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My life as it is now...
RightfulSin
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Ok, this is going to get really really heavy really really quick. Here it goes.
I am presently unemployed and I am constantly looking for new employment. I have worked in several places, most of which I have enjoyed. I have a "degree" from ITT Tech in Electrical Engineering and I am having trouble finding work in my field in my current location ( greater San Diego area of California). I have been staying up later and later the last few nights trying to figure out what the hell I am doing with my life. I went to ITT because I figured I had to go somewhere and my father is an electronics sales rep for large companies, so it just made sense I guess, I dunno. Before ITT I had been going to a local community college for business management with the intent of opening and owning my own restaurant.
I had always loved cooking and baking, and I still do to this day. I have not yet had a substantial job position in the field of electronics last for very long, usually not longer than a year. I am very very confused right now. I am earnestly thinking of going to one of the culinary colleges in the area where I live (possibly the Art Institute) in Southern California. But I am so torn right now. I have no job right now, as I have previously stated so I do not know what my mind is thinking. I mean, even while I was signing up at ITT but before the classes had even started I went down to a culinary school for a tour and class observation. I am torn right now because I have spent $30-40k on ITT and I am now actually thinking of throwing it away to pursue a totally different field. In my free time I am either playing on my computer (games), watching tv, or I am cooking/baking. I have always enjoyed it when I cook/bake something and share that with somebody else (like friends or family) and it makes me feel awesome when they say that it tastes good/great.
I just do not know what I am supposed to do. I do not have the funds to afford going to culinary school right now, and I am not 100% sure which school I would even go to. I just turned 29 last month and I am getting so bogged down in my own thoughts that it takes me forever to fall asleep (which is uncommon for me as I usually fall asleep immediately). I am getting a feeling of hopelessness, a feeling that I had wasted my life and that I am going nowhere. I just do not know what the ____ I am doing or supposed to do.
I am presently unemployed and I am constantly looking for new employment. I have worked in several places, most of which I have enjoyed. I have a "degree" from ITT Tech in Electrical Engineering and I am having trouble finding work in my field in my current location ( greater San Diego area of California). I have been staying up later and later the last few nights trying to figure out what the hell I am doing with my life. I went to ITT because I figured I had to go somewhere and my father is an electronics sales rep for large companies, so it just made sense I guess, I dunno. Before ITT I had been going to a local community college for business management with the intent of opening and owning my own restaurant.
I had always loved cooking and baking, and I still do to this day. I have not yet had a substantial job position in the field of electronics last for very long, usually not longer than a year. I am very very confused right now. I am earnestly thinking of going to one of the culinary colleges in the area where I live (possibly the Art Institute) in Southern California. But I am so torn right now. I have no job right now, as I have previously stated so I do not know what my mind is thinking. I mean, even while I was signing up at ITT but before the classes had even started I went down to a culinary school for a tour and class observation. I am torn right now because I have spent $30-40k on ITT and I am now actually thinking of throwing it away to pursue a totally different field. In my free time I am either playing on my computer (games), watching tv, or I am cooking/baking. I have always enjoyed it when I cook/bake something and share that with somebody else (like friends or family) and it makes me feel awesome when they say that it tastes good/great.
I just do not know what I am supposed to do. I do not have the funds to afford going to culinary school right now, and I am not 100% sure which school I would even go to. I just turned 29 last month and I am getting so bogged down in my own thoughts that it takes me forever to fall asleep (which is uncommon for me as I usually fall asleep immediately). I am getting a feeling of hopelessness, a feeling that I had wasted my life and that I am going nowhere. I just do not know what the ____ I am doing or supposed to do.
"If nothing is impossible, than would it not be impossible to find something that you could not do?" - Me
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1) Yes, it would suck if the money you spent on your ITT degree didn't end up being helpful, but there's no point in getting a job for the purpose of making your ITT degree helpful, or giving up further education or a different job because it would mean making the ITT degree not helpful. Economics has a term called "sunk costs" which describes money already spent that can't be reclaimed. In economics, sunk costs aren't factored into decisions, because they make no difference. Don't make any life choices around how much you spent on an ITT degree - whether you got it for free or for $30-40k, you should try to do the thing that makes the most sense for you right now, not for your ITT degree.
2) You might want to rethink culinary school - working in the restaurant industry is, from every account I've heard, pretty tough, both in terms of how much work it is and how much you get paid. Opening your own restaurant is an even worse proposition: the majority of new restaurants fail and go out of business.
3) Culinary school is probably a bad idea even if you do want to go into the food service industry. What you want is experience. There are lots of good tips in this Something Awful food industry thread and the new version of the thread.
If you're serious about it you may want to start a catering business 1st as it's way less riskier and it's something you can do while still maintaining a day job (being able to draw a steady paycheck while you try to develop a new business is usually key to going independent).
TL DR: Find a job to pay your bills. Once that is done you can investigate how to pursue an avenue into a cooking career. Don't go further into debt getting a certification unless you have some kind of guaranteed employment/business opportunity once you complete it.
Edit: Food trucks are pretty trendy, and there are plenty of examples where a good concept well executed led to enough revenue to eventually open a restaurant.
Also, you're not even 30. God willing, you've got plenty of life left, so you haven't "wasted" anything. I know plenty of people circa 30 that are just figuring things out, and they're not irreparably harmed by it.
Anyway, I agree with what the others are saying: first, find a job, and once you have a reasonably steady income, you can create a more comprehensive plan. Then you'll figure out what you're supposed to be doing.
The things that are appealing about having written a book have very little relationship to the appeals of writing one.
If you might want to cook for a living, just get a job in the kitchen at a mid-level restaurant. See how you feel after six months and decide if working in a kitchen is for you. If so, keep going. After two years go to culinary school.
--LeVar Burton
This is good advice. I did food service professionally for about 8 years before getting into technology. Cooking at home is fun, try being on a hot as hell line during dinner rush in the summer while all your friends are out having fun, oh and the day staff was drunk/high and didn't prep enough and the new guy didn't show for his shift tonight and the dishwasher is hungover and moving so slow he's practically in reverse. :-) I'm not saying this to discourage you from working in a kitchen, but to discourage you from going to culinary before working in the field. Its not a requirement to go to culinary, its a way to skip over working your way up from the bottom; I'd rather work with someone who's done the time in a kitchen then some brat out of culinary with no idea how to work hard and fast.
I started as a dishwasher and worked my way up, you can do the same: show initiative and interest in what is going on around you, pick up every extra shift you can, come in early stay late. Soon you will be doing prep or cold-side work instead of (OK more like in addition to) scratching pans and after that doing the real cooking. Look for a small/mid sized family owned affair, franchises are no fun and tend to not do too much in the way of real cooking in my experience. If you still love what you are doing decide if you even need to go to culinary, I didn't I worked under a chef, read/researched everything, watched Julia Child, Jacques Pepin ect. on PBS. Read Kitchen confidential by Anthony Bourdain, my experience was fairly similar to his early years, minus the gangsters. Know that substance abuse tends to go with the territory, avoid it yourself but accept it in others.
The biggest reason I got out is because overall the pay is average to lousy and the hours suck and you don't get insurance typically. Your partner will have to be a very understanding person indeed to not mind staying home alone or going out with others because you are working every night, weekend and holiday. Having a family will be difficult. This was enough to motivate me to get out and get in to IT but maybe the hours etc. will not be a problem for you.
Going to school for something does not equal getting a job for that thing. There are a lot of pissed off and/or very unhappy people that are currently having the life crushed from them under the weight of student loan debt because they went to school to become something. Then they graduate, and find out the worst secret ever... One does not automatically follow the other.
Spending more money to go to culinary school will not automatically result in you becoming a happy and successful cook. Just like all the waiters with law degrees, and the Starbucks barristers with teaching degrees in English.
I have learned this lesson too, I have a teaching degree in Social studies and could not find work as a teacher and had to get a job in a call center to pay the bills, it just happens that i am decent on the phone and have worked my way up the line one step at a time over the last 10 years.
Look, that's not an answer to your question I understand. But hopefully it will make you feel better to know that you are not alone, you were not the foolish one that got tricked into getting a degree that you can't find work for. All while the rest of us are having a great life in our chosen fields. Merrily enjoying a life free of mistakes.
You may just be in a bad area.
My dad is an EE and he's had an excellent and lucrative career working on offshore oil rigs
I think you need to be more creative with the skills you already have before you choose to scrap everything and become a chef.
As for your employment search. I had the same issue 9 years ago in the IT field. I was working part time at a Sherwin Williams store hauling paint while trying to find a job with a bachelors in software development when i found out how to apply for jobs at SW's headquarters. I found an open position in there help desk / pos development department and got a job that way. You should be asking your employeed friends to ask around and find out how to look at open positions because alot of times the companies will post the positions through employee only viewable web sites before actually going looking in the public area.
Sunk cost fallacy and all that, but that's not entirely the case here. By utilizing your degree instead of discarding it, there is the potential to recover some of your costs that will be lost if you don't utilize it. I'm not telling you to go into a field you hate - not at all - but you may want to try and find a way to utilize your degree in your field or in a related field.
Getting out into the real world, when there is no job or clear path waiting, is hard after a lifetime of knowing every next step. Some people don't think they can deal with it and end up having to get dragged kicking and screaming into the adult world, but even they usually adjust. You can adjust and find something that makes you happy. Maybe you don't become an electrical engineer, but instead apprentice as an electrician...or get into IT / helpdesk support, or work in any of hundreds of related fields that can utilize some of the skills you learned in your education. Hell, maybe you can leverage your degree to get into a wholly unrelated career path.
So that's the general life advice I'd give you. Just understand, it is hard not knowing where you are or what you are doing, and know that when those times come the best thing to do is keep putting one foot in front of the other - so to speak - until you find your path. You'll figure it out eventually, and when you do it will PROBABLY be drastically different than anything you predicted.
You enjoy cooking / baking. Have you ever worked in a commercial kitchen or even in the food service industry in general? Keep in mind that simply because you enjoy doing something on your time and in moderation doesn't mean you will enjoy doing it as a career. In fact, doing it as a career can often make you hate the thing you previously enjoyed. So before making a huge investment find out - go get a job in a kitchen and work there for six months before you re-evaluate. That kills two birds with one stone - you're employed, and you are seeing if that's something you actually want to do for a living.
Talk to some chefs / people in the industry. People who went to culinary school, people who dropped out of culinary school, people who never went and worked their way up. Get their advice - people are almost always happy to share the lessons they have learned and give you some advisement. Take what they tell you into consideration.
The experiences I had when younger (and my friends in the industry have shared with me) is that the food service industry - pretty much top to bottom - is a miserable and thankless place to work. For every 'Gordon Ramsey', there are a thousand guys who end up working in some corporate cafeteria, or making Awesome Blossoms at The Outback. Working in most kitchens is to the cooking you like what working on an assembly line is to restoring muscle cars - only related at the most superficial level.
As for working in the food service industry...the benefits tend to suck, the pay and hours aren't great, and there isn't that much long-term career stability / security. Substance abuse problems are ubiquitous - almost everyone in a kitchen is addicted to alcohol, pills, illegal drugs, or some combination. You have to put up with a lot of shit from customers, bosses, and co-workers who are flat out rude and aggressive. On the plus side, a decent cook / chef can usually find some employment just about anywhere.
I'm not trying to shit on your dreams, but you can't - or shouldn't anyway - commit to an expensive education in a new field with a rose-tinted view of it. Since you are unemployed right now, I'd definitely recommend applying at a few local restaurants, even if you're just a porter / dishwasher, both for some quick / easy work, and so you can spend some time in a kitchen. In the meantime, still look for jobs in your field, and look for other places that are hiring in their kitchen.
Just to confirm you have a BS right? ITT's use of degree has a very loose association with reality.
There should logically be no shortage whatsoever of EE jobs in San Diego.
Not only is SD a biotech hub, but there are several large companies which deal on a regular basis with hardware, many of which do not have anything to do with the state, except being occasional government contractors.
If you are having trouble finding EE jobs in San Diego, my first question would be, how is your resume? How many years of experience do you have in the field? etc. etc.
Utilize the skills you have to your advantage to get where you want. Hell get a big roll of butcher paper and map out your plans and goals for the next 5, 10 and 20 years. Don't fret about going literal to it but it helps pave a route than not having any at all. Good luck
― Dr. Seuss, Oh, the Places You'll Go!
Sorry, but a degree from ITT is not worth much in the EE field. People with a BS or MS from a decent school have reasonable job prospects, but ITT, not so much. The San Diego area is actually quite good for EE's with lots of defense contractors and companies like Qualcomm.