Career Goals

I've been thinking a lot lately about a question I was asked at work last week - what are your career goals?

Honest answer? I don't have any. I didn't even want a career until I found myself in one last year. But, I have been able to come up with some sort of answer to the question. I see it basically as two options:

1) Make a lot of money in a 'career' so that I have the means to make a difference, travel, and make music. In other words, I can live somewhere nice, buy a Steinway grand for my house, go wherever I want, and spend money and influence and time to support causes I'm passionate about.

2) Find a way to make a difference, travel and make music as a living, and the money doesn't matter so much. Like teaching music in an impoverished area, or working for an NGO, or pursuing music full time.

Both kinda freak me out - option one because I don't know what I'd be like with money and whether I could actually keep myself grounded and do what the point of the money was to start with. Option two because it's more intangible, and I can't believe I'd be so lucky to actually find a way to make it happen. :)

But you know what's amazing about this silly basic question that people get asked all the time? I finally have an answer to it, and I'm letting someone know about it. May not last longer than this week, but it's a new thing for me to have, and I like it.

So here is the problem - I'm not really on track to do either. And I'm 28. Twenty-eight! How did that happen so quickly? Sigh. Fortunately, I'm in London. There's nothing stopping me from doing whatever I want to do except fear and laziness, both of which I'm pretty well stocked in these days. But I now have the secret weapon of a written out 'goal' at my disposal, so maybe this will be interesting.

I think my first plan of action is to go all out at my current job for six months. Push myself and get some key objectives completed, see where that takes me. If it looks like I have a decent chance at either moving up there quickly or using it as a stepping stone, I'll go for option 1 for a while. If it looks like that isn't happening, or I find I'm really just not cut out for that life, then I spend some time researching how I'm going to go for option 2, and just do it.

That was a fun exercise. :)