Be What You Want to Be 626.4
“What will you be when you grow up?”
It's a serious question. As kids, we knew we were going to be something and that to be something was to be someone. Even as our ambitions changed, we knew what we were going to be was important and our choice.
When I entered UCLA Law School in 1964, I wanted to do good. Yet when I graduated three years later, I just wanted to do well. My life’s mission had changed, not as the result of conscious choice but as a surrender to the momentum of an elaborate matchmaking ritual: the ultimate competition to get job offers from the most prestigious employers and to attain the most hard-to-get jobs.
Money was definitely a factor, as almost all of us had student loans to pay off, but the larger force was a desire for validation. I was, by inclination and training, highly competitive. Getting a coveted job was the ultimate trophy. Intoxicated with a desire to win, I abandoned my wish of being significant in favor of being successful.
I was lucky. The tax firm I wanted didn’t make me an offer, so I took a teaching position at the University of Michigan Law School. I discovered I loved teaching and stayed with it for nearly 20 years before I founded an ethics institute in honor of my parents.
You may start out intending to be the captain, but if you’re not careful, you may find yourself drifting in another direction, a passenger on your own ship. Your life is too important to be little.
Be what you want to be.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
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Comments
Interesting saying, but it is incomplete. Back many years ago when I was in high school, peer pressure was pretty tough. In my junior year I resolved to try to live my life according to a saying I thought was and still is original:
Be what you want to be,
But want to be what you are.
Do what you want to do,
But want to do what you are doing.
Posted by: Dave Formosa | July 10, 2009 2:22 PM
It is all good and well for others to tell us to be what we want to be. It is not that simple! There are people who hold the handle and people who hold the blade. Those with the handle never fail to pull and cut others off. For us to do and be what we want, those with power need to be reminded to live and let others live.
Posted by: Beverly Smith | July 14, 2009 6:04 AM
Everybody tells us what to be -- our parents, our teachers, even our closest friends. But they don't teach us how. Would it be safe to say that anything you want is for the glory of God, whatever you and I conceive Him to be?
Posted by: Benj Sabulao | July 14, 2009 11:06 AM