“What do you love?” This is what Stephanie Tom, the chief consultant for the Asian American and Pacific Islander Legislative Caucus (AAPILC) asked me and my fellow CLA interns when she spoke to us as part of the Capitol Summit this past week. This question resonated with me, firstly because it’s not one typically considered by members of the AAPI community when thinking about their future careers, and because answering this question is exactly how I figured out what career I’d like to pursue in the future.
From my personal experience and from what I’ve heard from my friends who are part of the AAPI community, members of our community do not typically consider what we love in a professional setting or when thinking about our professional career. As far back as I can remember, my first thoughts when considering what career I’d pursue in the future revolved around what would make my parents happy and what would make all the work they’ve done and sacrifices they’ve made to achieve the life my siblings and I have worthwhile. I didn’t begin to think that what I love should be a part of my career until I was in college.
Stephanie said to me and my fellow interns that once you figure out what you love it’s a lot easier to lead. Hearing her say this was an eye-opening moment for me because I became cognizant of the fact that realizing what I loved led me to decide what career I should pursue. For me, law school had always been my dream career: becoming an attorney was a high-paying and well-respected profession, allowing me to achieve a comfortable life while also enabling me to give back to my parents and family for all that they’ve provided me to get to where I am in my career. However, I never had a personal reason for why I wanted to become an attorney. This was true until I led a mentorship program for the Filipino pre-law organization at my university. Giving undergrad Filipino students advice from what I’d learned in my past two years at UCLA as a Filipina trying to navigate the legal field and being a support system for these students who knew no other person in their community or family who was pursuing the same field was what I loved to do. So when Stephanie said that figuring out what makes it easier to lead I knew exactly what she meant. Leading this mentorship program didn’t feel like work, I put in the hours and effort because I was passionate about helping these students and my love for the work I was doing reflected in my conversations with others about the program.
What do you love? Though passion and dreams are largely discarded by members of the AAPI community when considering what careers to pursue, I think, like Stephanie said, what we love should be brought back into the conversation. Pursuing a career where you love what you do should not be belittled but rather uplifted, and finding this intersection should be encouraged in not only undergrad students but also those well into their careers.