At age 7, I decided I wanted to work with computers. I didn't even have a computer, so I have no idea how I came to that conclusion but I did.

At age 12, I decided I wanted to go to the United States for college.

Those two decisions have never changed. For a while, I entertained the idea of going to college in Toronto, where my aunt lives, but the moment I visited Carnegie Mellon, I knew I was destined to end up in the US. I've also contemplated going into a career where I'd get to restore paintings by using computers. But my main decisions of leaving my homeland and going into a field that seriously involved computers never changed.

Until now.

At the age of 17, I did leave Turkey and attend Carnegie Mellon, majoring in Information Systems with minors in Art and Computer Science. I even got a Masters degree in management at the same time. During the summer of my junior year, I worked at Bell Laboratories (they hadn't become Lucent, yet). As much fun as that was, I decided to join a firm that wasn't primarily a technology firm. I figured since technology was my field, I'd make sure to keep up on it either way and I wanted to join a firm where I'd have the opportunity to also learn about another field.

So, after graduation, I joined a really prestigious investment bank. It is the kind of firm where I could make a career and since I'm happy to dedicate myself to a firm, it all sounded great to me. Unfortunately, my first few years didn't work out all that well. I've had successes and happy days. I got to live in London for several months and in Tokyo for six months. So it's not that I haven't had great opportunities, but I've also had some unfortunate situations.

Due to that, last May, I decided I needed a drastic change in my life. For the first time ever, I started questioning my choices. As much as I like computers, I wondered whether that's what I want to spend my life doing. I bought a whole bunch of books on choosing a career; I was desperate to figure out what I was really meant to do. I considered every option including going back to college, taking some time off, moving to a different company, moving to a different area in my company, and many others.

At the end, I stayed in the same firm. I moved to a totally different area and I work three days a week. I work from Wednesdays to Fridays. On Mondays, I take three or four classes and on Tuesdays, I volunteer at the New York Society for the Deaf. I am the first to admit that I have a great setup and I'm enjoying it tremendously. I am 100% happier.

The thing is, I still don't know what I want to do. While my current situation is amazing, I'm not really sure how long it will last. I have this continuous nagging voice inside that keeps telling me that I need to make up my mind. For a girl who knew what she wanted since 7, the idea of all this unknown is really scary and I truly hate that I can't just relax and enjoy my current good luck.

If anyone has good ideas on how I can figure out what I should do with my life, I am truly open to any and all suggestions. If you know how to shut up my little voice, speaking up about that would be amazingly useful, as well.

How did you know what you wanted to do with your life?

Before?