Career goals and Happiness
A student wrote: “Following your advice of setting career goal. I set my career goal as “Graduate from college, have a good job, making a lot of money, buy many things so I can be happy”. My friends told me that it is wrong and selfish. What is wrong with my goal to be happy? Do you have any advices?”
Answer: Your goals are too broad, and not specific enough. Anybody can set goals like that. You need to define what would you like to achieve in a given time so you can working towards them. Career goals can be short term such as one or two years or long term such as five to ten years if you intend to grow in a chosen field. A short term example can be: “After graduate, I want to get a job as a programmer in a software company who can utilize my skills in JAVA and C++.” Or a long term goal such as: “I want to be software professional in the information technology industry. I want to work as software developers for five years then move up to project manager. After three years I like to be a chief architect, and eventually Chief Information Officer within ten year.” It is important to set a timeframe because when you have enough experience, you should find a way to advance your career. Basically, people with clear, written goals, accomplish far more than people without them. A good scenario is to acquire enough experience in a given position then continues to move up. Of course, you could add thing that you are passionate about or things that will make you happy.
Regarding you goals, there is nothing wrong with having a good job or making a lot of money. There is nothing wrong with buying many things. However, happiness is a state of mind, which come from inside. External things do not bring true happiness. They only give you joy in a short moment because after a while, these external things will lose its appeal. Unfortunately, many people do not know that and continue to seek more things, and this becomes a never-ending cycle of chasing after an “illusion of happiness”. Do not confuse happiness with brief pleasures. Do not chasing material things to be happy but focus on lasting happiness that come from within? If you live a life that cultivate happiness, regardless what you do, you will always be happy. You do not need to depend on external things to feel happy.
The reason some people are happy is because they have a different attitude in life. They look at the world differently, they think differently, and they interpret experiences differently. They have a different mind for happiness. Happy people choose to focus on the positive; they never blame others or any situation. Whenever they face obstacles they view it as experiences that they can learn from it, not consider it as a failure. There are simple things that can make you happy for example is grateful for what you receive. Today few people know how to say “Thank you” as they take thing as they deserve it. If you do not take time to be grateful for what you receive, what is the point of striving for future achievements and possessions? For example, you want a laptop and your parents give it to you, if you do not appreciate your parents' kindness then the laptop will become thing that make you happy for few days or few weeks. After that you will pay attention to something else such as an iPhone. If you take time to remind you about the things that you received. Be grateful by having a parents who love you, by appreciate all the wonderful things that they give you, by understand their love for you then you will have different feeling of happiness and that will last for the rest of your life. It is NOT the material thing such as the laptop that you receive but the love that you receive and the appreciation for them which is the true happiness. If you think about how you are going to repay their love then the appreciation of loving kindness will certainly make you feel happier.
Everyone has an interest or passion of something. It can be music, poetry, literature, arts or anything. By enjoy these simple thing will brings you happiness. In the busy lives of the fast changing society nowadays, you need to take time to enjoy these interests as they will make you relax and feel happy. Some people like to help others or does charity work, it will open your heart and bring happiness to both the receiver and the giver. Nothing gives greater satisfaction, meaning and happiness than sincerely helping another human being and seeing their appreciation as well as the impact it has on their lives. It does not matter how big or small the help is. Sincerely help others and contribute to society whenever you can and you will have more happiness in life. So when setting a career goal, you may add some of those things that will make your life more meaningful then you will find more happiness in your life.
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
