Sounds like the author is experiencing disillusion with the working world. (Not surprised to see that happening soon after their graduation. I had a similar experience myself.)
Here’s a parable that seems to illustrate what it looks like to find fulfillment in one’s work.[1] It helped me see the world differently.
> Three bricklayers are asked: “What are you doing?” The first says, “I am laying bricks.” The second says, “I am building a church.” And the third says, “I am building the house of God.” The first bricklayer has a job. The second has a career. The third has a calling.
And the trick is - from the outside, each performs the same work. But how each person views their work determines how much fulfillment they derive from it (and whether they succeed at reaching their long term goals).
Rather than searching for some magical job that fulfills you in all the ways you're not now, I would suggest focusing on how to make your current job more fulfilling first. Craft your role around the pieces of the work that move you.
If you can’t do that, no new role will fill that yearning, that emptiness, for you. You’ll just be searching your whole life for something that doesn’t exist, until you eventually give up.
Sure, a new job might be more interesting to you and might fit you better - for a little while - but all jobs, no matter how exciting they sound, are still jobs. They still have sucky parts that drain you and disillusion you and will make you miserable if you let them. And you need to learn how to persevere through that to find something to pull you out of it.
What I’m saying is: it might not be a job problem… it might be a you problem.
Three software engineers are asked: "What are you doing?" The first says, "I am writing software." The second says, "I am building a yoga instruction application." And the third says, "I'm making the world a better place through canonical data models to communicate between endpoints."
What would the third brick layer say if in fact they were building a prison? Or something less positive? I don't really understand who is the one I'm supposed to emulate here.
OP provided details that make the analogy feel distant.
That's not just graduates. The main difference with the gen Z if OP is even one, is that they have a much longer future than those who already worked decades. Mature workers would just accept to do the remaining legs even if meaning keeps falling. The young have bigger stakes, projecting the trajectory leads to an absolute no go, for them.
> The young have bigger stakes, projecting the trajectory leads to an absolute no go, for them.
If you told the young graduate me where I would end up in 15 years, I wouldn't have believed it.
The young may have a long trajectory ahead of them, but they are absolutely bad at planning and predicting where they will end up (unless you have rich parents, which means you'll probably end up okay regardless)
> I graduated in July 2024 from Avans with a degree in Computer Science.
But I have to confess, I'm not sure I understand your comment if you wouldn't mind clarifying.
I wouldn't suggest people (like mature workers) just accept the misery and run out the clock. But I do think it is extremely important to be able to find the meaning in your work, rather than hoping there is a magical other job out there that otherwise fulfills you.
Ok, so OP doesn't like working to make their boss rich. "Start your own company," you might say. But after the honeymoon period wanes, you might find that "I don't like working for someone" turns into "I don't like having to find all these customers myself" or "I don't like having to spend all my time doing paperwork or talking to investors or wearing a million hats or..."
My point is that there will always be reasons to be miserable at any job, so you need to be able to find the pieces that are meaningful to you.
To stretch the analogy a bit to relationships... if OP is saying, "I don't like my relationship with my current partner" I'm saying, "Sure, you can find a new partner if that's what you want. And maybe you should. But just know, there is no magic partner out there that fulfills all of your needs. You're going to have a relationship with a real, human person, and your new partner will have things you love about them and things that drive you crazy, just like the last one. You need to know how to build a meaningful relationship and find fulfillment in it, otherwise, there is no magic partner that will fill that hole in you."
From OP:
> I want to work on personal projects that I find important and help out other projects, that's it. If rent wasn't an issue I'd be working full-time on open-source
That's going to have exciting parts and miserable parts just like their current role, so they will be quite disappointed after the honeymoon period wears off if they aren't able to find meaning in the drudgery. If OP is looking at this as their magical next partner, they will certainly be disappointed when they realize that their new partner snores and leaves the toilet seat up and leaves dirty dishes in the sink.
Ever seen the movie OfficeSpace? It's funny as hell partly because there's a lot of truth to it. Here's the interesting part it was released in 1999 and the dot-com bubble didn't burst until March 2000. It didn't do well when it was released, probably because everyone was busy snorting toxic positivity, but it endured longer than Enron.
Here’s a parable that seems to illustrate what it looks like to find fulfillment in one’s work.[1] It helped me see the world differently.
> Three bricklayers are asked: “What are you doing?” The first says, “I am laying bricks.” The second says, “I am building a church.” And the third says, “I am building the house of God.” The first bricklayer has a job. The second has a career. The third has a calling.
And the trick is - from the outside, each performs the same work. But how each person views their work determines how much fulfillment they derive from it (and whether they succeed at reaching their long term goals).
Rather than searching for some magical job that fulfills you in all the ways you're not now, I would suggest focusing on how to make your current job more fulfilling first. Craft your role around the pieces of the work that move you.
If you can’t do that, no new role will fill that yearning, that emptiness, for you. You’ll just be searching your whole life for something that doesn’t exist, until you eventually give up.
Sure, a new job might be more interesting to you and might fit you better - for a little while - but all jobs, no matter how exciting they sound, are still jobs. They still have sucky parts that drain you and disillusion you and will make you miserable if you let them. And you need to learn how to persevere through that to find something to pull you out of it.
What I’m saying is: it might not be a job problem… it might be a you problem.
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/8663762-three-bricklayers-a...