Kels had a very specific goal of becoming a Doctor when at school, but her experience of depression, anxiety and Borderline Personality Disorder affected her levels of motivation. Through a lot of self-care and discussions with her career advisor she was able to reflect on things she really enjoyed and was passionate about, which in turn helped her rediscover her motivation.
If she had gone down the Medical School route, there is a chance that Kels may have ended up in a career for the wrong reasons.
There is a phenomenon in psychology called Identity Foreclosure.
Identity foreclosure occurs when people think they know who they are, but they have not even explored their options yet. So for Kels, she could have decided she wanted to be a Doctor at a very young age, possibly because of expectations from others, then made specific subject choices to enable this, in turn limiting her exposure to other opportunities or future careers.
This is extremely common in adolescents, partly due to the pressure put on us throughout childhood to know what we “want to be when we grow up”. This seemingly harmless question can force us to make a choice that our developing brains are not yet ready for about career paths we don’t yet understand. Often the jobs we end up doing may not even exist yet as we are making career choices. On average people will have 12 different jobs throughout their lives, this allows for lots of opportunities to change your mind or direction as you go through life. Your fashion choice isn’t the same as when you were 5 so why should your career plan be?
