I just don't know what I should be doing with my life. I'm a regular mumsnetter and I'm sure some of you will recognise who I am from this, but I've used another name so that I can speak a bit more freely about some things.
I'm seriously torn about what I should be doing in my working life, and it's all tied up with my own appalling personal characteristics and I need some wise words about what to do!
I can see a pattern in my life where I get a passion for something, learn everything there is about it and totally immerse myself in it for 2-3 years and then lose that drive and move onto the next thing. I don't drop these things entirely, but I've always had this tendency to pass in and out of intense phases - where I get totally absorbed in something for a while and then back off again. Until now it hasn't mattered, because while you're young you get points for having a broad range of interests and I'm fortunate that I have always found things pretty easy, and would quickly become better than most people in a relatively short time. But I'm very conscious that I'm getting to that point in life (just turned 30) where spreading your energies like that becomes counter-productive.
Left to my own devices, I would launch myself into 2 years of learning how to take the car engine apart and put it back together; then I'd gladly do a degree in electrical engineering because I like that kind of stuff; then I'd spend two years madly knitting and learning karate etc etc... And having spent most of the last 13 years as a student, to some extent I've done precisely that - I have a really diverse range of interests and have become quite good at them. But now I don't have as much free time to pursue these passing passions (children are 1 and 3) and I'm in my first "real" job, and I'm really feeling that I should be more focussed. And as much as anything I'm worried that if I don't change my habits, then in 5-10 years I'll be really frustrated with myself that I have another long list of past interests to add to my "Other Interests" in my CV, but nothing really substantial to show for it.
Professionally, I feel I'm at a bit of a crossroads. I'm currently teaching in the tertiary sector and I enjoy it, although it's not my dream job, mainly because I'm also supposed to do research and I'm too gregarious to enjoy the isolation of all that bookwork. When I started the job, I said to myself that I had no intention of doing any research - I'd just do the teaching for a few years and then leave, satisfied that I'd had a decent time while in a family-friendly job. But, inevitably I suppose, I'm now feeling a (self-imposed) pressure to produce some research because if I don't I'll be doing a sub-standard job and I hate being in a position where I'm setting out to do a bad job. One of the reasons I'm not doing much research is that although I'm in a full-time position, I've only been working part-time hours (first 3 days and now 4 days of childcare arranged, and I do the rest evenings/weekends/whenever). So I've been cutting back that way, although now that my youngest is heading into toddlerdom, things are easing up a little.
I need to stay in my current job for a few years, for practical and financial reasons. I can't afford much of a drop in income for a while, and this is the only thing around that gives me the flexibility I need for the children as well. Besides, there are aspects I really enjoy - just not the bit about doing a bad job and disappointing people I care about. (I really like my colleagues and bosses...)
Long-term I want to get into school teaching and my dream job would be as head of a school. But I can't make the switch until the children are a few years older as I don't think school hours are very compatible with really young children. So that long-term ambition is on hold. However, I do worry that if and when I make the switch, that I'll just demonstrate the same old tendencies and lose interest after a short while. Which would be disappointing.
In the meantime, I need to decide what to do about my current job. Do I put in more time and force myself to do an aspect I've always hated (research) in order to feel like I'm doing a good job? Or do I try to persuade myself to stick to the original plan and take what's good about the job and what suits me, make other contributions to the place as I can, and ignore the stuff that I don't want to do? Long-term, if I did switch careers, the research would be totally irrelevant.
Or, I could try to direct my research towards finishing a doctorate that I started a few years ago and which was hijacked by appalling personal circumstances at the time. There's no point in getting the doctorate if I'm going to switch professions - at least not in terms of the knowledge I gain. BUT, the title of "dr" is useful, even in a school environment. The thing is, I really don't want to do the doctorate itself (I hate working on it), but it could be useful, and it has always niggled that I didn't get it before. I had excellent reasons for it, and I'm not ashamed that I didn't. But in my heart it really niggles because it's the first time I set out to achieve something and didn't, and in an irrational way I have to admit I do feel a bit of a failure.
And finally, there's a really exciting small business prospect that I have before me. I'm totally enthused about the idea of doing it, but I strongly suspect that, even if I am pretty good at juggling, it is unrealistic to expect to work full-time (using only part-time childcare), complete a doctorate AND start up a small business. This business is totally unrelated to anything else, and wouldn't assist me in any other professional way. But I have good reason to believe it would make quite a bit of money if I had the time to put in (and we NEED the money), and I just get so excited at the thought of doing it! It's been a long time since I felt really enthused about doing something - I've spent a large part of the last few years doing research (the failed doctorate) that I didn't care two hoots about and feeling lethargic and frustrated. So it's so refreshing to be excited about something again. (But let's see how long it lasts...) And it's all highly speculative at this stage, but I can see that if in a few years I wanted to stop work and have no.3, then being self-employed would be a great way to keep working around the children.
So what should it be? Should I write off the business idea because it doesn't get me anywhere long term, however exciting it may be now? Should I go on with the doctorate which I hate doing but which might make me feel better about past failures? Should I just get over it and concentrate on my current job? How do I balance it all? I feel really lost about this, and quite depressed that my erratic behaviour could just be setting me up for long-term failure and disappointment. Help!