It might sound trite, but happiness is a decision not a destination, and my choices now are all based on whether not a particular action will get me closer to my goals. It's something I'm quite ruthless about, and it helps me avoid the aforementioned wild goose chases!
Success is about happiness and security, rather than hitting any particular sort of job or rung on the career ladder.
I am terminally curious, so I tend to be attracted to the shiny. That's a mixed blessing, as sometimes it means that I can end up right on the cutting edge, but sometimes it can result in wild goose chases as well. Either way, it makes life interesting!
The internet has made it possible to meet more people, make more connections and do more interesting work than would ever have been possible . It enables serendipity at an entirely new scale.
The amazing thing about working in social media and technology is that you can get to know the sharpest thinkers from around the world without having to spend hours on planes!
I first learnt to program a computer when I was nine, when my dad got a ZX80, but I think I would have had to be a particularly perspicacious child to have foreseen the iPad or Twitter!
As for where I am now, well, social media didn't exist when I was a child, and I never would have guessed just how much of a role in my life and career technology would play.
It hasn't always easy to combine these two competing ambitions and, in retrospect, it's a shame no one steered me towards science communications, which I think would have suited me down to the ground. But careers advice has largely been absent from my life, so I have pretty much made it up as I've gone along!
For example, because I'm a lapsed geologist, I followed the eruption of Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull in 2010 in great detail, amassing a huge number of links to news articles, blog posts, scientific papers, web cams, video and photos. That archive came to the attention of Chatham House, and they then commissioned me to research the way in which the media responded to the ash cloud crisis. I think that's the only time that my degree and my career have fully intersected, and it really was a lovely moment!
I had two competing ambitions when I was a child: I wanted to be a Scientist and Discover Great Things, but I also wanted to be an Author and Write Great Things. I've always tried to combine the analytical with the creative, to some extent or another, because I find it hard to do one without the other. I've worked as a tech journalist, social media consultant, and now am self-publishing fiction.
