{"id":3307,"date":"2022-10-30T14:49:33","date_gmt":"2022-10-30T20:49:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atiba.com\/?p=3307"},"modified":"2022-12-21T21:26:54","modified_gmt":"2022-12-22T03:26:54","slug":"follow-your-passion-to-a-career-with-eyes-wide-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/follow-your-passion-to-a-career-with-eyes-wide-open\/","title":{"rendered":"Follow your passion to a career with eyes wide open"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article originally appeared in\u00a0The Tennessean<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Follow your passion?<\/p>\n

It was halfway through my sophomore year in college when reality began to set in.<\/p>\n

It seemed like it was just yesterday that my parents had dropped me off at my freshman dorm, but somehow time had moved too fast.<\/p>\n

As a sophomore, I could no longer say I was \u201cjust starting college.\u201d\u00a0 I gulped when I realized that I was nearly halfway done and still had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.\u00a0\u00a0 I remember feeling like time was running out and the pressure was on.<\/p>\n

I went to the Career Counseling Center one day and saw a poster on the wall that stuck with me: \u201cFollow Your Passion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yes!\u00a0 This made sense.<\/p>\n

This was the answer I\u2019d been looking for as the countdown toward the work world was ticking away. I wasn\u2019t quite sure what my passion was at the time. But I figured I\u2019d eventually discover it, and then a clear path to success and happiness would open in front of me.<\/p>\n

In the end things worked out.\u00a0 I discovered I had a passion for all things tech, and I\u2019ve been happy working as an IT consultant ever since.\u00a0 \u201cFollow Your Passion\u201d turned out to be great advice.<\/p>\n

So, when my wife and I went to visit our college sophomore last weekend and he asked me for some career guidance I was surprised when I struggled to give him a solid answer.\u00a0 (To be honest, I often struggle when trying to give my kids advice. I usually defer to my wife.)<\/p>\n

But this was a layup.\u00a0 \u201cShould I follow my passion?\u201d<\/p>\n

In our kid\u2019s case, as I suspect with many others, this answer was actually not so simple.<\/p>\n

Unlike myself, where my passion happened to be directly tied to a practical career path, our kid\u2019s passion is jazz music.\u00a0 He\u2019s a jazz drum major and for years now he\u2019s been living and breathing music.\u00a0 It\u2019s not been easy, but with thousands of hours of practice and performing coupled with great teachers, he’s found something he both loves and excels at.<\/p>\n

But, just like me, as his time in school flies by, his long-term career prospects are on his mind. Can he follow his passion and still make a living? If he turns his passion into a job, will he eventually burn out? \u00a0Will the investment of time and money in college pay off?<\/p>\n

His questions had me re-thinking the \u201cFollow Your Passion\u201d poster that had influenced me all those years ago.<\/p>\n

After some deep thought here\u2019s what I told him:<\/p>\n