Follow heart & dreams or go for safety when it comes to career?

[Flyback]

Choice A:
You are offered an amazing job that is relatively safe (has 5 years of potential at minimum which is good in IT). It comes with an above average salary and the reward of working on some cutting edge stuff that most people in your field would be excited to work on. You would be very happy working on this. It would be stressful but you would definitely enjoy putting in the time to work on this. This opportunity is very rare.

Choice B:
On the other hand, your ultimate dream is to go even further in education and get into more research-oriented projects that could yield very big payoffs (both financial, and dare I say complete self-actualization). You have already started to work on these under the guidance of a professor. It is very risky at the same time (being research). Failing this in and of itself would not be too bad, but if you go for this choice you will not have the job opportunity in path A ever again.

My particular situation is that I want to go with B. If I fail, I won't have the offer of A ever again and will likely be stuck at a very mediocre and unrewarding job for a longtime. Hence my hesitation I'm nervous about charging into the unknown but don't want to end up living life feeling unfilled and thoughts of "what could have been".

 

[msparish]

How do you know you won't ever have a chance like that again. In addition, it sounds like you will be working on either a M.S. w/ thesis or a Ph.D. With either one of those degrees you are going to be fine financially. Follow your dreams.

 

[shortylickens]

As a general rule, most of the succesful people in America took big risks, especially early on.

We cant tell you what to do. It really is up to you. I dont know what will make you happy.

 

[rocadelpunk]

follow your dream!


/me becoming a math/science teacher, when I could've had a cushy engineering cubicle heh.

 

[Flyback]

Originally posted by: msparish
How do you know you won't ever have a chance like that again. In addition, it sounds like you will be working on either a M.S. w/ thesis or a Ph.D. With either one of those degrees you are going to be fine financially. Follow your dreams.

I don't know for absolute certainty, but I'm pretty sure it is like Halley's Comet--your lucky to catch it when you can

 

[ATLien247]

If you go with A, does that preclude you from doing B later on down the road?

 

[sixone]

If you have no one depending on you to keep a roof over their head and food on the table, go for your dream job. If you don't do it now, you likely never will.

 

[D1gger]

It depends on your current situation in life. Do you have a wife and / or kids to support? Are you free to take a financial risk? If you have the freedom, take the risk now and go for your dreams.

 

[Patt]

Go for B ... happiness is much more important than $$$.

 

[NuAlphaMan]

Originally posted by: shortylickens
As a general rule, most of the succesful people in America took big risks, especially early on.

We cant tell you what to do. It really is up to you. I dont know what will make you happy.

:thumbsup:

 

[huberm]

Originally posted by: Flyback
Choice A:
You are offered an amazing job that is relatively safe (has 5 years of potential at minimum which is good in IT). It comes with an above average salary and the reward of working on some cutting edge stuff that most people in your field would be excited to work on. You would be very happy working on this. It would be stressful but you would definitely enjoy putting in the time to work on this. This opportunity is very rare.

Choice B:
On the other hand, your ultimate dream is to go even further in education and get into more research-oriented projects that could yield very big payoffs (both financial, and dare I say complete self-actualization). You have already started to work on these under the guidance of a professor. It is very risky at the same time (being research). Failing this in and of itself would not be too bad, but if you go for this choice you will not have the job opportunity in path A ever again.

My particular situation is that I want to go with B. If I fail, I won't have the offer of A ever again and will likely be stuck at a very mediocre and unrewarding job for a longtime. Hence my hesitation I'm nervous about charging into the unknown but don't want to end up living life feeling unfilled and thoughts of "what could have been".

You answered your own question

 

[theknight571]

Originally posted by: sixone
If you have no one depending on you to keep a roof over their head and food on the table, go for your dream job. If you don't do it now, you likely never will.

This what I was gonna say.

Do it now while you can, cause later, when you have a wife and kids it will be even tougher to follow the dream.

 

[JEDI]

Originally posted by: Flyback
Choice A:
You are offered an amazing job that is relatively safe (has 5 years of potential at minimum which is good in IT). It comes with an above average salary and the reward of working on some cutting edge stuff that most people in your field would be excited to work on. You would be very happy working on this. It would be stressful but you would definitely enjoy putting in the time to work on this. This opportunity is very rare.

Choice B:
On the other hand, your ultimate dream is to go even further in education and get into more research-oriented projects that could yield very big payoffs (both financial, and dare I say complete self-actualization). You have already started to work on these under the guidance of a professor. It is very risky at the same time (being research). Failing this in and of itself would not be too bad, but if you go for this choice you will not have the job opportunity in path A ever again.

My particular situation is that I want to go with B. If I fail, I won't have the offer of A ever again and will likely be stuck at a very mediocre and unrewarding job for a longtime. Hence my hesitation I'm nervous about charging into the unknown but don't want to end up living life feeling unfilled and thoughts of "what could have been".

self-actualization FTW!

else you'll be angry and do self defeating things when u get older.

ie:
I was offered for tryouts to a AAA baseball team. but i was going on a trip with twins at that same time so i turned down the baseball team. it was REALLY doubtful that i could be in the majors, but now i'm thinking what if....

self defeating things:
posting on ATOT