How to find a career you can stick with forever

I have no idea what to do with my life.

Here I am, 22 years old, freshly graduated from college, a month away from starting my first big boy job, and wondering if I’m making the right choice.

That was me when my Dad asked “Do you want to take a celebratory trip to Yellowstone? I’ll pay for it.”

Heck yes I did.

I had been second-guessing my engineering path for a while now. And the downtime between course work and actual work was starting to wear on my resolve.

Looking at some beautiful mountain scenery was just what the doctor ordered after 4 years of pile-driving Electrical Engineering curriculum into my brain.

And, it was a big occasion, graduating college. In my family, least. First generation college grad. Dad was proud and we had always talked about seeing the mountains out West.

So, we hopped on a plane (first commercial flight for me) and headed to Denver.

Turns out Yellowstone is a long way from Denver.

So, we got a rental car and headed out. To kill the time, I downloaded a couple of audio books. One of these was “Predictably Irrational” by Dan Ariely.

Thinking back, I don’t know how I found it. Probably a Tim Ferriss podcast.

But it changed my life.

Behavioral psychology, marketing, and business. It had it all. And I was hooked. I mean, Dan was talking about how people behave so predictably that you could harness those behaviors to sell stuff.

For an engineer, this was mind-blowing.

Not enough for me to act on, but the lessons from the book wormed their way deep into my psyche.

Deep enough that I couldn’t get it out of my head for the next 8 years as I made my way through my engineering career.

When my Dad passed away a few years ago I started soul-searching.

This turned into writing, which turned into an obsession.

Then I discovered money Twitter, and met all of the really cool people I know now. While reading their threads, those lessons from Predictably Irrational kept coming back, again and again.

And the enthrall that book held over me came washing back.

Along with the thought: “Man, I wish I would have pursued this feeling 8 years ago instead of an engineering career.”

Now, to be fair, I regret nothing.

My career to this point has been successful, and I have learned a ton and met some amazing people.

But, here’s the lesson.

Follow your gut.

There are things you are drawn to, naturally.

Take note of those things, and go down the rabbit hole.

Write about them, find other people that are just as obsessed as you are and talk about these ideas.

This is what I’m doing now, and I wish I had done this sooner.

Hindsight is always 20/20, so to any of you that are in a career that you just tolerate, go down some rabbit holes.

Take action on the stuff you are passionate about.

It’s worth it.

If I don’t see you tomorrow, have an amazing weekend,

Swanagan