Have you ever sat back and considered how strange, weird, and oftentimes dumb humans are?
This isn’t about looking up whatever craziness Florida Man has gotten into lately.
What I am referring to is how hard it is for the human brain to recognize and understand the current world around us every day.
Think about it using that big, wrinkly brain of yours.
We build and create some amazing and wonderful things. We hope for the future. In English there is even a word, nostalgia, that defines looking back at the positives in our past.
Yet, if you were to ask any random human what they would call their dream job, how would they respond?
We do this a lot as we are growing up. There is the astronaut, doctor, adventurer, and marine biologist phase of life where that dream role is boiled down to a few generalities that we can imagine while we are playing with stuffed animals, blocks, and simple toys while young.
When we get older and have to start making decisions that will lead us down different paths in life, humans then hit the high school counselor roadblock of life. That is where someone else starts “helping” to define a path for us and where the idea of a dream job can start to fade.
By the time that we are out in the workplace, doing something to make money every day, the whole concept of a dream job seems so farfetched and ridiculous that it is hard to take seriously once life apathy sets in.
Throughout this growth and learning journey in life that we all take, most of the time the answer to the question of “What is your dream job?” would take the form of appropriation of some facet of someone else’s life that we only see a small snippet of.
Think of it this way. Would anyone be surprised if someone provided the following answers to that question:
My dream job is to be a movie star like Keanu Reeves!
Or:
My dream job is to work at Google!
First of all, if you have a life goal of being an amazing, humble, and generous person like Keanu Reeves then you are on the right track. While, ironically, I am writing about not knowing what his job entails, the public persona that Keanu shows is one of an amazing, friendly, and charitable human being.
We should all strive to be more like Keanu.
However, whether you want to see yourself on the big screen or work for a seemingly wonderful company like Google, these are not dream jobs.
They are incredibly small snippets of desires that have no bearing or basis in the context of an actual workplace role or backing in the real world.
Acting in movies takes a lot of effort, training, and hard work to get to that point.
Similarly, working at Google may be awesome for some things, but the truth is that Google has all of the ups, downs, positives, and negatives that any business has. They just have good pay and fun benefits and also happen to get these things highlighted in the media more often than most.
If Google was the ultimate dream job for many people then why do people choose to leave the company?
Sure – this may be a narrow-minded argument, but this isn’t the point I am trying to make.
The point here is that without that context, without that day-in and day-out knowledge, how will you know that working there is your “dream job”?
The article about how awesome Google is or that 2 hours of theater time watching Keanu shoot and karate kick everything in sight was great, but they give me insight into the months of training and weight lifting or the documented cultural issues around a lack of diversity and exerting undue influence over subordinates?
If those roles are so amazing then why are there plenty of examples out there of people who have left those places and are willing to talk about the negative aspects of what they were working on or the culture around them?
Look, I am not trying to tell you these places are good and bad. I am trying to make the point that without the entire picture, no one person can know without being in that situation and observing for themselves.
So how do you know what job will fit your dream role?
No job description on a website can tell you if that is your dream job, just like no resume can define whether that person is an ideal, perfect-fit employee.
Going through an interview process and getting to talk to multiple people and hearing their accounts firsthand starts to open things up. If the role sounds super fun and exciting and then meeting and getting to know the people already there passes muster then you just might find a dream role within reach.
Just be sure that the questions that you ask in any hiring process reflect your personal needs and frustrations that you want to avoid.
Never forget that the hiring process is a two-way street. You want to interview and find out about them just as much as they want to learn about you.
Now, the question is not really what is the dream job, but instead, the question becomes what culture, environment, products, and people need to be present to create an ideal scenario for you.
In short, what will lay your head down at night and what will get you up in the morning?
What has the potential to be exciting enough each day that, even after peeking behind the curtain and seeing how things really work from an inside perspective, you will still be pumped up and gung-ho about attacking whatever work and projects are put in front of you?
A dream job is not about fame, glory, money, or titles. It is all about mental and personal satisfaction.
One of my favorite jobs that I have ever been lucky enough to have was in being the night manager of an indoor soccer facility. Sure, it meant getting yelled at while refereeing when the calls didn’t go correctly. Mopping the floors and cleaning bathrooms at the end of the night wasn’t very exciting. However, the people and the excitement that I felt were always amazing and wonderful, and for quite a while, I was lucky enough to work at my dream job for a time.
Now, later on in my career, I find myself in a similar situation starting something new and this feels very similar. It is my hope that I have been lucky enough to have lightning strike twice and have found myself another dream role – which is a great and happy feeling to have.
So is being an actor or being welcomed into a giant tech company like Google a dream job for you? Is it for me? My guess is, neither of us has the context needed to answer it. It might be, but until that information is available to answer that question it will remain a mystery.
And that is 100% OK.
Your ideal role has a very high likelihood of having a different answer now as opposed to 5 or 10 years from now.
That is also OK.
A dream job does not need to be a static thing. Humans always grow and change. We grow older. We hopefully grow wiser. We have different needs and wants. We might start a family or want to move to a different location. Go for it!
The last thing to remember about dream jobs is that we all need the context to understand what comprises the answer for us as individuals. However, unless we are in that environment and see that culture and meet those people we won’t know what it is like.
While we can’t be afraid to get into an industry or role or company to find those things out, we also need to be able to clearly evaluate the spot that we are in today.
It could be the best company in the world with great pay, wonderful benefits, and an amazing culture, but if it doesn’t feel fun and exciting to you personally, then it isn’t your dream job no matter how appealing those things may seem to someone on the outside looking in.
Conversely, you may not make that much, and there could be some big red flags for things like future growth and opportunity, but if you are excited to go make that effort each and every day then why not embrace that as something close to perfect for you at this point in your life?
Don’t be afraid to put your own current role to a critical review. You might be surprised to find that you are a lot closer to something ideal than you thought. Then again, you might also find that you are able to define the few key missing pieces to the puzzle for yourself.
And no matter what, I hope you find enjoyment and fulfillment in any role or job that you do. Life is too short to strive for anything else!
Thanks for reading.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.