Biz Chicks Rule | Who Says It's a Man's World?

20 opinions for Contest: What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?

• Contest at Biz Chicks Rule: What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
  Apr 10, 2008 at 11:48 am

  […] a contest this month on What You Want(ed) to Be When You Grow Up. All you have to do to enter is visit this post at my women and business blog Biz Chicks Rule and leave a comment. The prize is a $25 gift card to […]

• Inkthinker | Freelance Writing Blog » Contest at Biz Chicks Rule: What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
  Apr 10, 2008 at 11:49 am

  […] a contest this month on What You Want(ed) to Be When You Grow Up. All you have to do to enter is visit this post at my women and business blog Biz Chicks Rule and leave a comment. The prize is a $25 gift card to […]

• Marjorie
  Apr 10, 2008 at 1:45 pm

  I’d always wanted to be an archaeologist, ever since I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark Alas, my mom wasn’t crazy with the idea, so when I went off to college she persuaded me to take a different route instead. Tough to be in an Asian family.

  I still dream about it to this day.

  Cheers,
  Marjorie

• Geri
  Apr 10, 2008 at 7:54 pm

  I really wanted to be a scientist like Marie Curie and make all sorts of important discoveries.

• Kristen King
  Apr 10, 2008 at 8:29 pm

  @Marjorie - Maybe you can do some volunteer work with your local historical preservation society and still fulfill those dreams!

• Kristen King
  Apr 10, 2008 at 8:30 pm

  @Geri - That sounds like fun! :)

• Lori
  Apr 11, 2008 at 7:51 am

  When I was six, I wanted to be a nurse like my redheaded Aunt Alice (and my gramma, but gramma never told us she was a nurse). I held on to that dream until the day I cut my foot on a piece of glass and nearly passed out from the minute amount of blood.

  The next dream was a rodeo star. I had this pony and she was gonna take me places. She did. One way. Because she and her colt were not weaned, it was impossible for someone my size and demeanor to convince her to ride away from him. So I compromised - I led her away from the barn and rode like the wind….right back to the barn. So much for the rodeo.

  When I got my organ in fourth grade, I was going to be a rock star. My sister had the tambourine and my brother was learning the trumpet. Even though we didn’t ask him, we were sure he’d want to be the next Herb Alpert to our female Osmonds. We practiced like mad, but I couldn’t quite make a powder-blue organ with no stand and the desperate need for an extension cord sound like the big time. There went that dream.

  All this time, we were doing other things. We’d put together a newsletter - happenings on the farm. We sold it to the neighbors for five cents. My sister soon tired of this, but I couldn’t stop! A writer was born.

  That was what I wanted to be when I grew up. I don’t write about the cats and the cows anymore, but this is the dream and I’m living it. :)

• Lori Widmer
  Apr 11, 2008 at 8:09 am

  http://loriwidmer.blogspot.com/2008/04/grow-up-already-what-do-you-want-to-be.html

• Devon Ellington
  Apr 11, 2008 at 9:42 am

  I’ve been a writer since I was six. Always knew. By the time I was 12, I also knew I wanted to be in theatre, and have spent my entire professional life in the arts. Temp jobs, occasionally, but no cubicle life for me.

  I still am a writer; in fact, I left the dual career of writer/production person to be a full-time writer last fall.

  I am what I wish to be. I built the life I want. There’s room for growth, and the upcoming relocation will be an enormous part of it, but I was uncompromising in my determination.

  I refused to be a cubicle prisoner and write “on the side”. I went after my dream and have lived it since I was eighteen.

  It hasn’t been easy; there have been tough choices. But I”m glad I didn’t.

  The only dream I gave up was that I also wanted to be an astronaut, and I was 35 by the time I gave that up!

  So now I write science fiction/fantasy and travel through space that way! ;)

• Kristen King
  Apr 11, 2008 at 9:48 am

  @Lori - You’re nothing if not flexible. ;) It’s fun to see how things evolved for you!

• Kristen King
  Apr 11, 2008 at 9:48 am

  @Devon - You are so committed to doing your thing. I love that about you.

• Johannah B
  Apr 11, 2008 at 10:45 pm

  I don’t remember the order …but vet, CPA, MBA, and then just wife, mom, writer, grandma.

• Nichole Smith
  Apr 12, 2008 at 11:10 pm

  Wow! It is amazing to see what everyone wanted to be and how they were brought here! I’m afraid I am nowhere near as interesting!

  When I was in the 5th grade, I decided I would be a comedian. I had spent kindergarten through 4th grade and I had some pent-up freedom of speech to let out. It was how I made my first real friends. I could make them laugh but sadly my parents and siblings didn’t think I was nearly as funny.

  Then I decided I got bitten by the notion of being an entrepreneur or librarian - it depends on your outlook but I would loan out my Garfield comic books to my classmates for $.10 a week (it was the 80’s, what can I say?) Oddly enough this was in the 5th grade also. I must have decided for world domination also because in the 6th grade I wanted to run for President. I had the most interesting cabinet but the school didn’t share my love for my extended summer vacation policy and birthdays as an exempt day from school proposal either. That same year I decided to be an artist when my “Just Say No” campaign poster of Garfield (which I drew of course) won 1st place. Unfortunately, Garfield is the only thing I figured out how to draw - so my venues are limited.

  In high school, I got serious. I wavered between an English teacher and a writer. My “creative” assignments always went on longer than our directions permitted and I had a knack for telling jocks and cheerleaders to cross their t’s and dot the i’s. My dad took one of my short pieces into the community college to one of his instructors who told him that I had talent and should pursue the dream.
  I didn’t. Until now. Who knows? Maybe there is a YA fiction piece in my little trip down memory lane!

• Cherie Burbach
  Apr 14, 2008 at 4:30 pm

  I wanted to be a writer for as long as I can remember. I wrote like my life depended on it, scribbling notes in one spiral bound notebook after another.

  Whenever I’d talk about writing, my parents would poo-poo the idea as ridiculous. One night at dinner I really wanted to “announce” that I was serious, so I gathered my courage, cleared my throat, and said, “I’m going to be a writer when I grow up. I’m just going to do it.”

  My parents said wasn’t that nice and then told me to be realistic and go into banking. I did. For years. I hated it. For years.

  A few years ago I got sick and couldn’t work like I once did - so I once again turned to writing. And haven’t looked back. It taught me a lot about listening to your dreams and not trying to please everyone else. I had to deal with health issues in order to “get it” but sometimes that’s what it takes in order to wake up and live your own life!

• Crystal Unrau
  Apr 14, 2008 at 9:32 pm

  I always wanted to be an architect - until I majored in drafting in high school and realized how much I DIDN’T like that actually work part of it, lol. So, I became a mom instead and started dreaming up things to do when I was done being a mom. I have wanted to be tons of things, all creative, and have since settled on Graphic Design specializing in wedding invitations. I LOVE what I do now:)

• Contest At The Business Channel: What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up
  Apr 14, 2008 at 11:53 pm

  […] me at the Biz Chicks Rule’s post and share your answer. Pretty cool prizes for the winner […]

• Kristen King
  Apr 15, 2008 at 8:46 am

  You guys have such interesting aspirations! I love it! :) Thanks for sharing. :)

  kk

• KathleenL
  Apr 16, 2008 at 11:45 am

  Growing up… oh, [she says with an audible sigh and a frown] do I have to?
  Okay, that’s rhetorical, but I do remember wanting to ride bulls in the rodeo, but when I was 9 years old and saw bull riding in person, I was glad I was a “girl” and back then they didn’t allow “girls” on bulls, especially since that was the reason my father said I ‘being a girl is why I could not ride the bulls.’ Then I wanted to be a Veterinarian, but I just knew in 9th grade I was too lazy to go through “all of that college.” Silly me, I’ve still gone through that much college, what was I thinking.

  Next dream … I wanted a job involving horses, this realization came in 9th grade as well. My dream was answered, rewarded, and realized. I studied Equine Science and trained, bred, boarded, and showed horses for 20 plus years. Plus, I got a job with Montie Montana Jr’s Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show in which I was able to use a multitude of my skills: horsemenship — via accepting a Roman Riding role, acting, and stunt work (including the Wheel of Death), etc. in this two-hour stage play. Many years later, I was able to use my horse husbandry schooling and experience to be a fill-in Vet. Tech during a thin work-related time in my life (divorce).

  I did not pick up the dream of being a paid writer until I became a mother, it started out as my way of contributing to the family horse business as I stayed close to home with the newborn. That was over 16 years ago and I’ve been playing with words since then. But as with all dreams, once they are reached I look to find and fulfill another, new dream. So, now I dream of having family members take my writing serious, making enough income as a writer to make a living as a writer and that includes selling a manuscript or two, of course. Another dream of mine is to see my grandfather’s manuscript about San Francisco’s Barbary Coast picked up and published. And I am certain there are more dreams to come.

• Chandini Lord
  Apr 18, 2008 at 6:44 am

  I think it’s interesting how many writers have shared their experiences. Is is because they can’t resist that urge to write just a little bit more?

  In any case, I remember the most instruction my mother ever gave me on what to be coming from when I was about 8 years old and Striptease with Demi Moore came out. My family was pretty open about sex and all of that so for my dad’s birthday the three of us, my mom, dad, and myself, went to see it. When Demi Moore was stripping at some point my mom leaned over and told me “That is what you don’t ever do. That is not a career for you.”

  Ironically, that same year I knew I wanted to be a lawyer. My mother and I were with a group of other moms and kids who sort of all knew each other and grew up together in a mall. We stopped by the candy shop and all the kids were told that they could get one thing. I looked all over while other kids grabbed anything. I kept coming back to my mom to ask if it was really ANY one thing. She assured me I could pick any thing I wanted as long as I only got one. So I proceeded to hand her a $20 bar of Toblerone. She laughed and bought it for me. I love to find loopholes in things and to make sure the agreements I enter into don’t have any. That’s why I’m going into contract law.

• KathleenL
  Apr 18, 2008 at 8:07 am

  Chandini Lord — it looks like you’ve got it figured out too.

Have an opinion? Leave a comment:

• Use this area to discover new blogs and content in the b5media network.
• Beauty & Style
• Business
• Celebrities
• Entertainment
• Health & Wellness
• Lifestyles
• Music
• Sports
• Team Blogs
• Technology
• Travel & Culture
• Video Games