To best prepare for the inevitable letters of recommendation that I am asked to write for my seniors, I ask them to do a bit of writing for me (tit for tat, I always say!). Standard questions that appear on the form include: What is your best memory at LHS? Name three adjectives that describe you and tell why. What career aspirations do you have and what steps have you taken to reach them? And finally, What is the best advice that you have been given and who gave it to you?

I often read words that parents, grandparents, pastors, teachers — the usual mentors — have passed on, and those words frequently center around following your heart, doing what is right, and finding joy in life. I don’t know what conversations this question has generated in my students’ lives, but I have a confession to make:

I honestly don’t know that I could answer that question for myself.  

I’ve never been a very good listener, especially when it comes to other people telling me what to do. Call that egotistical or stubborn–it’s a trait that I was born with and I think that I was born to be a teacher (Translation:  I’ve always like telling others what to do!). I fought this future when I was in high school, even when I was telling others how to do, well, just about anything, from correcting a grammar error, to making better choices, and when I moved into college life, and I found myself at a “teacher’s college” (yes, that is the heritage of UNT), I still resisted those classes in the education department. The nagging voice that stopped me was eventually said to me by one of my high school friends after I started teaching at LHS in 1977 — “I always thought that you’d do more with your life than be a teacher.”

Thirty-eight years later, I want to find her on social media (surprised that we “lost touch”?  I’m not!) and ask: “What more could I have done?”

What I hope that everyone is taking from this question, is that you are the only one who matters in your decisions, and that others’ opinions and advice should fall behind what matters most: your intuitive recognition of who you are and who you are meant to become. Some of you know that path with crystal clear certainty right now, and some of you are swimming in a sea of possibilities. Those of you who are treading water more than likely are looking jealously at those swimmers, and feeling inadequate because certainty is what you want more than anything right now!

So, just what will you be doing next year? Are you choosing the right major? The right college? Is it better to wait a year before beginning school? Live at home or go away? Feeling overwhelmed? Guess what, even those who seem to know what they’re doing are wracked by doubts, too. No one knows for certain about how right your choices are until, well, 38 years pass.

I know that I couldn’t have done anything “more” — anything better than be who I am, to be a teacher. And that ends in just a few months. There’s no regret in that declaration, just a bitter- sweet acknowledgement that I’ve got to figure out what more I can do in my life, and to find the pathway to the same sort of joy that teaching has brought me. (Ignore having to write all those deadline driven letters of recommendation and grading all those research papers and making all those phone calls to parents) This part of my life has been pretty wonderful, and I hope that all of you find the path you need to follow to reach what I’ve found.

Your path will probably be different from mine. And that’s expected. Your path may not be quite as straight as mine (Who works in the same job and the same location for 38 years?) Your path must be the one that you choose or you will never find wonderfulness.

I guess that I’m better at giving advice than receiving it, but if I expect my students to answer the hard questions, I’d better set myself up to those same standards. The only times that I have “listened” to the words of Mark Twain are when I’m turning the pages of Huck Finn or other examples from his pantheon of wit and wisdom, but I recently came across words of his that resonate with me. They speak about finding purpose, of finding a path that you certainly don’t know when and where it will begin and where it will end. These words are the best advice that I’ve been given, and they came to me just when I need them:

“The two most important days in your life are the day you were born and the day you find out why.”

Editor’s note: Karen Cooke has taught English at LHS since 1978. She was selected as the school’s teacher of the year in 2010-11. She is retiring at the end of the school year and will provide commentary on her final year of teaching at LHS as well as reflections on her career in this series of columns.