Is your dream, your career?

I found this  article really interesting:

Following The Career Heart

I have had this debate within myself for many a year…
Should I pursue a career that:

- I ‘think’ I should?
- That others think I should?
- That will give me financial security?
- Or do I pursue a career that truly makes me happy in spite of the first 3 factors?

There is often a massive divide in many people between ‘what they do’ and ‘what they would like to do’.
I think this divide is caused by the manor in which we are educated and the focus/ emphasis that is given to wealth creation…
What is more important…material wealth creation or personal wealth creation?

I’m sure this debate is not foreign to any of you and I would be interested to hear:

- Who has a divide in their job and thier dream?
- Who thinks that their job and dream line up?
- Who has considered a career change?

I know that I have followed a career that I think will give me security and status so far. Even though I began in Arts (note: I agree with the notion of all uni grads satrting in a generalist degree and then specialising), I have now gradually moved towards business. I know find myself at a point where my career is looking very promising, but it couldn’t be further from what I want to do and what would make me happy! I am now willingly to forsake the security that it provides and step into more uncertain waters…

My worst nightmare…waking up in 20 years and wondering what the hell happened to all those years…
Life’s short…taking chances is essential…and never leave yourself wondering what might have been!

An interesting dialogue…

I thought I might put up a link to an interesting link for social and political commentary. Some of you may already read this and I have just added it to the blogroll as well. It is called Unleashed and is on the ABC site. Although it is election focussed atm, normally it provides some very interesting debate and commentary on all areas of society. It could be an interesting source of future debate material for us…

Unleashed

The Great Melt

This is pretty interesting and also has cool things you can play with

NY Times – Arctic Melt Interactive

Couch Surfing

http://www.couchsurfing.com

Have a look at this for a concept and see what you think…
I personally think it is a fantastic idea! Pretty much all share houses are like this anyway and if I had known about this a few years ago I would have registered a few of the houses I had been in for sure. The reciprocal nature of this makes potentially a fantastic resource…of course there will be the bad experience for someone here and there, but on large you have a collective of people with a common goal – lets get out and see the world and meet some cool people along the way…

Would anyone consider registering now? I am contemplating it…

Pay fat people to lose weight

Would this work??
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/09/12/2030497.htm

“A doctors group has proposed that overweight people be given a $170 subsidy to attend an accredited weight-loss program.”

At first glance this idea seems to have merit; the obesity crisis is apparently worsening in Australia and as such obesity related diseases are also on the increase. Plus on a more shallow level, they’re unsightly…

But would paying people work?

I am going to argue that it might in some cases but on the whole it would be ineffective and using some shaky ‘economic logic’ that I have read and now think I know I will try to explain why.

At the moment there is for many people a certain level of moral, social, and ‘health’ obligation to stay in some sort of decent physical shape. This can come from other people telling them ‘that it is for their own good’ they owe it to them selves to get healthy. The problem then with using money as a motivator is that money becomes the overriding incentive to loose weight and people will stop loosing weight for more personal reasons and only do it for the money. This may seem at first to not matter a whole lot, after all, they’re losing weight so why does it matter what their motivations are? I guess it doesn’t really matter, but the problem with having money as an incentive is that it is too easy to just say ‘I can’t be bothered doing it, it’s only a small amount of money anyway, and I’m not actually loosing money’. This effectively negates the only remaining incentive and people will fall back into their old habits content with the knowledge that they are not loosing money, they are just not gaining any. There are many other factors in play here but the main point I am making is that using money as the main incentive for something as personal as a person’s health and well being is not necessarily the most effective scheme.

 

Here is an example of a similar situation from ‘Freakonomics’ in which a child care centre charged $3 per child every time a parent was late to pick up their kids. This backfired terribly and the rate of late pickups increased. The main reason being that the $3 fee negated any moral obligation the parents felt to pick up their kids on time; they obviously thought ‘well they obviously don’t care too much about late pickups; anyway, they are making more money off of it’. I suppose you could make the late fee $100 but then people would most likely not use the service at all.

Anyway, let’s hear your thoughts on whether this scheme would work and if not, what would work better?

Blackle – the black Google and other useless gestures.

After recent talk on blogs over the internet about how much power the white Google home pages uses to display on a computer screen many people were calling for a black home page. As a result Heap Media Australia has launched a Google page called Blackle.

Sounds like a nice idea except for the fact that it is pretty much useless; there are power savings to be made for CRT monitors but the power difference between black and white on LCD monitors is all but negligible.

This is an example of some of the useless gestures people are making in the hope it will curb climate change. The best (worst) example of this that I can think of is Wolfmother using low wattage amps to record their lasted album; I am not having a go at people trying to change things but I don’t need or want celebrities and companies telling me how good they are with their worthless gestures and how bad I am with my wicked carbon producing ways. Top of my list for annoying celebrities is Madonna and her self indulgent words at the Live Earth concert; something along the lines of “If you wanna save the earth with me, jump up and down now!”

This is not meant to be a post to have a go a people making genuine efforts to help, but please, no more Thorpie!!

Till Jonesy, Zemanek and Laws are all axed…

I am not usually one to take any delight in the demise of others, but today marks part one of the prophesy outlined by The Herd:

“Squawkin hacks, won’t relax, until Jonesy, Zemanek and Laws are all axed…77% of Aussies are racists, if you were here, i’d say it to your faces”

Zemanek has passed away and the vile affliction of ignorance and intolerance that he spread throughout this country has ended. Zemanek stood as a symbol to facist beliefs and gave credibilty and acceptance to the close minded in this country. Now let us hope that Jones and Laws aren’t too far off and their legacy ends with them…I don’t want to imagine a future of Australians running around, dressed in ozzy flags, screaming get the fuck out of our country!

To be continued…

5 minutes with a conservative

Sorry about the link but it’s best you read it for yourself:

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21984669-7583,00.html

I know there have been a few posts from me around this point, but it still amazes me that people like this exist!
I’d encourage anyone to put up some counter literature as the rise of right wing ignorance and ’staus quo’ is more disheartening than any environmental crisis. We are basically having an idealogical crisis!

It’s ok not to know…

I only include this as a link because I think it is important to read some of the responses from our fellow countrymen. I must admit that blogs have made me realise that, without sounding righteous, so many people have no fucking idea!

http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/yoursay/index.php/theaustralian/comments/atheism_shall_make_you_free

There are some parts of this article that stretch a little but overall I think it has a good message. It is ok not to know… We all find faith in our own little way – we don’t need an institution to provide that for us…

I’ve written an article on HECS…

… and I’d love to get some feedback and input from the crew.

How does a HECS-HELP debt effect your life?

Have a read over at my blog, and let me know what you think.