You know how people say that, behaviourally, you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with? Have we ever stopped to consider how much our profession influences the kind of people we meet and work with? Given that most of us spend around 9-to-5 working each day, I'm pretty sure most of our daily interactions as adults are tied to our professions.

This thought entered my mind while idling in line, at the grocery store checkout counter. I noticed each customer exchanging pleasantries with the cashier. One after another, they made generic comments about how beautiful the day was or how the winter was finally thawing out. By the time it was my turn, I realised I didn’t even know what to say. So I just exchanged a smile, lost in these thoughts.

For the customers, this is just one interaction during a grocery store visit. But for the cashier, those brief exchanges make up the majority of their interactions for the day. Contrast this with, say, a lawyer, who might spend their downtime chatting with colleagues about world news. Or someone working at a startup, discussing notable funding rounds a friend might have raised. Our daily interactions—the conversations we have, the people we meet—shape our perceptions of the world in profound ways.

I’ve been reflecting on this a lot. When I used to talk with people about career aspirations, we would focus on what we wanted to achieve. We talked about why we wanted to be engineers and how much we’d earn, or how, as lawyers, some of us would argue in court and save lives. But none of us ever imagined what our lives would look like as a whole—what we’d actually spend most of our time doing. Not the glamorous moments with capes or piles of money, but the everyday reality.

And now I wonder: is that why some people genuinely love what they do? Maybe they were the ones who thought about the whole picture beforehand. They set realistic expectations and embraced the journey—not just the destination.

How often does a law student consider the endless research and sleepless nights they’ll face as an associate? Or do computer science students think beyond creating an MVP (minimum viable product) to what it takes to make a startup profitable and sustainable?

I think people often confuse job satisfaction with contentment. If we understood the realities and set our expectations accordingly, we could plan ahead for the less glamorous parts of a job and approach them with effort and awareness—especially when passion just doesn't cut it.