For a while now, I’ve known that I do not want a career in academia, where my career would consist of teaching and research. I’ve realized that neither of those things are fulfilling to me. Teaching is not fulfilling to me because, more often than not, I end up in classes where the students are not there because they want to be but, rather, because they have to be. I blame the country’s educational system, not the students themselves, but it nonetheless serves to create an unpleasant working environment in which I’m in the position of having to impose something (i.e., subject matter) on a captive audience. Many factors, such as early-morning grogginess and aversion to actual work, come together to generate a negative energy that covers the room like a wet blanket. I also find research unfulfilling because of the whole “publish or perish” reality in most academic jobs today: constantly having to publish something in order to keep and maintain a career. I enjoy researching and writing when I actually have something to say, as opposed to doing those things because I have to say something.
Finally, another issue I have with academia is that I feel like I’d be spending most of my time thinking and talking about concepts and theories…when I’d much rather be using them in order to make life (mine or someone else’s) better. It’s one thing to give students a lecture about the concept of a “self-fulfilling prophecy” or write an article about it for a peer-reviewed journal. It’s quite another to use that concept to help someone understand how others’ expectations might be affecting his/her own achievements and failures in life and (more to the point, perhaps) how that understanding can be used to maximize wanted achievements and minimize unwanted failures. Of course, the former, the intellectual dimension, has its place and is indeed a precondition for the latter, yet I feel like I’d be more fulfilled by doing the latter: Actually using this stuff to help people!
I’ve been looking at other career paths that might be good for this aspiration to help people. I’ve considered stuff like social work, therapy and counseling, pastoral counseling, and ministry. The only problem is, I feel like each of these could be very limiting in some fundamental way: rules and regulations, more time in school, commitment to one paradigm or way of thinking, and/or a limited set of possible goals. No, I want something where I can improvise, listen to my intuition, draw from multiple sources, and let goals develop organically. I also want something where I can have a diverse set of clients who actually want to be there.
This has led me to look at the field of “life coaching.” From what I’ve read, it’s not formally regulated by the government, so barring the requirements of private organizations and training institutions, I’d probably be free to develop practices according to what my clients and I deem helpful. As a private practitioner (who is not a counselor or therapist), I would likely be seeing people who specifically wanted what I provide, rather than captive audiences. I can apply my current education to it, and training does not require as severe an investment as, say, a graduate program in counseling. Finally, because it’s so focused on positive change, there is less impetus to dwell on problems and negativity.
Thus, I am currently looking for resources that would be helpful to a coaching practice, both directly and indirectly, and I’m so grateful for the things that have turned up. I’m finding books, articles, websites, and so much more. Some are specifically about coaching; others address things, such as positive thinking, that are not directly related but are nonetheless invaluable to helping people better their lives. In addition, I am running into more and more information that leaves me confident that I can develop a successful practice. In fact, I believe that I’m already in the process of doing so: Wish me luck! 
