How to Choose the Perfect Career for Your Lifestyle
Getting to the phase of your life where you need to make decisions about your career can feel really serious. Maybe it’s before you start college, after college, a decade later, or even years before as you’re still going through school. For many of us, all of these key milestones can become moments where we ponder our next move. But how can you be sure to make the right one?
It’s safe to say that we can never know if we’ve made the right decision at any given point. All we can do is assess our options and make the right decision for now. If you know that you’re working toward something in particular, this can make things a little easier. But if not, it’s all about choosing the perfect career for you – or the lifestyle you want to create.
If you have found yourself in a situation where you’d like to be able to choose the right career for you – one that will match the lifestyle you want – you’ve come to the right place. In this blog post, we’re going to break down exactly what you need to do to figure things out and find yourself on the right path. Let’s get into it.
Does the Perfect Career Choice Start in College?
First of all, it’s important to think about your starting point when it comes to choosing a career that provides you with the lifestyle you want. Because it doesn’t always have to begin in college. You could launch your own business or find yourself in a new field after gaining years of work experience in the real world. So don’t pressure yourself to make the right choice during your educational years! Things change and they can often put you on the right path without you knowing it!
Choosing the Right Electives
You may also find that making the right choice of electives can be important for you too. While you may feel like you’re on the right path and majoring in something that either you enjoy or that you can see forming a career for you, having the right electives can also support your career and give you a foundation in areas that may go on to be relevant in the future.
Going to Grad School
At the same time, maybe you’re thinking about whether you’d like to go to graduate school or not. It could be that you think this is going to help you to advance your career or you need to retrain. Perhaps you’ve actually been out in the working world for a few years and now it’s time for you to make a bit of change. When this is the case, going back to school could be the perfect next option for you. Of course, if you want to get into academia, this is also an important step.
8 Tips to Making the Perfect Decision for You
Then, when it comes down to making the right choices and knowing exactly how to do it, you’ll find that it really helps for you to work through the below eight tips.
1. Understand What Life You Want
To begin with, in order to make sure that you’re choosing a career path that will enable you to have the life you want, you need to make sure you know what that is. So it’s important to ask yourself how you’d like to spend your time, where you’d like to work, how often you’d like to take breaks – and all the other important questions that can make up a life.
2. Truly Know What You Enjoy
To go along with that, you also then need to be thinking about what you like to do. What subjects or areas are you good at? What are your strengths? How do you like to spend your time? Your interests, passions, and the things that spark joy in you will often point you in the direction of the right career.
3. Focus on Happiness First…
With these two points covered, you’re then in the perfect position to work out what will make you happy. Sure, there are other requirements for choosing a career – and we’ll get to them next – but the most important part is making sure that you’ll be happy. We spend such a long time working, that you don’t deserve to be miserable. As you’re considering career options, think about whether you’d be happy doing that job day in, day out, for the next thirty or forty years!
4. …Then Sustainability Second!
However, as much as happiness is always paramount and you need to ensure that you are enjoying your life – you need to make sure that you’re choosing a viable career path. Is this something that you can do for a long time? Will you make money? Can you actually support yourself as you build the lifestyle you want? Making sure that you tick off all of these questions is incredibly important here.
5. Look into Training and Requirements
Then, when it comes to getting things underway, you need to know what’s actually expected of you before you begin. It could be that your college education or academics aren’t enough. Maybe you need to look into vocational qualifications like personal training courses, or getting real-world experience, such as going for an internship. Once you know exactly what you need to do to get started, you’re better equipped to make it happen.
6. Network Well
Another thing that might be important for you to do here is make sure that you’re networking. Your network is always a huge part of your success – you never know what opportunities might come up when you know the right people. Look to make connections and build relationships with a variety of people in your field. From there, you’ll never know what might come your way.
7. Consider Different Paths
You may also want to look into the different paths you could take to get to where you want to be. Maybe you have a few different career ideas that you’re considering. When this is the case, it’s a good idea to think about where they might take you. Once you know ultimately how you want to spend your time and what you want out of life, you may find that there’s one obvious path that points you in that direction!
8. Commit to Making it Work
Finally, you’re going to want to make sure that you’re committed to making it work. It’s not always enough to have dreams and hope for the best – you need to make sure that your desires are grounded in reality and that you’re prepared to make it all happen. When you know what you’re willing to put the work in and you’re excited to get started, it’s a good indication that you’re on the right track!
Getting Started in Your New Career
When it comes to getting things underway, it’s always important to have a plan in place to follow. It’s not always easy to work out what you want to do or how you’re going to get there – but mapping out the steps certainly can help. If you know that you want to be able to move into your dream career sooner rather than later, creating a career plan with clear, actionable steps is essential.
Then, with your plan in place, all that’s left for you to do is to think about getting started and seeing where each of the steps takes you. And before you know it, you’ll be bringing the career that best suits your dream lifestyle to life!