Potential Career Change?? At the very least, a shift in perspective...

I had my class at Mount Royal last night. I am taking a variety of courses for the Professional Business Communications certificate. So far, I have completed one course, am in the middle of the second course and I start the third course tomorrow. The fourth of the series is starting in a week or so.

I am taking this certificate program for two reasons. Both professional and personal. I want to develop my professional skills and beef up my resume, but I also want to develop my personal skills and grow as an individual. As I move through this process though, I start to realize that I am much further ahead than I once thought and part of that discovery is because of my confidence level. Now that I have been in class rooms with other people, I can see how much more confident I am in the grand scheme of things compared to others, and how good I feel about myself.

I was talking to Neil and Lauren both last night about a potential career change. I wasn't thinking of quitting my current job or anything, but I realized after this last class that I really do love speaking to people about things that matter to me.. It is such a rush and a huge boost of adrenaline. I was thinking maybe doing some teaching myself one day or perhaps doing some motivational speaking... I think this is something I will have to explore and even though it likely won't result in an immediate career change, it will at the very least change my perspective.

This class I am in is called "Speaking with Confidence" and I am not sure if I have blogged about it before but I rated myself a 7 or 8 out of 10 on the confidence scale when the remainder of the class hovers around a 3. The instructor often relies on me to keep the class momentum up because he knows I am willing to go first on occasion etc.. and I usually have something interesting to offer. What he may not realize is that by not forcing the other people to come forward, he may not be giving them as much opportunity to learn.. who knows, I could be wrong but I try my best to not volunteer to go first etc.. because they all need to break out of their shells too!

Last night, I wasn't feeling up to going to class much less doing a speech so I kind of purposely didn't bother writing my 5 min speech I was supposed to.. oops! And when I sat down in class I immediately confessed my sins to the instructor who offered to call my higher being of choice for my forgiveness, and then promptly asked if I would be willing to do an impromptu speech.

So impromptu it was.. I feel more comfortable with that anyway.. so I gave him two choices of topics.. 1) How I lost nearly 1/2 of myself (we all know what thats about) and 2) Trusting your gut instincts.

He chose the latter and I did a speech on an incident I had where I learned that my gut instincts are very clearly defined and that I am glad I trust them. The story is pretty crazy and most my friends have heard it.. (if you haven't, I would be happy to share in person but I don't want to blog about it).

Anyway.. the speech was supposed to be 5 minutes long and at 4 1/2 mins, my instructor was supposed to give me a time warning. I needed this desperately to learn how to judge time etc..
So I got up and started telling my story and felt so incredibly alive up there in front of the group. And towards the end of my story, the instructor held up his hand as my 30 second warning... and I summed things up...

The speech went marvelously. People were enthralled and fascinated. I had all of their attention and I loved it!!! The only problem was... My instructor was so wrapped up in the speech, that he forgot to watch the clock and let me go for 8 minutes and 33 seconds!!!!! Now those of you who know me, know that I have a number thing.. 8's and 3's... and it gave me chills when he told me I went for 8:33!!!

Anyway.. he had nothing bad to say, no criticism and complimented me in his feedback.. so I had to tell him what I thought I needed to work on... I confessed that I feel like I need a better and clearer understanding of how long a second, minute, 5 mins etc.. is.. and that I think that once you can grasp the concept of time, you can really control it rather than be at its mercy. At that second, I saw his eyes widen and although I don't think I really told him anything he didn't already know, I think I enlightened him a little bit as to a new way of thinking about this class.

So now, next week I have another 5 min speech and this one is supposed to be researched, prepared and outlined.. crap lol.. I think I may have set my personal bar a little higher than I expected to.. everyone was telling me that they are looking forward to hearing what is next!

I have some topics on the top of my mind that I could present... I could talk about my surgery, I could talk about June or I could choose something I have always wanted to learn...

We'll have to see!