Me and Careers

[Adrian Ţepeş]

So I've made plenty of threads before about how it's difficult for me to make up my mind about what I want to study or do for a living.

This is a really shitty diagram, I know, but I'm still in class and impatient



Basically, this is how my mind works. It's like different colors for different fields. White being more thought-involved, Black being more memorization and writing, Blue being "feel-good" philanthropic interests, and Red being combined, broad fields that are "exciting" and hands on.

And the White square in the middle is sort of the equilibrium where I have some moments of clarity. Bottom line, it's like a pendulum or switch that changes constantly from one color to the other based on a specific study. I change my mind all the time xD

Most of you know about my OCD, so I won't really say much more about that other than negative thoughts can influence the neurochemicals (colors). I.e. "I want to be a physicist...oh wait! Shit, now I have/want to be this instead."

I'm still searching for some way to help me define what my "place in this world" is, so I hope this wasn't out there, but yeah, I thought I'd just say what was on my mind to try to provide you with some clarity and maybe even insight into...well, me

[Schofield]

Question: Why are you so eager to find your place in a world which you most likely haven't experienced much of. I could be wrong, but most people our age (in western society at least) haven't experienced much of the world.

For people like you and I who haven't the faintest idea what to do with ourselves, it's best for us to not to delve into something we're unsure of. Some people just know what they want to do, so they can do it. We're young, we don't need to do anything with our life right now.

Go out and experience as much as possible, then you'll most likely know where you belong.

Experience > Knowledge

[Adrian Ţepeş]

I've heard that all before, and I think that's right. However, I just have this nagging feeling in my mind where often I'll see an interesting career field and be like, "I want to do that!"

In a perfect world, I'd spend time working for a few years in couples of those fields, but unfortunately, I can't in this world because I need a 4 Ph.Ds in order to be able say I'm qualified to teach undergrads.

My current job is giving my journalism and writing experience, I've worked in a trade, and I've got 60+ hours of community service, so I've got a small amount of experience. Still a lot out there, but still it's a start anyway.

[MrFancypants]

I think you may have some misconceptions about these subjects. For example, life sciences can be rather hands on and also involve a lot of memorization. Philosphy doesn't really fit in with the others on the left, it is more about reading and writing while math/phyiscs is about logic as well as fast and abstract thinking. I doubt that something like archeology really provides a lot of hands on work; maybe to the few who end up being funded for a dig, but studying this probably involves reading books and learning dead languages. Chemistry is closer to life sciences than history.
Doesn't really matter, the point is, making a decision based on such rough categories is probably not such a great idea. Better to talk to students/professionals and look what they are actually spending their time on.
As for the OCD problem with the varying career choices - you should be aware that aborting an education isn't worth anything and you will need to spend several years concentrating on one subject. That isn't too bad though because once you get past the basics most subjects are so broad that a single person won't be able to learn all the specialities anyway.
Another way to deal with this issue is to realize that choosing one subject doesn't necessarily limit you to the few jobs that subject is supposed to prepare you for. Most university courses don't prepare you that well for the stuff you need to do in an actual job anyway. They just work as a way for you to signal to an employer that you posses certain qualities they may be looking for, like intelligence, self-motivation etc.
You can influence this with the choice of your subject - a history degree is not as good a signal of intelligence compared to a math degree. The harder the subject, the better.

There are also more and more combined degrees, where you learn a mixture of things, this may be interesting for you as well. For example engineering and business administration (sometimes called industrial engineering). These courses also have drawbacks though, e.g. you have to deal with the most difficult subjects of both fields but you will be less specialized in the end because the combined course is not as indepth as the normal courses.

[Adrian Ţepeş]

I'll go a bit more in depth so that you can get an idea of how I feel about each of the subjects:

Originally Posted by MrFancypants

For example, life sciences can be rather hands on and also involve a lot of memorization.

The reason I'm interested in Biology, Paleontology, and Veterinary Medicine is because I love animals, learning about the body and prehistoric life. I started learning about medicine in particular when I was young.

Philosphy doesn't really fit in with the others on the left, it is more about reading and writing

Yeah, Nemmerle has told me plenty of horror stories about that department

Actually, I was mainly considering taking it as a minor in addition to a math or CS major and go to grad school for it and teach philosophy at the university level (as if they teach it at the high school level.)

while math/phyiscs is about logic as well as fast and abstract thinking. I doubt that something like archeology really provides a lot of hands on work; maybe to the few who end up being funded for a dig, but studying this probably involves reading books and learning dead languages.

When it comes to physics, the abstractions and such are highly fascinating to me (I've studied a few books on the subject, especially electricity which I've had practice and training in.) Math is mainly because it's very satisfying to understand a problem and work it out, and it's also fun to learn to derive from formulas and solve new problems by doing so.

As for archaeology, truthfully, both those aspects are interesting to me. I like doing the research and learning about ancient civilizations and technology used, as well as the field work. I've been told that most (successful) archaeologists are professors when they're not out in the field.

Chemistry is closer to life sciences than history.

This is another one of those cases where I'd take it as a minor in addition to a history major, especially if I went into archaeology.

Doesn't really matter, the point is, making a decision based on such rough categories is probably not such a great idea. Better to talk to students/professionals and look what they are actually spending their time on.

I've been using this site as a reference for a while now, and I think it provides some decent info:

StudentsReview : Choosing or Changing your Major?

That isn't too bad though because once you get past the basics most subjects are so broad that a single person won't be able to learn all the specialities anyway.

I think I recognize this, but with me it's kind of like, "want to do and be qualified for everything."

You can influence this with the choice of your subject - a history degree is not as good a signal of intelligence compared to a math degree. The harder the subject, the better.

That's another reason for considering math/physics since I'm told they have decent job prospects.

There are also more and more combined degrees, where you learn a mixture of things, this may be interesting for you as well. For example engineering and business administration (sometimes called industrial engineering). These courses also have drawbacks though, e.g. you have to deal with the most difficult subjects of both fields but you will be less specialized in the end because the combined course is not as indepth as the normal courses.

This is something I've been looking more into rather recently because they are essentially melting-pot degrees (namely cognitive science) that have a diverse knowledge base. Industrial Engineering, however, is actually something I've been looking into as well since it would be employing a good deal of skill sets and might also satisfy the "humanitarian/feel-good" sector.

[Nemmerle]

Originally Posted by MrFancypants

Philosphy doesn't really fit in with the others on the left, it is more about reading and writing while math/phyiscs is about logic as well as fast and abstract thinking.

Hnn. Very much depends who you get teaching it and what they're teaching. Formal logic, for instance, is part of the philosophy department where I went rather than the maths department. Philosophy is one of those oddball departments that varies quite widely, in my experience, in how it's taught and what is taught even within a given uni.