Remember when they used to ask that question when we were kids? Do you still remember your answer? Remember why you wanted to follow that profession?
Probably most of us didn’t exactly become that we imagined when we were kids but many have been able to fulfill their professional dream. When I say “dream” I’m referring to the original motivation behind the profession we “picked” when we were children—some wanted to help people, hence they wanted to become doctors; others wanted to help animals, hence they aspired to be vets. There were even those who dreamed of being rich and wanted to work in a bank.
As they grew up many professionals discovered that they could fulfill their professional “dreams” even without following the idealized childhood profession, and that different roads lead to the same sense of fulfillment.
The most important thing is to fulfill that dream. Consultant’s BS? Self-help talk? It might even be, but the most fulfilled professionals are usually those boosting best performance and standing out in their fields. If that isn’t enough to convince you, there’s also a mathematical equation to consider. We spend most of our time at work, so nothing more logical than working with something that gives us satisfaction.
I said satisfaction. And satisfaction doesn’t mean that the work is easy; that it’s necessarily the one that pays the best, or has fewer hours. It’s as if each phase in our professional trajectory were a chapter of a major story that you’ll title career a few years later. And satisfaction happens when this story is awesome and you’re proud of it (and sometimes inspires other people!!).
How are you drafting your chapters? Have you taken a moment to think about this?
And claiming that it’s too late and that you’ve done everything wrong in the past won’t cut it! If you need to change remember that the most important thing is the direction of the change and not how fast you do it (Edson Marques).
When you think about a profession don’t get stuck to the idea that you’ll necessarily work for a company, from Monday thru Friday, in a secure job with a boss to report to. Not that this is bad, it’s just that it’s not the only path. Humans have never experienced so many simultaneous changes and so many new needs than in the current globalized world. It sounds like cliché, but if we take a moment we’ll realize that "the world is upside down and no one has noticed it."
Take a chance!! There’re tons of opportunities in the new world being formed.
GOOD LUCK!!
