My career ambitions have left the building

There is a... relief... in admitting that your ambition is no longer that useful. I’ve wasted a lot of energy on personal ambition. But achievement never assuaged a feeling that my work isn’t necessary. The world may not need another thing, but it does need another person who derives value from elevating others. I’ve learned that I’d rather be forg... See more

We’re all familiar with the question every college graduate hears on repeat as soon as they’re finished with school: “What do you plan to do next?” That question invariably means, “What are your job prospects?” Meanwhile, the admonition to “get a job!” is synonymous with “grow up!”

What a soulless way to conceive of existence. What a dull invitation... See more

The opposite of a career is neither leisure nor culture, but aimlessness, capriciousness, the absence of cumulative achievement in experience, on the personal side, and idle display, parasitic dependence upon the others, on the social side.

Dewey admonishes against our tendency to define ourselves by what we are best at, which invariably routinizes ... See more

One of the biggest challenges people have when embarking on an unconventional path is disconnecting from extrinsic markers of success and listening to internal motivational cues. On the default path, you can spend an entire career playing other people’s games. At first, people on a pathless path try to fill the lack of extrinsic goals with new ones... See more

As my work-driven identity dissolved, I felt a burning ambition across all facets of life. Instead of a desire to achieve goals that society told me were valuable, I felt a hunger to discover what makes me feel fully alive. Instead of a commitment to “winning” other people’s games, I felt a commitment to design a life that I deeply enjoy inhabiting... See more