06 November 2008

Why You Should Do What You Love

Many teachers tell students to do what they love as a career. There are those who do not believe this, thinking that doing what you love may not pay well and that enduring the pain of doing something you hate can be worth it if it pays well.

I would just like to say that I have heard of a finance executive who worked in a stressful job in their 20s and then when he was 30 he had a heart attack and died. Many people say, "No pain, no gain." Since work stress leads to heart disease and diabetes, pain from career stress will have no gain. In fact, there is a cost of pain. Medical studies have shown that stress increase blood pressure as well.

By definition, something that you love doing is not stressful, which means that you can go on making money without chopping off years from your life expectancy.

It's important to remember that poverty can be stressful as well, so if you are young and you are starting from scratch then you may need to do something stressful to build up enough capital to cover necessities like food and clothing. You may need to work at McDonald's flipping burgers for a while and putting your income aside into a bank savings account until the interest from that account covers your food cost. Then you can be certain that you won't starve to death and you will have the freedom to pursue a better career.

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