Do you love your job/what you've done with your life?

I liked the work and the people, but I do not long for its return.

I’ve been EXTREMELY lucky for someone who never really figured out what I wanted to do with my life, and in having the good fortune to being born and living for the critical portion of my life through an era in which you could actually get away with it. I’ve also been blessed with certain talents which I neither appreciated nor strove to exploit but which have nevertheless sustained me without my fully realizing it. It amounts to a pigheaded sort of stupidity that I find truly exasperating when I spot it in others. So, though I may be bored with my “job”, I have nothing whatsoever to complain about and will probably spend the remainder of my life worrying about living up to the obligations accompanying so much clearly undeserved good fortune.

I like what I do and being owner of the company there is no room to not like what I do. But I would love it more if it been something I had aspired to do. I went to college to work in TV or film not make adhesives. I would have never dreamed of owning let alone working for a glue factory. 3 really unexpected unanticipated events happened in my life that got me to where I am. 30 years ago something fell in my lap and for lack of anything better to do I took a chance and got in the industry starting my first of 2 companies at 23 years old. 16 years later a company I purchased materials from asked me to come work for him….took chance #2. 16 years later he offers to sell me his company and I take chance #3. Every day I wake up and ask how the hell did this happen??

Nope & nope.

I’ve been happy with my profession (librarian) but I’m nearing retirement and will be happy with that. I’d like to be a novelist perhaps but to do that you have to write novels.

I’ve had a few different careers. I love what I do. I work too many hours, but the trade-off is I’m doing something that by-and-large I enjoy and care about. And yes I’m happy with my life so far. Again, I’ve had lots of different adventures. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve met wonderful people. And I’m not dead yet! So I hope I’ll do much, much more. As to the scale – I’d say I fit better on the ”“You only have one life to live, so always reach for a more rewarding occupation” scale. I really do believe this. And I think if we are doing something we love, it doesn’t feel quite so much like work.

I work as a dog trainer which is something I have wanted to do for as long as I can remember. My job is stressful at times (mainly due to the human side of it more than the dogs themselves) and the hours are long. There have been times when I wished I had a normal 9–5 office job, but whenever I reach that point I have a breakthrough with a troubled dog or an owner comes to me excited because they have finally got their dog to do a fun trick that we’ve been working on and I realise that it’s so worth it. Also, not a day goes by when I don’t cuddle a puppy!!

I work as a tutor and a dog trainer. The tutoring is a lot of fun with most students. It takes a long time to build a stable teaching relationship, especially as my students are teens – but when we’ve reached that point, I can sit back and just watch the kids learn. When they finally want to, it’s a breeze.

The dog training is lovely, for the most part. It’s draining, because I am an incredibly introverted person – but I have so much fun discussing dogs, watching them play, and observing them learn. Like @OpryLeigh said, breakthroughs and proud clients make my day. I regularly receive videos and messages via WhatsApp, detailing the latest achievements of one dog or other. That’s lots of little achievements for me, too.

I do look for rewarding occupations, but I am also very lucky. Jobs which suit me seem to just appear, all I have to do is be smart enough to grab a chance when I see it. If that goes on throughout my life, I’m good. I don’t think I will ever settle down with one particular job. I love the variety in my days, and the fact that I can make my own schedule.

I’ve never done anything, and I completely lack ambition.

I wanted to go to college and major in journalism.

Every year I’m more grateful to not have those student loans to pay off.

I’d still like to finish college, but I have no idea what I’d major in anymore. Nothing I’m interested in could pay for the degree.

Wait a minute, you can’t get away with that “I’ve never done anything.” And the ambition thing is also highly suspicious, beginning with the “Great Escape”

Meh. A short series of low wage jobs that amounted to nothing. Every company I’ve ever worked for is closed. Even the planning department of the government I worked for was merged with another department.

I have no on-paper qualification to do anything.

However, if “obsessive amateur researcher” ever becomes a paying position, call me.

I guess the answer would be a “no” all around!

@Seek You’re pretending to confuse “done anything” with “raking in money.” You certainly know the difference, and must not lead us to believe that you think otherwise.

@Seek: you have office skills from the job you had with the government. Those skills are valuable to many types of employers. Also, you have an idea about how government operates. If you wanted to, you could take civil service exams which might not give you a fun job but a job that pays the bills and has good bennies.

I’m a student, does it count?

Sometimes I ask myself why I’m in my college in the first place. I don’t really think I’m cut out to be a teacher. I know what I like ever since I was a child: to write and write. I could be a writer, or at least a screen writer or a director. But it seems that no one around me want me do do anything with writing. My parents forbid me from writing, there is no college for filming, my relatives urge me to be a teacher, saying that writing can’t get me money… I think I’m better than many students in my college who don’t even know what they want, but that lands me nowhere.

I do fine at school. But sometimes I think I would thrive much more if I was in a filming college.

I’m probably a “if you’re unhappy, save up a few months rent and take the jump.”

@jca – in my area they’re worth very little unless you speak fluent Spanish or have a bachelor’s degree. It’s a college town, there’s no shortage of clerical skills, even if the idea of going back into a cubicle didn’t make me want to boil myself in oil.

@janbb lazy penguin, why should you be spared the suffering? You already have your own publishing company. Get to work.

I’ve had three jobs and I’ve liked them all and I am now thinking about retiring and I hope to enjoy that too.

I can’t function doing mundane, uncomplicated stuff. It completely shuts me down and I get depressed. I chose a profession that is all about complicated problems, technical details and extreme consequences if things go wrong. I have had to make some really big decisions and by nature of the job I don’t have to be in the spotlight when doing so. I can still get my hands dirty in the field and play around in the machine shop and lab when needed at times too. I did allow myself to get too wrapped up in my last position and it took over my life. It stressed me to the breaking point so I left. I recently moved to a similar job but did so with clear boundaries. I’m still kind of looking for that ideal job though. I’d really like something that does not revolve around finding solutions for big things breaking or fixing pre-existing messes. I can at least sleep at night now for the most part but I’m still learning my new job. I will say that that once you have been in a position like my previous one all of the “normal” problems people complain about get trivial really fast. It really makes you appreciate simple things and simple problems. At one point I had a fantasy about living in a single room apartment and working at some shitty minimum wage job but without any stress. That was my queue to exit.