[fancyfish]

Your feelings sound not unlike colleagues working in hedge funds who say it's hard to maintain motivation when your purpose at work is to optimize a percentage risk/return at the end of the quarter. Quarter after quarter. Year after year.

I think this correlates with the idea we expect to derive most of our "purpose" directly from our work [1]. Which certainly doesn't bode well when you are told to go to college for your "passion," find a job doing your "passion," and are now underemployed at a job that primarily just pays the bills.

[1]: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/religion-w...

[asdff]

I don't think that's too much to ask that you derive some pleasure from your work. It does take effort, and 8hr is 50% of your waking hours a given day, and if you work for a hedge chances are you are working till at least 6 and weekends during busy season if you are <5 years out of school. That really is a huge chunk of your life and if you think its bullshit, it can really way you down.

[Konnstann]

I was told to major in something marketable, and minor in my passion. It happened that my passion was marketable to some extent, and now I do derive a lot of my purpose from my work. I'm lucky that my job is "making the world a better place" but it isn't incorrect to have that outlook.