How To Find Your Dream Job

"Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life".

I'm sure you've heard that phrase more than once in your over the course of your life. When we get to high school, there is a lot of pressure on us to know what we want to do for a career. What if we don't know? Or what if what we love is laying on the couch with our cat all day, listening to music, or playing video games? Sure, some lucky people get to make money playing video games and I know a guy who has people pay him to put listen to their music in the hopes that he'll like it and put it on his Spotify playlists. But most of us aren't that lucky. What are we to do?

I think finding work that we love takes some creativity and thinking outside the box sometimes. It takes knowing ourselves well - what are we capable of and what is beyond our reach. I made a little diagram to help us out with this process of finding what we love. (I did not invent this diagram, just created this particular one)

Let's take these ideas one at a time, starting with Things I Love. Think about your hobbies, current and past. What do you like to do? Arts? Science? Sports? Creating? What did you like to do as a kid that maybe you don't have time for anymore? Write down some ideas. Try for at least five. Got them? Great! Now for the next piece - Things I'm Good At.

Are you good at a certain subject in school? Can you fix just about anything? Are you a tech wizard? What do people come to you for advice on? What do your friends and family say you're good at? Sometimes, because something is so easy for us, we don't recognize it or we dismiss it as nothing. Ask your friends and family what they see you being good at. Again, try to find at least five things.

This is the kicker - Things That Make Money. As I said before, most of us can't make money listening to music or playing video games. Even becoming a musician can be a long shot. But there are a lot of jobs in the music and video game industries. This category is where you need to think creatively. If you love cuddling your cat or reading books, then maybe you might become the director of an animal shelter or an editor. If you're really good with technology, maybe you can be a web designer or write software programs.

Ideally, you are starting to see some connections between things that you love, things you are good at, and things that make money. If one (or more) of those things intersect, you've found a job that will probably be perfect for you!

Let me give you an example. A lot of boys want to be pro sports players when they grow up. We did the math one time and there are only 750 Major League baseball players at a time (25 men per team x 30 teams). That's a really small number. My brother was a catcher in high school. There are only 30 starting catchers. It's a really elite club. Not many people are going to be a starting catcher on a MLB team, or a starting anything on a pro team. So maybe you're not good enough to make it to the pros but you are good. There are careers as scouts, coaches, trainers, and writers. All these positions work closely with the sport you love and require a good knowledge of said sport. Now, some (like trainer and writer) require some other skills and knowledge, but the point is that you can still have a career related to something you love, even if it's not directly the thing you love.

A few things to keep in mind:

1. You (probably) won't keep the same job for your whole life. That trend seems to be disappearing. I say that to give you hope. If you find yourself in a job out of necessity and you didn't have the option for one reason or another to pursue a dream job, THAT'S OKAY! Work hard and keep your eyes open for other opportunities.
   
2. What is a dream job in one season might not be in another season. It's okay if your passions change. If you are blessed to work in your dream field and down the road things change, that's fine. Dreams sometimes change, for one reason or another.
   
3. If you are one of the really blessed people to have multiple intersections between the three categories, then you have some decisions to make. Picking one now does not necessarily mean losing the others forever. Again, there are seasons. Life changes and sometimes things come back that we set aside for a time.
   
4. You can make career changes slowly. My brother likes blacksmithing. He seems to have a talent for it but he's not sure he can make enough money at it to support a family. So one option is to work a side business and see what happens. It could be that one day he does make enough to do it full time, but while he figures that out, he has another job (that he happens to like a lot too :)
   

I mostly wrote this for high schoolers but it can be for anyone at anytime. Amy & Jordan Demos started photographing weddings while they were elementary school teachers. They slowly transitioned and now get to do two things they love - photography and teaching! Anyone can go after a dream job at any time, it just might take a little while to make the change.

Do you work in your dream job? Was it easy to find or did you have to work to discover it? If you are in high school and are trying to figure this out, I'd love to help you work through these things if you need someone to talk to!!!

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