If you do something you love as a career, you’ll
never work a day in your lifehave one less thing that you love.“When your vacation becomes your vocation, you will never have a vacation again.”
I’m a homebody, and 2020 and the WFH stuff did exactly this to me.
Depends
It’s not that you dislike doing it because you get money for it
You dislike it because you do it all day and don’t have any veriety in it. When it’s a hobby can can take a break from it at any time and do something else in the meantime
I’m sure this is a part of it, but this is also a phenomon that’s been studied in psychology called the “overjustification effect.” Basically, once you introduce external rewards to something that was previously done for internal satisfaction, people become motivated only by the external reward and will lose interest without it. The external motivation can also “crowd out” your internal motivation and diminish it completely.
That doesn’t really apply to me since my internal motivation dies out pretty quickly and if I force myself to keep going I only get worse and worse results and start hating the things I love.
I don’t really get a lot of internal satisfaction or at least not enough that keeps me doing something. If I notice I start losing motivation, it’s better for me to stop and pick it up again when I feel motivated again (which can take months or years).
I enjoy the process of learning something new.
Same applies to basically anything.
Driving is awesome, but when you are driving because you are commuting, or you have to drive your kids to kindergarten/school it becomes a chore and you no longer enjoy it.
I love programming. But when I have to do it for someone else to earn a living, and do it in a specific manner that they dictate, it feels like a chore and I no longer enjoy it.
Having a workplace that is fun and enjoyable isn’t about doing the thing you love. It’s about a lot of other things, such as the people you work with, the company culture, how much freedom and choice you are granted.
do it in a specific manner that they dictate
That’s the root of the whole thing.
Obviously, if someone is going to pay you to do something for them, they’re going to want you to do it their way, in the manner of their choosing. That’s kinda the point.
The conclusion, of course, is that what you are really enjoying is the freedom to do what you want…and what you want just happens to be this given activity. Once you’re doing it for pay, you’re trading that freedom for money (capitalism in a nutshell, trading freedom for money). All the trappings of the specific nature of that trade are just window dressing and detail.
This applies to literally anything anyone does as a profession, all throughout history, even/especially “the oldest profession”.
Yep, it’s like playing a game that you like while having someone watch over you saying, “no don’t do that, no that isn’t good enough, you are taking too long, redo it all by this deadline”, and the ever present threat their assessment of your playing will have on your ability to live your daily life.
Pretty much.
In the actual nature of my work, I love it. I’m a CAD drafter and 3D modeler. I got started on this path as a little kid when I loved to draw and design Star Wars ships, especially floorplans and schematics of them.
If I could do that all day, it’d be heaven. Instead it’s always far less interesting things, on tight deadlines, with shitty software, and it has to be done in the least efficient ways possible, and I’m given vague and conflicting instructions on what is even wanted.
But it pays better than the Star Wars ships, and I like having food and a car and beer.
A guy I work with now flies drones commercially now, he says he cannot wait to stop flying drones for the rest of his life
Yeah that’s what happened with me and computers. Grew up obsessed with the things, then started a career in IT.
Now I love coins and mythology much more than anything computer related. Thinking of making it my next career… maybe not.
I was torn between being a SysAdmin and a Dev. Went to school for SA and now I’m a Linux admin. No regrets and it was fun when I first started… Now not so much.
I actually have fun pretending to be a Dev in my free time. Built a couple open source things and I enjoy it. I’ll NEVER be a dev for my job.
Funny enough, I did the opposite I’m a Dev but tinker with being SysAdmin in my free time.
The grass is always greener outside of corporate control.
How do you tinker with SysAdmin? Just set up random systems, or do it for a local club or so?
I’d assume it’s just self hosting stuff you didn’t build. That’s all I do at work, make sure the app our dev team created stays up and has resources to grow.
Some days I wonder if I should get out of tech altogether. I miss setting things up, getting deep into things I find fun. I feel work takes the fun out of it, honestly.
I’d love to volunteer somewhere that’ll make the world better. Homeless shelter, food bank, etc. The problem is, how do I do this AND pay my bills AND have free time to relax?
Just become independently wealthy, a couple of hundred million should do the trick. Then you can hire people to care about the fortune, and spend time on your passions.
/S
Now I love coins and mythology much more than anything computer related. Thinking of making it my next career… maybe not.
Haha was about to say, you gonna end up not loving it as well. But if it pays there’s no problem switching fields from time to time. Better to keep things fresh and interesting :)
See… maybe it was because I wasn’t actually all that interested in driving when I made it a career, but I actually still love driving, even though I did it every day for years. It could be because of my accelerometer.
Automotive testing engineer here, please tell me about your accelerometer!
It’s pretty basic. I took a piece of cork and a string to attach it to the base of a mason jar, so the cork is suspended about halfway up, then I filled it with water. I just put that mounted to the center of my dash, and it indicates how much lateral force I’m using during turns. As long as I keep it as close to the center as possible, I’m using the smoothest line.
Fantastic!
I personally own an old pre-smartphone accelerometer with a built-in acceleration calculator (and what is now considered retro LED display) that pretty much works on the same principle, a free-moving arm is attached to a potentiometer to measure the angle accurately (though that only works in one direction).
The accelerometers we use for crash testing use two little crystals rubbing together, they can pick up changes as little as 0.1G but also remain accurate up to 2000G.
I love my job when people don’t make it suck
Life in a nutshell. Never make your hobby your job, because you’re going to hate it.
I’ve tried it too many times…
Music? Check. Film? Check. Computer programming? Check
Finding a new job now? Umm…
My favourite thing about computer programming was the commute. I think I’m gonna try applying to the place that runs the trains now.
I tend to agree with this a ton, yet it’s left me asking over and over, “What the fuck do I do for work that won’t steal my time and leave me miserable?”
I don’t know if there’s any answer for me personally on this, as I think I just abhor the entire modern arrangement of work that wants your whole life instead of only a small portion of your time just to get by.
Musicians can relate to this.
Dealing with people ruined music for me worst part was people’s egos no one takes constructive criticism well anymore. Man I just want this shit to sound good so I can get a check for 25.00 once a month don’t be a dick because you’re obviously off key 😢😭
You can do anything mindfully or mindlessly. If your paycheck comes in contact with your personal development of a skill, and your freedom to explore its possibilities and your capabilities within that mindset, then yes I understand why doing your passion as a job might be tougher to wrestle with. But I think we must do this. Because if the alternative is to mindlessly do something we don’t love, and spend our lives wishing we had more time to interact with what we do love, then we are trading even more freedom away than if we had made our passion into our work. It is your responsibility to maintain a mindful, aware, thoughtful relationship with your own skills. Do your passion for yourself, more than for your boss. Save your energy at work for your own time.
yep.
