Professor: ‘Follow your dreams’ is cruel advice

[cynatnite]

With graduation season in full swing, students across the nation are being told the key to success is to “follow your dreams.”

But Professor Lisa Wade of Occidental College argues the idealistic cliche has no real value to students — and verges on being harmful.

“I think it is actually kind of cruel to give that advice,” she said on HuffPost Live. “First, because a lot of students don’t know what they want to do and so they feel this incredible pressure to figure out what their passion is just at that one moment.”

“Second of all, I think it is just absurd to think that the majority of Americans are going to be able to follow their passions, to get paid to do what you love,” Wade continued. “Historically speaking, that has been incredibly rare and is still incredibly rare. So I think it sets students up for failure.”

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/06/02/professor-follow-your-dreams-is-cruel-advice/

[Lady Freedom Returns]

1. I think better advice is follow your passions.

Dreams are very pin point, one direction. Passions have many branches.

[KittyWampus]

13. How about "Indulge Your Curiorsity"?

[Lady Freedom Returns]

15. People should do that all the time.

You know they say that if one keeps learning and studying, that one's brain stays healthier. It needs exercised just like the rest of your body.

[Laelth]

54. I like the advice I saw recently here on DU (from a different commencement speaker).

Can't remember the speaker's name, but his advice was this (paraphrasing): "Figure out what the world needs, then figure out what you can to to give people what they need, and then do that. If you can manage to take these steps, you will be rewarded with the sense of well-being that comes from making people's lives better, and your chances of succeeding, economically, will be greater simply because you are targeting your energy toward a real, human need."

That, I thought, was very realistic, sound, and ethical advice.

-Laelth

[Newest Reality]

2. More like:

Practice lowering your expectations every chance you get.

Try to get along with your parents because you either have to stay there or will be moving back in at some point. Read books on family relations and how to facilitate them.

Start doing a little research on anti-depressants and their alternatives so that you are ready when it is your turn to take the plunge in this decaying culture. There really won't be much "therapy" for you if you don't have the kind of money it takes to get some professional to sit and listen to your problems for a "client" hour.

Don't give up on playing video games because they may be a primary form of entertainment and even have to double for vacations you won't have.

It is okay to follow your dreams if you are actually sleeping and you may find yourself sleeping more and have the time to follow your real dreams into places you will never go while awake.

Yes, you may be eligible for food stamps!

[Egalitarian Thug]

5. +1

[90-percent]

17. +1

[rastaone]

20. Ouch

Its sad because there a lot of truth in that post.

[Laelth]

55. Agreed. Very sad because, for many, it will be very true.

Welcome to DU, btw.

-Laelth

[Blue_Tires]

72. Dude...That hits a little TOO close to home

the rest of my day is going to really suck now...

[Newest Reality]

74. Oh, sorry.

I'm late Boomer and though many of those options are not available to me, the lifestyle of being part of the ten to twelve-percent of the now unnecessary, or expendable part of this internalized, capitalist Fiefdom is still just as meager and dire.

There is the option for the youth who realize what they are being handed, (crumbs and dung) to focus their angst about potential Serfdom into a proactive stance. That includes doing more study and investigation, as well as exploring the means by which this heist is conveyed, portrayed and executed.

Don't wait for something to happen, just ease gradually into being something that happens in response to it as a way of life. That does not even mean being revolutionary or a lopsided rebel, but rather, acting as an aware participant and knowing that a thousand cuts by a thousand people is far more effective to slay a beast than pounding at it alone with your fists.

Sorry about the reality of my attempt to portray this in a humorous way. It is not like I am being hypocritical though.

Thanks for commenting.

[hunter]

3. Fuck this world without my dreams.

Seriously, without a dream to follow, what's the point of living?

Might as well be a bunch of robots and slaves serving the rich and powerful.

I will not be a robot, I will not be a slave.

[Awknid]

4. I agree with hunter!

I changed careers at midlife to what I had always wished I could do. No I haven't made a fortune, but I hold my head up higher now than before. And when I have work, I love it so much, it makes up for the times I have none.

The problem with NOT following your dreams is that you will be miserable otherwise. If your dreams are something that is not in demand you can always do it on the side. Nowhere is it written that it must be the only thing you do! But not doing it at all will create a miserable existence!

[RobinA]

107. Holding Your Head Up

I agree with this completely. I changed careers a couple of times after a variety of derailments. One derailment involved going into a career but not in the area of that career that I chose it for. I wanted to be a paralegal in public interest law, but I wound up in litigation because "there are no jobs in public interest," which was true. I hung out in litigation for years working for a big company and not liking it. I was eventually laid off, which caused me to get back into my very first career choice, mental health. I obtained a Masters degree, which I never thought I would do. I don't make a lot of money, will just barely (maybe) recoup the cost of my degree, and have not done some things that I would have been able to do with a higher salary. But I am proud of what I do, which I never was in a litigation department of a computer company, and I feel like there's a reason to come to work.

I agree that the "follow you dreams" rhetoric is a little off base and does set some people up for disappointment, but I also think that combining reality with dreams and reasonable expectations can just work out with luck and decent play of the cards you're dealt.

[Xipe Totec]

7. Funny thing about the word robot...

The word robota means literally "corvée", "serf labor", and figuratively "drudgery" or "hard work" in Czech and also (more general) "work", "labor" in many Slavic languages (e.g.: Bulgarian, Russian, Slovak, Polish, Macedonian, Ukrainian, archaic Czech). Traditionally the robota was the work period a serf (corvée) had to give for his lord, typically 6 months of the year. The origin of the word is the Old Church Slavonic (Old Bulgarian) rabota "servitude" ("work" in contemporary Bulgarian and Russian), which in turn comes from the Indo-European root *orbh-. Robot is cognate with the German root Arbeit (work).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot#Etymology

The Russian word for work is работa (rabota).
The Russian word for slave is раб (rab).

[malaise]

8. +1,000 n/t

[bvar22]

12. Do you want to Make Money....

OR
Do you want to be happy?

I'll follow my dreams.


I am deeply grateful that I went through school back when my Advisers and Mentors
believed that School was a Place to Learn about The World,
the People IN it,
and about the Lives and Thoughts of Those who came before me,
and NOT a place to prepare me for the Work Place.

I would like to use this opportunity to Thank them!

[Posteritatis]

16. It's not necessarily a zero-sum thing anyway. (nt)

[DeadLetterOffice]

18. I want to eat.

And have shelter, and clothes, and medicine when I need it.
While these things alone will not make me Happy, a lack of them will certainly make me Unhappy. Not to mention hungry, homeless, naked, and sick.

The real question is: Can you pay for your life doing what you're passionate about?
-- IF YES: Awesome for you -- go for it, and recognize that you're damn lucky.
-- IF NO: Welcome to the bulk of humanity. Go forth and hopefully make a living doing something you can tolerate, and follow your passions on the side for awhile. Maybe you'll be able to live off of them someday in the future. But in the meantime hopefully you won't be hungry, homeless, naked, and sick.

[lolly]

22. Yes, this.

Realizing that you're never going to be a ballerina, or an NBA star, or a best-selling novelist, doesn't necessarily mean that you can never dance, play, or write.

It means that you will have to find a way to support your dreams, and make a few sacrifices in other areas.

[raccoon]

65. Well said! nt

[Zorra]

39. "School was a Place to Learn about The World,

the People IN it,
and about the Lives and Thoughts of Those who came before me,
and NOT a place to prepare me for the Work Place.".

Same here, word for word.

[liberal_at_heart]

42. today's kids can forget about creativity, fun, passion, and dreams. They don't teach those things

anymore. Now the only thing they teach is how to pass math, science, and writing on a state standardized test. That's it. That is what our entire school system teaches. Nothing less. Nothing more.

[Egalitarian Thug]

89. Hear, hear. We are witnessing what a sad and hopeless place the world is when

the unimaginative and incurious hold absolute power. It's not too late, but we are well on our way to that dismal reality.

[blahblah98]

27. I think this is what Prof. Wade is talking about...

I quit my job of 9yrs to go back to school and bring high-tech from engineering to the business world. I spent all my savings & maxed out my credit cards, but after 3 1/2 years, I started a company. I thought I'd made it. Then my partners fired me, and eventually ran the company to bankruptcy liquidation so I was left with nothing. The high-tech industry crashed, and I bounced between jobs, employed about 1/2 time. Stress wore down my family, my wife was angry & depressed all the time, my kids grew up under-performing with fewer opportunities than I'd had. We ate from the food-bank, borrowed from family to pay rent.

Finally after 15 hellish years I got a corporate job at a good, stable company. I'm paying my debts now, even bought my first house a couple months ago at the age of 50. My wife & I'll be working well into our 70s.

So I've come to believe that following your dreams applies to the rich and fortunate few. For the rest of us working-class folk it's a giant gamble with your future, the odds are not in your favor and the downside may be devastating. The media loves to play up the myths of the American Dream / Horatio Alger / Social Mobility, but the reality is we hear about the 1% successes but not the 99% failures.

Successful entrepreneurs sometimes talk about the dozens of times they failed before they succeeded once. How many among us can afford to fail a dozen times before that one success? I failed nearly that many times. Now, success to me is that corporate job I left nearly 20 years ago.

I think the brutal reality of today's college graduate job market is what Professor Wade is talking about: Do pursue your interests, but be realistic, pragmatic and always have a backup plan. My son in college likes & does well at history, but that is one of THE lowest-paying majors; why pay $150k for something that will eventually pay $40k/yr? He's logical and reasonably good at math, so it's a STEM major for him. There's a fine line between a dream and a nightmare.

[HiPointDem]

36. +1. working class kids are fed all sorts of unrealistic crap & thrown into the workplace.

i'm all for having dreams, but reality-based dreams. for working class kids that would include an education in the class system, the propagandistic function of the media, etc.

[DeadLetterOffice]

50. +1

"Always have a backup plan."

My mom pounded this into my head from birth.

[Egalitarian Thug]

90. You and your son are likely to get another lesson in reality, I'm sorry to say. n/t

[blahblah98]

92. Love the romantics

But the romantics had patrons.

RE: Tux: Open Source eliminates intellectual property not capitalism. Where do salaries come from? "Free beer" is great, but "paid services" is how one makes a living. But I digress.

[Egalitarian Thug]

95. You're right, it doesn't eliminate capitalism (if only it were that simple), but we do it because

it is what we love to do, and make no mistake, you can make a good living doing it. It simply precludes the potential to become a billionaire by stealing other people's work claiming it as your own property and then reselling it forever.

The world has been moving to Linux for almost two decades now because of two basic factors; it doesn't lock you into becoming, what is for all intents and purposes, a permanent slave to a single corporate overlord that you must pay regardless of circumstance. And it just works.

As for my previous comment, and I don't expect that you are going to believe this, the urgent need for the so-called STEM workers is a myth. There has always been enough of us, more than enough, to fill the need. What they want is cheap and disposable and nothing says cheap and disposable like a bumper crop of new grads willing to work for as close to nothing as possible until they can be replaced by the next crop.

Reality is that technology has forever changed the world of the 21st century, but we're still supporting a 19th century social model and the beneficiaries of that old model want to keep their gravy train going as long a possible. Studying something that you really don't like simply because you believe that it will make finding a job more likely is a tragedy on several levels.

Employment is not a goal, it is a sentence.

[RobinA]

108. The Romantics

also did a lot of dreck for money - important to keep in mind. People seem to lose track of this when trying to be all pure like they somehow imagine the Romantics to have been. Romantics gotta eat and keep themselves in opium just like everybody else.

[a la izquierda]

97. Maybe your son likes history...

And doesn't care about $$, but instead about living a fulfilled life.
-from a history professor who has an amazing job...and will never make 6 figures unless I lose my marbles and become a corporate whore.

Your post is disturbing to me.

[Demeter]

29. Hunter, You CAN Follow Your Dreams

Just don't expect to make a living doing it.

I have a totally dull, mundane job. It pays the bills. It leaves me lots of time for thinking.

My dreams are done on my own time. And I have succeeded far beyond my hopes in many of them. When I reach the age of collecting Social Security, I can try to make them pay, a little.

For now, it may be living two lives, but it's better than not living either.

[hunter]

37. Wherever I end up, I'm always living my dream.

The physical circumstances have never much mattered to me.

Even in my very darkest places I've never been "not living."

I can hardly manage one life, two lives would be too much.

[klook]

71. I don't have a patron or an inheritance,

and I'm not willing to live at poverty level. And I've had other mouths to feed most of my adult life. BUT I have dreams that cannot be ignored.

I've followed your model for a long time, and it has worked for the most part. My job is my patron, supporting not only subsistence but also the non-lucrative activities that are my true interests. I'm lucky to have gotten jobs that usually left me plenty of time and energy to pursue those interests.

The huge gamble against long odds that pays off for the plucky hero makes good copy. It also makes for a lot of human misery among those 99.9 percent ( and their families) who don't win the prize.

[Zorra]

35. Fuckin' a right, hunter! I followed my dreams and my life is, and has been, total ass kickin'

fun!!! I can't ever die, it just wouldn't be right, I'm having too much fun.

Never been a robot, never been a banker's debt slave, had lots of adventures, and I'm the happiest person in the world.

Life rocks.

[Tom Ripley]

47. Absofuckinglutely, hunter!

[treestar]

61. Yes, that sounded like she was just telling the truth

about what the 1% want. The schools churn out robots, we are often told, and she's saying find where you fit as a robot. And hopefully that job will tire you out so you don't have the energy to pay attention to politics.

[Octafish]

69. + Infinity

We need dreamers and dreams worth following.

Well said, hunter: The professor wants to get a promotion and raise by helping produce more automatons for corporate murka.

[LanternWaste]

78. It does indeed follow that many people will put their dreams

It does indeed follow that many people will put their own dreams above and beyond that of family, community, and the future; and have a difficult time comprehending those who do not.

[hunter]

79. My current dream is to build an economic system...

... that puts family, community, and the future first, to create a just society where EVERYONE can pursue their dreams, and NO ONE has to take a soul crushing job simply to survive.

Our current economic system is a highway to hell.

[galileoreloaded]

94. but you are a slave. :( nt

[hunter]

96. Our economic masters ignore my good advice, so it's only fair I ignore them.

I think this makes me some sort of feral person. My participation in this economy is minimal. I buy plain food, a little bit of water and electricity, and an internet connection that's too slow for video. No cable or satellite; I don't watch television. The closer I can live to a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, the happier I am. (No, that's not the reason I'm "hunter" here. Hunter is my name.)

I'm trying to think if I've ever been "successful" at anything. Well, our adult kids are good people, and that was one of my dreams. Financially? Nope. If my wife and I'd had any sense we'd have emigrated as quick as we could to a true first world nation. Canada would have been an excellent choice. But we stayed and medical problems of the sort no one can predict wiped us out financially. And yes, we did have "good" insurance, or so we thought. I guess "good" means you get actual medical care; they don't just prop you up in the ER and push you back out onto the streets.

[ruffburr]

103. Jimmy Cliff-

Said it best " I'd rather be a free man in my grave than living as a puppet or a slave" (from the harder they come song)

[sibelian]

109. A Dream? How about a Plan?

It's been made very clear to me for a long time that my life isn't really anything to do with what I want or deserve.

But I might be able to get out soon.

[JaneyVee]

6. I have some pretty weird dreams.

[Democracyinkind]

77. Do tell.

[Texasgal]

9. How sad..

Look what we have become.

[Egalitarian Thug]

10. Another academic advocating for post secondary education's devolution into overpriced

vocational training. Cause yeah, the world needs as many investment mangers as it can produce...

And for the particularly slow authoritarians here, if you don't get your finance degree from the right schools and make friends or be related to the right people, you are not going to be the next hedge fund superstar or bankster, no matter how far you push your head up the bosses ass.

[YoungDemCA]

84. How many people really *want* to be "banksters", anyway?

Other than those whose definition of the 'pursuit of happiness" is the profit motive.

[thelordofhell]

11. I Guess She Never Dreamed About Being A Professor..........

[daleo]

14. Muddle through and make the best of things

Not inspirational, but pretty much describes most people's lives.

[Shankapotomus]

19. I agree with the professor

Especially concerning my own dreams which tend to be so outrageously implausible it would take a multiple conversion of circumstances for one to happen. This has made me conclude there's nothing wrong with dreams, but they are more about luck and being in the right place at the right time and not something under our total control. I think it is the motion picture industry that has confused us about the difference between what constitutes a dream and just something achievable by the exertion of effort and work. Depending on your starting point in life and surrounding environment, some dreams are just not achievable no matter how much effort you apply.

I much prefer "Follow your peace and contentment." and if a dream happens, it happens. But personal peace and contentment is usually within reach of everyone who is free to act and once they become aware that's all they really need.

[nolabear]

21. Absurd.

With enough help and some courage you can find some form of your dreams. It might not be all you do, and it might not pay the bills, but to tell people to abandon the thing which lets their soul shine through is horrid. Giving up on dreams means life is cheaper, yours and those of others. You just become a...consumer.

[rastaone]

23. My father always told us

to pursue whatever profession we can achieve that would make us the biggest amount of money and then with that money, we can have the time to indulge in our real passion or dreams. Ofc this is the philosophy he followed and ended up loving the job he is doing. He is 65 and teaching physiology and the only way he retires today is if he is forced out of his job.

Btw his dream was to become a soccer player.

[Curmudgeoness]

24. It is true that it is very rare to actually survive

following your dreams. Better advise would be to make the best of whatever direction your life takes you, and always find time to enjoy your free time with your dreams, loves, hobbies. This way, it is not impossible to stumble into that perfect career/job, but it saves people from feeling like a failure when they do not attain that dream.

[Douglas Carpenter]

25. well obviously she is right - at least for the overwhelming majority of people

There just are not enough avenues for the vast majority of people to make a respectable living that will sustain them during most of their working life doing what they really, really love. The world just does not work that way.

If someone can find something tolerable that pays them a decent living - that is doing better than the most people.

[L0oniX]

26. Dontcha have to find yerself first?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

28. Our sick society only values making money.

It does not value creativity or artistry of any kind. Our society values conformity and buying stuff. It chews highly trained people up and spits them out.

Also, just because you get a business degree or law degree does not mean you will get a job. I earned a Juris Doctor and was unable to get a job with it. It made me even more overqualified than I was when I earned a B.A.



I was not encouraged to major in anything I was good at. I should have gotten an art degree but that wasn't allowed as it was "not practical".

[FarCenter]

30. Colleges should stop saying "Follow your dreams" when they enter college

If the student has been following their dreams for four years of college, they're screwed already.

At commencement time, they will commence falling off the cliff of dashed expectations.

[Marr]

31. Look, you're American, so scale it back it, alright?

[AnotherMcIntosh]

32. "Choose to be happy."

[MadrasT]

33. It's OK to follow your dreams if you do it with eyes wide open.

Unfortunately too many people do it with eyes shut tight, just figuring "It'll all work out somehow".

I *wanted* to major in music in college. I did major in art for 3 years... until I realized that the likelihood of me making a decent living was slim-to-none.

Changed my major to information science and that career path has made me financially comfortable and able to pursue things I enjoy *outside* of work.

It would be great if we could all make a living doing something we love but that just is not realistic.

My job is tolerable and I make a more than enough money doing it. That's good enough for me.

People need to realistically consider how to balance "stuff I like to do" with "viable career options". Not sure enough people take that into consideration. The professor has a point.

[hunter]

34. My dad is an artist. For some years he made his living teaching art.

When they defunded art in the school curriculum he taught science. Lucky for him he had an education that covered both. (His dad was an engineer who built rockets and sent men to the moon, just another sort of artist...)

My dad has been and always will be an artist, even when he was teaching science.

I think once you get into that "*outside* of work" place you've lost something.

[HiPointDem]

38. most people have lost something th

[treestar]

62. Somebody may have a passion for information science

People are thinking of music and art, and it is true that there is not much money to be made there except for the super-talented or connected. Acting, sports, and other things are like that too.

So if you are not one of those elite, there is still doing it as a hobby and finding something you like.

[reformist2]

40. I say pursue your interests... At this point, picking the "right" major is pretty much a crapshoot.

[Pelican]

41. Thought this was the extension of the "You aren't special" guy...

Went the other way though...

[backscatter712]

80. I keep thinking of this video...

[Libertas1776]

82. I like his speech better...

if you follow links from the TYT clip, u can watch the whole speech on youtube. It's very good. One thing he said that I really liked was "Climb the mountain so you can see the world...not so it can see you."

[Pragdem]

43. She's right. And you dreams should have nothing to do with which degree you pursue. nt

[liberal_at_heart]

44. Is this a public school or private?

I have to wonder if students at private schools get the same message. They probably hear things like "You are the future leaders of this country. Go out into the world, and become the next CEO or President of the United States."

[alp227]

99. It's the private college in Los Angeles where Barack Obama went from '79 to '81! n/t

[undergroundpanther]

45. This whole society

Is a set up to fail,if you have any moral core,any compassion or genuine wisdom.This culture grinds up the gentle ones,destroys the good heart,kills the compassion,and strangles the dreamer. It slowly murders the soul.

I hate this culture,and when I was young and tried to be part of it it traumatized me.I never will try to be and do what I am not again. I'm not evil enough or mean enough to value success in a world I cannot cope with where everything has a price tag hanging off it.

[DLevine]

56. That has been my experience as well. This culture rewards sociopaths. nt

[bhikkhu]

46. I always wonder what that would have been like...

Instead of going to college I went to work fixing cars. My reasoning was that I needed something to pay the bills that didn't occupy too much brain-space, as there were a number of more intellectual things I really wanted to pursue, but that pay very few people's bills.

So I opted out of the college path that might have been better for me all around, and might have put me on the path of making a living at things that truly interested me. Who knows how that would have gone.

In any case, 30 years later, even though I've never really even liked cars, I find that long practice has made me good at what I do. I'm paid well, and I've always been able to find work. Changing careers was always a hope (still paying college loans for an education degree), but once you have the blue-collar label stamped all over you resume, not likely. I suppose its silly after all to be good at something and not enjoy it, so I'm more or less at peace with my job now. And it does still leave me with plenty of time to pursue other interests.

Still, I do wonder what it would have been like, what I might have been like, if I chose my passions over security...

[JI7]

48. why does it have to be one or the other ?

can't people realize the world they live in and do what they need to get by but at the same time still hope for something better and try to get it ?

even realizing a dream in your 50s or an older age would be better than to just accept things as they are.

also people experience many things in life that they might not if they had avoided certain things thinking they wont happen.

[Quantess]

49. Bumper sticker truisms are always lousy advice.

Anybody who gives short quips as supposed gems of wisdom is not worth listening to.

[raccoon]

67. You should start a thread with this! nt

[Are_grits_groceries]

51. Meh!

Follow them!
You'll find out quickly if you can or should pursue them. Some will and some won't. Some will have the persistence and planning to move forward.

If you don't try, how will you ever know what you could accomplish?

Without the dreamers who pursued their dreams, this world would be a much sorrier place. A lot of writers, artists and others had to persevere to reach them. That's true in a lot of fields. All of us owe a lot to dreamers and future generations will depend on people who are dreaming now.

Be careful when you follow dreams and don't follow nightmares in disguise.

[magical thyme]

52. the sad thing for me is that had I followed my dreams

I had a good chance at being one of those lucky few. My dream started when I was just 11 years old and was in an field that was about to take off. I was fortunate to have been seen in my teens by a couple of top pros...one in his 70s who was fading out; the other in his 30s who was a 2-time national champion and about to become an Olympic coach. Another former Olympic coach also spotted my ability just a couple years later.

Unfortunately for me, my parents believed like the professor above and did me a "favor" by deliberately sabotaging me when I was in my teens and early 20s.

Life is competitive enough in the "fun" fields, without having family that sabotages your relationships and partnerships. They didn't need to support it. Just keep their vile hateful mean-spirits the fuck out of it

My life has been one of miserable muddling through, watching from the sidelines as people with far less talent made decent livings at my dream.

[riderinthestorm]

93. Oh magical thyme (((hugs))). You know my husband was one of the "lucky few"

and this life, while physically demanding, is a dream.

I so wish this had been a possibility for you.

I just have to say that while my husband has done it on the pro level, it really took "me" - the manager - to make it happen. If you didn't have that someone "else" to take over the rest.... it would have been impossible anyway.

I do EVERYTHING else while he rides and trains even now with 30 years of experience - he needs to always be out there so I do everything else. Changing the oil. Scheduling, booking entering and invoicing lessons, clinics, shows. Mowing, client and facility maintenance, advertising, website design, advertising, staffing (yes I speak Spanish - he doesn't), contract negotiations with sponsors, investments, horse/sales prospect searches... gah. Too much.

He would never have "made it" without me.

He thought he'd be a vet but dropped out of a biology program at SUNY Geneseo after 2 years because he was broke. He turned to horse training in desperation after 10 years helping Sue and Terry Williams get Abdullah to the Olympics as a teen. He'd done a ton of Abdullah's dressage work and got lucky with their reference. Right place, right time. He was also heavily respected in the Trakehner breeding world despite his young age - able to handle even the worst stallions....

I just don't know that anyone can make in this sport anymore without $$, serious patronage help, and top class references. Sure its possible to make it as a broke college kid sleeping in stalls helping at shows.

But damn. Its a harsh life.

Seriously? Its not all its cracked up to be....

[magical thyme]

100. it's ok, Rider, I re-read my post at work yesterday

and I thought of all the "what ifs" that could have happened had I not been sabotaged. I could have ended up even more miserable, lol...

I remembered that I gave up after a stint as a barn manager for Kathy Connelly. I saw that every single person who was "making it" had somebody paving the way somehow, including her. Her students had parents paying their horse's board and training; in at least one case, a student married money and went from living off his parents to living off his wife.

I also think about the occasional jerks at work and imagine one of them on my farm and shudder at the thought.

I've been fantasizing the last few weeks -- and am trying to save for it right now right after I take care of major home maintenance -- about picking up just 1 good, low-cost prospect, bringing them along and if they don't like dressage, sell and try again. I have my eye on a low-key, unraced tb mare (wouldn't train, not interested in running) with very good conformation, size and substance at a nearby track. She will probably be gone by the time I have some money free, but maybe another one just as nice or better will happen along. Unless I die of old age first...

I wish you were closer. I'm looking right now for a local trainer to help me get my mare through her "testing" phase. Once she accepts stuff, she is golden. She was very well behaved for her first 10 weeks under saddle last summer and fall. Then she entered the "testing" phase, as in, "No, you can't make me." Every other ride she has tried something different. So far I've been bucked off and hit in the face. Still in one piece, but she is so athletic and powerful that I concluded to try to push through this phase alone would be suicide. Your husband's experience with Trakehners would be invaluable right about now!

[riderinthestorm]

105. Good luck! I know many people make extra bucks with prospects that fall through the cracks

Sounds like that mare may be it...

As for your Arab mare... yeah. I don't know where you are located so no references here. We're in No IL. The only Arab cross dressage mare we have in the barn right now put up a shitfit when asked to stand quietly at the mounting block. 2 hours later my husband finally got her to stand. Quietly. To be mounted. She promptly reared up and fell over backwards on him as soon as he got in the saddle, cracking 2 ribs.


Needless to say, he wasn't amused.


As far as Kathy Connelly goes, well, now you know as I'm sure you know intimately. Most ALL top trainers have patrons unless they are individually wealthy. Robert Dover etc are heavily subsidized by patrons (most of them lovers).

Did you hear about Bill Gates' daughter in FL this past winter? He leased 5 Grand Prix horses for her to compete AND rented an estate in Wellington for more than a million bucks for the 5 months season. She's 15 yrs old.

You can't compete with that.

Alas.

[magical thyme]

106. my understanding is that arabians are all about bloodlines

according to a breeder/acquaintance from a few decades ago. There are certain bloodlines that are golden. Her horses were sweethearts and wouldn't rear, buck or bolt for anything (but hers lacked good conformation and athletic ability). Back in the 80s when the arab market crashed and truckloads were being shipped to slaughter, the top arab trainers in the country, Bill & Susan Bohls, bought up some of their client's herds and started their own breeding operation. (But not the herd my old gelding came from, lol.) The arabs they bought were golden -- beautiful conformation and gaits, but also beautiful minds and hearts, so safe for their amateur clients. As their trainers, they knew which bloodlines to buy. The rest are tough, tough, tough. You cannot "make" them do anything; you must win their hearts to get a willing partner or you will have pony mind in a very powerful body. My old gelding was essentially sweet, but deep down needed to be in control. He had to get me off every way possible, but just once. It seems he wanted to know my limits in order to "control" me. It took him years to figure out how to buck me off, but once he had he never did it again. But he would amuse himself by just getting me unseated a bit with little bucks before settling in to work. He also wouldn't hold still for mounting, until one day he finally managed to scoot out from under me and leave me eating dirt at the mounting block. And then he never did that again, and instead stood stock still to take care of me. He just needed to once, and then he took care of me. He also flipped on me once -- I jumped free and he landed right next to me. But then he rolled over me and used my back to hoist himself to his feet. I spent about 15-20 minutes as a quadriplegic and literally was just a head in the dirt before feeling and movement returned. I had a fractured sternum and deep tissue bruises that took 2-3 months to surface. I also sprained my knee badly, I think when I was jumping free. I consider that the most athletic feat I accomplished in my life. If you jump too soon you can pull them on top of you. Too late, and you can't get out from under them. But the momentum when they start to fall is enormous. There is no way to train for when to jump. I just remember my voice in my head saying, "No...No...No...NOW!" while my out loud voice was cussing up a storm. It all happens in slow motion...

The mare doesn't have his sense of humor or caretaking mind, and although she looks sweet and will cozy up and beg for treats from strangers like a dog, butter doesn't melt in her mouth. But once she accepts things, she is quite obedient and willing. She just needs to accept being ridden, but getting there could be lethal. For example, learning to accept the girth, at first she was very afraid. I proceeded very slowly and she lost her fear and seemed ok. Next season, I start very slowly again, but she had decided "no girth" and went crazy. Broke away from me inside the barn and tried to climb over the dutch door into the stall with the gelding. All you can do is stand back and let them have their tantrum. Once they accept, it's never a big deal again. This season, she tried to puff herself up but I don't give her anything to resist. I just leave the girth a little loose while putting on other tack until she's relaxed, and then gently tighten it. Lunge a little, tighten it the rest of the way. After a few days of that, and I can take it straight to riding tightness, especially once the weather is warm enough. They are very, very sensitive and intelligent, so it's also a matter of respecting that and allowing them the space to think things over and decide it is ok and safe. With lunging, she broke 2 sets of side reins that were long enough to start 16+ hand horses in (she's 14.3 with a short side of medium length neck). So I switched to vienna reins, which I prefer anyway. She tried to fight those, but they don't give her anything to fight, so she accepted them, but not quite. This spring, she had over the winter figured out being "on the bit." Soft, soft, soft and beautiful. And a few minutes later, rebelled without warning and hit me in the face. So I got off and put her on the lunge. She totally regressed and re-visited her fight with the vienna reins until she realized she can't "win" a fight or break them when there is nothing to fight. That will probably never happen again; she has totally accepted them and I can see it in her carriage. Even her winter blanket, on the 2nd winter I took a double-barreled kick and ended up with a cracked rib. Now, I can just toss it on without a thought (although I always am careful; she schooled me well).

Part of it is also climate. It is winter to them until it's at least 80 or 90 degrees. At 100 degrees they become totally different horses. We're melted into a puddle and they're finally comfortable, easy and willing. And diet matters. If you look at pictures of them in their home environment, they are bags of bones. They have been bred for centuries to run in desert heat on very, very little low grade fuel, and we overstuff them with premium and put them in a cold climate. I found with the gelding, and I'm seeing with the mare, that when they are overfed they become aggressive. Carbs are like angel dust or something in their system. I'm thinking I may need to move to the desert to keep her warm enough to relax. My 2 arab breeder friends both send horses out to two different top trainers and when their horses came back, announced that the trainers "starve them into submission." It's not starvation. It's an appropriate diet for the breed. They aren't meant to look like quarter horses.

As to Bill Gates, I have a personal hatred for him after he ruined the company where my career was at (Digital Equipment Corp). He destroys everything he touches. He is a lousy engineer and all about marketing and legal loopholes. Microsoft software sucks; there were much better products out there all along. And now his kind destroyed dressage, although I have to say the destruction started really back in the late 70s to early 80s. I saw an interview with him and Melinda Gates on PBS the other night. Frankly she looks like hell at this point; with all their money, her face has misery etched into it. The bad news is he read a book on fertilizer. The worse news is now he thinks he's an expert on agriculture so is planning to save the food supply. I see soyent green in our future. He also is designing a better nuclear reactor. Make that fluorescent soyent green because we'll all be glowing in the dark...

Back in the 80s, the Germans were very clever to change the judging rules to favor their horses. They saw the "adult amateur" market coming, and turned it into a market for oversized horses with fancy gaits, and money took over the dressage world. For a long time, they sold to us for top dollar horses that would have gone to slaughter. I remember Fritz Stecken pounding a table asking why Americans were importing the German horses. He considered thoroughbreds to be the best horses in the world. He said we had the best horses in the world right here. Instead, Americans being Americans, we tried to buy something that actually takes generations to grow.

I was there when Kathy Connelly was being helped financially by her father and dating Tad Coffin. At that point, she always smiled very sweetly while she was grinding you under her heels. Unlike Robert Dover who just wiped you off his boot and pretended he didn't notice you, as if you were a turd he accidentally stepped in. Luckily I had moved on when Tad traded Kathy in for a "caretaker" type. Word was she did not handle it well. 'Nuff said

Right now I have 2 part time jobs. In 3 years, I can start Social Security and lose one of the part time jobs. If I can also being doing some training up and selling, that could work...it would be nice ending. Postpone gratification until I can do it more on my own terms.

[sibelian]

110. That happened to me as well.

It's awful.

(((((magical thyme)))))

[Laelth]

53. I agree. That's cruel and unrealistic advice for all but the very rich. k&r n/t

-Laelth

[Buzz Clik]

57. Next she'll be telling us there are no silver linings in dark clouds.

What a cynic.

[backscatter712]

58. My current theory: Have two jobs.

One of them, of course, is the day job, which will probably suck, but is the one that has a paycheck and helps you pay the bills and keep a roof over your head.

The other one is your real job, the dream job. Unfortunately, for most people, that job doesn't pay well. Or at all. But that's the one you should pour your love and your blood, sweat and tears into. You've got nothing to lose.

[stevenleser]

102. That is basically my situation right now. The other thing I would advise is...

Have a plan A, B, C, and D, where plan A is what you would really like to do to earn money, plan B is your next choice, etc.

Put most of your effort in plan A and see what you can do to set yourself up to be able to do each one if necessary. Have plan C or D or both be extremely realistic and attainable options on which you know you can fall back.

[Safetykitten]

59. It is cruel and stupid.

[treestar]

60. After reading the comments

I'm thinking that advice to find a job you tolerate is awfully convenient for the corporatists and the 1%. Not sure it's inspiring, which graduate speeches ought to be.

[HughBeaumont]

63. Horatio Alger: Bullshit then and bullshit now.

I work on my dreams but I'm not stupid enough to think I'll ever get paid for them. That's a pie-in-the-sky thing.

[callous taoboy]

64. Yup, 6 more years until retirement, then I'll follow some dreams....

[hobbit709]

66. Most dreams turn into nightmares.

[raccoon]

68. "Is a dream a lie if it don't come true, or is it something worse?" -- Bruce Springsteen. nt

[HughBeaumont]

73. The Onion: Turning Satire Off For a Bit . . .

http://www.theonion.com/articles/find-the-thing-youre-most-passionate-about-then-do,31742/

I have always been a big proponent of following your heart and doing exactly what you want to do. It sounds so simple, right? But there are people who spend years—decades, even—trying to find a true sense of purpose for themselves. My advice? Just find the thing you enjoy doing more than anything else, your one true passion, and do it for the rest of your life on nights and weekends when you’re exhausted and cranky and just want to go to bed.

snip

Say, for example, that your passion is painting. Well, what are you waiting for? Get out there and buy a canvas and some painting supplies! Go sign up for art classes! And when you get so overwhelmed with your job and your personal life that you barely have enough time to see your girlfriend or boyfriend or husband or wife, let alone do anything else, go ahead and skip classes for a few weeks. Then let those paint brushes sit in your room untouched for six months because a major work project came up and you had a bunch of weddings to go to and your kid got sick and money is tighter than you thought it would be and you have to work overtime. And then finally pick those brushes back up again only to realize you’re so rusty that you begin to question whether this was all a giant waste of time, whether you even want to paint anymore, and whether this was just some sort of immature little fantasy you had as a kid and that maybe it’s finally time to grow the fuck up, let painting go, and join the real world because, let’s face it, not everyone gets to live out their dreams.

Not only does that sound fulfilling, but it also sounds pretty fun.

Really, the biggest obstacle to overcome here—aside from every single obligation you have to your friends, family, job, and financial future—is you. And I’ll tell you this much: You don’t want to wake up in 10 years and think to yourself, “What if I had just gone after my dreams during those brief 30-minute lunch breaks when I was younger?” Because even if it doesn’t work out, don’t you owe it to yourself to look in the mirror and confidently say, “You know what, I gave it my best half-hearted shot”?

[4_TN_TITANS]

75. After graduation, it took awhile to figure out

how to translate an English degree to business use. Customer interaction is what I'm best at.

I'm not following any dreams or passions, I just went with what I was good at - communication.

[patrice]

76. Dynamic balance + Isn't it to be expected that a dysfunctional culture would produce inflated

"dreams", or deflated ones for that matter too, out of relatively in-authentic self-concepts?

Self-concept is a very market driven trait and all of us know how markets induce bias and, hence, warp.

[cbdo2007]

81. "Follow your dreams" isn't only about getting a job, it is about living a good life.

Without dreams there is nothing to strive for.

[YoungDemCA]

86. Without a roof over your head and food to eat, there's nothing to strive for either...

Just saying.

[cbdo2007]

91. except food and shelter. We all have different levels of dreams and goals.

[snagglepuss]

83. .

[YoungDemCA]

85. The issue is that we a society and system that equates happiness with wealth and status...

...and a society that is unbearably cruel to those who don't have wealth and status.

The reality is that "following your passion" is a privilege, not a right. Ideally it would be a right, but most people don't have that luxury.

[jrandom421]

87. Scott Adams' take on this

[hunter]

104. But Dilbert is a miserable little man living in his own self-imposed hell.

He might be happier marrying the daughter of an Elbonian pig farmer and raising pigs, but we have no idea what his dreams are or were.

They've been burned out of him.

[jrandom421]

88. Harry Chapin's take on this

[flamingdem]

98. She should just say "Look student you're

f**ked"

[WCGreen]

101. All I got from that advice was a restraining order....