logoalt Hacker News

amunozotoday at 3:49 PM6 repliesview on HN

The hardest thing is to know what's your best fit. Any advice?


Replies

toast0today at 6:34 PM

Like with many things, finding the best is hard, finding a good enough fit is a lot more attainable and maybe should be the goal.

If you work on projects in groups often, you might be able to find what fits you by what things you end doing especially if you do those parts well. Do you read and interpret the directions, do you do the assembly, do you keep the group on task, do you verify the output is acceptable, do you figure out how to proceed when there's a problem, etc.

Also, what tasks do people who know you ask you to help with; especially if those people have choices for who to ask and then specifically ask you. Those are things that likely fit you; especially if you get enjoyment out of doing those tasks, beyond the enjoyment you might get from doing any task for someone. Sometimes, you might get asked to do these things for reasons other than you're good at them, or you may be good at them and also hate doing it, etc; so like be aware of that.

If you're lucky, what fits you is distinctive and commercially apprechiated. But not everyone has those fits, so it's good to also look for things that fit well enough to pay the bills. You may need to develop other skills to get into a position to use your good fit as well.

GarnetFloridetoday at 6:28 PM

Are you an extrovert or introvert? Look at how you spend your time. Do you have to spend time with people or have to be alone sometimes?

What do you do when you have nothing else to do? I know that's really hard these days with all the distractions we have. So maybe what do you watch or read about? What are your interests?

But the world changes. I started out as an engineer and that got shipped to China. I pivoted to IT, shipped to India. Pivoted to technical writing and now there's LLMs.

I figure things out and share to make it easier for others too. That works in a lot of industries.

lugutoday at 6:02 PM

Ask people who know you well what you are talented for. Oftentimes we don't see it ourselves. As you get good at something, it become easier, and you think of it as a given. On the opposite, we tend to over appreciate what is difficult for us.

doug_durhamtoday at 5:04 PM

What do you find yourself gravitating to? What part of your job comes easiest? That things are easy to you that other’s find difficult? What do you spend time learning more about even when you don’t have to? Those are directional. For me the first time I started writing code I knew that’s what I’d need to do for a living.

adrianwajtoday at 5:39 PM

Turn procrastination into pragmatism.

Switch from service-to-self to service-to-others, or vice versa.

See your mind as shut gates that can be opened to something already perfect.

Make your sub-conscious super-conscious - any tips there?

I remember Prince (musician) said he would receive things from God and send them back to source.

Cut the strings that make you a puppet??

anonym29today at 3:52 PM

A lot of pop-psychology doesn't hold up when subject to empirical review, but OCEAN / "Big 5" does, and it's probably a decent starting point.

E.g. if you are low in extraversion and agreeableness, you probably wouldn't make a good nurse or waiter, but you might not make a bad lawyer or engineer.

show 1 reply