A very interesting statement of one of our contemporaries is that any person, to one degree or another, is both a psychologist and a philosopher - they say, life forces him to. On the one hand, the main driving force of every person is the craving for knowledge, the desire to reach certain social heights, the desire to be wise in any everyday situations - and this is the philosophy of life. How to Analyze People on Sight by Elsie Lincoln Benedict (best contemporary novels txt) 📖
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Misdirected Mothering
¶ A very unfortunate case came to our attention several years ago. In Chicago a mother brought her eighteen-year-old son to us for vocational counsel. "I am determined that James shall be a minister," she said. "My whole happiness depends upon it. I have worked, slaved and sacrificed ever since his father died that he might have the education for it. Now I want you to tell James to be a minister."
We refused to take the case, explaining that our analyses didn't come to order but had to fit the facts as we found them. She still insisted upon the analysis. It revealed the fact that James was deficient mentally, save in one thing. His capacity for observing was lightning-like in its swiftness and microscopic in its completeness. And his capacity for judging remote motives from immediate actions was uncannily accurate.
He was a human ferret, as had been proven many times during his boyhood. At one time the jewelry store in which he worked as a shipping clerk lost a valuable necklace, and after the police of Chicago had failed to find a clew, James' special ability was reported and he was given a week's vacation to work on the case. He took the last three days for a long-desired trip to Milwaukee. He had landed the thief in the first four. We told the mother that her boy's ability was about the farthest removed from the ministerial that could well be imagined, but that he would make an excellent detective.
"I shall never permit it!" she cried. "His father was a policeman. I distrust that whole class of people! I am taking James to the theological seminary tomorrow"—and away she went with him. Two months later she came to us in great distress. She had received a letter from the Dean saying James had attended but one day's classes. Then he had announced that he was going home. Instead he had cultivated a gang of underworld crooks for the purpose of investigating their methods and had gotten into serious trouble.
¶ Never choose a vocation just because it looks profitable. It won't bring profits to you long unless you are built for it.
Never choose a vocation just because it looks easy. No work will be easy for you except that which Nature intended for you.
Never choose a vocation just because it permits the wearing of good clothes. You need more than a permit; you need ability.
Never choose a vocation just because the hours are short. You can't fool employers that way. They also know they are short, and pay you accordingly. The extra play these leisure hours give you will amount to nothing but loss to you ten years hence.
Never choose a vocation just because it is popular or sounds interesting.
"I am going to be a private secretary," said a young woman near us at the theater recently.
"What will you have to do?" asked her friend.
"Oh, I don't know," the girl answered, "but it sounds so fascinating, don't you think?"
Never turn your back on a profession just because it is old-fashioned, middle class or ordinary. If you have talents fitting you for such vocations you are lucky, for these are the ones for which there is the greatest demand. Demand is a big help. If you can add a new touch to such a one you are made.
¶ Never choose a vocation just because your friends are in it, nor refuse another just because your worst enemy is in it.
Two friends come to mind in this connection. One is a splendid woman we knew at college. She became a German teacher and up to the outbreak of the War had an instructorship in a western state university. The elimination of German lost her the position.
"Why did you ever choose German, anyhow, Ruth?" we asked her. "Your abilities lie in such a different direction."
"Because my favorite teacher in high school taught German," she replied.
¶ An opposite case is that of a friend of ours who has worked in an uncongenial profession for thirty years. "You were meant for engineering, Tom," we told him. "With all the leanings you had in that direction, how did it happen you didn't follow it?"
"Because the man who cheated my father out of all he had was an engineer!" he said.
Never choose a new vocation just because you are restless. You will be more so if you get into the wrong one.
¶ Never choose a vocation just because it promises social standing. The entree it gives will fail you unless you make good. And social standing isn't worth much anyhow. When you are in the work for which you were born you won't worry about social standing. It will come to you then whether you want it or not. And when it does you will care very little about it.
¶ Never take a certain job for life just because people are dependent upon you. Save enough to live one month without a job, preparing yourself meanwhile for an entering wedge into a vocation you do like. Then take a smaller-paying place if necessary to get started. If you really like the work you will do it so well you will promote yourself. You owe it to those who are dependent upon you to do this.
¶ Never do anything just to show you can. Don't let your versatility tempt you into following a number of lines of work for the purpose of demonstrating your ability. Versatility can be the greatest handicap of all; it tempts you to neglect intensive study, to flit, to become a "jack of all trades and master of none."
¶ There are but three general classes of work. They are:
WORK WITH PEOPLE;
WORK WITH THINGS;
WORK WITH IDEAS.
Each individual is fitted by nature to do one of these better than the others and there will be one class for which he has the least ability. In the other one of the three he might make a mediocre success. Every individual should find a vocation furnishing that one of these three kinds of work for which he has the greatest ability. Then he should go into the particular branch of that vocation which is best adapted to his personality, training, education, environment and experience.
Part One VOCATIONS FOR ALIMENTIVES
¶ As stated in Chapter I, Alimentives are born for business. They can sell almost anything in the line of food, clothing, or shelter because they are so interested in them themselves they can make them interesting to others. They like money for the comforts which money alone can bring and business furnishes a wider field for money-making than any other. So the Alimentive likes the commercial world for itself and for what it brings him.
¶ The Alimentive can deal with both people and things, but it should be in the capacity of selling the things to the people.
¶ The Alimentives have the greatest opportunities today for making fortunes and many of the multi-millionaires of America are combinations of this type with the Cerebral. This is due to the fact that the world must be fed, clothed and sheltered and the Alimentive, more than any other type, excels in the marketing, manufacturing and merchandizing of these things.
¶ The Alimentive makes an excellent overseer also. He is so genial, likable and yet so bent on saving himself work that he can get more work out of others than can any other type.
So he succeeds as a foreman, supervisor, boss, superintendent, manager and sales department head.
¶ The Alimentive loves comforts. He feels he must have them. Because any man's success will be found to lie in the direction which most nearly satisfies his basic instincts, the Alimentive succeeds by making "the good things of life" look so interesting to others they are willing to buy them from him at the best prices.
¶ Every man who is largely Alimentive in type can sell commodities or oversee the work of others. Every woman who is largely Alimentive can also sell the same commodities, oversee the work of others in her department and become a good cook.
¶ The Alimentive should avoid vocations dealing exclusively with ideas. Books are almost the only things an Alimentive can not sell successfully. This is due to the fact that he is not as interested in ideas as in things, and the things he is interested in—food and comforts—are the farthest removed from books.
¶ When he goes into partnership the Alimentive should endeavor to do so with a practical Muscular, a clever Thoracic or another Alimentive.
¶ He should avoid as partners the pure Cerebrals and the pure Osseous. The former are too high brow and visionary for him, and the Osseous are too critical of his easy ways.
¶ The Alimentive, when looking for employment, should try to avoid the boss who is a pure Cerebral or a pure Osseous. The Cerebral may be a good planner but his plans and those of the Alimentives will not work well together. The Cerebral can not see the Alimentive's point of view clearly enough to forgive him for his too primitive methods. The pure Osseous boss soon becomes disgusted because the Alimentive is so lacking in system. He usually comes out all right in the end, but the orderly Osseous is too exasperated by what he considers the Alimentive's slackness, to wait for the end.
¶ The Alimentive should avoid all frontiers. He can not work well without conveniences, and since these are few and far between in unsettled regions it is much more difficult for him to be a success there.
¶ Cooking, catering, nursing, merchandizing of all food and drink stuffs, the conducting of cafes, restaurants, hotels, cafeterias, rest rooms and all places maintained for the ease, comfort and feeding of mankind, are the general vocations for pure or extreme Alimentives.
¶ The merchandizing of the artistic, novel and esthetic in food, clothing and shelter; conducting of tea rooms, confectionery stores, smart specialty and clothing shops. Salesmanship of restricted residence districts, fancy cars, etc.
¶ The merchandizing of more practical commodities such as potatoes, meat, middle class homes, durable clothing. Alimentive-Muscular women make excellent dressmakers.
¶ Merchandizing of farms, ranches, timber, lumber, hardware. Bond salesmanship.
¶ Merchandizing, manufacturing and marketing of food, clothing and shelter commodities on a large scale in world markets. This type combination exists in most of the world's millionaires.
¶ The Thoracic type works best with people. Every person in whom this type predominates will make his greatest success only in vocations bringing him into contact with people.
¶ As we have pointed out, the Thoracic is a born entertainer. His greatest abilities lie in the direction of the stage and all forms of its activities.
¶ The Thoracic loves the approval and applause of others. He is clever, dazzling, often scintillating, brilliant and magnetic. All these enable him to win fame behind the foot-lights, upon the screen and in many lines of theatrical work. His gregarious instincts also enable him to make a success of work
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