I am quite a drifter when I search around among different concentrations to study. Though these years' education, I know a little bit of Geology, Geophysics and Geography, but don't know whole a lot of anyone of them. It is this unique path which I believe is the reason I am still exploring where to land my interest. Sometimes, I think it gets almost impossible to be a generalist in this rapidly evolving science field. Rather it's doable to be a specialist or an expert in one particular field.
I was into Structural geology the most in college, because of its less amount of memorization comparing to petrology or paleontology as well as its more intuitive research method as of inductive reasoning. But when I declared this major I neglected one very crucial aspect of this field, which caused me endless fear and issues that I am still trying to fix today. It is the field work. It exhausted all of my passion about the field during our two expeditions to map surface ruptures casued by 2011 Yushu Mg.7.1 Earthquake in eastern Tibet.
Right after I came to UofM and discovered an opportunity to learn numerical modeling in Geophysics. My eyes and heart went wide open. "Yes, this is what I'm gonna do for my research and to make a difference in the world." I told myself. Looking back, I was quite relentlessly determined at that point. But as you may expect it didn't work out well. I accomplished what I planned to do, yet I wasn't happy and lost my zeal again. There are many factors which made this journey not quite the one as what I had expected. One big reason is that I found myself unmarketable when I hit the point of looking for a job. It was sad and frustrating when I see myself useless after these many years' education. Though I landed a job in the environmental consulting business eventually, I quickly realized things or rules in the business field that I am not compatible with. It won't be fair to not mention the positive sides of this experience, like new skills that I learned, insides of the environmental consulting business that I got to know, and operational techniques that I wouldn't be able to acquire through education. But I still can't neglect the inner voice coming from my heart, which tries to tell me "Hey, this is not for you. You will make a bigger impact in your life and the world around if you pursue your dream of knowledge." I heard the voice unambiguously whenever I stay true to myself. I know this is time to change again!
Here is the change. I am a PhD in geography now.