What Does Your Job Do For You?
- Thread starter Konfyouzd
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Konfyouzd
Return of the Dread-I
I'm more than likely gonna work til I die. That's part of why I don't seek ultimate fulfillment from it. That'd make me so sad when it's all over. At least that's what I think now.
maliciousteve
Contributor
1. Helps pay my bills
2. Gives me some sort of purpose, rather than sitting on my arse wondering whether music will provide me with what I want.
3. Keeps me physically active
4. Gets me outside appreciating nature (I'm a professional gardener)
It's not what I thought I would be doing with my life. But I've accepted that I'm never going to be able to earn a good living playing music, as there are and have been too many things going against me.
I do enjoy my job at times but my hunger for playing music will always been in my mind. I keep thinking it's what I'm meant to do with my life but unfortunately, life has a way of fighting me at every ....ing opportunity so I'm making the most of what I can.
2. Gives me some sort of purpose, rather than sitting on my arse wondering whether music will provide me with what I want.
3. Keeps me physically active
4. Gets me outside appreciating nature (I'm a professional gardener)
It's not what I thought I would be doing with my life. But I've accepted that I'm never going to be able to earn a good living playing music, as there are and have been too many things going against me.
I do enjoy my job at times but my hunger for playing music will always been in my mind. I keep thinking it's what I'm meant to do with my life but unfortunately, life has a way of fighting me at every ....ing opportunity so I'm making the most of what I can.
Konfyouzd
Return of the Dread-I
I don't think we structured a society that nurtures following one's calling. We put professions on pedestals a lot of the time and skew the perception of the "value" we all have to one another. Or something...
tedtan
Well-Known Member
Not only that, but I also feel like if I were to do the things I'm most passionate about for a living I'd lose my passion for them. I used to like programming a LOT more before I started doing it for a living.
Isn't that always the way?
Shortens my lifespan, provides me with continuous stress...but finances my guitars
THIS! So much this!
That's just because they're too young and inexperienced (naïve) to have a clue at this point in their lives. Give them another 10 years and then look to see what effect Washington has had on THEM. Anyone over 30 shouldn't have a hard time figuring that one out, as unfortunate as that is...
I wouldn't save that for girls only. I would like my job to be my passion as well, I'm just experienced enough to know that the things I'm passionate about don't pay well AND that I need a job that does pay well because I have a family.
I mean, how many of us here have pursued music as a profession before realizing we needed something else that pays better? I'm guilty.
Konfyouzd
Return of the Dread-I
That dream was shattered for me in highschool.
My dad: "That shit won't pay bills. Its not even music."
My dad: "That shit won't pay bills. Its not even music."
facepalm66
The Master of Joints
^ true story. Same here. Well screw me then. I'll be a hipster and make SOLO ALBUMS INSTEAD.
Andromalia
Pardon my french
My job gets me:
-Decent pay
-Nice company
-Like minded colleagues (+++ factor for me)
-Lots of free time (but don't tell them !
)
The job is about my passion but is not my passion itself and is pretty uninteresting, but I have done outdoor jobs when I was young and I know I'm better off than lots of people, and I get above average salary.
So to speak it's the "less worse" job I could find. Applying to another atm but it's a VERY long shot.
-Decent pay
-Nice company
-Like minded colleagues (+++ factor for me)
-Lots of free time (but don't tell them !
)The job is about my passion but is not my passion itself and is pretty uninteresting, but I have done outdoor jobs when I was young and I know I'm better off than lots of people, and I get above average salary.
So to speak it's the "less worse" job I could find. Applying to another atm but it's a VERY long shot.
icos211
Schecter faithful
My job gives me something to put on my resume when I apply for grad school. You need 3 things when you try to get into vet school: Incredible grades, an inhumanly high score on the Graduate Readiness Exam, and years on years of real experience either volunteering or working hands-on in a vet clinic. If you are lacking in even one, no matter how much the other two may make up for it, you will not get into vet school. So I get paid shit, covered in shit, and mauled to shit (Who the .... would think it's a good idea to give a cat a bath?!) so that in 4 years I just might have the opportunity to go $300,000 into debt!
Still, it's the first rung on the ladder to the job that I have always dreamed of, and so I do what I can. Someday my job will get me the opportunity to heal sick and injured animals, and make the lives of those who can't fend for themselves better.
Or, if I still don't get into vet school, I'll have a biomed degree and can just fall back on going to human med school. Then I'll make SUBSTANTIALLY more money and can drown my disappointment in expensive guitars.
Still, it's the first rung on the ladder to the job that I have always dreamed of, and so I do what I can. Someday my job will get me the opportunity to heal sick and injured animals, and make the lives of those who can't fend for themselves better.
Or, if I still don't get into vet school, I'll have a biomed degree and can just fall back on going to human med school. Then I'll make SUBSTANTIALLY more money and can drown my disappointment in expensive guitars.
I teach guitar, percussion and music theory to mostly very young kids. And work with asylum seekers as part of a community group.
I basically drink a lot of tea, play a lot of music and get to meet some really great people. I don't really do anything that feels like work to me.
I'm a lucky ....er.
I basically drink a lot of tea, play a lot of music and get to meet some really great people. I don't really do anything that feels like work to me.
I'm a lucky ....er.
SpaceDock
Shred till your dead
I don't know anyone from any of those majors who even works in their field, myself included....
Pre grad's are like real world virgins, until they actually start working they don't know anything. I have known so many folks that were all "money comes easy" and "I'll make it big with my art/music/novels/writing/blog/photography/whatever" Then they are waiters and liquor store clerks after school, lol.
I was a sociology grad and it took me a long time to get off the ground floor, but I think I am doing great now. I really like my job and it is very interesting, but I wouldn't mind being a famous slacker either.
Pezshreds
SSBRO.org Regular
I work for my local council taking calls for customer service. It's not overly rewarding and I have to know A LOT of information (people can call and ask literally anything). But there's still some days where something so small will make my day.
Example
I had an elderly lady call up, and she was stressing super because someone stole her bin. In 2 minutes I logged and organised a new one, and she was so grateful, you could hear in her voice that she genuinely appreciated my help. To me it was a simple process, and I do it 10 times a day, but hearing how it helped her made me feel great.
I know that was a little off topic, but just put it in there to say I'm not overly passionate about my job, I do it because I get a very generous pay, I'm good at it, and the people are friendly at my work and it allows me to do things outside of work that I enjoy and is helping my gf and I save for a house. But there's still the odd occasion where I feel really good about doing my job because it's helping other people.
Example
I had an elderly lady call up, and she was stressing super because someone stole her bin. In 2 minutes I logged and organised a new one, and she was so grateful, you could hear in her voice that she genuinely appreciated my help. To me it was a simple process, and I do it 10 times a day, but hearing how it helped her made me feel great.
I know that was a little off topic, but just put it in there to say I'm not overly passionate about my job, I do it because I get a very generous pay, I'm good at it, and the people are friendly at my work and it allows me to do things outside of work that I enjoy and is helping my gf and I save for a house. But there's still the odd occasion where I feel really good about doing my job because it's helping other people.
I'm a programmer working in higher ed, writing educational software and community outreach stuff (we do a lot of grant funded work with public health, social work, etc. departments).
I get paid decently (though not nearly what my skill-set would command in the private sector) to do work that generally helps improve the world in some way. Eg, NIMH recently paid for me to spend time in townships in South Africa deploying software that I wrote to help train community counselors on HIV medication adherence. You could argue that a lot of my time is spent educating the already privileged students that attend an Ivy League school, and that's not quite Mother Teresa territory, but at the very least, I can sleep at night knowing that the underlying goal of my workday isn't ultimately to make some rich person even richer. I can live with that.
Programming is certainly a passion for me. If I were independently wealthy and didn't need a job to put a roof over my head, I'd still spend a good chunk of my time programming (I'd just have more freedom to choose exactly what I worked on). My day to day work only partly fulfills that though. Most of what I work on doesn't require stretching myself significantly and doesn't really get into the particular areas of programming that I'm most interested in (high availability distributed systems, self-stabilizing systems, etc). I can work in bits and pieces here and there but I can't justify spending much of my employer's time on stuff that's tangential to the "bottom line" of our mission. I'm frequently tempted to find another job that would let me spend more time getting experience in those areas. But I know that I'd be giving up a lot. Aside from the aforementioned warm fuzzies, my coworkers are generally very cool, smart, wonderful people, my days are usually pretty low stress (I have a lot of responsibility, but that usually comes with the power to actually make decisions and get things done), it's pretty straight 9 to 5, I get good benefits and way more vacation than most Americans, and a key part of my job is basically learning some new, totally random subject in depth every few months, often with direct tutoring from a top name in the field (I get to work with Nobel Laureates from time to time).
That said, I don't have a family to support or anything so I'm very lucky to be able to do what I do. If I were responsible for anyone else, I'd probably suck it up and go wherever the money is and I don't think there's anything wrong with that trade-off.
I get paid decently (though not nearly what my skill-set would command in the private sector) to do work that generally helps improve the world in some way. Eg, NIMH recently paid for me to spend time in townships in South Africa deploying software that I wrote to help train community counselors on HIV medication adherence. You could argue that a lot of my time is spent educating the already privileged students that attend an Ivy League school, and that's not quite Mother Teresa territory, but at the very least, I can sleep at night knowing that the underlying goal of my workday isn't ultimately to make some rich person even richer. I can live with that.
Programming is certainly a passion for me. If I were independently wealthy and didn't need a job to put a roof over my head, I'd still spend a good chunk of my time programming (I'd just have more freedom to choose exactly what I worked on). My day to day work only partly fulfills that though. Most of what I work on doesn't require stretching myself significantly and doesn't really get into the particular areas of programming that I'm most interested in (high availability distributed systems, self-stabilizing systems, etc). I can work in bits and pieces here and there but I can't justify spending much of my employer's time on stuff that's tangential to the "bottom line" of our mission. I'm frequently tempted to find another job that would let me spend more time getting experience in those areas. But I know that I'd be giving up a lot. Aside from the aforementioned warm fuzzies, my coworkers are generally very cool, smart, wonderful people, my days are usually pretty low stress (I have a lot of responsibility, but that usually comes with the power to actually make decisions and get things done), it's pretty straight 9 to 5, I get good benefits and way more vacation than most Americans, and a key part of my job is basically learning some new, totally random subject in depth every few months, often with direct tutoring from a top name in the field (I get to work with Nobel Laureates from time to time).
That said, I don't have a family to support or anything so I'm very lucky to be able to do what I do. If I were responsible for anyone else, I'd probably suck it up and go wherever the money is and I don't think there's anything wrong with that trade-off.
Watty
Naturally Cynical
Uh, maybe I'm missing something, but why shouldn't it "work that way in her case?" If she's already got a degree and is contemplating grad school, then she's halfway to where she wants to be anyways. And why shouldn't she go for exactly what she wants if, as per this whole conversation, it's liable to pay well AND be something she's passionate about. Moving to a different place, which I assume is the issue, is a small price to pay to support her in that endeavor for the time being.
And because you're apparently dating a neuroscientist, I feel like I don't need a flame suit to say that it's actually "accept."
You would willingly go $300,000 into debt so that you can fix Fido's broken leg?!
Not saying that it isn't a valiant and noble profession, but I think this sentiment is really kind of displaying the trap that so many college kids fall into. They go to school for (insert a degree that should be a hobby instead of a profession), accrue a ton of debt, graduate with little to no job prospects outside of the standard service industry type stuff, and then never pay the debt off, all while bitching that the system screwed them over. I suppose at the end of the day, you're degree is a whole lot different than someone graduating into communications or some such, but that's still crazy. I get that you'll be paid well, but you need to look at the cost benefit ratio in paying them off versus your lifestyle while doing what you "love" for work. Please take a look at the student debt share of our economy before you make a hasty decision that would end up tipping the scale at the figure you mention.....it's scary as shit.
Every time I hear a story like this, I think I die a bit on the inside. Real life is like a raging ....ing river and all these folks that think they're going to "go with the flow" on a tube made of their passion in life are in for a rough ....ing awakening when the river turns out to be raging and see those of us that thought ahead in kayaks filled equipped with helmets and pads for the rocks life throws our way.
Alex Kenivel
Stunt Guitar
Ive had crap jobs and physically demanding jobs. I was okay with delivering school lunches, but the company worked me damn near like slavery, plus the hourlong commutes to and from really sucked. Although jobs ive had in the past like working in an hardwood flooring warehouse were okay and I could find some way to like what I was doing, I wasn't happy with them, which seemed to fuel my songwriting and my need to make music more than anything.
My obvious dream job has everything to do with music, but having a kid at 18 and deciding to be a responsible father kinda shat on those dreams.
Now I'm a daycare/preschool teacher in a school my future mother-in-law owned for 30 years. Whole different ballgame to me and I love it. Not very physical, a little stressing at times but kids surprise the hell outta me every day, more than adults, even. A large pro about my job is I get to play guitar for the kids and they fvcking love it. To my fiancée, my boss is the closest thing to a sister she's ever had and she knows all my..."extracurricular activities" and is cool with them.
Hey its not my dream job, but it sure beats having worked in a -10 degree Fahrenheit cold storage facility on a forklift where you're not moving and getting frostbitten.
I'd still take the job of Successful-And-Well-Off-Musician any day, tho
My obvious dream job has everything to do with music, but having a kid at 18 and deciding to be a responsible father kinda shat on those dreams.
Now I'm a daycare/preschool teacher in a school my future mother-in-law owned for 30 years. Whole different ballgame to me and I love it. Not very physical, a little stressing at times but kids surprise the hell outta me every day, more than adults, even. A large pro about my job is I get to play guitar for the kids and they fvcking love it. To my fiancée, my boss is the closest thing to a sister she's ever had and she knows all my..."extracurricular activities" and is cool with them.
Hey its not my dream job, but it sure beats having worked in a -10 degree Fahrenheit cold storage facility on a forklift where you're not moving and getting frostbitten.
I'd still take the job of Successful-And-Well-Off-Musician any day, tho
MemphisHawk
Well-Known Member
When I was in high school, I decided I wanted to be a linguist. I graduated from that 13 years ago and now I live in Japan as a Chinese and French translator. I got exactly what I wanted.
That said, it isn't exactly what I thought it would be. I AlWAYS work more than 40 hours a week. Never more than 75 or so. None of me ever hopes to be at work that long. I make great money, but I have like 6 minutes a day of free time so besides saving substantially towards retirement, there isn't much time for anything else.
Would I trade? No, I pat myself on the back everyday for sticking to my guns, and I know that it will pay off with an early retirement (looking at around 42 years old). If you can't be born with a silver spoon in your mouth, an early , comfortable retirement with everything paid off is the next best thing.
That said, it isn't exactly what I thought it would be. I AlWAYS work more than 40 hours a week. Never more than 75 or so. None of me ever hopes to be at work that long. I make great money, but I have like 6 minutes a day of free time so besides saving substantially towards retirement, there isn't much time for anything else.
Would I trade? No, I pat myself on the back everyday for sticking to my guns, and I know that it will pay off with an early retirement (looking at around 42 years old). If you can't be born with a silver spoon in your mouth, an early , comfortable retirement with everything paid off is the next best thing.
wilch
Well-Known Member
...double post :\
wilch
Well-Known Member
My job:
- affords me some luxuries (guitars, cars, geek stuff)
- pays my mortgage
- causes me stress
- affects my health (heart problems, little to no sleep)
- steals time away from what I love to do
- at times makes me regret my choices in life
I'm only 34, but if I could have my time over again, I would choose to do what I love, as opposed to what I knew would afford me some of the things I want.
To wake up in the morning happy, loving, and knowing what you're about to embark on for the day is nothing but a dream to me. One that's getting away (responsibilities and fear).
I reckon, aim to do what you love for a living, or be in the industry that feeds what you love and you'll never work a day in your life.
Basically, I use to be the same as you Konfyousd, I think. I use to think, as long as what I'm doing pays for my hobbies, then I'll be sweet. But the reality for me is, it pays for the things I want, but I dislike getting up every morning, and I'm constantly asking myself if I'm wasting my life.
- affords me some luxuries (guitars, cars, geek stuff)
- pays my mortgage
- causes me stress
- affects my health (heart problems, little to no sleep)
- steals time away from what I love to do
- at times makes me regret my choices in life
I'm only 34, but if I could have my time over again, I would choose to do what I love, as opposed to what I knew would afford me some of the things I want.
To wake up in the morning happy, loving, and knowing what you're about to embark on for the day is nothing but a dream to me. One that's getting away (responsibilities and fear).
I reckon, aim to do what you love for a living, or be in the industry that feeds what you love and you'll never work a day in your life.
Basically, I use to be the same as you Konfyousd, I think. I use to think, as long as what I'm doing pays for my hobbies, then I'll be sweet. But the reality for me is, it pays for the things I want, but I dislike getting up every morning, and I'm constantly asking myself if I'm wasting my life.
My job allows me to destroy what I hate most. Literally.
I blow the ground the .... up. I hate nunavut with a passion, and I love that I'm doing my part in destroying it in the name of greed.
(I work on the drilling and blasting team at a gold mine in nunavut, canada).
I blow the ground the .... up. I hate nunavut with a passion, and I love that I'm doing my part in destroying it in the name of greed.
(I work on the drilling and blasting team at a gold mine in nunavut, canada).
Necris
Bonitis.
Even in that hypothetical society where everyone is urged to follow their calling we would likely end up in the same place; eventually some person who follows their calling is going to end up at a job they hate because someone was better qualified for the job they wanted.
It's unfortunate; and I will never truly make peace with it, but I'll acknowledge it.
