Tonight I get to temporarily return to (sort of) being in my 20s. I’ve been invited to attend my alma mater the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Ad/PR Networking Night, along with several other professionals in the area. We’ll each have 30 seconds to share a little about our educational background and work experience before mingling with 50-70 students.

While I’m accustomed to communicating in 140 characters or less on Twitter, this 30 seconds of professional sharing is tying me up a bit. Should I stick to the true but polished recap of my career or admit to taking a few years before figuring out what I wanted to do for the rest of my life? I’m having a neurotic Larry David (Curb Your Enthusiasm) moment wondering whether my less then pretty path to finding a fantastic, rewarding, and even long-time career will inadvertently incite job panic in anyone.

I didn’t know what I wanted to do when I was 21, 23, or even 27, yet I knew a whole lot of what I didn’t want to do. And that process of elimination (thanks What Color is Your Parachute), along with discovering genuine interests and skills along the way, helped me figure things out. Today I have a career that I love at a fantastic company and my work is ever-changing. And thanks to this blog post, I’ve now figured out how to handle tonight's introduction. :)