Enjoy your job by making it worthwhile.

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Some people only get jobs to get a salary. They are not really about doing anything worthwhile. Many of us spend years working in jobs in which we have no genuine interest. Money-motivated people are idiots. If you only ever do things which you really want to do, you will usually become extremely good at doing them. I am probably almost a robot. I am happy about what I did in my working life. I had one job, which had an overbearing boss. If he was alive today and offered that job, I would pay to do it again. My boss never knew the workings of what I did. It was really funny when on one day after I had been there for ten years, he came and watched me work. He was horrified and said 'I know what I don't want to know' and he fled. But he came back later and thanked me. Between the two of us, we actually achieved.
He was a specialist in the physical properties and heat treatment of steel, and I created the automated chemical analysis system.
 
Find a job you like and you'll never work a day in your life. The best excavator operator I ever knew told me thar. He was 75 at that point and still ran equipment every day.
 
Some things are really funny. The other day I was talking about one of my bosses, on another topic on this forum, and said 'He was a bachelor and thought he could argue'. I was not joking. I was married when I was 23, and was studying part-time while working in a full time job until I was 29. By the time I was with him, I was in my 40s. He was about 60.
One of the subjects I studied was thermodynamics. Many students had failed it at other colleges, and came to where I studied, because we had an excellent lecturer. He was about 65 years of age and had probably been married for about 40 years. There was a girl in the class who had a go at him. I really admired the quiet way he answered her every argument and invited her to continue. Being married teaches us a lot. I think single guys often really suffer.
 
Not everyone is fortunate enough to fall into something ( work ) that is a joy let alone one that has blissful remuneration and of course joy indeed to those who find themselves in such a way fortunate.

Some years back one of the senior executives of “ International Paint “ gave me an interesting piece of advice / perspective by saying

“ if there is no perk to a job the job isn’t worth having and if there is no perk you must create your own “

Of course the need to create your own perk becomes the drive to change one’s job where a perk is built in, whatever form it takes.

Saved me a few times from getting bogged down when the ideal job changed by virtue of “ progress “ real or otherwise.
 
When I was a baby WW2 was in progress. In movie theatres we watched guy in Spitfires shooting at each other. When I got older, I discovered motorcycles were the next best thing. It has shaped my thinking. I have only ever applied for jobs in places which suit my interests. When you learn maths, physics and chemistry at school, they can be quite boring. But when you are developing a motorcycle to go faster they become useful. My loves are classic racing motorcycles, music and chemistry. They all have facets which are useful in developing motorcycles. I became qualified as an industrial chemist by studying while working in a government laboratory. As soon as I qualified, I immediately got a job in the Government Aircraft Factory running a laboratory which developed and controlled materials and processes. After a couple of years, I moved on to me next job - where I set up a laboratory developing steel and controlling processes for making guns and rocket motors. The reason I went there was they had a computer. My offsider and I taught ourselves to programme it. I used to play a musical instrument - computer programming uses the same part of the brain.
When I built my T250 Suzuki racer, I used the computer to print a table of the port heights in relation to degrees of crankshaft rotation. It worked extremely well.
I get enjoyment out of some very funny things. When a big rocket motor is fired and you are near it, it is a pants-filling experience. I loved firing a 5 inch naval gun. My last permanent job was running about 5 laboratories in an explosives factory. I sort of retired in 1989, and worked in private organisations- mainly in management jobs related to engineering.
If I had stayed in the aircraft factory, I would have continued studying part-time and moved into aircraft engineering. I think flying a Spitfire during WW2 would have been the ultimate.
Some people are afraid of dying. My main fear is of dying without having achieved. When you are dead you probably do not know it, so it is only ever other people who die. What you leave behind is important.
Never worry about thing which you cannot change.
 
In the Ordnance Factory Maribyrnong and other government factories, the best products were always 'foreigner's'. I did not realise until just before I left there, I could have had a billet crank made for my 850 motor - legit. Nobody ever talked much to anyone from other sections of the factory.
 
I’d be tempted to check out something like the wiring or systems technician roles. Hands-on work like that is right up my alley.I got into locksmithing a while back, and honestly, it’s been a solid move. It’s not just fixing locks like I thought—it’s making keys, working on safes, even figuring out security systems. What’s cool is you can work for yourself or join a company, so there’s plenty of options.
 
I fix classic cars for a living, it's very enjoyable, every job is different and a challenge, I'm currently working on a 1969 Lamborghini Miura and a 1926 Bentley 3 Litre. The job requires, common sense, skill and research, but it is very rewarding as it not only entails repair work, but it is also preserving our motoring heritage and in some cases social history.
 
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