Using Creativity To Find Your Path

1) The world is full of opportunities! Don’t limit your career goals to only jobs you’re familiar with. What types of jobs did the role models have? Were any of these jobs new or surprising to you? If so, which ones? How could you learn about other types of unusual jobs or jobs that you haven’t heard of before?

2) Listeners learned that pursuing your interests and believing in yourself can help lead you down the path towards a life that will make you happy. What are your interests or what things do you love to do? How do you make time for these interests alongside your schoolwork and other commitments? Why do you think it’s important to continue to pursue these hobbies or activities?

3) One role model told us that “the best thing young people can do is to be open and excited about change and creative about looking for opportunities.” How do you feel about change? What could you do to be more open or excited for changes in your life? How can change lead to opportunity?

4) Trying new things can feel hard or scary. But it is important to expose yourself to lots of different opportunities and ideas. When is the last time you tried something new? What happened? Do you think it gets easier or harder to try new things as you get older? Why?

5) A role model said, “You have to live a life that’s going to make you happy at the end of the day.” What kind of a life do you think would make you happy? You might think about family, friends, a career, or other goals. What things do you need to do now to set yourself up for that type of life?

6) The final role model told us that “creativity is a survival tool.” What do you think she meant? Do you think people that can apply creativity to their lives are ultimately more successful than people that can’t? Why or why not?

The best thing young people can do is to be open and excited about change and creative about looking for opportunities and finding them. My father had a job– same job for 33 years. That doesn’t really happen anymore. Every time a door closes, many more open. Your creativity lies in seeing those opportunities and saying, “Okay, yes, I can deal with it, and let me see what else is there.”

I think that people should not be afraid to try new things. If it’s something that you’re interested in– if you can take a class or take an after-school activity, participate in a sport, participate in drama, even if it’s not something you might want to do long-term, just try it out because those opportunities give you so many skills and they give you so much confidence to pursue the next thing. So don’t be afraid to explore. I think there’s so much value in doing that.

What helps me now is knowing who I am and what I want and what I love, and just staying with it and just keeping at it because so many times I think people grow up loving things and wanting to do things and maybe not getting encouragement immediately from people around them, or what they want to do, they don’t know anyone else who does it, and so they feel kind of different, and that can be a little scary. And it’s a little lonely to do something so different from what all your friends are doing or something. And so I think just believing in yourself enough and just believing that you can do it is very, very important.

There’s a lot of pathways. A lot of my friends have nine-to-five jobs, and they’re a lawyer– which there’s nothing wrong with that, but it just wasn’t for me, I knew. And so I actually feel really blessed that I was able to just continue to pursue my interest and to find something that’s actually then I get paid for and I can develop into my own. So it’s just for me, I guess, believing that what I want to do, it can work. There’s something out there for me. I don’t need to just do something that someone told me that you’re supposed to. You can really create a position.

Because I always love to express myself. And when I found words hard, music was easy. It was a way I could– a vehicle in which I could just move through. And so I knew that from very early on.

You have to live a life that’s going to make you happy at the end of the day. And for me, that is to live a creative life. And with that, it’s also in how you live your life, how you touch other people, and whether that’s in writing, whether that’s in gardening, whether that’s in how you raise your children, or feed your family, your friends. So you have to think creatively to have that mindset then. Creativity is a survival tool.

Using Creativity To Find Your Path Independent Learning Guide: This all-purpose guide can also be used by educators, parents, and mentors to jumpstart a valuable discussion about exploring interests and passions to identify career possibilities and life opportunities.

Using Creativity To Find Your Path Classroom Lesson Plan: This step-by-step lesson plan is available to guide a more in-depth “before, during, and after” learning experience when viewing the video with students. This lesson plan is also suitable for use in after-school programs and other educational settings.

Use Empowerment Activities as a fun way to reinforce the video topic and build community with your students.

• Personalized Planter

Fun Page Activity: What are your passions? How might you continue to follow your passions in the future? Whether you decide to focus on a career that includes your passions, or you devote free time to your interests, pursuing the things you love will help you lead a fulfilling life. Home in on your interests and imagine your future in this simple fun page activity.