dream job : The Art of Non-Conformity

Profiles

Swiss Man Finds Dream Job Mushing Sled Dogs in Alaska

Sven Haltmann went from a miserable office job existence to living his dream life in Alaska, with not just one but two dream jobs. He now spends his winters mushing and his summers running a hostel, meeting guests from around the world.

I used to work for a health insurance company in Switzerland. Even though I loved everyone that I worked with, I hated the job so much that I wanted to shoot myself in the head every Sunday thinking about the start of a new week.
Since I was only 20 and already miserable, I knew I had to do something different to change the path I was headed down. I applied as a tour guide in Greece, got the job and worked on the island of Crete for three years during the summer. Unsure of what to do during the winter, I applied to work for a dog musher who competed in the Iditarod trail sled dog race.

Profiles

How One Woman Left A Busy NYC Life To Become an Accidental Entrepreneur

Rosie Yakob calls herself an accidental entrepreneur because she’s loved nearly every job she’s had, so never really considered starting her own business. But eventually, the constant busyness of life in NYC became too much.

I loved my job right up until the very end. Which meant I had a lot of explaining to do, as my now husband and I were preparing to leave NYC. “You loved your job!” my friends exclaimed. “Where are you going? For how long? What’s next?” everyone asked, both thrilled and frustrated with my vague response of “Traveling. Who knows!”
When we left NYC, we were surrounded by people who were constantly busy. This culture exists in many places, but we found the answer so unbelievably common in NYC. Even I found myself responding to “How are you?” with the dreaded “b” word. While I loved my job, I always clarified to those who commented on my love for the work that I was “working to live, as opposed to living to work.”
How quickly we trade happiness for business, or busyness, especially when it comes to work and salaries.

Profiles

Connecting the Dots to a Dream Job in the Hemp Industry

Annie Rouse has been passionate about hemp ever since she was a kid growing up in Kentucky. While she knew she wanted to help change the restrictive hemp policies in the U.S., she’s also had some interesting jobs along the way that helped her out in surprising ways.

As a leader in the hemp industry she's now started a hemp foundation, a certification program, and a commercial marketplace.

My job history is like that Steve Jobs quote “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.” While giving out free beer, designing sunglasses and monitoring water quality didn’t seem connected at the time, now I can look back and see how all the different jobs have helped get me where I am now.

Profiles

How One Woman Started a Location-Independent Company Right Out of College

Michelle Rødgaard-Jessen went from a corporate gig, to a social change organization and finally landed on running her own business from the road. As an online marketer, she's narrowed her target audience and grown to the point where she's had to hire employees to keep up with the demand.

My name is Michelle. I'm from Denmark, and I’m a location-independent online marketer. I’ve had a lot of different jobs before this, including supermarket clerk and cleaner when I was in high school, and volunteering in a hospital in Costa Rica. During university I worked for a pharmaceutical company and focused on preparing myself for a job in the corporate world when I graduated.
The last year of my university studies I decided to study in Beijing. When I was in China I was lucky enough to be offered a remote job at a small Danish company who needed market research in China. It was this remote job that opened my eyes to even more possibilities. I hadn’t realized it was possible to create and work remotely.

Profiles

From Bad News to Whole Foods: One Woman’s Path to Entrepreneurship

A stay-at-home mom turned foodpreneur, Sundara Clark called on years of experience in the industry to fill a hole in the dessert aisle. After getting a lactose intolerance diagnosis for her daughter, Sundara set to work creating an organic, vegan, paleo gelato that her daughter could enjoy, without any of the mom-guilt.

After five years as a stay at home mom, I was ready to jump back into the economy. Only problem was, in Humboldt, California where I was living, jobs were few and far between. Since I wasn’t inclined to be a lumberjack or marijuana farmer, I knew I was going to have to strike out on my own. I just wasn’t quite sure what that was yet. I’ve worked in all parts of the food industry - served in restaurants, made fancy desserts, and done sales and purchasing for a food distributor. While I was growing up, my mom worked as a distributor for a then-fledgling company called Odwalla. In retrospect, it makes sense that I got into the food business, but it actually started with a bit of bad news.

Profiles

“Getting rejected led to starting my own business”: One Man’s Journey to Year-Round Summer Camp

Blake Boles is one of the lucky ones: at a young age he knew exactly what made him happy. With that clarity of vision, he created Unschool Adventures, a company that designs and runs multi-week experiences for teens and young adults—and created his own dream job in the process.

When I was 11 I went away to summer camp for the first time: two weeks of total bliss in the High Sierras of California. The instructors I met there were mythical, almost god-like figures with hard skills (like how to roll a kayak), soft skills (like comforting a homesick camper), and an exuberance I'd never encountered before in my young life.
I decided immediately that I wanted to become like them.

Profiles

Woman Finds Her Dream Job in the Land of Milk and Honey

After 10 years, multiple career moves, and dozens of job titles, Nicole Buergers has finally found her dream job as an entrepreneurial beekeeper and cheesemonger. Have you ever heard of such a combination? Here's how she tells the story:

While I have my dream job now, it’s taken quite a peculiar journey to get here. Throughout my life I've juggled multiple jobs at once and been "the queen of the side hustle." Normally, I would have a 9-5 job to pay the bills and at least one part-time passion job on the side.

Profiles

“Turning 50 Is Extremely Liberating”: One Woman’s Path to Her Dream Job

I love second act stories! It's never too late (or too early, for that matter) to create a new life for yourself and change the world while you're at it. Tonya Hobbs took a big risk, and she couldn't be happier.

Here’s her story:

Finding the work I was born to do was the result of a full-blown, midlife-crisis. I had changed careers and returned to school for a master’s degree in social work at age 40, but as 50 approached I was plagued by the question “Is this all there is?”
I worked in a field I loved. My job was never done. Yet I longed for something more... I just had no idea what “more” really meant.

Work

Don’t Join the Popularity Contest: Make It Happen Yourself

Many times a day, I hear from someone who asks for help promoting a cause. They have something they're working on and want to share it with me—totally fine. I generally like to help as many people as possible. Being helpful relates to feeling happy, at least for me, and it's also a nice thing to do. Some of these requests, however, come in the form of “vote for me and spread the word” pitches—and these I feel less comfortable with.