Do You See Your Profession Like Your Grandfather Did, or Like You Do?
I wrote this poem when I was 21.
At that time, I had just finished my bachelor's degree. It was that period between "I've got this under control" and "what am I doing?". One day I was certain I'd found my path, the next day something completely different pulled me.
For a long time, I judged myself for this.
Not because I wasn't working. Not because I wasn't studying.
But because I could never identify with just one profession.
One period, psychology took me. Then branding. Then fashion. Then business. Then writing.
And every time I changed direction, I thought maybe the problem was me.
Today I know the problem wasn't the change.
The problem was trying to fit myself into a definition that couldn't contain me.
If you look back just 50 or 60 years, it made sense to identify with one profession for your entire life. Survival was the priority. Having a job was a blessing. Few people had the luxury of exploring dozens of different paths.
But today we don't live in that world anymore.
Today you can study management, work in fashion, build a business, write poetry, read neuroscience, create a brand, learn AI... and all of these not be hobbies, but part of the same life.
Yet we keep asking ourselves the same question:
"But me... what am I?"
The more I study humans, the less I believe identity should be built around a profession.
A profession is merely a way a person expresses themselves.
It's not the person themselves.
This is also why I created Vleerazspace.
Not to document the "perfect" version of myself. But to document the versions.
Because each version thought differently. Believed differently. Created differently. And each one brought the next.
And even if today I'm no longer that 21-year-old Vlera who wrote this poem, she was just as true as I am today.
I think we need to talk more about professional change.
Especially for our generation.
We live in a time when new professions are being created every year. Some don't even have names yet. Some didn't exist five years ago. And some we are the ones creating.
Maybe this is why many of us feel lost.
Not because we don't know what we want. But because we find ourselves between two worlds.
Between a mindset that still expects us to choose one profession for life...
...and a reality that demands constant adaptation.
It's a battle between the old and the new. Between what we've been taught... and what the world is asking of us now.
So if you've just finished university, or you're in that phase where you think you're late, don't judge yourself so quickly.
Remember...
Maybe you're not lost.
Maybe you're walking on a path that hasn't been paved yet. Maybe the profession you're looking for doesn't exist yet in the form you imagine. Maybe you're one of the people who will help create it.
And maybe...
not all roads are meant to be found. Some are meant to be built.