Insights from Guidon and Hanna Article

While reading the Guidon and Hanna (2002) article, I thought back to when I had my “aha” moment in my career development process. Prior to this moment, I had it pretty easy and thought I knew exactly where I was going. I was going to Arcadia University to become a physical therapist. During my time there I kept losing sight of my final goal and needed to make a change. I transferred to Millersville where I emerged myself in all psychology courses possible. I decided I would get a mock internship with a physical therapist to gain experience and to truly see if this was the career I could see myself in. My internship left me with confusion and frustration. I had just spent the past couple of years with my goals set of becoming a physical therapist and knowing exactly how to get there. At this moment, I did not know what to do. About a week later, we had a speaker come into one of my psychology courses to speak about their internship opportunities over summer. I thought to myself well, you have nothing to do over summer and you get to work with kids at a camp, how bad could it be? By the end of the summer I had my “aha” moment. I knew that psychology is right where I needed to be and I was going to make this my new goal in my career process.

From looking at my own process of second order change I wanted to see the transformations in my family from the genogram project. Unfortunately I did not think about this sooner when completing the project but the Guidon and Hanna (2002) article brought it to my attention. My father knew he wanted to become a Certified Public Accountant during his senior year, just as I had my dreams of becoming a physical therapist. The difference between us was that he actually found his passion right away. He studied hard and passed his licensing exams and was on his way. I think he reached his “aha” moment when his own business became successful. He had a consistent knowledge of his ultimate career goal but during the process of opening his own business he had his doubts. Once he started making a profit and becoming successful, he reached his moment and realized that this was the right choice for him.

My father and I are one and the same. We both hold high importance to helping others and doing the best you can. I have had these values passed on to me my entire life. He also taught me to just let things happen. If something negative occurs, roll with it and learn from it. I think this is similar to the Mitchell, Levin, and Krumbotlz (1999) article I found on chance. Both my father and the article propose to allow fate to run its course and have the person gain insight from this and create new experiences. By recognizing environmental differences, a person can learn much more than by forcing their future.  

Guindon, M. & Hanna, G. (2002). Coincidence, happenstance, serendipity, fate, or the hand of God: Case studies in synchronicity. The Career Development Quarterly, 50(3). 195-208.

Mitchell, K., Levin, A., and Krumboltz, J. (1999). Planned happenstance: Constructing unexpected career opportunities. Journal of Counseling and Development, 77(2), 115-124.