• Blog
  • Archives
  • Bio
  • Awards
  • Speaking
  • Book
  • Contact

The unglamourous work you love

Published: Thursday, 28 February 2013

I love the process of getting an idea, making a plan around it, and then bringing it to the world.  It usually involves a lot of emailing, fleshing out a plan, meeting with people, learning, designing, daydreaming…

It's not very glamourous, but I just love it so much, and find it so invigorating.

And then if I've done it successfully, good things happen in the world to a lot of people.

And if I've done it unsuccessfully, then I look at what went wrong, and I try again.

It's the whole process of always trying to improve myself, learn more, and then see the impact of that on the world, that gets me excited.

And that's why people tell you to follow your passions.  Because you're going to be spending most of your time working on unglamorous things with a bunch of people who are working on their own unglamorous tasks to make a bigger project happen.  And if you don't enjoy that, well then life's not going to be very fun.

But no one sees that.  All people see is the glamour and glitz of winning awards, receiving publicity, and hobnobbing with celebrities.  But all that glamour takes up such a tiny fraction of it all.  And is just a lot of filming and camera flashes to capture a tiny fraction of time, and then distributing that far and wide.

The work you do though, and bringing that to the world - that takes ages.  And no one would want to capture it, because it's so unglamorous - just doing the same tasks over and over again.

So follow your passions and do what you love.  Because living a successful life isn't about fame or awards or external kudos.  A successful life is one where you live each day striving to make yourself better in an area you're passionate about.

About Me

Marita ChengForbes named me a world's top 50 woman in tech & 30 Under 30. I founded Robogals and Aipoly and was Young Australian of the Year 2012. Currently working on robotics company Aubot. I'm the youngest Member of the Order of Australia (AM) and I give speeches around the world.

I tweet @maritacheng and I'm on Facebook.

Subscribe

Enter your email address to receive my latest blog posts: 

 

Random Articles

  • You’re not a failure, you just haven’t found your passion

    When I was 17, I came 3rd in an international Japanese speaking contest. However, I don’t do anything about my Japanese studies now. The year prior, I got...

  • Turn off the noise

    The world is so noisy!  Every day there's the breaking news through your multiple most trusted news sources; there's the buzz of your twitter and...

  • Scrap paper

    I write all my blog posts on scrap paper. I printed so many speeches last year that I have all these A4 scrap sheets of paper that just have...

  • Q&A

    Q&A on ABC alongside two Nobel Laureates:  Peter Doherty and Brian Schmidt, Chief Scientist of Australia Ian Chubb and respected microbiologist...

  • How to choose your projects

    Ask yourself: 1.  What do I want to learn? 2. What do I already know? Then: 3.  Devise a project you’re interested in that involves others - Create a...

  • Hardy Group interview

    The Hardy Group invited me to speak with them about healthcare, robotics and leadership.  Here I am riffing about those topics!

  • How successful are you?

    “I go to Imperial College”, “I’m applying to MIT”, “I play bowls for my county”, or “I’m a pro-series gamer” means nothing to the person who doesn’t know...

  • YouthActionNet Global Fellowship Day 2: Look for what works

    Two Saturdays ago, I was in Adelaide taking a late-night stroll by the beautiful, still, River Torrens with 3 member of my Robogals Global team -...

  • Accolades: Sonya and Harry

    I'm so proud of Sonya Chan and Harry Eakins, who were both recognised by their faculty at Imperial College for Services to the Community. Sonya Chan...

  • YouthActionNet Global Fellowship Summary of the Week

    YAN was an amazing experience.  I believe the more you put into something, the more you get out.  And so I put in as much of me as I could, and I had an...

Enter your email address to receive my latest blog posts: 

 

Scroll to Top