If you don’t like your parachute, don’t get on the plane to begin with.

Oct 16, 2007

A tech blog I read called Coding Horror posted today on how important it is to find a job that you think is fun. It all rings true, though articles like that gave me hives when I was in my late 20s. At that time, I invariably hated my jobs: admin assistant at the Sheraton Boston, technical manual writer at an engineering firm, bottom-rung editor of financial reports at PaineWebber, and an occasional high-stress web programming job for human-hating financial services companies. I’d be running out of the office at the end of the day. Then I’d find some “follow the love” article and feel guilty that I was making horrible decisions with my life and putting off what was so important, and that if I could just sit down and realize that all I wanted to do was develop dessert recipes or build irrigation systems, then I could move to Austin, Texas and open a store or some nonsense and be happy.

The main problem with this line of thinking: What if what you love isn’t obviously available to you in career form? When I was 27, there were two jobs I would have loved: writing sketch comedy for Conan O’Brien or being a member of They Might Be Giants. Those jobs don’t really have analagous substitutes in other industries. I didn’t want to write sketch comedy for my hometown cable access show, nor did I have any musical talent to allow me to create my own They Might Be Giants.

I’ve never totally beaten this problem, but a major step that I took was refusing to depend soley on my job for my happiness or my identity. Alternative approaches: find a job that takes as little of your time as possible; or maybe find a job where you’re not crazy about what you’re doing, but you like the people around you as you do it; find a job you’re good at, where you can get the satisfaction of doing something well. For six months last year my primary responsibility was taking video files and converting them to new formats of video files — and I loved coming into work because I liked the other people there, and we had time for lunch. Am I really losing?

I mean, if you’re struck with inspiration — if you find your one true career love, then by all means chase after it and start proselytizing in your blog about how the secret to happiness is finding a job you love! I’ll give it a glean.

Edited to add: Though you risk sounding like a Jesus freak, but for jobs.

| Tags: computers, work

9 Replies

paul
Oct 16th, 2007 at 10:28 am

here here hines!

given the lack of “dream job” availability, i think the best possible option is find a job that takes as little energy as possible and let’s you have time for whatever quirky side-projects fuel your real passion. it may not be a formula for upward mobility, although sometimes the crappy day job can be parlayed into a stable middle-class life. i finally made the decision to stop looking for satisfaction in my job about 6 months ago, in conjunction with starting classes at UCB, and my life has gotten so much better since. i may not set either the corporate or comedy worlds on fire, but at least i’m not living a life of quiet desperation anymore.

i’m trying to find a pithier way of saying all that and converting that slogan into a t-shirt. maybe “WWTD?” (what would thoreau do?)
Michelle
Oct 16th, 2007 at 4:40 pm

Well said.
Hal
Oct 17th, 2007 at 7:08 am

My job is tolerable and seldom annoying, and it gives me funny stuff to talk about, and the people I work with are nice, and I get to check my e-mail and do other webby stuff, and I wouldn’t be unhappy if I had it forever, except I want lots more money.
Marcy
Oct 17th, 2007 at 10:37 am

My boss and I talked about this once.

And he said it’s really important not to care about your job, but to have a passion for something else. He thinks those people make the best employees, 90% of my co-workers do something interesting on the side.

And that is why I like my job. That, and because we drink a lot.
Damian
Oct 17th, 2007 at 11:36 am

I’m completely on board with this plan. I am very underworked and have loads of uninterrupted time in which to write. Now if I just have the discipline to write what I’m supposed to be writing instead of writing about how I should be writing…
ari
Oct 17th, 2007 at 12:09 pm

Will Hines, I like what you wrote.
Gavin
Oct 17th, 2007 at 12:45 pm

Hey Will,

Do you have like water noodles, tubes or rafts? Any type of fun floaty things we can use at the big pool party?

-Gav
Doibles
Oct 17th, 2007 at 3:41 pm

The French have a great word, “perruque” (40% down the page), which basically means “doing personal work at one’s ‘real’ work”. Probably says a lot about the French. I think the closest English comes to it is the phrase “sticking it to the man”.
Doibles
Oct 17th, 2007 at 3:45 pm

As it’s a noun as well as an idiom (literal meaning is “wig”), I should clarify that to mean “personal work done at one’s ‘real’ work”.