# Do you control your career or does it control you?



## Ewok City (Sep 21, 2020)

OrchidSugar said:


> I want to switch over for the pay and relative freedom alone. Just not sure if it’s worth pursuing something I’m not actually passionate about. Technology scares me more than excites me. It seems you (and others) have genuine love of the craft though.


This:



HAL said:


> If you're not passionate, don't do it.


Totally agree. The real reason why there are so many CS dropouts is not because the subject is hard, it's because most students lack passion. The stability and the high pay is not worth all the frustrations, I think there are other jobs that are just as high paying and secure as CS.

But yes, I would agree that maybe you should give it a try first, before deciding if it scares you. 10 years ago, I used to tell jokes to people who told me something that's unlikely to happen, "_cmon man, that's just ridiculous, you're imagining things here. What next, me taking a CS degree? LMAO seriously. _"

It wasn't until I was involved in a game development team, initially as the music composer, eventually one of the programmers, that I discovered my passion in the field. Fast forward to today and I can say the journey have been really enjoyable and fulfilling. There's always something to look forward to every morning when I wake up.

My suggestion is to give it at least 6 months. The initial phase are usually the toughest because we're overwhelmed with information- there's so much you could do that you don't know where to start, and looking at the end goal, the progress you make each day seems so tiny and meaningless compared to it, and this could be demotivating. "Cmon, when can I start building my app?" But if you could just hold on and get past this stage, the upcoming learning journey will be smooth (at least for the few months or years until the next slope of learning), and you'll just be on a roll from there onwards. Websites, apps, IoT gadgets, you name it, you can build whatever you want. I would suggest thinking about what you want to build early on, because it would fuel your motivation and passion for the next few years. I love games so I started with Unity, and I was going hardcore on it for at least 3 years before I switched to learning about information systems stuffs such as websites, apps, etc.

So yeah, it's a really exciting field to be in, and I always encourage people who are scared to get in to get a taste of it first- who knows, it might just be the best thing that could ever happen to you!


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## recycled_lube_oil (Sep 30, 2021)

HAL said:


> For me it's a 50/50 mixture of salary and company.
> 
> I'm still growing a lot on the salary side of things so I'm easily swayed if I see something that pays a lot more.
> 
> ...


I've noticed that the job market for programmers/developers seems to be booming at the minute. Since starting the more advanced topics in my Open University degree I have lost a lot of the passion I had for infrastructure. I am glad however that I am on my final year (although once my final project starts I can kiss goodbye to sleep), I have already expressed my interest in dev work to the Head Of Development at the company I work for and the response was promising.

Although... there are a few interesting companies in the city I work in, which would probably suit me better if I could land a job there (reminds me, I need to look at there software engineers on Linkedin and see what tech stack they use).

I have done the whole jump job just because the new job pays well, if I have no passion at the job (as was the case when I switched jobs and moved to a new city), I won't do well. Its not that I can't, its just I won't as I have no passion.

Programming I am quite positive about however, I am currently on Annual Leave (new Open University year started this week) and spent about 6 hours yesterday, messing with RESTful routing using Node and Express.


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## recycled_lube_oil (Sep 30, 2021)

OrchidSugar said:


> I noticed on this forum and life in general seems like those who have the greatest sense of agency and optimism tend to be working in tech. I want to switch over for the pay and relative freedom alone. Just not sure if it’s worth pursuing something I’m not actually passionate about. Technology scares me more than excites me. It seems you (and others) have genuine love of the craft though.


I can't explain it. I just enjoy being a dumped a problem and working on it. Then I feel achievement once an issue is fixed or I design/implement a solution.

The end use, the domain, doesn't really motivate me, its the work itself. I know some people are motivated more by what the end result/what the company does, but for me at least, its just about the tech and what I do with it. 

Although this may not shine a good light on me, if a firm was legitimately doing something to save the earth, but had old outdated tech and no budget/plans for updating, I would not be able to work on it. It would make me feel like I was making myself irrelevant in the tech market. I have been there and experienced that (NHS, cough, cough, cough).


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## recycled_lube_oil (Sep 30, 2021)




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## Tripwire_Desire (Jul 8, 2017)

Neither.


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## islandlight (Aug 13, 2013)

The way I was raised, I never thought about a career. I just bounced around restaurant and low-paid factory jobs.

I finally got a university degree and certificate at age 30, but job prospects were poor, so I worked in other countries for a while. Pay and working conditions were not great. No opportunity for advancement.

At age 50 I was in an isolated location. No local jobs at all, so I decided to make money online. It kind of worked out, although my annual income was at or below minimum wage level until I retired.

So my "career" controlled me, in the sense of keeping me poor.


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## Eu_citzen (Jan 18, 2018)

I've been in both. Sometimes I ended up fancying a new interest, or a random tangent led me down a new path, and I then followed that path until it closed. 
That said, I probably fall more into the second category than not.


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## shameless (Apr 21, 2014)

I thought about this question again later.

Frankly I think I let work control me, and at some point I did learn I could control work.

What drives me now though is neither. At least not directly. I opted to not go for a job that had better direct longer term career path, and I opted to not pursue completing my degree at this exact time. But I put quite alot of thought into it. As far as what I want. When I thought about what I want in a few years I realized it was no longer the more prestigious job I had once cared about, but I also realized I do not want to be always feeling like a work horse my entire life.

So right now what controls me is the flexibility I mentioned because I truly want to focus most on saving saving saving. I decided it was a good place to settle on happy medium job that offered flexibility so I can work more and save. That does not mean any of the jobs I plan to pursue have no potential opportunity in career ever. I just decided that if I get control over finances and work my ass off for a few years it will never matter as much about the career thing if I have no debt and enough assets. That can even afford me the luxury of having spare money to invest. I guess strangely I have enough faith that I will probably have a decent career as an outcome once I am into my 40s anyways. But what drives me now is flexibility and saving. If I can do that the way I look at it, I am truly free later. With low overhead costs I will be able to afford to be pickier, give more, and also enjoy more.

So that is my view.

When I did the math both ways to see if I would make out better putting education and career first vs if I would do better putting flexibility, mediocre income, and savings first. I actually make out way better by just saving for 3-4 years. If I save n grind now, and complete my degree later/pursue career heavy it just turned out in my case my bottom line is much better.

I wish I would have looked at my bottom line sooner. I could have been doubling down with two jobs with double income sooner helping my bottom line, rather than having worked the hours of two jobs in salary barely increasing anything. Ok I cannot say it was nothing, I did acquire marketable skills.

If I eliminate my overhead living costs to barely anything I can also probably even open my own independent consultant business. I wish I would have thought to do this stuff sooner.


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