Quick story: When I was about 5 I was at the grocery store with my mother and sister, and I was watching wide eyed as the butcher gutted a fish. I blurted out, "Do you like your job?", and he just looked at me, exceedingly unimpressed. Oops.
Just started a new job today. 8 hours in is a little bit soon to judge, but it got me wondering. What do you guys do, and do you like it? What is your dream job, and, why is it or is it not possible to pursue? If you hate what you do, are you at all bitter, or pretty resigned to that fact?
I'm working at a startup, doing back end, mobile, and web development. I think my dream job would actually be to have my own small software company, doing something to move us forward as a species. Even if it's just a little. Not sure I have the chops yet to run my own show, but maybe someday it will be practical for me. Just trying to learn as much as I can at the moment.
My current job is not my dream job. I can't describe what my job is. People ask me all the time. If it's some one I want to have a conversation with - I might try to describe my job. Otherwise I tell them "Project Manager at a tech company" and that usually makes them go away. I don't know that I have a dream job.
I'd love to be a cinematographer.
I'd love to be a DP.
I'd love to be a Foley engineer.
I'd love to be a stunt driver.
I'd love to be a pyrotechnics engineer.
I'd love to be a college professor. but something tells me that even those jobs suck sometimes. I may not have my dream job, but I do have my dream life. My job is just a means to an end. I trade my time to some corporate assholes for some money - perhaps more than I'm worth. And I use that money to do stuff, buy stuff, and go places. It works out well. When that agreement is no longer satisfactory to either parties, I get fired or I get a raise, or I quit. It's not glamorous, but it's my life.
I've been an erotic writer for the last year. Writing was one of my dream jobs, so when my stuff started selling on Amazon I quit my dayjob and pursued it full-time. For a year I wrote every day, traveled, partied, and lived through my laptop. The self-published ebook market became saturated, so now I'm lining up a job to wash dishes. I'm not too bummed, because I improved my writing skills a ton, had some unique life experiences, and came out of it looking like only somewhat of a weirdo to my friends. I have a few more ideas that will last me about 4 months, and then I might try writing about other things.
I'm a postdoc, and I really enjoy it at the moment. The trouble with (academic/scientific) research is that you can either pursue someone else's vision, or you need to find someone to pay for it. This provides a hefty dose of uncertainty for the future---I can always fall back on someone else's vision, since I still like eating, but I'll only really be happy at work pursuing my own research agenda.
I work in a warm comfortable office, I work with nice people, I am paid a fair wage with benefits etc. There are things about my job that I dislike, there are things I would like to improve but on the whole I like my job. I spent a summer working with a plumber when I was 17. He was a mean old guy and he didnt pay me much because it was a summer job and I was naive. I think back to that time every now and again. I learned a lot that summer, having a boss that watches everything you do sucks, getting paid little for hard work sucks. I didn't earn much money that summer but the experience was invaluable to me. Now when something is bothering me in work I can always say "At least I don't have to unblock a sewage pipe today"