Careers for "left-brained" people with an extreme Percieving preference

[ygolo]

I have a lot of interests that take technical skills, and am reasonably good at these things.

However, I have a horrible time focusing on "assignments." I really prefer to work on whatever strikes my curiosity at whatever time.

I realize that artists can often work in this manner.

But what about technical individuals?

Are there careers for people who have an extreme preference towards unscheduled activity, and a preference for so-called "left-brained" fields?

For me in particular, the fields are:
physics, math, computer science (theoretical), software engineering, electrical engineering (both theoretical and practical), mechanical engineering (both theoretical and practical), chemistry (just learning now), psychology (just learning now), philosophy (just learning now), economics (just learning now), finance (just learning now), biotechnology (just learning about now), and probably a lot more things that are deemed "left-brained."

The main questions that need to be answered are:
1) What are the markets that are flexible enough that I will have "customers?"

I was thinking, publication in journals, submitting inventions to manufacturers, and working financial markets are examples of the type of thing, I was thinking about​

2) How do I make enough to support myself in a reliable manner?

Somehow, I have to extract enough predictability to pay my bills regularly. I'm not sure how to do that.​

3) What resources should I secure for myself?
4) How do I break the news to parents, and perhaps a significant other, in a way that it is acceptable?

In the late 19th century, people like Edison, Tesla, and Armstrong (I think) would have fit this mold. But I don't know how to go about this life-style in the modern era. It's almost like you have to have one great invention before you can spend time inventing.

 

[wildcat]

I have a lot of interests that take technical skills, and am reasonably good at these things.

However, I have a horrible time focusing on "assignments." I really prefer to work on whatever strikes my curiosity at whatever time.

I realize that artists can often work in this manner.

But what about technical individuals?

Are there careers for people who have an extreme preference towards unscheduled activity, and a preference for so-called "left-brained" fields?

For me in particular, the fields are:
physics, math, computer science (theoretical), software engineering, electrical engineering (both theoretical and practical), mechanical engineering (both theoretical and practical), chemistry (just learning now), psychology (just learning now), philosophy (just learning now), economics (just learning now), finance (just learning now), biotechnology (just learning about now), and probably a lot more things that are deemed "left-brained."

The main questions that need to be answered are:
1) What are the markets that are flexible enough that I will have "customers?"

I was thinking, publication in journals, submitting inventions to manufacturers, and working financial markets are examples of the type of thing, I was thinking about​

2) How do I make enough to support myself in a reliable manner?

Somehow, I have to extract enough predictability to pay my bills regularly. I'm not sure how to do that.​

3) What resources should I secure for myself?
4) How do I break the news to parents, and perhaps a significant other, in a way that it is acceptable?

In the late 19th century, people like Edison, Tesla, and Armstrong (I think) would have fit this mold. But I don't know how to go about this life-style in the modern era. It's almost like you have to have one great invention before you can spend time inventing.

You are an extreme right brainer, is that what you are saying?
I am a little slow in understanding.

 

[Orangey]

It seems to me like he's saying that he's more of a right-brain person, but he prefers the subject matter of left-brain oriented fields.

 

[kyuuei]

I think inventing should be a tinkering hobby on the side of your job. If you succeed, all the better, if you don't, it was merely a hobby.

I've found that my job, an unscheduled and relaxed one as it is, even have assignments I dread. I don't think you can completely wriggle out of those, unfortunately.

If it's technicals you like though. The dude we work with gets paid to work on other people's websites for them. Like for example: We run a skin care website.. We don't know much about programming and such, but we know what we want and such. We provide and upload pictures, write-ups, input, etc. and he does what he can to improve our site, help design it, post it in adverts and such. Not exactly structured, you work on your own time and schedule, but it's self motivating.

I'm sorry I don't have much more for you to work with.

 

[wildcat]

It seems to me like he's saying that he's more of a right-brain person, but he prefers the subject matter of left-brain oriented fields.

Thank you Orangey.

I wonder why he thinks some or most of those fields are more for the left brained than for the right brained.

 

[Jae Rae]

I was the same way with math until I started to need it for my trading systems. As my systems get increasingly sophisticated I am in need of increasingly more sophisticated math. I have no trouble focusing on math now. The problem is my math is rusty. No big deal. I start things from scratch all the time.[/FONT][/COLOR]

You need to find what motivates you. Where is your passion? You seem kind of like me. You should give trading a shot. I can focus on trading endlessly. Try to focus more on automated trading systems. Avoid too much manual trading. You will bleed cash.

Could you explain what you mean? I thought you meant trading as in stocks, but then what the heck is manual trading? Do you mean you have a formula to automatically trade when they hit a certain point, but some are traded outside that system using some other criteria?

 

[ygolo]

I think inventing should be a tinkering hobby on the side of your job. If you succeed, all the better, if you don't, it was merely a hobby.

Inventing "on the side" is pretty hard, since that means all my time will be spent on technical stuff. I would like to spend my work time on it, and then spend other time doing whatever. I suppose that means almost all my time would be unstructured.

I was the same way with math until I started to need it for my trading systems. As my systems get increasingly sophisticated I am in need of increasingly more sophisticated math. I have no trouble focusing on math now. The problem is my math is rusty. No big deal. I start things from scratch all the time.

You need to find what motivates you. Where is your passion? You seem kind of like me. You should give trading a shot. I can focus on trading endlessly. Try to focus more on automated trading systems. Avoid too much manual trading. You will bleed cash.

I don't know if I found my passion.

I have been learning to trade. Stock options mostly. I have been most successful trading credit spreads against short-term when they hit resistance/support in a long-term trend moving the opposite direction of the short-term trend.

Thank you Orangey.

I wonder why he thinks some or most of those fields are more for the left brained than for the right brained.

I meant that they are often thought about as "technical" or "left-brained," even they are not.

Could you explain what you mean? I thought you meant trading as in stocks, but then what the heck is manual trading? Do you mean you have a formula to automatically trade when they hit a certain point, but some are traded outside that system using some other criteria?

I trade manually. But I want to get some sort of program-trade system set-up. I don't trust my system enough (yet) to do it professionally.

 

[Risen]

I think inventing should be a tinkering hobby on the side of your job. If you succeed, all the better, if you don't, it was merely a hobby.

I've found that my job, an unscheduled and relaxed one as it is, even have assignments I dread. I don't think you can completely wriggle out of those, unfortunately.

If it's technicals you like though. The dude we work with gets paid to work on other people's websites for them. Like for example: We run a skin care website.. We don't know much about programming and such, but we know what we want and such. We provide and upload pictures, write-ups, input, etc. and he does what he can to improve our site, help design it, post it in adverts and such. Not exactly structured, you work on your own time and schedule, but it's self motivating.

I'm sorry I don't have much more for you to work with.

Yes, I love doing that. My neighbor hired me to do pretty much the same thing for a couple months; just making profiles and adding information to his websites to beef them up and generate traffic. It was really cool because it basically required me to do something that was fairly routine, but also required my creative input. It's a very good combination.

 

[yenom]

rfocus on one thing and ignore all the other. I see strong growth in the biotech industry in the future, and you should focus on this. Some knowledge og economics is also very useful in the real world.

 

[Jack Flak]

In the late 19th century, people like Edison, Tesla, and Armstrong (I think) would have fit this mold. But I don't know how to go about this life-style in the modern era. It's almost like you have to have one great invention before you can spend time inventing.

This gets to me often, as I feel cheated out of a career of "intuitive engineering," which is how it was done for thousands of years. Now it's more likely to be an employed engineer being an SJ, studious and mindful of details, and that's not my bag.

 

[ygolo]

I really want to be a general inventor without the confines of corporations or academia.

I think dealing with fundamental forces with an engineer's eye is the closest I can get to being a Tesla-like inventor.

So I am looking into Ph. D. programs in High Energy Physics (both theory and experiment).

It actually seems to have the array of interests I like, minus the life and social scieces and finance.

 

[tinkerbell]

Market Research - you get to research all the topics you enjoy and apply your maths and people skills

 

[ygolo]

Market Research - you get to research all the topics you enjoy and apply your maths and people skills

First, I don't really have people skills.

But as far as my interests go...

Really? That's hardly the impression I get.

When I say "Math" I generally mean the conceptual version, not the computational version. Though proficiency at one is needed for the other, the use of computers has made computational math a button pushing process.

 

[Venom]

its awesome to want to invent crazy stuff. But Tesla was a once in a millennia mind.

This is the way it works: an intuitive genius has crazy revolutionary ideas, and then then next many generations spends their days being unintuituitve trying to fully explore those ideas. Thats where we are now. There just isnt "room" to go make intuitive inventions, because we are still getting plenty technical with what we've got. Thats why you feel boxed into being only systematic in those fields you have interest in.

 

[speculative]

Make sure to incorporate some right-brain action into whatever you do so there is some balance there. Left-brain-only work is either being outsourced to India, or to computers one or the other: Amazon.com: A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future: Daniel H. Pink: Books The trick is to incorporate some right-brain into the left-brain work to stay in demand...