What’s Important in Choosing Your Career

Jay Earley, Ph.D.

There are many different criteria that people use in choosing a certain job or career—security, recognition, power, life purpose, and others. If you happen to be in serious financial difficulty or on the edge of being out on the street, you choose a job for survival reasons—whatever will pay the bills. Most people choose a career partly for the financial security it can provide or the enhanced standard of living. These choices are completely valid, but people often find that if they stay in a job that pays well but doesn’t provide anything else, they end up disappointed and frustrated. They also need work that is enjoyable and challenging. Be careful that you don’t get used to a high paying job and a pricey standard of living which then rules out career choices that would be more satisfying.

Many people choose careers for the rewards they bring. In some job situations you may be recognized and admired for your talents and achievements. Other career choices may lead to considerable status and power and the satisfaction that comes from “playing in the big leagues.” These rewards can be important in helping you to develop your sense of self-worth. However, a job must provide more than just these external rewards or you will probably end up feeling bored or restless.

It is important to find a job that is intrinsically satisfying as well as rewarding. You want the work to be enjoyable and interesting for its own sake. Some people also value work that allows them to make meaningful connections with other people or to belong to a friendly group in the work situation. Others value work that allows them to be in situations that are enjoyable—being in nature, performing, working with teams, traveling, etc.

Even though your work is enjoyable, you may eventually want more. Most people find that they want work that involves challenges and new learning, that uses their initiative and talent as much as possible. For greater satisfaction, you want a job that engages your creativity and uses your unique talents, personal strengths, and special qualities—those things that are your particular gifts to the world.

Sounds pretty good, huh? But for some of us, even this isn’t enough. Ultimately we want our work to be meaningful. We want it to contribute to something larger than ourselves. If the work only takes care of me (and my family), it may not feel truly meaningful. Therefore we become interested in the effects of our work on other people and the world. We refuse to engage in work that is destructive or that violates our values. For those of us who have the opportunity, we want to go even further, to do work that is actively aligned with our deeper values and makes a contribution to other people or to the world in some way. This might be a contribution to a cause, to society, to art or knowledge or Spirit.

Ideally your career will be your unique contribution, one that reflects your mission, your ultimate purpose in life. This is what makes work deeply meaningful. And of course, the work should also be enjoyable, challenging, and creative. Your life purpose career should integrate both sides of yourself—personal fulfillment and contribution to something larger.

I offer Life Purpose Coaching as a way to help people discover their best career choice—one that includes all of these perspectives with a special emphasis on the meaning of your life and your unique contribution to the world.

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