how to pick a career without crying in the shower

I ‘HAVE TO’ write about this topic on picking your career and not losing your mind over it. See among teens, this is the #1 priority to navigate and make sense of the world. It is during this time that their hormones manifest into ripe energy bursts to change the world, but an old uncle comes suddenly pops up with unsolicited advice that mechanical engineering is evergreen and you realize you have been working in a power plant for 30+ years and crying everyday in a shower

Before I tell how how to pick a career that you would love doing, you may ask, who are you to tell us? Fair point. I can share this because:

1. I went from wanting to become a dancer, to playing tennis (and failing), to becoming a mechanical engineer, to a tech consultant, to a YouTuber, to starting my own business, only to realize I love being in the fintech industry. I am currently a Product Manager at Capital One, which is a leading bank in the US and I love being here. And I also make YouTube videos and write in my free time. So yeah, I switched gears A LOT. And I am in a much more fulfilled place now.

2. I have been fortunate to have had a front row seat to witness some of my friends changing their careers like Akash from Dil Chahta hai changes his girlfriends.

3. Ive read a lot of amazing books. You’ll love some of the analogies I share, which came to me because of reading.

Mind you, I am going to share the initial story through an Indian cultural lens, things in the west might be a little different (only initially).

When we start our life, it’s like we are swimming in a river downstream. The path has been set for us by society. We didn’t choose our parents, our life, our country, our culture. Most of what we do in our formative years is a sum total of your surroundings and how people want you to flow. Which is fair, you can’t navigate yet. It’s almost like success has been set up for you already in this river and you are optimistic about life and it’s possibilities. You are okay to flow along as long as the river is flowing. 

Then comes the first turn of your river, at the mouth of which you now enter a relatively still pond. You go to college.

Now almost all ponds are more or less similar, where you get to have a ‘choice’ to experience things. You can swim in any direction you want. You can see multiple shores form the pond where real life starts and you can begin working in the real world. You can go anywhere. The million dollar question is - ‘where do you go?’. At this exact point, the oracles of the world will come to your feet and whisper an age old mantra to you - “Follow your passion”.

An Indian uncle will come and say the same - “Follow your dreams, work hard, never give up”. Your parents will say the same, Robin Sharma will say the same. The hell you know what your passion is. You like a little bit of this , a little bit of that, how do you make a career out of anything?

And then just like the scene in 3 idiots where the freshmen stand hunched and naked, you stand in a line with million other graduates and wait for the career kick on your ass. Whichever direction the kick comes in, you go in that direction. Very common story. So what can be done?

First things first, passion is overrated. At such a young age where you are impressionable, you can be passionate about literally everything. You only realise what you are passionate about when you do something for long and you realise it is effortless and comes naturally to you. But hey, we haven’t got all the time in the world, time is scarce, how do we go about it?

First, you list down what you like and what is feasible. By feasible I mean what is within reach. You all know some things just can’t be done in your specific environments and there’s no point chasing a dead end. Things that overlap these two filters are golden for you. I wish I knew this before.

Now give yourself a time limit to experience and experiment, wether you actually like it or not. Want to be a director? Make a short film and see if that excites you. Want to be a software developer? Build an app, deploy it and see if you liked doing it. And so on. And it’s perfectly okay to like multiple things, trust me, you have infinite capability to manage multiple things. For now.

Next step is to find if the stuff that you are doing and you are liking, are you even ‘slightly’ better than others. Do you have a natural ability and a competitive advantage. ‘Slight’ is good enough. Once you find this fit, be willing to work as hard as you can with your ability. Your hard work is much more refined and channelized now.

One more nugget to add: let curiosity drive you and not passion. If something genuinely fundamentally makes you wonder, don’t let that thing ever go. Everything that humans have built and have excelled at, were done by curious souls. Once you have a general idea of the space you want to be in, the last thing is to do is ‘be aware’ which is the most crucial part.

Have you heard about the “Red Car” theory? If someone asks you in your office, “how many red cars did you see on the way to the office?” you aren’t sure. But if you know the next day the same question is going to be asked, even if you don’t count, you will naturally pay attention to the red cars. To be precise, your mind will lookout for red cars automatically. That’s the game. Be attentive and aware of the opportunities aka red cars which can open asymmetric games for you.

I want to add one last and controversial thing, Imtiaz Ali’s movies have ruined a 9-5 job. It’s almost like if you are working in a 9-5, you are not quote unquote Successful. That’s a horribly wrong notion. It depends on what you want from life. If a 9-5 gives you steady income and fuels your passion for other things which you like doing? You are there! Why is there a general notion that only Ambanis and Musks of the world are successful? I feel a person who loves the people around him/her, is happy with the work, has decent compensation and has multiple interests and hobbies to look forward to, is successful too. It’s a personal choice. Work can be wonderful. You don’t always have to find ways where you don’t work and you have money. For successful people Ive read about, work matters to them as much as the money they have. Don’t think about having, think about becoming. Becoming successful according to what you think, as opposed to having a lot of money.

And boom, you won’t ever cry in a shower.

Thank you for reading!