Can first principles guide career choices?

Absolutely, and it might just be a powerful tool to help you avoid a mid-life crisis.

Simply put, "First Principles" means not constantly looking at others or what "everyone else is doing," but rather returning to the most fundamental aspects of a matter and asking yourself the most basic questions.

Let's use an example to compare these two approaches:

Conventional Thinking (Analogical Reasoning):

Many people choose careers this way:

They look at what's hottest right now – "Oh, AI, big data, I should learn programming."
They look at relatives and friends – "My uncle is a civil servant, very stable, maybe I should take the civil service exam too."
They look at salary rankings – "Finance/investment banking pays well, I should go into finance."

You see, this is all "analogy." Because others succeeded or seemed to do well doing something, I should do it too. It's like seeing someone look good in an outfit and buying the exact same one, without considering if the material, cut, or color truly suits you. The result might be that you put it on and find it awkward and unflattering.

First Principles Thinking (Returning to the Essence):

To choose a career using first principles, you need to break down the concept of "career" into a set of fundamental components, and then reassemble these components to build something that is truly best suited for you.

Instead of asking yourself, "What job should I do?", you should ask these more foundational questions:

What do I genuinely enjoy doing?
- Note, it's about "doing," a verb, not a noun. It's not "I like finance," but rather "I enjoy analyzing data to find patterns," "I enjoy interacting with people and persuading them," or "I enjoy quietly creating things by myself." Find your "sweet spot."
What am I good at?
- What tasks do you pick up quickly, or with a little effort, can you do better than 80% of people? Is it logical reasoning? Imaginative thinking? Hands-on ability? Organizational skills? This is your core competency.
What kind of life do I want?
- This question is crucial. How many hours do you want to work each day? What is your minimum income requirement (note: minimum, not 'the higher, the better')? What kind of city do you want to live in? Do you want your work to bring excitement or stability?
What is the meaning and value of my work?
- What problems do you want to solve for the world? Or, what do you want your work to look like in the eyes of others? Is it helping people become healthier? Creating beautiful things that bring joy? Or building efficient systems?

Once you've clearly thought through the answers to these four questions (your "components"), you'll have a "blueprint" that belongs to you.

Then, take this blueprint and search in society to see which existing "professions" can meet most of your requirements.

For example:

Conventional Thinking: "I want to be a lawyer because it looks cool and pays well." After two years, you find you absolutely dislike the high-intensity confrontation and lengthy paperwork, and you want to quit every day.
First Principles Thinking:
- Enjoy doing: Deeply researching complex problems, identifying their logic and connections, and explaining them clearly to others.
- Good at: Strong writing skills, rigorous logic, patience.
- Desired lifestyle: Upper-middle income is fine, but wants personal time for travel and family, doesn't want to work 996 hours.
- Sense of value: Hopes to help others solve practical problems.
Looking at this blueprint, being a litigation lawyer might not be suitable (lifestyle mismatch). However, becoming a patent agent specializing in writing patent applications for tech companies, a consultant providing compliance training for businesses, or even an analyst who writes in-depth industry reports, might be a perfect fit.

To summarize:

Choosing a career using first principles means starting from "you," not from "the job." It forces you to honestly confront yourself and clearly understand who you truly are and what you want.

This process can be difficult at first because it requires deep self-analysis, not just simply copying others. But the benefit is that the direction you find this way is highly likely to be something you genuinely love and can stick with long-term. You're not just "finding a job to make a living"; you're "designing your own career path."