How I Ended Up in a Slaughterhouse: A fictional short-short story

Questions My Clients Have Asked Me

What Governs Our Choices?

Teach?

The Ph.D's Dilemma: A fictional short-short story

A Dancer Talks to Her Dog: A short-short story

A Cheese Clerk Talks to His Dog: A short-short story

"Should I Follow My Dad or Mom?" A short-short story

An MD and His Starving Artist Child: a short-short story

Astronaut or Homemaker: A short-short story

In Search of the Secular Grail: a short-short story

The Danger of Pursuing Status

My most read recent post is Deciding Not to Live Up to Your Potential—almost 50,000 views in the five days since it was published. As is standard, I wrote it in the third person, citing people’s decisions and the undergirding principles.

My Psychology Today article today describes how I personally addressed that issue and my ambivalence about that decision.

Careers for the SuperSmart

Some highly intelligent people choose to use their smarts to just slide by. They talk their way into jobs they can do easily, find housing that’s below-market. This article isn’t for them.
Most highly intelligent people recognize noblesse oblige, the obligation to use their gift to contribute to  Gross World Happiness.

Of course, one’s career choice should capitalize on strengths and interests and skirt  weaknesses and distastes. But all things equal, in my Psychology Today article today, I make the case that highly intelligent people will likely make the biggest difference when choosing one of two careers: medical researcher or data scientist.

Choosing a Career: An unconventional approach

Most people end up in their career sub-optimally:

• They fall into their careers by chance.
• They pick from a few common choices: doctor lawyer, teacher, electrician, psychologist, etc.
• With a career advisor, human, video, computer, or text, they inventory, abilities, skills, interests (if they have them, passions), and values.

The latter approach would seem optimal but it’s not:

• It too often yields unrealistic goals—For example, the person dreams of making a solid living as an environmentalist, performer, sports executive, or visual artist. Unless you’re brilliant, talented, connected, or dogged, ideally all the above, they'll why the words “starving” and “artist” so often adjoin.
• Most careers don’t require a narrowly constrained set of attributes. For example, there are introverted and extroverted psychotherapists, brilliant and merely workmanlike ones, sciencey and feeling-oriented ones.
• There are tens of thousands of careers, most that have many variants. Even with a computer to screen careers, you’ll be (not very validly) matched to a few from just a few hundred. Much better fits could remain buried.

A better way?
In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I offer an approach that would seem to balance ease with accuracy.

The World's Shortest Course on Money:

Eight months ago, I wrote an article of the same title, but there’s enough that’s new that I wanted to write this: It's my PsychologyToday.com article today.

A Potpourri of Career Questions

A reader asked me a number of career questions. I've answered them all as my PsychologyToday.com article today.

Choosing a Career: Quick takes on 21 good careers

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I pretend I'm asked to give a very quick reaction to each of 21 careers that have significant pluses.

A Holistic Approach to Choosing a Career

Many people give up trying to find a well-suited career because the process seems so daunting. In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I offer an easier but effective method.

10 of My Favorite Careers

My PsychologyToday.com article today profiles ten of my favorite careers.

Go for Meaning or the Money?: A Debate

I've been having another internal debate. This one is on whether one should go for meaning or the money? 

I've written that internal dialogue as my PsychologyToday.com article today. HERE is the link.