How do you know when you have found what you are best suited to be doing in life?

I wake up every day excited to go to work. I hate taking sick days, because I like being there. The people I work with are great, we spend most of the day laughing and having a really good time, while we're helping the schools and church we work for do the work they need to do in order to make our community and world a better place.

I could, without working too hard at it (okay, maybe in this economy it would take a little more effort) double if not triple my salary somewhere else, because the Church does not pay well. I knew that going in. I tell people that, and then I tell them that the difference is that "I'll live longer working here."

Because work is a pleasure, not a stressor, and it means my days are full of endorphins, not stress hormones. The worst thing I'm going to have to worry about working where I do is having too many laugh lines. But I'm not doing what I think I want to do.

I don't spend very much time thinking about that, I'm busy with interesting projects at work, and loving the time I spend with my family at home. But my goals and vision for myself were not where I am now in terms of vocation, and some tiny part of me is, when I have a chance to reflect on it, a little disquieted (I won't say unhappy) that I'm not doing the other stuff I grew up wanting to, and started to chase, but veered off course from. The questioning about place or function once or twice in five years is probably natural anyway, the process of the mind taking stock and comparing to the various mental pictures we have of ourselves.

I would not trade my joy-filled, stimulating, happy life now for anything, including the possibility that I would be rid of that questioning. There is as much possibility that I'd just question something else. Perfection isn't acquisition in my view, it is process.So I'm arguing with the assumption of "best suited.

" I think you can be insanely, gloriously happy without having a best fit in what you're doing. It has to be good, whatever it is, but who is to say that just because a part of you pines to be a basket weaver, you can't have more happiness as a chiropractor, owing to all the other things in life it impacts and influences, and because it is also intrinsically satisfying, even if only 98% as much as basket weaving might me.My best tip for acquiring this sort of state is to stop looking for it. Humans have the capacity to doubt or question anything, and in so doing they spoil a whole lot of stuff for themselves.

You can read the Garden of Eden story that way if you want to, loss of paradise for chasing the one doubt, the one thing not quite right. Other tips include: being confident, comfortable in your own skin and with your own abilities. Ours is a very competitive, very comparative society.

Most people are so busy worrying about other people's perceptions of them, they barely have time to worry about what they perceive about other people.No one expects you to be a grand-master chess player and a virtuoso piano player and have perfect teeth and get the Donaldson reports done on time. They just want you to get the Donaldson reports in on time, and the time you spent worry about all the other stuff you weren't being or doing, you could have spent either a) doing them (piano lessons, chess in the park with your kids, etc), or b) not worrying and enjoying what you do have (like chess in the park with your kids...)Also: Act on your dreams. You can wish for a trip to Europe "some day" for your whole life and never go.

Of you can put $20 of every paycheck toward it every time, and actually get there in a decade. You bank will probably do this for you automatically if you ask them, and in 15 minutes you've gone from a wistful fantasy to a fixed-date reality. No one said you had to get a college degree or master's or PhD in the regular way as a full time student.

Take one class at a time, but keep taking them, and suddenly you're at the end of all those credits, wondering where to hang the sheepskin. You may not get your dreams and desires "right now," but just because you can't at this instant doesn't mean you shouldn't make actual progress toward them. That has to do with what you're best suited to doing because you'll never be in a good fit if you're in the habit of wishing for things you never act on.

Good luck.

If you only have two of them -- even if you love it and can make a living at it, for instance -- you're still doomed. How do you know if you love it? Always a tough question, and some people take a lifetime to figure it out.

I'm 40 now, I program computers for living, and I knew that I'd "program computers" since I was 10 years old. But is that enough to describe what I do? Would *any* job programming computers be just as good?

Not at all. There's lots of details that go into it, and I think that's part of why the question is hard - your life experience will cause you to continually refine the question. Maybe what made you happy at 25 doesn't make you happy at 40.

Ask yourself, "Would I do this for free? If somebody comes along and wants to pay me to do this, would my first reaction be, 'really? '" Do you wake up every morning excited to head in to work, and go home pleased with yourself for what you did all day?

I hate to say "you know it when you're there", but you do, you really do. Hope that helps.

When you are excited to get out of bed every morning!

Hard to say IN ADVANCE. You know you're there when you're glad to work overtime and in fact find you've done so without realizing it and think about your work during off hours and buy books (out of pocket, not your boss's) to bone up on it.

This is a great question and is actually quite relevant to my current situation. If you're still young, around high school or college, I suggest you try each and every whim and interest (lots of free opportunities for students) that comes along. There's nothing like getting into something and experiencing it firsthand to help you decide if it's something you like or not.

The more things you try, the more things you can rule out right away as not a good fit. The older you get, the less freedom and time you have, because of increasing responsibilities or just realizing that you've went autopilot down a career path without much thought. Finally, it has to be something you're passionate about (or something close to it) and something you enjoy doing it.It's a cliche but it's true.

If you like talking to people, then find a job where you're meeting new people all the time, etc.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.