Maybe the most important profession of the future is being human?

A job market we won't recognise

Recently I spoke with someone who works on artificial intelligence in Silicon Valley. She said a phrase that stuck firmly in my head: “Iryna, in three years we won't recognise the job market at all.”

And I'm a career guidance counsellor. My job is to help teenagers answer the sacred parental question: “So what will you be?” 🙂

There's a concept called the technological singularity. In plain language: technology is developing so fast that change becomes too rapid for us to confidently predict what comes next.

And it feels like we're already somewhere nearby.

Stop guessing the “right” profession

Professions will appear, disappear and change. Our children will have to keep rethinking themselves: retrain, change roles, master tools that didn't exist yesterday.

There's a popular comparison: a single modern edition of The New York Times contains more information than a person centuries ago could access in a lifetime. For our psyche that's too much. It doesn't get a firmware update together with ChatGPT.

“How do you ride this train — and not go crazy?”

And this is where, for me, the most important part of preparing children for the future begins: not guessing one “right” profession, but learning to notice your own interests, strengths and the conditions you want to work in.

Raising a person who can withstand change

What matters to me is raising a person who can be steady and flexible at the same time. Hear themselves. Manage their attention. Recognise emotions. Withstand uncertainty. Stop. Recover. And then set out and learn something new again.

It is precisely this inner core — human and social skills — that will be priceless in any profession, no matter how many times professions change like gloves.

But career guidance shouldn't end with a report. The results should be discussed, tested in real action and turned into a next step. For some, taking the test on their own is enough; for others, a conversation with a career consultant is needed; and for others — longer support in choosing an educational pathway.

Try, don't just think

No test replaces experience. A teenager needs not only to read about professions but to work in a team, build their own project, negotiate, present an idea, make mistakes and start again.

That's why career guidance at Big Fish combines self-discovery with practice. At our educational camps children try different roles through real multidisciplinary projects — and see not an abstract job title, but themselves in action.

Where my two worlds meet

And here my two worlds — career guidance and yoga — unexpectedly meet.

Practices of attention, breathing, contact with the body, the ability to notice your own state — this isn't just about a mat and “spirituality”. These are the skills of the future.

“We cannot give children a map of a world that doesn't yet exist. But we can plant the seeds of inner resilience from an early age.”

So that however many times they have to change their route or their profession, they don't lose the main thing along the way — themselves.