Values vs. Paycheck: Wondering What I'm Going to Do for the Rest of my Life

It takes me a long time to make a decision, and when I finally do, I follow through. At my worst this makes me both indecisive AND stubborn: every time someone asks me what I want to do after I graduate is a personal crisis because even though I understand career choices aren't a straight line, I can't jump the hurdle that whatever I choose could be permanent. I usually come up with the weak answer, "I haven't really had enough classes to decide," or "something involved in sustainability." That works now, but what about when I have to choose electives? Or when I'm actually graduating?

One of my biggest fears is selling out. I'm a compassionate person, but a little bit of an idealist. If I become a professional engineer or a project manager, it's possible that I could be working on projects that directly oppose my views on sustainability and social issues. One example of this is that I was recently reading a booklet sent out by a company advertising resilient cities, and showed off plans about big urban centers and new neighborhoods. On the surface, this was exciting: a private sector company that cared about making our cities more environmentally friendly seemed too good to be true. However, in an effort to sell their ideas, they discuss how much the rent would rise as an added benefit. With this, you have to wonder if we have an issue making green communities inclusive to people who can't afford higher rent.

This was in the middle of my internship, where I was learning about the cut-throat construction industry-- I came to realize that the profit driven nature of the private sector strays too far from my values. Owners generally go for the lowest bidder. Who decides what projects I work on, and who they're going to benefit? Even if I am working at a company that won a huge sustainability project, would my team be as interested in making an impact, or will they just be looking for a paycheck?

I've also thought about the public sector, but that also lacks some agency (pun not intended). I can't imagine how employees at the EPA feel in our political climate if they went in hoping to make an impact. However, I have not immersed myself in this side yet and want to do so before I decide that it is also not for me.

Another option I've been seriously considering is furthering my education and getting a PhD, perhaps in a field other than engineering. My practical training in engineering may translate well if I were to end up at a think take like the Earth Institute or UCLA, but becoming a tenured professor is a bit of a gamble. I do love technical writing, and I'm hoping to get some undergraduate research experience in to see if I love it enough to put that much money and time into extra schooling. I also enjoy teaching.

It's apparent I have an internal conflict going on about what my values really are. I want to be able to sustain myself AND the planet, but I'm not sure how feasibly I can get both. At this point, with three years left of undergrad, I'm just trying to get my hands on any exposure possible and talk to a wide variety of people in various aspects of industry.

On Productivity Blogs

Around this time every summer I begin to get excited about school starting again: I put my classes in my calendar, buy a bunch of discount school supplies, and, most of all, fall into the rabbit hole of productivity blogs. For some reason I think that just reading about stuff is going to actually make me more productive: in high school I think I spent more time looking up how to get my work done than actually getting my work done.

To be fair, I've actually started to take some of the tips I've seen in blogs like College Info Geek, one of my favorite sources even though I have literally NOTHING in common with Thomas Frank. I think that's what makes him so marketable, he has very practical tips that apply to pretty much everybody. I also appreciate that he's not always right and often contradicts himself. I've been watching him for four years and he definitely helped my college productivity.

I have loosely developed my own style for academic success though, and I was never really sure what it was so it's not like I could hone in on it and improve it. However, on CIG I ran into Tom Miller's Phyzzle and it clicked. Like, his how-to articles are almost to the T in what I do to pass my courses but he actually put it in a step by step process. It's what I should say when people ask me how I did so well on a test: it's how I can cut out the things that don't work.

These blogs are amazing in contradiction to the person I've stopped listening to -- that is, Cal Newport. I'm not going to sit here and bash him, but I'm just going to say that he needs to get of his soap box and leave room for the productivity bloggers who are more practical and don't infantilize their audiences. I think the newer techniques are more mindful of the modern world and actually, in my experience, work without being so dogmatic.