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Why Do You REALLY Want to Work in ML?

Why Do You REALLY Want to Work in ML?

Fixing our motivation to play the long game.

Marina Wyss
June 12, 2025

Welcome to Gratitude Driven, a weekly newsletter where I share practical ideas and insights across personal growth, professional development, and the world of AI and data science.

In This Newsletter

Why Do You Really Want to Work in ML?
How to Stay Up-to-date On AI/ML Without Losing You …

Why Do You Really Want to Work in ML?

If you’re like most people who read this newsletter, you probably want to break into a career in data science or AI/ML. And like most people, you probably feel overwhelmed by everything there is to learn, the pace of change, and the reality of a competitive job market.

One thing that helps me when goals start to feel too big is to stop and think more deeply about my true motivation.

Hindu philosopher Bhaktivinoda Thakura describes four fundamental motivations in life: fear, desire, duty, and love. To put them into context of a career switch, we can think of these like:

Fear: “I need job security” or “I am scared of being left behind by AI.”
Desire: “I want to earn a high salary” or “I want a job that others respect.”
Duty: “I owe it to my family to do my best” or “I have an amazing opportunity to learn.”
Love: “There are so many problems in the world that we can solve with this technology, and I want to help make the world a better place.”

Take a moment to consider which of these feels most aligned with where you are in life right now. There’s no right or wrong answer, but there are some things to consider with each motivation:

Fear can be a great motivator to get started, but it isn’t sustainable over the long-term. It limits our ability to do our best because we’re too in our head to make good choices or take necessary risks (like starting in the first place).

If desire motivates you because you think happiness is on the other side of success, you’re likely to be disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, money and status are awesome — but they aren’t enough on their own. We need a deeper internal motivation.

That deeper motivation can come from duty or love.

When you're motivated by duty, you're driven by something bigger than yourself — whether that's gratitude for the opportunities you've been given, responsibility to your family, or simply the belief that you should use your talents well. This kind of motivation is steady. It doesn't depend on external validation or immediate rewards.

Love takes it even further. When you're genuinely excited about the problems you could solve in service to others, that excitement carries you through the hard parts. Work becomes purposeful and meaningful over the long term.

Reframing your efforts from the perspective of duty or love can give you that extra boost when fear and desire start to drain the life out of your goals.

Just some food for thought next time you feel overwhelmed.

How to Stay Up-to-date On AI/ML Without Losing Your Mind

This week was all about staying up to date on AI/ML, both from the perspective of what to pay attention to, as well as techniques for actually doing the studying required.