What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
If you could do anything and get paid, what would it be?
That’s what Chase Jarvis said once during his interview with Andy J. Miller on Creative Pep Talk. This question gave me a whole new perspective on career.
When we ask ourselves the kinds of job we want, there is a long checklist that we need to go through. Not a checklist actually, it looks more like this.
It’s so intimidating. That’s why thinking about future jobs has never really excited me. And I’m sure a lot of people can resonate to this. Why in the hell thinking about the future is so stressful for many of us when it should be something exciting? It used to be fun when we were little. I want to be a ballerina. I want to be a football player, a singer, a painter, a writer...
We grow older and we get to know a little more about how the world operates. And sadly, we stop being creative. We now think with our left side, the boring side of the brain too often that our real dreams are pushed down. Pushed down so deep to a point we don’t know what they were anymore. As Chase says, instead of listening to the voice inside of us, we focus on the external things like money, the practical things, cultural norms and pressure to fit in to the society. They all turn things that we want to do to thing the society wants from us. They kill all our inspiration, curiosity and creativity once we had when we were little.
I’m not that young anymore, but my career path still stays unclear. I’ve been from studying dance to working as a web programmer to going back to school and studying marketing. With my fancy master degree in business, I was still struggling to find my path. I’d thought this would get me a secure job, but I didn’t want just any job. And turns out, marketing wasn’t my thing. As I typed in marketing as the keyword on job search engines, I was feeling unclear and dissatisfied. I didn’t know what I wanted.
Or I knew deep down. I just needed to ask in a different way. That’s why the question “If you could do anything and get paid, what would it be?” was groundbreaking. I could do absolutely ANYTHING and someone’s going to pay for it.
As I wrote down everything that came up to my mind, things that I really liked and cared came to the surface. I was writing things that I’d never thought of if I was asked what kind of job I wanted. I even wrote things as simple as eating, reading, discovering new food places and travelling. And now, I’m at a PR agency focus on restaurants and cafes. I think Chase’s question worked on finding my dream job.
I wished I’d asked this question before college so I didn’t have to spend a massive amount of time and money on something that I wasn’t passionate about. But then again, this is a road that many people I respect took to where they are today.
There are ways to do what you love and get paid. Always. Would it be an easy road? No. But one of the hardest steps — to discover our true passion — is done. So now, get to work.
