Finding the Path

I've long had the impression that some people just know what they are "meant for" from an early age.

You meet people all the time who aren't terribly introspective, they just "do". That's who they are.

Maybe it just doesn't worry them. Maybe it doesn't matter why they do what they do.

I'm led to understand this idea that your job fit you, that you ought to find your niche, be (to some degree) fulfilled, is a peculiar American invention (at least according to my European friends, some of whom have come around to it nonetheless). Other places, work is work, non-work is life.



I suspect most of the world was built with people more life that.

If there was a point where I didn't have the bug, I have it. A number of times I've carried home a work problem, chewing on it, stewing on it. Like difficult non-work problems, there's this feeling of being alive with thought. What is going wrong? How to fix it? How do I get from here to there?

Work, the good work I've had, provides these problems in quantity. And the good work I've had has provided the motivation with it, the sense that solving these problems makes a worthwhile difference.

So that's what I look for in a position. How do you describe that in an interview? Should you? You don't. Interviews aren't for that. Most people I meet aren't introspective and deep personal discussions, if ever, come a long time after any interview. But that's really my principal motivation.

I want to feel alive. I love the thrill of a hunt, or an insurmountable challenge where through determination and cleverness I surmount it anyway, even eventually and then I get to enjoy the feeling that I've left something just a little better in the world. It's not even the quiet pride of accomplishment or accolades after, I want to feel alive, engaged, effective.

Some of us spend inordinate energy thinking of how to get there. Some wonder if they ever get there and what will it be like. Not a directed hunt. But the first time you feel that way, you know what it looks like and at least how you got there the first time.

This is why we try to bring up our children, teaching them, training them to handle increasing challenges. They at least get healthy self-confidence. Some come to enjoy the thrill of the challenge.

As I look forward in my life, I find I've forgotten a lot of my past. Maybe some of that was deliberate. I never connected the dots and so I'm left trying to figure out from scratch to what task and life I'm best suited.

To a degree, the work I've done so far has given me a fair idea of what I like and don't like, where and how I'm effective, and not.

But there are many moments past and present which I should pay more attention to. The past doesn't necessarily define my future, who I become and what I do, but I suspect it frames it. Where I've been successful thus far, maybe it fits a pattern.

It's not a clear picture, but a few moments in my life may be giving me clues.