Secret Subject Swap - Career

Photo by Magnet.me on Unsplash

Welcome to October's Secret Subject Swap. 

Again five brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts.  

Sit back, grab a cup and check them all out:

Baking In A Tornado
The Diary of an Alzheimer Caregiver
Climaxed
What TF Sarah
Part-Time Working Hockey Mom

My subject is 

If you could have any career you wanted, what would it be?

It was submitted by: The Diary of an Alzheimer Caregiver thank you, Rena! 

What a great - and tough - question!

It reminds me of my appointment with the career counselor when I was about 15 years old. I was supposed to make a list containing all kinds of jobs that sounded interesting to me. 

I'm pretty sure teacher, interpreter, graphic designer,  advertiser and banker were on that list back then. 

What do they stand for? "Something involving people and languages" or "something creative".

How does the banker fit in? 

Pretty sure my Granddad was responsible for it. He always tried to prevent us from building unrealistic (and futile) castles in the air. Safety and stability were his priorities in life, and you can't blame him. He was a fugitive from the national socialism and came with nothing to what was going to become Israel.

For a short time I did actually work for a (private) bank in Zurich, and while it was an OK job, I didn't like the conservative environment.

Back to today's question... if I could have any career. 

Would I want to be a doctor? I mean it'd be a nice, nobel and purposeful profession to help patients. Would I be able to handle the fact that all patients can't be healed? That some can't be helped because they won't listen to you? Would I even be able to handle the long hours, and especially the night shifts? With the shortage in medical personnel, the pressure must become worse and worse. What if I made a fatal mistake because I hadn't slept in days and was physically and mentally exhausted?

Would I want to be a lawyer? I appreciate clear situations: this is what you're allowed to do, if you overstep these boundaries, you're going to be punished. In ice hockey this works beautifully. If you trip your opponent, you will end up in the penalty box. Simple. 

Action / consequence. Done. 

When I first had law classes in college, I had high expectations. It didn't take long, and I got disillusioned. There wasn't a lot of black and white, but a whole lot of gray zone and judicial discretion. Once I found myself in a real life job in HR, I got further disillusioned. Employees who misused the system, got away with it. A store manager who stole from us, had to pay back a tiny fraction of what he stole, and the effort, time and money it took to get him to do so, wasn't even worth it at the end of the day. 

What are supposedly dream jobs for some people, make me want to run. Fast.

Model, actress, fitness coach, you name it, I don't wanna do it.

The term "career" doesn't even sound all that alluring to me anymore. What does it mean by definition?

Actually, can't I just get paid well for what I already do besides my day job?

I'm not talking about the household chores, even though I wouldn't mind getting paid for them, too. Thank you for providing x amount of quality meals and loads of laundry, we realize you also worked after hours, here's your pay check.

I'm talking about my being a "Life Coach" for quite some people in real life and online. I am a good listener, I am empathic, and I give good advice, they say. 

I'm also talking about being a Hockey Mom beyond the laundry and the driving. I make videos from all the games, it's a lot of work, and it takes skills and dedication. I seem to have become an informal contact point for other parents. I blogged about some examples here. They include care, cake and cork. Sometimes I just bring people together by sharing their phone number.

It's not that I feel I am done with the corporate world. I would love to do a bunch of "work experiences" or internships if you will. It'd be super interesting to get to know different fields like food development, retail, the travel industry. I could totally see myself doing road trips, evaluating rental car companies, hotels and restaurants 

Enough about me. What would you do if you could have any career?

Let me know below and don't forget to visit my fellow bloggers.