Can you relate to my situation? For years, I was working in the financial industry with very little power over anything in my career. I found myself doing the same reports over and over again, tackling the same “month-end” month after month.

I began to ask myself what am I doing here? I felt brain dead day after day. With every passing day I began to lose my drive. I wanted so badly to do something meaningful with my life. I felt like part of a herd of sheep as I found myself catching my train to Union station every morning in the hectic morning rush. My life mantra was dictated by the same routine: get up, get dressed, commute to work, commute back, make dinner, sleep and repeat.

After graduating from university, life sort of just happened. I had to take on an entry level position at a bank. Time flew by with additional responsibilities that typically tie people down, making them grow up sooner than they are ready to. I wasn’t born into a rich family. I had no financial support so I had to support myself.  I hated feeling like I had no choice and often I felt the strong desire to run away before I became too comfortable with the fat paycheque, benefits and pension.

So one day I decided to boldly resign, only to return to a similar job months later due to “practical” reasons. Yet again, after a few months into my new job I resigned. This was a clear indication that I simply was not meant for the life of a worker bee in the corporate world. All the years I had convinced myself to put up with insurmountable levels of dissatisfaction had transformed into a volcano that was ready to erupt. You may believe that this is not something a wise career-minded person would do. But when you feel so overwhelmed from forcing yourself to go to a job that you despise, by the end of the day you are zapped out of your energy and all you can think about is coming home and sleeping. This is simply not normal! You need need to take time off to rethink and find a way to pursue something you love, to connect to your spirit and find a way to be true to yourself. I needed to feel alive again.

I often hear stories from my colleagues talking about how much drive they used to have when they were younger. Eventually they succumb to the practicality of life and are alive without feeling alive. Along the way they have become disconnected with that special light inside them that encourages them to push their limits.  Some thrive by climbing the corporate ladder, but there are far more people who remain at the lower end of the hierarchy. Unfortunately, these people find themselves unhappy and immobilized to do anything about their circumstances.

We are not all made the same way. What tickles your fancy may not tickle mine. Often we are dissatisfied because we are mismatched to the career we find ourselves in either due to society, family pressure or financial hardship. Sometimes the confusion is even derived from having too many career choices to choose from or lack of knowledge about the day to day life of certain careers.  I’ve met far too many people who have changed their minds multiple times in terms of their degree or line of work.  The million dollar question is: How can we increase job satisfaction and promote career progression?

I believe that youth at the tender age of seventeen are not wise enough to know what they want to do for the rest of their lives, even with all the fancy career assessment tools at their disposal and parental guidance. They just haven’t had enough life exposure to properly learn about themselves, to know what they enjoy and what they don’t, or what they are good at and what they are not.  The high school curriculum with mandatory volunteering programs is not a bad start. But it would be far more beneficial if youth could have direct exposure to their chosen field, thereby making practicums a mandatory portion of curriculum design. All university programs should have co-op placements. This way students will get the opportunity to explore what it feels like to work in their field, see if it matches their skillset and if this is really something they can see themselves dedicating their time and energy to.

So here I am. I know what I truly want to do and I admit that it’s not an easy task to execute and get to where I want to be in life.  Having a profession that you love to wake up to every day is priceless to me.  After all that I have been through, I am now in complete agreement with Confucius: “Choose a job you love and you’ll never have to work another day”.