{"id":2396,"date":"2022-01-27T11:00:46","date_gmt":"2022-01-27T11:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/?p=2396"},"modified":"2025-10-22T15:14:45","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T14:14:45","slug":"help-i-cant-find-my-purpose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/2022\/01\/27\/help-i-cant-find-my-purpose\/","title":{"rendered":"Help! I can\u2019t find my purpose!"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the 2004 musical Avenue Q, <\/em>Princeton is a 22-year-old graduate desperately searching for his purpose. By the end of the show, he concludes that, actually, he has no idea what his purpose is \u2013 and maybe that\u2019s okay.<\/p>\n

I LOVE this.<\/p>\n

It feels as though it\u2019s been drilled into us from day one. Follow your dreams! (But only if they\u2019re realistic.) Find your purpose! (As long as it makes you lots of money.) Get a good job! (Wait, what does that even mean?)<\/p>\n

\u2018Passion\u2019 is another buzzword we\u2019ve heard a lot of. Many of us have been told that the only way to achieve job satisfaction, to truly \u2018make it\u2019, is to find work in a field we are passionate about. And don\u2019t get us wrong \u2013 caring about what you do is obviously a good thing! But when words like these are overused, they lose their meaning. We churn them out on autopilot in job applications and at interviews, without really thinking about what they mean.<\/p>\n

The problem with \u2018dream jobs\u2019<\/h2>\n

At the risk of sounding extremely cheesy, careers are a journey, not a destination. We understand the value of planning and exploring your career prospects early on. But this is not to say you are doomed if you don\u2019t know what you want to do.<\/p>\n

If you expect to have your dream job all figured out by the time you graduate, you are closing the door on so many other opportunities<\/a>. You\u2019re also putting yourself under unnecessary stress. Very few of us stay in the same job or even the same sector our entire working lives. Career paths are not so linear anymore. The skills you gain early in your career can help you pivot into other jobs. They can also help you understand what it is you enjoy. It\u2019s okay if your vision of work is still a little fuzzy right now \u2013 you\u2019ve got plenty of time to figure it out.<\/p>\n

Work is work<\/h2>\n

There\u2019s also a lot of talk about finding fulfilment and purpose in your work, and for good reason. At the Careers Service, we want to support you in finding meaningful work that you enjoy, are good at, and care about.<\/p>\n

However, sometimes when we are thinking about how to answer those tricky interview questions \u2013 why do you want to work for us? Where do you see yourself in five years\u2019 time? \u2013 we get caught up in what we are \u2018supposed\u2019 to value. The pressure to find our dream job can lead to us ignoring our own personal values \u2013 things like work-life balance and flexibility. If you enjoy your job and it meets your needs, there is no need to get hung up on what your purpose \u2018should\u2019 be. \u2018Should\u2019 statements can lead to or exacerbate existing anxiety, causing us to feel dissatisfied with what we have already achieved.<\/p>\n

My career path is different from what I studied<\/h2>\n

This goes hand in hand with those pesky \u2018should\u2019 statements. Most of us have a vague idea of what we can do with our degree<\/a>, but what if you end up doing something completely different? Is that okay?<\/p>\n

Our answer: yes! Your purpose in work does not have to be a carbon copy of what you studied at university. Remember, the average person changes career seven times throughout their life, and so diverging away from your degree discipline is perfectly normal. Consider how versatile and employable this makes you: you\u2019re not rigidly confined to one career. Too little structure can leave us feeling aimless, but we can use flexibility to our advantage. Read more about transferable skills<\/a> and how they can open doors for you.<\/p>\n

In conclusion<\/h2>\n

Your purpose at work isn\u2019t necessarily clear when you graduate. Often, it\u2019s something you figure out along the way, from past and future experiences: good, bad, and everything in between. We can help you understand what motivates you \u2013 get in touch at careers@bath.ac.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the 2004 musical Avenue Q, Princeton is a 22-year-old graduate desperately searching for his purpose. By the end of the show, he concludes that, actually, he has no idea what his purpose is \u2013 and maybe that\u2019s okay. I...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1443,"featured_media":2398,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[748],"tags":[54,668,10,6,666,667,665],"class_list":["post-2396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","tag-career-choice","tag-career-path","tag-career-planning","tag-careers-advice","tag-dream-job","tag-passion","tag-purpose"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2022\/01\/mark-fletcher-brown-nN5L5GXKFz8-unsplash-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1443"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}