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Author Topic:   How did you discover what to do with your life?
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 8 of 32 (413808)
08-01-2007 1:29 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by taylor_31
07-31-2007 10:42 PM


The important thing is you
taylor_31 writes:
Any recollections or advice on picking a career?
The best advice here already that I'd agree with is this:
brennakimi writes:
i think that depends on what interests you.
I think this should be stressed. I'd even say it soley depends on what interests you.
Personally, I'm a lot like ikabod. My work, or my career, is simply "what I do during the day to make money" in order for me to take part in the non-money-making pastimes I love to do at night or on weekends. My job's purpose is to give me the money I need to have a place to stay, eat food, and do what I like to do (hang out with friends, enjoy a few recrational sports, etc...).
But, this only works for me. I personally don't care too much about having lots of money. I don't care too much about my job, or work. I don't care too much about my career. I don't want to be focused on my career, so that I can clearly focus on my personal life (family, friends... whatever).
If you do care about those things, and tried my approach, you'd become quickly dissatisfied.
So, my advice is to figure out what's important to you:
Do you want to be focused on making a lot of money?
Do you want to be focused on your career?
Do you want to be focused on your family?
Do you want to be focused on travelling?
Do you want to be focused on learning?
Figure out what you want, and gear your lifestyle choices along those lines.
It would be nice to be able to have all of these things, but some are just impossible.
For instance, it is impossible to be extremely focused on your career/job, and also be extremely focused on your family. If you're focused on your job you'll work lots of overtime, you'll want to bring your job home and you won't mind travelling for extended periods of time for the sake of the job. And if you're focused on your family, you'll never work overtime, never work weekends, and never travel for the job in order to spend as much time with the family as possible.
So, it all depends on what you find to be important. And only you can answer that question.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by taylor_31, posted 07-31-2007 10:42 PM taylor_31 has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 10 by Phat, posted 08-01-2007 2:35 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied
 Message 11 by macaroniandcheese, posted 08-01-2007 2:40 PM Stile has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 24 of 32 (413998)
08-02-2007 9:21 AM
Reply to: Message 11 by macaroniandcheese
08-01-2007 2:40 PM


Re: The important thing is you
brennakimi writes:
nonsense.
that's one of the magical things about the career i've chosen. in academia, it's very easy to incorporate your family into your work life.
Of course it's possible to do both at the same time, I'd never argue otherwise. But, then you're not exactly focusing on either one specifically, are you? You're focusing on both.
Which is, of course, equally justified. And leaves us exactly in the same position... to figure out what's important with the individual.
I was just pointing out that there's only 24 hours in a day. You can spend 12 focusing on work, and 12 focusing on family, or 24 focusing on work, or 24 focusing on family... or 24 focusing on wind surfing... it all depends on what's important to you.
What you can't do is spend 24 hours focusing on family and 24 hours focusing on work in the same 24 hour period.
You certainly can split your focus and do both (or 3 or 800 things). But then you have to accept that you're splitting your focus. Your "balance" is another person's "not giving 100% to a single ideal". Of course it works the other way as well, some person's "extremely focused passion" will be your "uselessly narrow vision".
Neither is better or worse, but it's only honest to state that each side exists. And, again, we're back to figuring out what's important to the individual.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 11 by macaroniandcheese, posted 08-01-2007 2:40 PM macaroniandcheese has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 26 by macaroniandcheese, posted 08-02-2007 11:36 AM Stile has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 27 of 32 (414019)
08-02-2007 11:59 AM
Reply to: Message 26 by macaroniandcheese
08-02-2007 11:36 AM


Re: The important thing is you
brennakimi writes:
i just see no better way than an occupation in which i can include my children
I didn't mean to imply that your choices were in any way inferior to any others. I agree that the choices you've made have maximized the efficiency for you to focus on what you find important.
i'm wasting so much of my life sleeping!
I was always disturbed by the "10% of your life is spent on the toilet" stat...

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by macaroniandcheese, posted 08-02-2007 11:36 AM macaroniandcheese has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 28 by macaroniandcheese, posted 08-02-2007 12:20 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied

  
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