Maybe I Should Have Done Something Else With My Professional Life

As I was volunteering at a local food pantry the other day, it occurred to me that I may have made a greater positive impact in my small corner of the world if I had worked in other fields rather than spending almost 30 years in various classroom and teaching almost 30 different subjects (along with coaching three sports).

Up until recently, I had never thought this before, and it was a bit unsettling to consider.

I certainly don’t believe I wasted my professional life, but I now sense I could have put my writing, speaking, education, organization and presentation skills to much more lasting, and quite frankly, meaningful use.

In the course of my professional life when I took breaks from teaching or after my teaching career ended, I have worked as a paid staffer and/or volunteer with animal shelters, the incarcerated, the homeless and multiple conservation and literary arts organizations. I also worked for rural newspapers.

During these experiences, which I enjoyed very much, I found I improved these organizations/businesses and elevated their capacity to serve causes, people, animals and watersheds. I also wasn’t spending $4000-$5000 of my own money every year to support my efforts like I did while teaching.

Can you imagine what I could have done with the energy I expended staging a couple hundred lunchtime open mics out of my classroom?

Of course, I wouldn’t have had all the summers off, which I certainly put to good use, including getting the writing going.

I am just thinking out loud here, wondering about certain career choices. I regret nothing about these choices because living with regret is no way to live. But still, I think I could have done so much more with my energy, expertise and passions. I’ll never know. It is impossible to quantify such things.