“Choose a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life” – Confucius
Your career is your life. You are dependent on it, you source your livelihood through it and you spend most of your time on it. Both your career and your life are dear, cherished and valuable to you. They are both dependent on each other and can nurture your survival with happiness, pleasure and joy.
However, you must choose the right career to enjoy your life. The most effective way to go about choosing a career is to go for the one in which you derive the most satisfaction.
Whether you’re a fresh graduate or a 5-year-old veteran in Nigeria’s labour market, here is how to choose the career path you love and will keep you contented all your life:
Discover Your Talent
Every individual has a natural talent that is unique and different from that of a friend or a colleague. Although we tend to overlook this, it is impossible to ignore our natural aptitude. This is because your talent is your natural endowment and remains distinctive to you alone.
As you kick-start your journey to finding your desired career, you must dig deep within yourself and find the natural powers that are exclusive to you. Study yourself closely and be mindful of the things you do with ease. You must also be observant of people’s accolades about the tasks that you carry out effortlessly. Improve on those talents by consistent practice and take it a step further by enrolling in a professional training program. By doing this, you are well on your way towards transforming your talent into a career.
Discover Your Passion
The second step for choosing the right career is finding the one thing you love doing. You must find that single, most important task you not only enjoy doing, but also have strong enthusiasm for, when carrying out the role.
A lot of Nigerian graduates miss out on this one. Before getting admission into the university of their choice, many graduates prefer enrolling in Oil and Gas, Banking and Finance, and Business Administration courses, based on their popularity or marketability.
Most of our people overlook the disciplines they are passionate about, and this is unfortunately the wrong way to go. In a speech Steve Jobs gave to his audience during his keynote address to freshmen at Stanford College, he said:
“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”
Go For It
When you have a strong conviction and finally decide on the career that best suits your passion, don’t settle. Don’t make decisions solely based on people’s speculations and advices, nor surrender to common career trends.
Remember, it is important to do something you are both passionate about and good at. It is even better when no one else is doing it, that way you are creating a niche and have the first-mover advantage in the market. Your career is a greater part of your life and choosing the right one, will significantly contribute to you living a more fulfilling life.
