university try them for yourself, so now you know you can do anything, the downside is you can't do everything, these four basic options will actually turn into over four thousand cities to visit, over four thousand degree granting universities in the world alone, millions of jobs to choose from. and an infinite number of projects that you can do yourself well makes its power can be stressful and now how happy you are to know that I only have to choose one, but no one told me this, no one gave me the memo that there is an infinite ?

There are a ton of options, no one told me it could be a mattress jumper or a Disney imagine or a slide tester. You sound amazing, don't get me wrong, this is a great choice you make when you finish school, but it is the first of many more choices to come, this is not a make or break choice, if you choose something you may like it great if you hate it, it's When choosing a game, you don't have to get it right first out of the gate and This doesn't mean you should cut and change when the going gets tough, it just means that when you've given it your all and things aren't working out, you can make a change. and it is important for me to clarify here that the problem is No, choice is a privilege, as I give this talk, many people your age do not have those options, so it is also important to be grateful, if you do not want your options, the problem then lies in the lack of support for students to make the transition and the emphasis we place on choosing a path that takes me to the next point hey, it's action, the outdated questions, the days of lifelong employment are over , you no longer have to stay in a job because you chose it years ago Now I don't want to take you back to the Middle Ages, but I do want to give you a brief overview of how the transition has changed, while traditionalists and baby boomers commonly made their way in the ranks working at a single job for twenty-four hours. years ago it was Generation This is no longer new information. 20 years.

A while ago it would have been motivating, now anxiety around the choice can overshadow inspiration. Today, we are slowly seeing a curve towards an increasingly personalized path where you can literally pay your way with some universities that allow students to create their own careers. Companies that allow employees. to create their own jobs, responsibilities and schedules and as our paths become more personalized, there is still the same question: what will you choose now? in the past the model was the longer the better now it is happier the better the change away from companies and Returning to the value of people, I am very sorry, being lazy or having rights, which are words that are used a lot today in day, it's about staying true to yourself and your path and making the most of this life we ​​have now, last and worst of all. the question misses the point, is not helpful or inspiring, and does not teach them how to decide;

Instead, being asked this question continually throughout their lives focuses on the idea of ​​having to make a decision where there are so many other questions we could be asked. Instead, what do you like to do? What are your strengths? What makes you happy? But these questions are not asked often enough. Instead, we keep getting the same old question, so when people say, well, if you don't know what. you want to do what you are interested in I have no idea why you spent your entire life focused on choosing a career path, a stream that you are not interested in the time of day, so you have had your entire life to date to answer this question and now What's next is over for a generation that grew up on the Internet.

This is not something you can Google. You can try. In the end you will end up with more opinions and more questions. So how can you find a happy path after school. access your own Wi-Fi W observe your interests focus on what you like to do make a list of five things you do in your free time or things you think about when your mind wanders don't underestimate these things Investigate your options now start writing five things you would like to do when you finish school so when I was younger I said I wanted to be a lawyer, a poet and a marine biologist because these are some of the options I had in my head the second part then is to research and write five new things that I don't you knew they existed and with these five new options you can change any of the initial list and if you do this every month in your last year of school along with your list of interests, some interesting options will start to open up for you and although some Of you will be confident in your answers and you will only need to write one thing on this list, if this is you, I am not saying that you have to come up with more options, but I do urge you.

You have to stay open, be aware of your interests, even be persistent with them and know that in the future, if you want to make a change or try something additional, know that you can follow your dreams and dream big, whatever they may be. Never make a decision about your future based on the fear of pleasing others or how difficult you think it will be to achieve your dreams. There is a great quote from old Nightingale that says to never give up on a dream for how long it will take you to achieve it. Anyway, time will pass and lastly, if that old question slips into spam, let's face it, the Oscars will take a while to catch up, then you can respond with this I'm interested in and I will.

Look where it leads me to conclude. I want to leave you the message I would share if I could go back in time and talk to that stressed out, crazed 17 year old me. I would say to that gangly, wide-eyed teenager. He stops looking for a perfect path and starts concentrating on his path. I would tell you to take advantage of its unique Wi-Fi. I would tell him to trust that if he makes a decision based on the information he has based on his interests. investigate his dreams then that is without a doubt the best decision you can make thanks