Soar to New Career Heights
Where psychology, philosophy and practical experience unite.
Soar to New Career Heights
Where psychology, philosophy and practical experience unite.
Welcome to the Career Stoic Blog
Frank Parsons, an early pioneer of helping people choose a career and working back in the late 19th century, identified three broad factors that one should consider before selecting their career choice and getting to work. And no, passion has nothing to do with it:
"In the wise choice of a vocation there are three broad factors: (1) a clear understanding of yourself, your aptitudes, abilities, interests, ambitions, resources, limitations, and their causes; (2) a knowledge of the requirements and conditions of success, advantages and disadvantages, compensation, opportunities, and prospects in different lines of work; (3) true reasoning on the relations of these two groups of facts."
[Source: Parsons, F. (1909). Choosing a vocation. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.]
I wish I had of known that before I embarked on my career choice of engineering years ago. While there have been a few bright spots, most of it has been stressful working conditions on things and projects that I've only had a cursory interest in. I knew for years that I had to get out of it but, the money! And, after getting the cancer, the insurance! Thus, back in 2021 I earned a nearly useless master's degree in psychology. Interesting, but not enough to change my career and get paid a decent wage. So, here I am again in graduate school, this time, studying mental health counseling with the plan of becoming a licensed career counselor.
Like Frank Parsons, who for a long-time thought of his very own career path as nothing more than a long run of mistakes, I too am in the same boat. Through my new graduate program and through the application of Stoic philosophy, this blog will chart my course of becoming a counselor so that one day, I can help others avoid making the mistakes that I made and end up making a decent salary yet hating every other aspect of their careers.
Stoic philosophy, one of the longest standing tools of how to live the good life, has seen its popularity rise in recent years. Much to the chagrin of academic philosophy, Stoicism may even be considered to be mainstream, and for good reason. The Stoic philosophy, originating in Greece around 300 B.C., knew that the well lived life was achieved by the regular practice of four principal virtues in their daily lives – courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. This practice runs counter to the academic philosophical method of endless argumentation and abstraction.
To the well-lived life, and shall we say, the well-worked career, these virtues can be applied in many ways. For example, courage is tapped to get the job you really want, wisdom is gained through hands-on job experience, temperance, or self-control, is knowing that every job has its challenges and a cake job is not really what you want, and finally, justice in that you are providing yourself and your employers, customers, clients, etc. with the best of your efforts in delivering your employer's product or service.
Career Stoic aims to cultivate our inner Stoic to help us be more productive at work, to strengthen our resilience to stress from work and career aspirations, to sharpen our focus on the parts of our career path that are in our control. Career Stoic strongly believes that, by taking the best of the Stoics methods, we can achieve our career objectives by finding a job that helps fulfill the vision we have for our lives, including the coveted work-life balance, respect amongst our peers and most importantly, pride in our capabilities and accomplishments. After all, there are not many things that are more satisfying than rewarding ourselves after a long and productive day of hard and smart work.
Soon, Career Stoic will be adding career counseling and mentoring services to help you soar to new heights in your job, your career and your life satisfaction.
The Blog
Approach to Careers
I believe in a holistic approach to career development which takes our own virtues and our strengths and weaknesses as the foundation for success and fulfillment in any career, from accounting to welding, from artistry to waiting tables, from engineering to cashiering. I believe that everyone has unique talents and strengths that can be leveraged to achieve career success. Using the ever-growing popularity of the ancient philosophy of the Stoics as a tool, this blog aims to help us career-minded folks gain confidence in ourselves and our abilities and skills.
About your Career Stoic Blogger
My name is Pete and I’ve been working for over 20 years as a mechanical engineer and project manager in various industry sectors of under the head of engineering, procurement and construction. In 2021, I earned a Master of Science degree in Industrial & Organizational Psychology, a drawn out way of saying "psychology of the workplace." Recently, after my 3rd layoff in the last 8 years, I decided to start writing this blog to help me and others remain as stoic and as strong as possible in a seemingly and endlessly uncertain job market. In the meantime, I'm working on a hard right career transition from engineering and project management to an industry related to psychology and philosophy.