^I'm tempted to put this on my business card

Money does buy happiness.

Took a year off to work full time after highschool and going to college for Organic Chemistry this next year.

Been a scrren printer, a stagehand-light tech, absolute bum and am now embarking on a new thing, not sure what, but it involves words and paper.
But goin to school now, returned after almost 30 years to get a degree- in ?
may go into teaching.
I dont know, and that is where I am supposed to be right now. The only thing I know for sure is that I am changing, evolving and am here, now. Conciously this time, and asking for divine guidance, to evolve into a being motivated by Love in all I do.
I had a vision of myself at 40 travelling in a red pickup across adesert, with a dog. Dont have either, but who knows? Goin to the auto auction tomorrow...

I love this topic, very cool folks!

@null

Inspired by a point that my supervisor reiterates on a weekly basis:
Be careful about schooling without purpose: It could end up being pointless. Higher education is a big time/money investment. If you have no idea why you're doing it, then you might be better off practicing something you love for 4 years and getting really good at it on your own. A degree in Education is perfectly legitimate, but a degree in ? won't get you anywhere.

A point that my brother makes in response to that:
A college degree looks great to employers regardless of what it is in.

My 2 cents, for what it's worth:
I don't know what the reality of such cases is. I guess I would say that the sooner you have a plan for post-school, the better. However, in my opinion, schooling as a means of personal evolution is an honorable endeavor, despite what my supervisor thinks. Otherwise, a degree in the subject you are most interested in teaching will help you put your foot in the door as a teacher, though perhaps not as much as an Education degree.

Good Luck.

Self employed horticulturalist. Always was and probably always will be. Keeps me calm and happy ,I love it!

how does one break into that gig?

please do tell. i am an aspiring herbalist/horiculturist.


unfortunately, in my present situation, I require money to get by. I would like to change that in the future before money becomes even harder to acquire.

My friend is doing the TEFL course and he says it is REALLY difficult.

English is an absolute mission of a language, even if you are fluent. He was telling me about a few of his lessons and it sounds quite challenging... with a lot of info to learn within a short period of time.

Being able to travel to so many amazing countries, as well as helping kids learn a new language, sounds incredibly appealing.

Good luck!

I spent my adult life building a career that provides steady good pay with benefits, and at the same time gives something back to the world I can be proud of.

Now in my mid-40s, I work in an arcane corner of the finance world, helping not-for-profits get the resources they need to do their work and grow. I also advocate for these nfps to folks in business world and government who would rather focus on efficiency and profit. I'm a suit, but feel more like a mole.

It's all well and good, but something has still fallen out-- I'm not writing fiction like my soul calls me to do. I'm not building the puppet shows that I love to perform.

I am hoping that I can still find a way to have the best of both worlds- economic ease and enough time for my creative spirit. Not sure if it will work, though. My partner and I have developed a 5 year plan to achieve our dream of a creativity filled life. I'm setting off on that journey now--

After 5 years, I may need to leave this job, which frightens me. I have faith that the right doors will open, but I still find the change very hard indeed.

Thank you for the opportunity to share with you all.

I have had a few friends do it successfully and one of the friends doesn"t happen to be the crispiest biscuit in the tin, so it is do-able. Application to the task is required. All of them did say it was very intensive. I think i would save up and do it in-house at a college rather than on-line. If i had to pay for it i"d try to make damn sure that i passed, i am too tight fisted with my cash to throw it away.
@ Nitegazer i wish you all the best with your 5 year plan, it sounds like a plan!

My own story started out as a hobby during my normal secondary school years, following that I attended horticultural college for a number of years. My speciality was plant propagation and production, after graduation, a few years spent on a commercial plant production nursery specialising in propagation ( hardy outdoor plants). Then I set up my own business . From those early days of nursery work it has evolved into aprox. 50% design work and garden and landscaping which has catered to my more creative side.

College degrees/diplomas aren't a prerequisite for getting into the sector, but they are useful. Most of the bigger firms started out as backyard operations gradually evolving/ expanding over the years. Nowadays it would be useful to research a niche market where competition isn't so rife, like rare plants, Unusual herbs and vegetatbles, "sustainable and organic gardening" Catering for small scale urban food production. The latter has particular appeal as the general population will have to come to terms with inflationary pressures,and trade wars, even real war a possibility.

It's not a quick road to making a fortune, but working with plants has a therapeutic aspect to it. When all is said and done happiness is more important than riches!

Currently, Integration Analyst for Hospital Billing applications.
You would be surprised how complicated Hospital Billing can be. 100`s of DB tables, many 500 line queries with 3 or more levels of nested sub-queries.
Looking to move on shortly to a new job, hopefully Java or C# developer, but it all depends.

Glass Alchemist.
I make ceremonial objects out of borosilicate with fire.

Laid off carreer technical sales rrrrep, now part time greenskeeper, day trader. I think I like this. No, I know I know I like this.

Hope this thread keeps truckin. Good idea. A great read!

The career of Ascension. All is provided via the Art of Manifestation.

I done the online course and it was pretty intense, I done tefl not celta which is a difference of around $6-700 roughly. Difference being you get 4 or 5 hours teaching real students and 4 weeks in a classroom with the CELTA, with the TEFL its 100 hours work online and a 2 day course with a trainer and other TEFL students. The 100 hours took a lot longer than 100 hours, I was working full time so I done it over the course of 6 months, if I wasnt working I probably could have done it in 3 months.

Its stood me in good stead but I forget most of the units, the most valuable part was the lesson planning units and the resources I got from it. But nothing can prepare you for going into a class for the first time and being told to do what you like I learned how to teach English by teaching English, I have friends who done the celta and they said it was a waste of money but coupled with a degree (which I dont have) your going to get a better paying job and could work in Europe but a lot of people here in Vietnam dont even have a tefl never mind a degree, it stands you in good stead but it isn't always necessary.

For example some high paying schools in Vietnam only accept the celta certificate that they themselves sell to you, money making scams and thats what most Language centres are as well, a lot of them just want a white face. One terrible school said to my american friend go stand at the window you dont have a class, hes like why?? They said marketing So people walk by and go look white men teaching English, he told them im not standing at the bloody window for marketing, too funny.

So the CELTA really may be a waste of money to be honest, it depends where you want to go in the world, if its china or many asian country's or some south american countries you really don't need it. I can get a job just now $1500 a month 20 hours class time, accommodation and food in China, they are screaming out for them there, my friend is doing it for 6 months save his money, which is easy, then back to the warm countries.

Its a great rewarding job, great laugh. Best leap I ever made but like others I tend to go from one thing to the next, my goal is to learn the language and im sure that will open doors as like anything Im sure you could get bored, some of my classes are pretty tiring, standing in a class of 50 teenagers trying to keep them quite and its 38 degrees. Luckily those classes are only occasional but its good to teach all different kinds of classes, real money is in private tutoring which ive just started which is so easy, they come to you for a few hours you just dress normally teach a bit and get paid a lot more

At the moment I am unemployed (like alot of people in my Country) but am still 50/50 if I should move to Norway & begin work over there at a steel works.

edit - My fiance is half American/Norwegian & lives close to the 2nd Norwegian city Bergen

God bless you.

I perform quality control tests on chromatography columns. Sometimes, they even let me shred paper!

I work as a plumbing contractor in California. I also enjoy growing Salvia Divinorum, amongst other things