To consider forfeiting it all to be a beautician?

[AllTheGin]

Please let me start by saying that none of this is meant to be a stealth boast, or to be condescending to anyone else. I've name changed.

I'm quite clever. Mensa and multiple scholarships as a child etc. But got pregnant in sixth form, and consequently didn't finish my A Levels. I'm part way through a part time degree now in an academic subject, which would ordinarily lead to a "good" office based job with long hours and high pay.

But I hate office work. It makes me feel claustrophobic, bored and trapped. I just don't want to do this for the rest of my life.

I'm toying with finishing my degree and then going to college and doing beauty or maybe hairdressing. The people I've spoken to IRLthink I'm mad. My DM in particular thinks I'm "wasting my mind" and is convinced it will be another pointless course and I'll still be no closer to finding a job I enjoy.

WIBU to forgot what I could be and to go and try something completely different which doesn't necessarily need high academics, but needs a different skill set instead (which I'm not even sure I have?!)?

If it’s going to make you happy and you can earn enough to be financially stable, it doesn’t matter what you do.

What makes you think you’ll like beauty or hairdressing?

I think you should do a job that you enjoy and find fulfilling. You spend a lot of time at work, it's miserable to be spending hours every day doing something your hate. Besides which, my hairdresser makes a fortune working for herself.

Why not do both, keep your job as a safety net, and do your course as an evening or weekend thing, then after you have e completed the course once you have secured a job in a salon then give up your office job..that way you have the safety net of a wage while you study, and if it
is hard to find a job with the beautician thing then you will still have your office job to fall back on...

You’d be surprised. Some of the most intelligent and successful women I know, I met through working in the beauty industry. There’s more to it than just working in a salon but as jobs go it’s not a bad place to start.

Its not necessarily one or the other, there are so many jobs that just need a degree. Would there be something you could use your degree and also enjoy?

I retrained at 32 to do Beauty I did an ITEC at a private college. I had salons for 20 years if I had my time over again I would do hair dressing - I would do a Toni and Guy private course. Beauty has changed beyond recognition I loved it but now I do something else - it is an over saturated industry with some poorly qualified therapists in it. You make a lot more money doing hair but get qualified with a reputable training course.

Do what makes you happy. Don’t be sucked in or influenced by what our current society provides a better economic outcome for. That is not how you decide what you want to spend your only life doing. Time is precious. The most precious thing we have. Spend yours wisely. Do what will make you happy.

I think I'd like it because it's kind of my "thing". I love hair, beauty, the way I feel when I'm "done" and I'd like to make other people feel the same way that I feel when I leave the hair or beauty salon. I think I'd like the creative side of it, the different people, the possibility of being self employed and being good at making other people feel fantastic about themselves. When I imagine my future working in my degree subject, I see London, commuting, stress, pressure, hierarchy, corporate shite, suits. When I imagine working in the beauty industry, I feel proud and content even though I haven't actually achieved anything there yet if that makes any sense?!

From your post , I’d say go for it!

Live the life you love

I wish I'd trained as a hairdresser: it's hard work but it's such a useful skill, it's creative, it makes people feel good, you can be an employee, self-employed, an employer, start a salon or an empire ... do it, OP!

I don’t think there is anything wrong with trading in an office job for a beautician job in theory however, (and I ask you this from my experience with highly intelligent people) are you just keen to learn yet another new skill and delay starting work and essentially making a life decision? After qualifying as a beautician would it then be something else you’d want to learn?
Also do remember all jobs get routine and monotonous over time.

Sounds like it’s for you. But I would finish your degree first whether or not you intend to use it especially if you have put a fair amount of time into it. Having a degree opens so many doors. Say you did really well at hairdressing and wanted to go into lecturing in a college or business. Or maybe you found hairdressing wasn’t for you at least you would have your degree to fall back on.

Yanbu

I'm actually inclined to wonder why you conflate being a MENSA member and achieving scholarships something that is below a beautician. You appear to have watched too much TOWIE.

Yes, I do wonder if I would get to the end of a beauty course and think that wasn't for me either. And then what!!?

It's not about delaying work, I already work full time in a role related to my degree. It's more about knowing what I'm good at, but not enjoying what I'm good at. So maybe there's something else I could be good at that I could actually also enjoy?!

Argh, I really envy people who know unfalteringly what they want to do and whose skill sets match it.

PS VladimirsPoutine, you seem to be vying for an argument. I made it clear that I meant no offence, but strong academics are not always linked with more vocational qualifications. If your child was capable of being a medical surgeon but, after qualifying, decided he wanted to be a tree surgeon, perhaps you'd also ask the question I'm trying to ask now, i.e. am I silly to be thinking of this. It's not a typical route into a career in beauty is all I'm getting at. I don't see either career as more important than the other, and if I did then I wouldn't even be considering a change of path, would I?

I'm not vying for an argument largely because I would struggle to give a shit. I'm just pointing out that your stereotypes need further questioning and indeed introspection.

If you have a big as brain as you do - you would realise that (a) Mensa isn't actually at all that intellectual and (b) scholarships are awarded not necessarily based on intelligence.

If you want to pursue another career by all means do so - I've worked in all sorts of places in all sorts of careers and jobs. But I never thought I was 'above' anyone I worked with which is essentially what your post is screaming out.

I did the equivalent of being capable of being a medical surgeon but qualifying as a tree surgeon. I am now managing director of a company with a £4 million turnover. Do what you love and make something of it!

YANBU I think if doing hair and beauty will make you happy then you should go for it! I left school with good a levels, got a job that I hated then ended up working in a garage and loved it! Don't worry what anyone else thinks is right, just do what will make you happy as well as pay the bills.

I had the same thing. I didn't complete my degree and then went and studied beauty. I had the same comments.
I love beauty.
But if you are employed the pay is awful. It's usually minimum wage and senior therapists make only slightly more. It's demanding physically depending on the treatments you offer and it's competitive. Weekend Work usually.
The best way to make more money is to be self employed but you have to be very good in order to get a name for yourself and become popular, keep a full diary. Successful people are smart as you need a good head for business and advertising as well as a talent for treatments plus interpersonal skills.
Are you dexterous? Have High attention to detail? An artistic eye? Confident? Friendly? Able to put people at ease?

Special effects make-up?

Definitely finish your degree, then give it a go. I considered a similar career change, but found that the new career path wasn't what I thought it would be, sound found my niche in the old one.

So found, not sound.