I Got the Degree… But It Wasn’t My Purpose: My Journey to Alignment

In this episode, I’m sharing my real journey of finding my purpose—from earning my bachelor’s degree in criminal justice to realizing it wasn’t the path I truly wanted. I talk about the internal shift, the realizations that changed everything, and how I felt called to advocate for the underdog and be of service in a deeper way. If you’ve ever questioned your path, felt pulled in a different direction, or wondered what your purpose really is, this conversation is for you.

Transcript

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I'm your host Tierra, coming to you with another episode of Rooted Thoughts Podcast. In today's episode, I'm going to be sharing with you my journey of finding my unique purpose as well as some of the realizations that I came to while going through that process. So I do want to first kind of mention that my journey is not complete. I am actually still in that process. But I do feel like I have a little bit more, well, actually a lot more clarity than what I had in the past. So we starting from the beginning, I would say back in like elementary and middle school, your girl loves some Nancy Drew books. I'm talking about, I would literally read every single book that came out. And I was one of those kids who would rush to finish my work so that I could go to the library just to make sure I get me a new book. So I went from being in love with Reading Nancy Drew books to I would say around sometime in high school, I fell in love with the show Criminal Minds. So this show fed my love for wanting to or having a joy for solving things. And so that led up to me wanting to be a crime scene investigator. So before I go any further, I do want to mention that I did go to school in the hood. And so I may not have gotten some of the resources or guidance that I should have gotten prior to graduating. And the reason I'm mentioning that because, for one, I do not recall at all ever speaking with the guidance counselor in my high school. I don't recall anyone going over different career paths and what does it pay and how likely I am to get a job in that field or anything like that, right? So I just had it set in my mind that I was gonna be a crime scene investigator, and so I went out to college, and which college was also like it was sort of my escape plan. It was kind of my way out from my dynamics and where I currently was in life and everything like that, because I knew that I wanted to do something different from what I was seeing in my surroundings, but I didn't know exactly what that was. So to me personally, college was that opportunity for me to pretty much get out there in the world, figure out me a career, and graduate, get a job, and be successful and live happily ever at the right wrong. So I did end up going to the Forth Valley State University, in which while there I majored in criminal justice. So again, I had this whole idea of what my career in life was going to look like up until my final year of college, which was my third year, because I did go to summer school, so therefore I did finish a little early. During that last year of college, it just suddenly dawned on me one day that I'm very family oriented. And before I ever even thought about what it was I wanted to do career-wise, I always knew that I went to have my own family. I want to go on vacations and, you know, do the whole nine yards, right? So then when I thought about being a crime scene investigator, I started saying, hmm, you know, crime don't stop at 5 p.m. So there's a high chance that I would have to be on call at nighttime. There's a chance that I may have to miss vacations, I may have to miss school functions and things like that. And I wasn't willing to do that. But at the same time, I'm literally in my last year of college with this criminal justice degree, and I had no other idea. There was no plan B. I had no idea what I was gonna do this degree outside of being a crime scene investigator. And honestly, I never even researched at that point to find out if I even needed a degree to be a crime scene investigator. So in that moment, I actually just let go of the idea of that career field because me personally, having a family that outranked being an investigator. You are listening to Real Thoughts Podcast with your host, Tiara. Follow and leave me a review. So I went on and finished my degree, and then from college, I up and left from the city I was in and went back to my hometown. And there I first started working at a call center for a short time until I figured out where I was going next. From the call center, I wound up out of prison as a CO. And that's a correctional officer, in case you don't know what that acronym is. Yeah, I remember going to HR and explaining to them, like, okay, I got my bachelor's degree in criminal justice. Do I get extra pay for this? Yeah, I swear the lady probably she didn't really laugh in my face, but under her breath or in the inside, she probably did laugh at me. Because here I go at a job that only requires a high school diploma, by the way. And I'm up here asking about some extra pay for my degree, in which there was no extra pay for a degree because the job did not require a degree. So I'm not gonna lie, that did sort of feel like a slap in the face. But I did still continue on with the job because hello, I need a job. I had bills to pay, of course. But during that time, I believe probably about a few months before I actually started the prison, I had actually got accepted to an online grad program in which I was getting my master's in, I believe it was the studies of human behavior. And that was going fine. I was actually acing all my classes, but one day when I was at work, I suddenly had an epiphany. I hope I'm saying that right. Suddenly I just realized, or I asked myself, why are you doing this? Or what are you gonna use this degree for? And in that moment, I realized that I wasn't getting that degree because I actually had any plans or any intentions on actually using it. It was more so of saying, hey, look at me, look at what I have achieved. Because coming from where I come from, you didn't see that a lot. You didn't see a lot of people going to college, you didn't see a lot of people actually succeeding. And some of them who went to college, you didn't even see them actually finish college. So I was super excited to not only say that I finished, but to say that I also went for a second degree and also accomplished that as well. But the more I thought about this, these were all the wrong reasons that I was going for this degree. So right then and there, while at work, I probably shouldn't say so. I wasn't supposed to be on my phone, but I was outside of the prison. But I did email, um, I think it was like the guidance person who was over me. I can't remember the correct terminology for it. But I emailed him and basically told him that I needed to enroll out of classes because this was no longer working for me. So of course he sort of messaged me back and began telling me why are you sure you're doing so well? Because of course he knew that I had kids and everything like that. And so I think that he thought that I was doing well for me to not only be working full-time, but to also be a new mom to twins. So I pretty much just told him, like, you know, of course, yeah, I'm sure, you know, this is just not working for me anymore. And I dropped from the classes and from the online school. And then I started thinking, okay, so what's next then? From there, I did try. Well, I kind of I dipped my feet in a few other things, specifically around entrepreneurship. I believe the first thing I tried out was I was selling bundles. That was an epic fail. I don't know why in the world I thought that I would be successful at selling bundles. For one, I barely talked to anyone. And so I feel like when it came down to it, it was more so of most people from this area, they preferred to buy things from, you know, their friends and their homegirls. And I didn't have a lot of those, honestly. I also sold things on Amazon for a little while, as well as I even tried making candles, which that was actually fun. But at the end of the day, none of those things, it didn't pull on my heart. It didn't do anything for me, honestly. I always felt like I was still missing something. So during this process, something else that I learned about myself was that I love to help others. And I also had a theme for the underdog. I'm talking about if there's anybody around me who's being treated unfairly or who's being bullied or anything like that, I always felt the need to speak up for those people. I also love to speak about things such as different family dynamics and breaking generational curses, as well as just being a better version of yourself. But at the same time, I didn't know what it was that I actually wanted to do with that. I kind of thought about the idea of going into psychology or being some type of therapist because I do love psychology. I love the way, I love the mind, I love discovering and learning about why people do the things they do and what makes people, you know, act the way they act and things like that. But at the same time, that still didn't seem like what it was I actually wanted to do. So after six years of working at the prison, I ended up going to another state job, which was with guardianship for adult wards of the state. That job totally burned me out, in which I then decided it was best at that point for me to resign from that job. And I started basically Instacart and while also working on a blog where I talked about things such as mental health and making better life decisions and things like that. Now, I do want to say that I had been working since the age of 17, and I had never quit a job without having something else lined up. So this was the first time for me, and it was actually a very scary time because I quickly found out that that wasn't for me either. Especially when I would have those days where one day I may make a good bit of money, and then the next day I would make barely anything. During that time, though, I started to see that there were things going on in my personal life in which no longer work for me, and that was in my first marriage. So I started to think that, hey, this may not be forever, and if so, I need to definitely make sure that I set myself up so that when this ends, I'm able to still support not only myself but my children as well. So I decided to go back to another estate job, and that job is the one that I'm currently doing now, which is with adult protected services. So when I started this job, I went in with the mindset of knowing that this job isn't my permanent job, and it's only for right now, and for however long God says that I need to do this job, but I knew that at some point in time it was gonna come to an end, in which I do feel like I am nearing that time. I just don't know when it is yet. I don't know if it's this year, next year, or whenever it is, but I can feel it, and it seems like it's really close. But with a lot of state jobs, though it does come with benefits, the pay is nowhere near what you deserve, especially for everything that you do and that you endured. But at the same time, I do feel like what has kept me in this role for the time that I have in this role is because, for one, I'm able to investigate. And like I said in the beginning of this, I love to solve things. I love to figure things out. But not only that, I'm also able to be of service to others as well as advocate for quote unquote the underdog. But this whole time, I would say since around maybe 2017, 2018, I have been just writing, writing, writing. Whenever something comes up that I feel like I want to get out, I just write it down. So I've been writing just, you know, thing pieces. I've even started a series script. I started a book. Though none of these things are finished, I did begin these things like a long time ago. And it's actually so fun to actually go back and reread what I wrote and you know, just to see the mind frame that I was in during that time frame. You are listening to Real Thoughts Podcast with your host, Tierra. Follow and leave me a review. So, me being someone who likes their freedom, I like work-life balance. When it was recommended to me about starting a podcast, of course, like I said before, I was severely scared. And not only that, I had the same idea that everybody else has. Like everybody has a podcast. But just having the ability to discuss what it is I want to talk about and just have that outlet outweighed all other fears that I had at that time. And in all honesty, just keeping it real with you, something that you're gonna probably look forward to or you can look forward to, is me creating my Substack. I had no idea what that was until my sister mentioned it to me. And when she mentioned it, it just seems like the perfect spot for me to also kind of just get some things out and go into more details about just some of the things I like to discuss. And I'm even thinking about at some point beginning a novel. And my hoping wishes that at some point in time these things were bringing enough income so that I'm able to replace that with my current job. Or who knows, my man may actually make me quit before then because I ain't gonna lie, y'all, he be stressed out when I'm in the field. But with any of this episode, I just want to let you know that it's okay if you don't have it all figured out. As long as you're doing something to provide a living for yourself, especially if you have children, because they shouldn't have to suffer while you figure it out. And make sure your purpose is actually your purpose. Make sure you're not doing something just because someone else is doing it or they had success with it, or because someone else wants you to do something. And make sure you're not just doing something just because it makes a lot of money. Because if that's the case, you will forever feel like you're working and you will forever feel like it's a job to you. But if you do something that's aligned with your purpose, as the people say, you will never feel like you have to work again in your life. And with that being said, I'm your host, Tierra, and this is Rud Thoughts Podcast.