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What's best in life?
Artereis
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
This is a tangent to my other thread.
I've never been the kind of person that identifies myself by my job. I see work as a means to a happy personal life. I've kind of fallen into each job post-college without expecting to. My tenure at my current company has given me a lot of opportunities, and I've been promoted into better positions 3 times over the course of 8 years. My current position is classified as remote, so I work from home. The pay is pretty good and I get tons of vacation. I'm the youngest person on my team by at least 20 years, but I feel like I could sink some serious time here. My boss is getting near retirement age, and I think I would have a pretty good shot of moving into his role at that time (if they decide to keep it) when I consider the other people on my team. I've never really thought about looking for a new job because this one allows me to have a pretty good work/life balance, but while I don't dislike my job at all, I don't exactly love it. I don't care that it's not sexy or exciting, but it's not exactly engaging to talk about with other people, and I definitely don't get passionate about it.
On the other hand, I haven't had many reasons for personal development. I'm an implementation consultant, so I spend most of my time in spreadsheets or speaking to customers. I'm familiar enough with SQL that I'm comfortable writing queries to handle data changes within our product's data structure, but there isn't much need for me to go learn anything else. My boss trusts me and tends to put me on new projects because I'm pretty flexible and quick to learn, but that's typically something related to one of our companies specific products than a transferable skill. For example, there's talk of doing some hosted offerings and I'm being considered as the one who would manage all of those machines throughout customer subscription cycles.
The only real personal learning I could see myself doing to directly contribute to my work is learning C# and start doing custom work like a couple of the other engineers. I'm not fluent in any particular programming languages, but I've dabbled in enough of them over the years that I can understand code when reading it. I've never really considered going back to school because I've gotten as far as I have on my natural talents even though I only have a BA in English, and a new degree isn't something I'd be putting to immediate use.
I guess I'm not really sure what I should do. The events I've detailed in my other thread really have me thinking about my future and what might be best for me. This job has been 90% of my post-grad work, so I really don't know what I would do if I woke up tomorrow and didn't have a job anymore. I have a ton of very specialized knowledge and I'm not sure how much would translate to another company. Has anyone been in this position before? Is there stuff I should be considering that I haven't mentioned?
My wife has grown into someone who very strongly identifies with her job, and spends as much time as possible there. I think that difference is part of what is costing me my marriage. I don't know if I'd ever actually be that kind of person, but would anyone consider dropping a job in my position to try and see if you could find a job you loved? I honestly don't know what that would be. Am I missing out on something by just being content?
I've never been the kind of person that identifies myself by my job. I see work as a means to a happy personal life. I've kind of fallen into each job post-college without expecting to. My tenure at my current company has given me a lot of opportunities, and I've been promoted into better positions 3 times over the course of 8 years. My current position is classified as remote, so I work from home. The pay is pretty good and I get tons of vacation. I'm the youngest person on my team by at least 20 years, but I feel like I could sink some serious time here. My boss is getting near retirement age, and I think I would have a pretty good shot of moving into his role at that time (if they decide to keep it) when I consider the other people on my team. I've never really thought about looking for a new job because this one allows me to have a pretty good work/life balance, but while I don't dislike my job at all, I don't exactly love it. I don't care that it's not sexy or exciting, but it's not exactly engaging to talk about with other people, and I definitely don't get passionate about it.
On the other hand, I haven't had many reasons for personal development. I'm an implementation consultant, so I spend most of my time in spreadsheets or speaking to customers. I'm familiar enough with SQL that I'm comfortable writing queries to handle data changes within our product's data structure, but there isn't much need for me to go learn anything else. My boss trusts me and tends to put me on new projects because I'm pretty flexible and quick to learn, but that's typically something related to one of our companies specific products than a transferable skill. For example, there's talk of doing some hosted offerings and I'm being considered as the one who would manage all of those machines throughout customer subscription cycles.
The only real personal learning I could see myself doing to directly contribute to my work is learning C# and start doing custom work like a couple of the other engineers. I'm not fluent in any particular programming languages, but I've dabbled in enough of them over the years that I can understand code when reading it. I've never really considered going back to school because I've gotten as far as I have on my natural talents even though I only have a BA in English, and a new degree isn't something I'd be putting to immediate use.
I guess I'm not really sure what I should do. The events I've detailed in my other thread really have me thinking about my future and what might be best for me. This job has been 90% of my post-grad work, so I really don't know what I would do if I woke up tomorrow and didn't have a job anymore. I have a ton of very specialized knowledge and I'm not sure how much would translate to another company. Has anyone been in this position before? Is there stuff I should be considering that I haven't mentioned?
My wife has grown into someone who very strongly identifies with her job, and spends as much time as possible there. I think that difference is part of what is costing me my marriage. I don't know if I'd ever actually be that kind of person, but would anyone consider dropping a job in my position to try and see if you could find a job you loved? I honestly don't know what that would be. Am I missing out on something by just being content?
Artereis on
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I'm a software engineer, I generally like my job, and I would have no issue staying in it for a very long time, but it's not the big passion of my life and I'm ok with that. That's something that's going to vary from person to person, though, and you will know better than anyone else how you really feel about turning a job, even one you love, into your be-all-end-all. For me, my job lets me pay for tickets to the movies and trips to the apple orchard and video games and whatnot, while allowing me the time to actually enjoy those things, and I consider that to be the best part of it. I want time away from work, but not everybody does.
You can't give someone a pirate ship in one game, and then take it back in the next game. It's rude.
That said, you should not hate the thing you're going to do for 40 hours a week. But it sounds like you don't mind, and perhaps mildly enjoy(?) your setup of writing SQL queries and talking to customers from home. I think I'd like that too! Sounds like you have good hours and benefits and opportunities for advancement. That's fine; actually, it's pretty great!
However: if you are not going to define yourself by your job, you need to have something that gives you a sense of ongoing purpose/fulfillment. Now that you aren't primarily defining yourself by your romantic relationship, you need to think about what keeps you going, and whether that's enough. I can't get my life's purpose out of my relationship--I'm too independent for that, and also we keep doing long-distance for a couple of years at a time, so extended contact with my husband is not a daily part of my life. Instead, I end up feeling really fulfilled by playing videogames, by reading, and by the occasional creative act (for me, writing or making embroideries). I guess that sounds boring? I'm really happy, though!
Contentment is really valuable. Unless you have a driving, monetizable passion (that wouldn't be crushed by you doing it for work instead of for fun), there is no reason for you to consider switching jobs. If you think you are lacking something to keep you going, you should look at your free time and figure out how to enrich it to make it more fun/purposeful for you.
Crush your enemies-
You want a job you're actually crushing/good at. Something you do well, where you aren't constantly concerned for your job security.
See them driven before you-
You want a job where you do get to see the results from your hard work. It's really great to go home at the end of the day knowing you accomplished something, even if that something is as simple as restocking some shelves. Humans like goal setting and achieving.
And hear the lamentations of their women-
Humans crave hearing feedback. Whether it's the respect of your professional peers or the respect of your social peers, somewhere in your life you will want to hear from others that you're respected.
Other than that, most people, myself included, want their life to give them what they need to pursue their greater life goals, their riddle of steel if you will. It sounds to me that that's where you're struggling most: what is your great job enabling you to do with your life? I think that's something everyone faces. Ultimately, life can be pretty meaningless except where you ascribe your own value to it.
This post is even more effective if you picture it being read to you by Darkewolfe's avatar.
Good credentials, plenty of past promotions, good experience with documents, management, manual labour; no job.
If you really want to explore and see what's out there, take some time off and start looking around. Submit your resume to any job postings you find interesting. Go to any interviews you're invited too and find out more about what those jobs are like and what they offer. You can always turn down any job opportunities you are given if they don't seem like "the one".
Finally, you've said your current job gives you a pretty good work/life balance. I think this is a very important benefit that should not be overlooked. Finding a job that pays well and offers you the work/life balance you're looking for is hard to find. Obviously, for every person, what they consider "pays well" and what they need for a good work/life balance is different, but if you feel you have found that sweet spot you should really embrace it.