What is your career plan?

As a disabled person I often feel like the term ” career plan” is a little bit ignorant of reality, a little bit too optimistic.

I wish that I could have a career plan and simply stick to it. But the continued in accessibility and ableism of society makes this difficult.

If you’ve been following me for a little while you will know that I am trying to look for work. At this point I am trying to look for any work from home, as this is the most accessible work to me at the moment. This is despite my qualifications in other areas.

While qualifications are important to some career plums, experience, may also be considered equally if not this is more important. Well I have the former in my chosen career area, education, I lack the latter.

When even my University struggle to find me experience in this area, it is not surprising that I find it so impossible alone.

It was suggested to me recently, that I complete volunteering work to get the necessary experience in order for me to get a job. As I haven’t got passed the interview stage previously due to this lack of experience. That is if I believe the managers of the job I did manage to make it to the interview stage with, that my only flaw was my lack of experience, and this itself is not ableism. My difficult in getting experience is surely reflective of the ableism of society. This suggestion that I would just be able to get experience in the field is definitely ignorant of the reality I have experienced.

This is all without considering the fact that the physical energy it would cost me to work, makes it only worth it for me if I am paid for the work that I do. I am far to qualified to put in the hard work involved in this job, simply for the sake of volunteering. This might sound harsh, as if a job is just about money. But I think I am just facing the reality that money, proper payment for hard work, is important.

And finally, lets not forget that I deserve to be paid for my hard work, and the fact I’m disabled, as a result of which a job is even harder for me to get. By that I mean that I cannot just take any job that comes, doesn’t mean I should simply volunteeer. I also want to add here that I have a great deal of respect for those that choose to volunteer, but I want paid work, for my own self worth, to prove I can earn my own money.

So you can see my chosen career path is a little complex, and I’ve only told you a very small part in all of this. I haven’t even begun to consider here the difficulties that could be involved in adapting a role so I can then complete were I to get it. It is all just very complex.

So I am looking for any job that I can do from home, just to be doing something, and of course earn a little more money. Though the same issue of lack of experience does also plague me here, at least other issues of access will not, when I hopefully eventually find something.

It might also be worth mentioning here that I am trying to get in to a professional freelance capacity if I can, and maybe eventually an author, in my longer term plans. This way I can at least give some of my dreams a fighting chance.

Do wish me luck with all of that, and I wish you all the best of luck with your career plans, and if necessary your back up career plans. I hope whatever you do works out for you.