Ambition vs the Simple Life

This post has nothing to do, really, with our lives, but just a few rambling thoughts ...

Is being ambitious required? Important? Necessary?

I have been thinking about these questions lately. As we talk to friends, at this point in our lives, our future lives and ambitions seem to always come up. What do we want to do with our lives? In general, it seems like all the guys I have talked to (and often their wives) have big plans on what they are going to do that look something like this - find a job (or other money making opportunity) that makes lots and lots of money - definitely way over six figures. Hopefully being at the very top of their field.

And that is just not our goal. Really, at least the way I see it (you'd have to ask Katsu to see if he really agrees with me), I want a simple life. The way I envision Katsu's career is a job that makes enough (like 60-70k perhaps) to support us and a few kids, a job without a terribly long commute, hopefully a smallish house with a smallish mortgage (though it might be a largish mortgage to get the short commute), and reasonably hours (roughly 8-6 on almost all days or less) and a job that he somewhat enjoys.

Quite frankly, I am very happy with our life right now. I am very satisfied with the amount of money we make as graduate students (roughly 40k) and would be happy living on that, though it might get tight when we have several kids. Honestly, it's enough and more. We can save for retirement, rent a nice apartment, pay all our bills, and go on fun vacations and dates. And as our family grows our income will need to grow to, but I don't envision us "needing" 150k or more as many people we meet seem to want/expect.

I feel lucky that Katsu is home often and works roughly 9-6 and no weekends (more or less). And I have always made that the expectation. I guess when it comes down to it, I would much rather have Katsu home on weekends an evenings then make twice as much or have twice as big a house. And I don't see why that will change as we get older.

Maybe that makes us less ambitious than all our friends. But I think that being super ambitious and wanting the best education for the best job at the best company to climb your way up to the high life comes with its own costs and sacrifices. And working 80 or 100 hours a week to be the world's best researcher or professor just doesn't have its appeal to me.