Don't follow your passion

https://80000hours.org/articles/dont-follow-your-passion/

by joe_developer • 11 years ago

5 1 11 years ago

If your passion is dealing crack cocaine, should you do it?

I actually think so, if the passion is indeed that specific. If not, then perhaps it's a passion for dealing in general, in which case a job as a sales rep or a startup founder would be the best bet :) (or, perhaps it's a passion for crack cocaine, in which case whatever, don't let me judge your life choices).

Also, the article assumes that social impacts must be "good" (which further begs the question of what "good" means). A crack cocaine dealer can certainly have a "social impact", even if that impact is "more people addicted to crack cocaine".

We found that the most important four factors for being satisfied in your work are:

The first three out of four reasons go hand in hand with passion for one's work. If I'm passionate about being a crack cocaine dealer, for example, I'm more likely to find my work meaningful, I'm more likely to form meaningful relationships with my colleagues (depending on how you define "colleague", granted), and I'm more likely to be good at my job. Incidentally, observation #4 tends to also exist for being a crack cocaine dealer; from what I understand, it pays well and has excellent job security, so long as you can dodge the fuzz sufficiently well.

Finally, “follow your passion” encourages the idea that there’s one perfect path for you

Only if one believes that one may only have a single passion. I have multiple passions, like writing programs, watching cartoons of magical technicolor miniature equines, making fun of hipster ninja rockstar web-scale Wangular.js Ruby on Fails ThongoDB devops on Hacker News, and - of course - getting people addicted to crack cocaine (in roughly that order). That would mean at least four perfect paths for me, maybe more.

Now, if this were a cartoon of magical technicolor miniature equines, where once you hit puberty a tattoo of some abstract concept gets magically and permanently tattooed onto your buttocks to visually remind everyone of what you're now permanently destined to do for the rest of your life, then perhaps this argument would have some merit. Luckily for humans, this is not necessarily the case.

At the start of your career, explore your options, learn about yourself and try out different areas.

A.k.a. "figure out what you like doing", a.k.a. "find your passion".

Don't follow your passion

Related Stories