Chasing Professional Dreams

What do you want to be when you grow up?

It’s a question we’re asked as kids. In high school. In college.

Does anyone ever get it right?

Billy Crystal memorably had the midlife crisis in City Slickers when he realized that “I sell air.”

And there was that viral video going around — maybe only in the corporate technology circles I now run in — of the standup comedian saying No one ever says ‘I want to be a project manager at a technology company when I grow up.’

When I was a kid, I wanted to be the starting shortstop for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The dream died when I told my dad. I remember it vividly - I was in the backseat of his blue Oldsmobile (a huge boat of a car that only old men in the 1990s drove). He was honest - but it wasn’t what you want to hear when you’re 12.

You’re going to have to eat, sleep, live, and breathe baseball to do that and I don’t think that will happen.

Well, it may have if you didn’t quit hitting me ground balls after 15 minutes when the only words out of my mouth were More, please, or Again. #thisistherapy

My oldest daughter has changed her career path no less than a dozen times - one for each of her years. She wants to be an Olympic swimmer, and then a marine biologist. This is after a desire to be a pizza waitress, a pilot, an author/illustrator, a coffee shop owner, and other various professions.

Remembering the verbal gut punch I took from my dad’s honesty - vs. being a supportive parent - all we have done is encourage our daughter’s Olympic dreams. I even have a former colleague who was an Olympic gold medalist who has offered to chat with her … we are doing what we can to help her understand the pain, suffering, and hopefully glory, of that quest.

My youngest daughter is enamored with her first-grade teacher, and now she wants to be a teacher. An honorable, but not lucrative, profession. And that’s OK! The world needs teachers — good ones make as much of a difference in children’s lives as parents sometimes.

The other day, on the way to the dentist, she said she now wants to be a dentist. But only on the weekends.

Monday to Friday, I want to be a teacher. Saturday and Sunday I want to be a dentist.

She came home from the visit excited to floss. To floss! This kid …

She also said her first-grade friend wants to be a veterinarian. A lot of kids want to do that — they love animals.

Ultimately, people want some kind of glamor in their jobs.

And, unless you’re my dad, you encourage it. You help them. You talk to them about their dreams, their jobs, what they want to be when they grow up.

No one ever says I want to be a garbage man.

**Wait. Checking mental notes. … There was a kid I knew in high school named Richard Drilling who wanted to be a garbage man because, as he said, They make $20 an hour. **

As Judge Smails says in Caddyshack: “Well, the world needs ditch diggers, too.”

There is something to be said about those kinds of professions. The world does need garbage men, and ditch diggers, and people who change tires, and things that a lot of people probably don’t dream about when they are 7 years old.

I’ve been to two Super Bowls for free for work. One of which, this one, I was fortunate to watch my team play in! Talk about being lucky!

A lot of those jobs seem like they are punch-in-punch-out duties where once you’re off the clock, your brain can relax a bit. You’re likely not up all night tossing and turning about the nail you have to hammer tomorrow, and you’re not grinding about the presentation you have for the CEO.

There is a peace of mind to it, I’d imagine.

Whether you’re a kid and you want to be a doctor, or you’re in college studying to be an engineer with hopes of creating the world’s next great technology project, the dreams stay alive until you either achieve them, or some form of life wins and you succumb.

The gazillionaires who made it still had to work at it, sacrificing a ton of things. The famous athletes, or actors? There is stress in staying on top of your game, but also stress in pleasing everyone. How would you like to be booed at your job?

The majority of us fall somewhere in the middle of chasing dreams and making concessions. We recognize things like “work-life balance” or find hobbies that fulfill our lives outside of work. Other things become important, or we don’t want to waste all of our free time slaving in an office or hunched over a computer.

While my dream of being on the Dodgers died, my dreams of being on Major League Baseball fields, and working in professional baseball didn’t.

At 25 years old, I had achieved my dream of becoming a Major League Baseball beat writer. I was learning on the job from a terrific set of old scribes, who I am sure hated that I was around. This is our traveling beat before Game 1 of the ALCS — Angels vs. White Sox in Chicago. The third straight playoff game in three different cities (NY-Anaheim-Chicago). I will say that when I was covering baseball, I made it a point every day to step onto the field to remind myself of where I was and that every paying person in that stadium would trade spots with me.

I have been super fortunate to have had some really cool jobs in my life. I wanted to be a sports writer covering MLB. Done. When I was younger I wanted to be a sports broadcaster. Done. I once wanted to broadcast a baseball game and then write about the game — a mix of both. Done and done. While I didn’t get to do that for the Dodgers (nearly impossible, but what did I know at 13?), I got to do that while working at UC Santa Barbara.

Work has taken me all over the country and all over the world. I have handed out big checks to schools and kids. (side note - if you ever want to be the star of a show, I encourage you to hand out a big check somewhere. It’s awesome.) I’ve been to Super Bowls, and famous people have gotten to meet me. I’ve been a media spokesperson in good times and bad, and gotten to be a sports broadcaster on TV and radio.

Everyone loves you when you have a big check to hand out.

I’ve somehow failed upwards, turning my sports writing career into a successful corporate communications career with increasing visibility, responsibility, and trust from C-level executives at every stop along the way.

And while I never really dreamed of these corporate jobs — does anyone, honestly? — I hope that the grind, the hard work, the effort, the constant learning and questioning of things to understand better, pays off for how my kids view me, and learn from me.

I hope my youngest gets to have a weekend side career that many would dream of being their main career. I hope my oldest is in the Olympics and becomes a marine biologist, or an author/illustrator, or whatever is next.

All I know is there will be nothing but encouragement over on this side for them to chase their professional dreams. And when they get their first job, which won’t be a dream job, I’ll be happy for them, the same way my mom was happy when I got a job at McDonald’s.