what kind of career?

Everbrite, thank you! I took a peak at both USAID and Foreign Service and it's almost exactly the kind of work I've always been interested in. I realize that it's not uncommon for people to change careers in their 30s or 40s, but time is valuable, and I don't want to waste it. Maybe it's my perfectionism, but I like to get it right on the first try. I wish I had studied international relations in school instead, but I can't look back.

Traveling is never the same as living and working overseas

That's quite true. I worked as an Au Pair in Italy for 6 months - very different from me backpacking Spain for a few weeks. It wasn't a long stay but I think I got a decent feel for living abroad.

At 24 there's no need to decide long term yet. If you've been in school most of your life, I think it's a good idea to take a break and work or volunteer in various situations to really understand what you want. Imagining what something might be like is no substitute for actually doing it.

That's what I'm told, but I don't know. I feel rushed to start mapping out a career now. I just don't want to waste time. At the moment I'm only concerned with traveling and doing whatever else pleases me as I've just finished university last year, but within the next 2 years I want to have a good idea of what I'll do next. I've thought a lot about volunteer work and considered Peace Corps, but the 2 year commitment scares me a little. Of course there are alternative programs to Peace Corps and I'm looking into them. I wouldn't mind doing a little work in Africa for half a year.

Shrinks never have to tell you, when you're well. They just keep you on drugs. You buy the prescription, and dull the bugging harpies. Stateside drugs cost double.

And all you do for a living is say, "And.. how did that make...YOU feel?"
Go abroad and grow. It helps put a new rudder on your ship of education.

Do something else for a living for awhile, so you'll have experience and people watching skills. Not just glean from a book of theories.

In Oz, I worked at things, I'd never considered, in places I couldn't have heard of. I'm forever greateful.

Finally writing that book.

I wish I had studied international relations in school instead, but I can't look back.

You don't need international relations. In fact, sometimes not having studied this is an advantage. You need common sense and a broad general knowledge. I know people in the Department who studied art history and engineering and all sorts of things.

Lots of Peace Corps volunteers later join the Department or USAID or other NGOs.

Ruth

I'd have thought that the Peace Corps would be a great place to use your talents and qualifications. Alternatively, I'm sure than anywhere that works with refugees would value your expertise so why don't you just ask around - write a letter to the UNHCR or the Red Cross or something and ask them. Can you afford to do some volunteer work in this area to start with? At least by doing something like this you'll have the opportunity to work out whether it's what you want longer term.

I feel rushed to start mapping out a career now. I just don't want to waste time.

but the 2 year commitment scares me a little.

You want to map out your entire life but you can't make a 2 year commitment to the Peace Corps. This makes little sense.

Everything starts with one step. Sometimes that step is a 2 year commitment to something like the Peace Corps and sometimes it isn't but no plan you make today should be so rigid that you can't make detours when and if it is necessary.

Ruth

'I feel rushed to start mapping out a career now. I just don't want to waste time.'

'but the 2 year commitment scares me a little.'

The way I read it is that if someone wants to make the right decision (as if such a thing existed) i.e. not wasting time then a two year commitment or any other committment would be scary as it might be the 'wrong' decision.

It is a basic problem of being human and having choices. The assumption I would challenge is that there is a right decision.

The most important thing is to do something. Even if you make the "wrong" choice, you'll be ending up with valuable experience, and have a better idea of what you do want. I dropped out of uni 3 years ago in order to change direction, but I just lost all my momentum, and I've wasted those three years trying to come up with the perfect idea -- and now I'm finally making real plans, they're frustrated at every turn by not having a degree, or any useful experience. So whatever you decide, make sure that 2, 3, 5 years from now, you'll have something you can take with you, be it a degree or just volunteering experience. You don't have to get it right first time -- indeed, most don't -- the only way through is to keep trying things until one of them sticks.

hey,
if you have conflicting ideas about what you want to be and what you think you should be it helps if you can consolidate what your interests are and where your strengths lie. Try a graduate careers planner and see if it can provide you with more ideas on what jobs are out there which are relevant.
and good luck!

Kuter Preference Test. Works wonders. Take one with a councilor. at a college. It asks similar questions worded differently. Scattered throughout.
The councilor has a book thats coded with different aspects of your wishes.

They want you happy.

I asked my sister, how my grandad liked being a lawyer. She said he hated every minute of it.

Travel slowwwly is a school, of different points of view etc. Living in Spain, this Texan figured out, all my complaints are just the shoe on the other foot.

good luck.
TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE.