A New Approach: 4 Fundamental Interests

A New Approach

What is needed is a new approach to helping young people identify their deeper and more fundamental interests in life as a basis for making smarter decisions about college, majors, jobs, and careers. The superficiality of current guidance approaches is the root cause of both anxiety that young people and their parents feel about these impending decisions and the high frequency of poor decisions that are made. For example, families may be swayed into choosing certain majors and career paths by superficial information and advice, particularly found on the internet (the world’s largest source of misinformation), such as lists of the top hot jobs this year, which college majors earn the most on average after graduation, or which jobs have the most long term security in face of outsourcing and economic ups-and-downs. The media, particularly prime time TV, bombard young people with false and misleading images of various jobs that frankly will not turn out to be exciting and fun as they are made to appear. For decades teaching has been portrayed as very fun and rewarding on TV. Recall for example, popular shows like Room 222, Fame, Welcome Back Kotter, Saved By The Bell, and more recently, the smash hit Glee; and the hit movies Goodbye Mr. Chips, Dead Poets Society, Stand And Deliver, Lean On Me, Mr. Holland’s Opus, and many more. The downside of teaching--that it is hard work with relatively low pay and the kids are not always adorable and funny—is almost always overlooked. It seems that half of America’s high school graduates want to go into forensic science following the success of crime scene/forensic laboratory shows in recent years. There is nothing wrong with these shows as entertainment, and there is nothing wrong with going into forensics. But choosing majors and careers based on media portrayal of jobs is risky at best because it creates false expectations about what that job and career are going to be like.

The problems, of course, do not lie in reading the lists of hot jobs, high paying jobs, etc.: such information can be interesting, informative, and occasionally even helpful. The problems come from two sources. First, it is risky to be swayed too much by reported trends and predictions, some of which lack insight into what is really behind the numbers, and some of which are of questionable validity in the first place. Second, it is a major mistake to base educational and career decisions on such superficial criteria alone, even if the data were accurate and valid. Certainly, if the “hot jobs of the future” line up with deeper reasons to consider a particular major or career, then all the better. But basing such decisions on superficial criteria alone has a high risk of not working out in the long run. Bloggers, journalists, editors, and other media producers, for example, have proven their fallibility in predicting societal changes and employment trends. By the time a young person gets through college, for example, the once “hot job” may have cooled off, possibly for reasons that were not obvious just a few years earlier. It should be alarming to anyone that the so-called “hot jobs” change significantly from year to year! Clearly, basing educational and career decisions on such fickle media coverage is a very bad idea.

Level	Criteria for Choosing A Major, Job, And Career
Superficial	Hot Job Areas High Paying Jobs Media Portrayal of Jobs “That Sounds Like FUN” Recession-Proof Jobs Best Jobs For Your Personality
Intermediate	Find Your Purpose Develop A Mission In Life Identify Your Spark/Legacy/Bliss Follow Your Passion Capitalize on Your Aptitude/Abilities
Deep	Fundamental Interests: Basic Priorities And Goals In Life

A large portion of America’s self-help industry focuses on educational and career choices. The Gallup Organization’s Strengths Finder (Rath, 2007) is popular right now, for example, and Richard Bolles’ annually updated What Color is Your Parachute? has been a worldwide bestseller for over four decades. These resources clearly have been entertaining, informative, and helpful to people for a long time. But each and every one is also limited as a basis for making educational and career choices because it fails to get at deeper underlying motivations and priorities that guide people’s lives and enable them ultimately to construct meaning out of what they did and accomplished.

How can discover those deeper motivations, priorities, and goals? One obvious way is to talk with older people, particularly those whose working life is behind them, as they reflect back on their jobs, careers, and lives. Listening to them, we can begin to see that people have very different fundamental interests that lead them to set different priorities and goals in their lives. Achieving these goals leads to a satisfying, meaningful, and fulfilling life. Not achieving these self-determined goals leads to lack of fulfillment and some degree of disappointment and regret. Fundamental interests, therefore, are the basis on which people validate their lives--that is, construct meaning, value, fulfillment and satisfaction in their jobs and careers and ultimately in life. Surprisingly, there are just a few major ways that people complete the sentence

I had a satisfying/meaningful/fulfilling life because I ________________________ .

One response is very common, in fact, almost everyone says it: I found most meaning and value in my relationships with family and friends. There may some hermits out there somewhere, living in cave in Tibet perhaps, but for the rest of us, close relationships are key to meaning and satisfaction in life. Of course, this is not necessary about work: You are going to have friends and family regardless of whether or not you go to college, and regardless of what major, job, and career you choose. You are going to spend about half your waking adult life at work, going to and from work, thinking about work, and working when you are not actually at work, and for the most part this will not involve your friends and family. The other half of your waking life, you can spend with friends and family. So let’s regard this as a universal way that almost everyone constructs meaning in their lives and this is not necessarily informative about college and career choices.

Outside of friends and family, many people find fulfillment in their accomplishments. They’ll say, for example that they worked hard and were highly successful in their career; they might have worked their way up to an important position; took pride in their prestigious title; had been given responsibility, power, and authority in their job. Part of their success may have been manifested in a high standard of living: they lived in a nice house, drove a new car, had material comforts and even wealth.

This type of answer stems from a strong achievement motivation that drives some people. Achievement oriented people strive for success defined and demonstrated by power, position, title, and role in their environment. They strive to be important in other people’s eyes. They want to be in charge, to control resources, and yes, make a lot of money and support a high standard of living. Other people respect and look up to high achievers because of their position. For achievement oriented people, working up to a position of importance, power, authority, and high pay defines personal success and ultimately validates their life. It yields deep meaning and satisfaction for them.

A fundamental interest in your life might be to strive for high levels of achievement. This is not necessary greedy or self-serving. Nor is it necessarily due to some deep inferiority complex, as some psychologists have suggested. Achievement is an important positive motivation and one that has made America great. The history of America has been largely the history of high achievers. Achievers are not necessary selfish, shallow, or power hungry. In fact, as you may know, compared to the rest of the world, American’s give far more money to charity than any other country. Much of this comes from high achievers who, as they make more money, feel the need to give more back to worthy causes.

Many studies show that first-born child and only children in particular tend to be more conservative and achievement oriented than later born children. Do parents just put more pressure on them to achieve from day one? Almost everyone has some degree of achievement motive. The key issue is where achievement ranks in your own personal priorities for your life.

Another thing that older people say is that they take pride in learning and acquiring knowledge throughout their lives. Motivation to learn is another fundamental interest that orients people toward accumulating a high degree of knowledge and understanding. Knowledge oriented people are curious about the world and have an insatiable drive to learn more about it. They are oriented toward a “life of mind” in that they constantly ask questions and seek knowledge and understanding. For them, admiration and respect of others comes from people recognizing their high degree of intelligence, knowledge, understanding, and--the ultimate compliment—wisdom. They like being sought out by others to answer questions and solve intellectual problems. Their satisfaction comes from always learning more, and never stopping learning in life. This satisfaction is primary internal: It is intrinsically rewarding to answer their own questions. They often have no need to prove their knowledge to anyone else.

How do achievement oriented and knowledge orientated people differ? Achievement oriented people are driven more by extrinsic rewards and they seek more social validation in their lives than knowledge oriented people. In other words, achievers want people to see, acknowledge, and respect their achievements. Knowledge oriented people are more intrinsically motivated and care little about social comparison, title, or role. Knowledge oriented people are more intellectual, whereas Achievement oriented people are more materialistic.

The question is not if you have either achievement motivation or motivation to learn: Everyone has both. High achievers may seek and value knowledge, and people devoted to knowledge may have some degree of achievement motivation as well. The key issue is the relative priority these two fundamental interests have in your life. You can only have one top priority at any one time in your life. The other priorities are not unimportant, but there can be only one #1, and that will be more important in constructing meaning in your life than the other lower level priorities.

The third type of fundamental interest stems from mastery motivation. Mastery motivation is the desire to develop your talents and skills to their highest possible level. Doing so is very deeply satisfying to mastery oriented people and is a strong basis for validating their lives. Such people say that they had a meaningful and satisfying life because they worked hard to perfect their art, craft, sport, or discipline and they reached a high level of proficiency and performance. In other words, they developed their talents and skills to a level of absolute mastery. Mastery motivation is very strong in some people. They simply cannot stand not being good at things that are important to them. They do not have to be good at everything—that’s perfectionism, which is often destructive in the quest for life fulfillment.

Mastery oriented people distinguish themselves from others and earn respect and social validation by publically demonstrating their skills or wares. Musicians, dancers, actors, and performers of all kinds, as well as athletes, artisans and craftspeople such as potters, weavers, woodworkers, glassblowers, and in fact everyone who relies on complex physical-motor skills to do their job is mastery oriented. A chef, neurosurgeon, Olympic athlete, ballet dancer, Zen master, even a ping-pong champion, may be driven to be best in the world at what they do. Their commitment drives them to endless training, rehearsal, and practice to develop ever higher levels of expertise and ultimately, total mastery of their discipline.

Doesn’t mastery overlap with knowledge and achievement? After all, mastery must involve learning and it is clearly an achievement to be best at something. Yes, they are related, but they are also distinctive in important ways. Knowledge is mental (I know and understand), whereas mastery is physical (I have skills and can perform). Knowledge can be completely private, in the knower’s head, so to speak, whereas mastery is usually demonstrated publically. You can share your knowledge (give someone an answer, for example), but you cannot give them your skill; you can just show them your skill. With mastery, the goal is improvement of skill to a level of proficiency. That can lead to achievements which in turn can lead to positions of power and authority, but those are just a consequence of mastery, they were not the primary goal. Conversely, achievement motivation leads people to seek positions of power and authority whether they require any degree of mastery or not. Mastery could contribute to achievement, but for achievement oriented people it is not the primary motivation or goal.

Lastly, some older people looking back at their lives take great pride in and derive deep satisfaction from the fact that they developed many deep and enduring social relationships. They derive meaning from being embedded in an extensive and intensive network of relationships. Such socially oriented people are “people people,” and they often pursue jobs and careers that not only put them into frequent interaction with people, but also often involve caring, sharing, advising, and helping others. Such people are driven by the “social imperative” to band together, build, and maintain social relationships in life. For them, people and relationships are the top priority in work and in life. A commitment to serving others extends beyond the normal circle of friends and family that almost everyone has to an indefinite number of people with whom they will have contact in their lives. Likewise, their commitment to people and relationships extends across both their leisure time and their work hours. Friends, relatives, coworkers, and neighbors, clients, are of top interest to get to know, to communicate with, to empathize with, and to care about, support, encourage, guide, and help.