Even if you have the perfect career in your sights, it's still not easy leaving the fold, comments Goodman. Advisors and associates may tell you that you're wasting your training and making a mistake.
Maybe your mentors feel they've failed you as academic parents, she says. And perhaps your colleagues are angry because they're also unhappy but too scared to try something new, explains Yoon, who got her Ph.D. from Cornell University. The way she sees it, "their reaction has nothing to do with you. They're just showing you their personal neuroses and fears."
Even your family might not be warm and supportive. For years, Bieker-Brady's nearest and dearest hazed her with lawyer jokes. "They really believed that lawyers are Satan's closest friends," she says. "Now they've accepted my choice--although they did have to go through grief and mourning first."
Regardless of what others think, you have to follow your ...
