Each person has particular interests, which generate pleasure and are related to personal experience. For example, if a person has an interest in handicrafts, he or she must have done it at some point so that it can be considered as a pleasurable activity. Thus, interests are those preferences that have already been experienced and cause pleasure, while tastes are those things that we have not necessarily practiced, tried or known, but for some reason attract us. For example, a person may like handicrafts despite not having done them.
This is how tastes for things can be practically infinite, but interests are something more selective, such as an interest in research, reading, writing, social change or anything else.
But when it comes to the world of work, tastes and interests are not always involved. And in fact, it is estimated that if a person does a job with an extra motivation, beyond the economic factor, that is to say, satisfaction brought by the work itself, the performance of the worker is much better. Therefore, the most advisable thing is to do a job with the greatest possible pleasure. In this way, the company earns thanks to your work, and at the same time you gain certain economic stability thanks to the fruit of your effort.
How do you identify your tastes and interests?
Now that you know what tastes and interests are, you just need to know how to identify them. To do so, we recommend you to ask yourself the following questions:
- What are the daily activities you enjoy the most?
- What are the personal experiences that have given you the most pleasure?
- What are the topics you are most curious about?
- When you look at social networks, what are the contents that attract your attention the most?
- What are the activities and/or topics you want to learn more about?
It is worth considering both your lived experiences and those things that are part of your daily life, such as your hobbies, pastimes, activities that are easy to do, those contents that you prefer to read or research, your favorite subjects, the things you admire the most in other people, and so on.
Then it’s just a matter of exploring those areas of work that appeal to you and in which specific job you feel you can perform well. It’s worth taking your time to research specific jobs in order to find the one that will really satisfy you. If you finally find a job where you see problems you want to solve, you’ve probably already found your ideal occupation.
As you can see, this is the result of self-reflection, where you must explore all those things that bring you curiosity and pleasure and then determine those related areas. Sometimes, the result can be totally unexpected but satisfying.
Tastes and interests, how can you relate them to the world of work?
Although it may seem incredible, identifying what you like can sometimes be a bit complicated because this type of reflective acts requires meditation and time. In fact, having skills for something does not mean that you really like or are interested in it. Therefore, here there are some tips to consider when identifying your tastes and interests:
- They change over the course of life: as the years go by, some interests may diminish, while others are maintained and some new interests are generated. The fact that you liked something 5 years ago may not seem so relevant today.
- Hobbies don’t always become a vocation: you may like to exercise and that makes you feel good, but it doesn’t mean you have the passion to do it professionally. Sometimes hobbies may well help guide you, but it does not mean that this is explicitly the way to go.
- The tastes for certain subjects does not mean that you will work on it: for example, in the case that someone has a taste for physics, it does not necessarily mean that she or he will become a physicist; because it is a subject that is related to many other work areas such as engineering, architecture or even daily life. Considering your point of view, analyze what specific areas of that subject you like and how you would be interested in applying them at the work level.
If you calmly consider each of the aspects mentioned above, you will be able to make a decision that goes in favor of your tastes and interests. Remember that you should do it calmly and take your time so that you can achieve satisfactory results. In addition, if you consider that something specific really interests you, you just need to do a little more research about it. Nowadays, you have infinite probabilities and ways to get answers to your questions, so make the most of it!
