Humans, it seems, are naturally afraid of change. They fear it so much, that they seek to avoid it, often falling into something that they aren't completely happy with simply so they don't have to seek something else out.
I myself am a victim of routine. I wake up at the same time, drive the same route to work, put my stuff in the same place on my desk, go to the same coffee store, order the same drink, do my daily work things, possibly take a second trip to the same coffee store to get another drink (different from the first, but the same day to day), do the same thing after work, eat the same meal for dinner, and ultimately go to bed after playing through my five lives of Candy Crush before falling asleep.
It's bad.
However the end of an era has come.
Very recently I made a decision (and not lightly, there was a lot of crying and discussion involved in it) that very well has changed the next year+ of my life. After switching my major it's the biggest decision I've made since. As some people know, I've decided to leave my position in the photo department and move on. At first I had no idea where I was going, and then I got an inkling, and then I had a discussion, and then I got a job — as a graphic designer, nonetheless.
It's a step forward. I came to college with virtually no work experience, learned how to ballroom dance, switched my major, got a job as a photographer, stopped dancing, got a job as a photo editor, and two years later I'm a senior with an intent to graduate in the spring working as a graphics person.
My life, if nothing, has been interesting.
There are times where I've shunned change as an overall, but oftentimes I resort to viewing it as a step in the right direction. Although I'm not a necessarily religious person, I am a firm believer that everything is going to happen for some sort of reason. Working as a photographer opened a lot of doors and gave me a lot of skills that I wouldn't have necessarily had prior to. I've worked with people from all walks of life and done so many different things and experienced everything from court to traveling to the middle of nowhere (Wisconsin) and bunny hopping across the seemingly one main road in the entire state after drunkenly eating TGIFriday's at midnight.
I've covered hockey games across the state and got to take photos at the one place of my dreams (Joe Louis Arena), and covered nearly every single game in an entire MSU hockey season — to the point some of the defensemen would smile at me every time they saw me pointing a camera in their direction.
I've made a lot of friends, made a few good photos along my way, and made some self-discoveries. I grew into myself.
This summer I continued to grow into myself. I grew a voice and earned some respect and had an influencing say in a lot of things. I helped contribute to the redesign of a 100+ year old newspaper. I delivered newspapers and designed advertisements and found things that I truly enjoyed doing, doing them with people I enjoyed being with.
People say that the summer before they come to college is a time for change, but I firmly believe it's the summer before your senior year — the time when you start to think about where you're going to be in a year, who you're going to be spending your time with, and what you want to do with it.
It was absolutely a challenging summer, and it definitely wasn't easy, but I've already learned so much and am ready to take another giant leap in order to learn more. Joining the creative team, learning how to do news design and ad design and (possibly) even web design is just another hallway into another set of doors that can open as soon as I fall in love with what I'm doing.
Already something that I'm interested in, joining a design team is certain to bring me to some very interesting places.
And I'm excited about the new direction.
