"Reaching for your goals" | Teen Ink

"Reaching for your goals"

November 14, 2014
By Anonymous

I now have started taking action reaching for my goals. But first you have to make them, and one of the hardest decisions you can make is what do with the rest of your life.

Making my goals starts when I was really little my dream was always to be a professional hockey player. For years I practiced and by the end of the season during my sophomore year, I felt worn out, I was playing for a team at a high level we practiced everyday three hours per day. The days we didn't have practice meant it was game day, but even the games where a lot of work the majority of them meant a flight to New York or Minnesota we would go for the whole weekend and come back Tired. Then just to stay up for hours scrambling to finish schoolwork until I fell asleep in a chair. That year changed my perspective on if I really wanted to play hockey as a job, because what I really wanted was to play the game for fun. 

So what I started doing over the summer was looked for a “real job” that I would like to go and do when I got older. After looking For a while I narrowed it down at first to something that has to do with technology and computers. I was always interested in computers since I was little. I asked and got my first laptop for Christmas when I was about nine years old. I was so excited, I remember that morning running down the stairs and waking my Mom and Dad up I ran to the tree. I Opened everything as fast as I could, when I opened the box and looked inside, there was a grey and silver laptop exactly what I wanted. My face lit up when I turned it on and I didn’t want to leave when it was time to go to my grandparent’s house. I would use it all the time, once I got curious and thought to myself, I bet could take this apart and put it back together.  I could do it now But then once I got it apart It took some help from my dad to get it back together. 
Next I started looking at schools to find what classes that most schools offered in that field. This was one of the first times I felt I had a big decision to make that could affect a lot of things in my life. What I found when searching was American schools other than a few in technology classes where most were being outclassed by foreign schools. The class that I thought was right for me was computer science because it sounded interesting, you get to be a part of innovation moving forward and when you're doing the job you get to push boundaries and make advancements that could help lots of people. Another reason the field interests me is its very new.
After I had set my goal it was time to start working towards it, I started by looking for classes I can take now and found a lot of classes offered by the high school. I’m taking computer hardware this year and Intro to programing and the harder version AP computer science both next year.  I also found a few classes I can take out of school. But even before that I was showing some interest, I built my own computer I found It a lot of fun and I would keep doing it if it wasn’t a lot of money, It is something I invested a lot of time and money into, and so far I think it has paid off with all the fun and use I have gotten out of it. I started to try and teach myself about programing, and other stuff you will need to know to be a computer scientist. Just recently I started looking at schools to study abroad I searched for countries with a lot of advancements in the field and a large job market for computer scientists.
In the end, South Korea has a big market with large companies like samsung, LG, and many others. I now want to go to school in Korea for computer science. It is sometimes called a place of the future because the vast amounts of advancements in technology. With internet speed of higher than anywhere in the world, 40% higher than Japan’s second place and over 100 times faster than in the U.S.! As well as many other categories like faster phone’s computers and more. So first I have to get there, so I’m starting a korean language class outside of school this year, and I plan to take classes until I feel I’m ready to move. There all the classes can be taught in English so that’s going to be very helpful but for day to day life, I would need to learn the language even though English becomes more popular every year.  
I have started saving money to move and I have started reading about getting the visa to learn out of the country. My goal would be to go just for school then come back unless I end up really liking it. Although it would be sad leaving my family behind, I would probably miss them a lot. I would miss my Mom and Dad from what I have read about culture and daily life though it seems extremely different but in a better way, you eat healthy, use more public transportation, people are hard working, and a good place to be if you're looking for any kind of entertainment. Going through this made me feel responsible and I am really looking forward to the steps I will have to take starting now to get to my goals. About a month after I started thinking about this option the first person I told about wanting to move so far away was my mom and she seemed supportive but also sad. “It looks like a great place but I wish it wasn’t so far away” she whined. After that It accidentally slipped out when I was talking to somebody, but it ended up being good because even though I didn’t know them very well they thought it was really cool and gave me much more confidence talking about it. It make me feel much more comfortable, and made me happy to be different, I notice in school so many people strive for the same thing. I feel you won't ever get ahead if you try to stay with the pack. After that I have told my brother and a few of my friends and they also where supportive and very curious. Over this time I think the most important thing that I took away from it was if you want something bad enough you can have it you just have to work hard enough and want it bad enough.



Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 0 comments.