Career Goal Tending

“We don't have a lot of time on this earth. We weren't meant to spend it this way. Human beings weren't meant to sit in little cubicles, starring at computer screens all day, filling out useless forms and listening to eight different bosses drone on about mission statements.”

- Peter Gibbons, Office Space

Not to sound vain, but I feel that I have accomplished a lot in my career considering I haven’t even turned 30 yet. And while I have worked hard to earn those achievements, I can’t help but feel lucky and humble for what I have. I see so many people stumble and bumble around in their career, never earning more that 32k a year and never striving for anything better, that it just makes me feel so grateful that my parents instilled me with a strong work ethic and provided me with their intelligence genes. I have been blessed with so much, and worked very hard to get the rest, that I can’t help but feel guilty when I feel dissatisfied about my career situation.

Not to sound like Sarah Jessica Parker typing on her laptop in Sex in the City, “but does anyone still dream of their dream job?”

I’m not complaining, really I’m not. I like my job, the company I work for, and most of the people I work with. I am very thankful for having a job that gives me enough income to support my lifestyle; and that it provides me with health insurance and retirement benefits, all the other perks that come along with working for a medium-sized corporation. But I don’t jump out to bed, rub my hands together, smile at myself in the bathroom mirror and say, “I can’t wait to go to work today.”

If you need a visual of what I am talking about, envision Annette Bening in American Beauty while she’s getting ready to show a home she just put up for sale - “I will sell this house today. I will SELL THIS HOUSE TODAY. I WILL SELL THIS HOUSE TODAY!!!”

Fairly regularly I find myself wondering how many people actually love their job. Is it a fairy tale notion to expect total and complete job happiness? Does the fact that you are at one place, doing a certain job 40+ hours a week, 52 weeks a year, year upon year until you retire, make it a logistical impossibility to suggest you’ll be happy most of the time you are doing that job?

Getting back to American Beauty for a second; one of the reasons that movie is so freaking, ridiculously, damn good, is because Lester makes a cathartic (and entertaining) journey from being a sedated, unhappy, corporate drone, to an inspired, reenergized drive-thru window employee at Mr. Smiley’s. When we first meet Lester, he painfully has to will himself out of bed. And while the movie never shows Lester in the morning after he takes the Mr. Smiley’s job, I can’t help but think Lester enjoys going to that job much more than he enjoyed heading down Media Monthly Magazine, where he had spent the previous 14 years of his life. Lester’s $65,000 a year job, his benefit package, his impressive job title at a formidable publication, did not bring him happiness. It was a job at a Hardee’s-look-a-like that finally brought him that. Well, that and a high school cheerleader … but I digress. (The true meaning of Angela’s and Lester’s relationship is a posting for another time)

So does that mean I should quit my job and apply at Sonic to find my “dream job”? Probably not. But it does make me wonder if I’d take $10,000 or $15,000 less to work at a job that I genuinely look forward to everyday. I’ve often made fun of those ski bums who surround their whole life in snow – they teach ski school, work the chairlifts, hang out in lodges, ski the back bowls, subscribe to Powder Magazine, etc. But maybe instead of poking fun at their perceived slacker attitude, I should be envious that they have found something they truly enjoy doing and can make a living (albeit a modest one) at.

The problem in doing what Lester Burnham did, and what Peter Gibbons did, and what ski bums do, is that there isn’t a future at Mr. Smiley’s, working construction, or giving private ski lessons to Texan tourists. You can’t provide for your family working fast-food. You can’t work on a construction site until you’re 65 and expect to be reasonably healthy. You can’t save money for retirement, or for your kids’ education, or get health insurance, working winters at Vail.

So I struggle. Where is the line between career success and having a future for you and your family, and finding a job/career that will bring you happiness the rest of your life? Do you trade one for the other? How realistic is it to have both? Are those people who are often envied: movie starts, athletes, persons in the media, politicians, CEOs, novelists, etc., happy with their careers everyday? Or do they have the same complaints and frustrations as I do? Does a quarterback look at a football field the same way I look over a sea of gray cubicles at my office?

In The Soprano’s, a one-legged Russian immigrant tells Tony that Americans are spoiled and that they think they deserve happiness; while the rest of the world expects to be unhappy. Maybe that’s true. Maybe I am just another spoiled American who can’t appreciate what I have, when so many people in the world are starving, or working in sweat-shops, or are unemployed, or work in factories. Maybe I should just shut-up and be happy with my white collar job, even though I don’t jump out of bed every morning with overflowing enthusiasm.

Perhaps dream jobs are like dream cars, dream dates, dream houses – perfect in your imagination, but ultimately much different in reality. But America was built on dreams. And maybe the reason America continues to prosper is because while we might expect to be happy, we also work very hard to obtain it. We don’t settle. We don’t leave well enough alone. We aren’t satisfied with the status-quo. We aren’t complacent. We strive to find something better.

So I am left with muddled conclusions. How do I measure my career success, progress, satisfaction? Do I evaluate it based on my job title? By the number of people I manage? By my annual salary? By my happiness with my job? By the size of my house? By the car I drive? By the contributions and differences I make within my profession? Are Lester Burnham, Peter Gibbons and all those ski bums in Summit County, successes or failures? Are the old sayings, “you have to do something for love before you can do it for money.” and “if you do something you love, the money will follow,” accurate commentary about life, or just wishful thinking?