3 Simple Tips for Choosing a Career Path Early

1. Take a good look at what you like to do.

Do you enjoy drawing or writing? A career in marketing or design might make sense. Did you always have the coolest ant hill on the block? Maybe you could look into a career in biology. Do you spend your days sitting on the couch eating gourmet nachos? A career in TV or food might be in your future.

Head on over to our Careers section, where you can browse by field to see what kind of options you're looking at.

2. Figure out how much you want to make.

Is what you love doing going to make you enough money to support yourself and maybe a family? Will you be able to live the life you want to live and own the yachts you want to own?

Being a poet sounds fancy, but… those guys and gals usually have to take on a second—and third and fourth—job to pay the bills. Your calling might be to become the coolest mall Santa in the world, but, uh, that's seasonal. What will you do for the other 11 months of the year?

You can browse by salary in our Careers section to see what kind of money you might be able to make in your chosen career. If it doesn't match the lifestyle you want to live, you'll have a lot of thinking to do.

3. Talk to people around you.

What do your parents like and hate about their jobs? How about your parents' friends? Your older coworkers? Getting the inside info can be huge. If you can actually shadow someone on the job, that's even better. For example, you may love the idea of being a vet; but what if when you actually went into a clinic, you found that sick animals is not something you (or your stomach) can cope with? It's good to figure that out now, before you spend $100,000 on a degree you'll never use.