Growing Up and Following Your Path
story by Litzy Rodriguez and Lily Beck, photos by Emma Frost, design and illustrations by Lizeth Valdes
As you sit in your two-hour lecture for the third time this week, do you ever revisit that childhood dream of being the next massive pop star? If you had just auditioned for “America's Got Talent” when you were 14, Simon Cowell would have pushed the golden buzzer, and you wouldn’t be waking up at 7:30 a.m. to make it just in time for your 8 a.m. class.
Even with the strongest ambition and wildest imagination, the real-world may come to kick you in the face, setting you in a cycle of questioning where you are in life. This feeling of uncertainty about the future can put you at a standstill. To normalize feeling uncertain and adapting to your path as you grow, PULSE spoke to CWU students to reflect on their academic journey.
Growing up, everyone has at least one idea of what they want for themselves in the future. Amaya Belden-Reeves, an education major at CWU, speaks to her own childhood dream. “Something that I watched was ‘American Idol,’ so I grew up and I wanted to be a singer,” Belden-Reeves says.
Jessica Perrine, a graphic design major, had the same idea. “When I was younger, I also wanted to be a singer,” Perrine says. “Taylor Swift was in her country era and I was really into that.”
Everyone has dreams growing up. Whether it be like Perrine and Belden-Reeves who wanted to be the next big performers, or it’s something along the lines of an education-based career. The only difference between young dreams and the reality of being a grown-up is the expectations that we face while going through life.
Growing Pains
Every person you meet, every form of media you consume and every experience you live through influences every new version of you. For many CWU students, attending a four-year university is the first step towards discovering their most authentic self.
Lucy Roedel, an elementary education major, is an example of someone who grew up with a dream and continued to pursue it through college. “When I was younger, I wanted to be a veterinarian and then a teacher,” Rodel says. “Those were the two I was kind of going back and forth between.”
Growing up, Roedel saw both of her parents working within STEM fields, which definitely had an impact on her career goals. “I’ve always loved animals so I was like, ‘oh, that’d be so fun,’” Roedel comments “My dad is a doctor and my mom was a therapist, so I kind of had that [focus] ingrained.”
Though many college students are currently pursuing their childhood dreams, some have taken a different direction. Take Kennedy Nokes, for example. Though she grew up wanting to be a teacher, she is now a missionary who decided to stay in the Ellensburg community after graduating from CWU.
Nokes came to college with hopes of becoming an education major, but promptly switched to hospitality, tourism and event management. She speaks on this switch, saying “I realized as I got later into the program that I loved working with kids and serving them, but teaching wasn’t the capacity that I could do it in.”
Amaya Belden-Reeves says that after she found real-world role models, she decided that she wanted to become a teacher. That is exactly what she is pursuing now at CWU as an education major. Belden-Reeves reflects on growing up and not being sure if she would actually make it to where she is now. “I just don't think that a lot of what I'm doing now would have been seen as achievable, based on the knowledge that I had of my surroundings at the time,” she says.
Belden-Reeves says expectations played a big role in why she didn’t think she could make it to college. “I think a lot of [pressure came from] societal expectations of what my class was and where my family was financially at the time,” Belden-Reeves says. Even though she has faced struggles on her journey to college, she has persevered and has made it to a place she never believed she could get to.
Embracing Your Path
When reflecting on one's past, it's easy to reminisce on your former hopes and dreams and compare them to where you are now. “I think my ten-year-old self would be proud of where I am,” Roedel says. “I had something that I wanted to do and I’ve seen this goal all throughout college.”
From a young age, Nokes believed she was going to be a teacher. “I have always had family that were teachers, and I just loved the teachers who were in my life,” Nokes says. Now, in her new career, she reflects on what her ten-year-old self would think of the change. “I think surprised, but pleasantly happy that I found something I feel more confident in.”
When Belden-Reeves is asked what her 10-year-old self would think of her now, she says, “I think surprised, if anything, that this is the road that I ended up taking, but proud.” The notion that she would never attend college made her goal of becoming a teacher seem out of reach. “I was like, it seems like so much responsibility and so much to take care of that I probably wouldn't have thought that I could handle it,” Reeves says. Fortunately, trusting her instincts led her right where she wanted to be.
Jessica Perrine is one person that has proved that you can persevere with your childhood aspirations. Perrine is a graphic design major, pursuing the dream she has had since she was young. “I wanted to be at least an illustrator, and at most an animator,” Perriene says. She reminisces on how when she was younger, she dreamed of being able to draw in a way similar to her favorite shows. “I now feel that I’m close enough to that, that I can now say that I am [proud],” Perrine says.
Own your Journey
Challenges and obstacles are something that everyone faces in their own way. Though this is true, the quest to find joy in where you end up is always an option. Going against the grain can be intimidating. Societal and familial expectations may limit how far your dreams go outside the box, but those walls don’t have to constrain you. No matter the path you may set out on, anyone can make the decision to change it to reflect their true desires, whether that means continuing down the path they began on or turning in a completely different direction.
Would the Taylor Swift Era's Tour ever exist if she didn't write “Our Song” for her high school talent show? Would Quinta Brunson's show “Abbott Elementary” win an Emmy for outstanding writing for a comedy series if she never posted her skits to Instagram in 2014? Big dreams start with small steps, so take that first one forward.
Looking Ahead
Whether meeting new people on campus or having a casual conversation with a stranger, the different walks of life people come from can be seen everywhere. Some people have the support of an entire city while others can only pat themselves on the back, but everyone is capable of carving out the future they want.
Jessica Perrine says that she wishes her childhood self knew that nothing is impossible. “I think there’s no such thing as a stupid idea,” Perrine says. “Just ones that are difficult to do, but not impossible.” Growing up, Perrine knew that she had big dreams that she wanted to pursue, so she did just that. Even though she faced the challenges of not being “perfect” right when she started, she kept going and grew into a place where she feels proud.
Amaya Belden-Reeves says that if she had to tell her younger self one thing, it would be, “more things are achievable than you think they are.”
Belden-Reeves faced many challenges growing up in a low-income household. She says that she didn’t have high hopes for her future because college was just out of reach. However, this didn't stop her from pushing through and pursuing what she once believed was unachievable. She tells fellow students to reach out to scholarship programs and stay involved with those who offer them support.
Lucy Roedel says, “If you don't understand something, don't be afraid to ask your teachers for help.” During her childhood, Roedel says that she found it difficult to seek out assistance. She didn’t want to be seen as not being smart enough, or unable to help herself. Once she found out that asking for help is a normal and beneficial thing to do, she hasn’t had a hard time with it since.
Kennedy Nokes says that “things are going to change, and that's okay. My plans for myself will change and I’ll learn more about my own skills.” Growing up thinking you’re going to do one thing and then changing that to another can be quite intimidating, but these stories prove that happiness can still be found in change.
