The advice that saved my life

When I was a little boy I was asked many times by my teachers, “What do you want to be when you grow up”?

I usually had an answer for them, but it was always different: “I want to be a firefighter, a football player, a doctor, a cop”. 

After some time had passed I became self-aware that I kept changing my mind due, to the mere fact that there appeared to be so many options for me to choose from. I was so confused as to what I wanted to do with my life. I didn’t know whether to join a football team or start studying for a medical degree. 

I was stuck in this dilemma until my father gave me advice that, I would say, altered the course of my life: “Son you don’t have to be good at just one thing when you grow up. This is a big world that is constantly changing and evolving, so there is no reason you shouldn’t prepare to evolve either. If you are good at only one thing you won’t survive that long when the world decides to make a drastic change; like it always does. There’s nothing wrong with growing to bea mathematical genius and proving to be a professional fisherman, or a medical professional but knowing how to hunt, or even becoming a teacher but at the same time training to be a professional hiker. Have a profession, that you like doing of course, to make money but don’t be afraid to sample everything in the world. The more knowledge you have the better prepared you’ll be for anything”. 

I understood my father very clearly that day. That same advice guides almost every decision that I make, such as: learning a second language but at the same time understanding chemistry or to go from understanding advanced math to understanding the human body, as well as from comprehending a novels true meaning to understanding a society, human and animal kingdom alike. I feel that the advice my father gave me that day has prepared me for the rest of my life, no matter what happens in this world.