Most people don’t see the romance in Tim’s career. He designs and runs sewage plants.

I was talking about that to him this last weekend. “You think of it as sewage,” Tim said, “but I think of it as an engineering problem. And I like solving engineering problems.”

Joe is in the kitchen cabinet business. It’s exciting for him because he’s turned it into a game that he can play, like the pro athlete he once was.

Every time he serves a customer, he has the opportunity to score. The more he scores, the better the business does. After twenty plus years, it’s doing very well indeed.

Years ago, a wise person suggested to me that the secret of a happy and successful career is to make enough money doing something you love. Tim and Joe remind us that you don’t have to love the things other people think are romantic.

For years I’ve been speaking to audiences at industry conventions. I’ve worked with people in glamorous fields like investment banking and space exploration. And I’ve worked with people in industries that most people don’t think of as glamorous, like running truck stops or selling pedorthic footwear.

Take any industry you choose. There will be people who are passionate about it and who’ll tell you how much it “gets in your blood.” There will be people making enough money doing something they love.

That’s part of your challenge if you’re starting out. Unless you’re dead sure what career path you want, you may be best off if you remain open to the possibilities for a while.

Tim never planned on sewage plants. Joe never planned on kitchen cabinets. But because they were willing to explore the possibilities they wound up with very successful careers.

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