"People do get stuck in a life not of their own choosing, but if you look at their history it is clear they made a series of choices along the way that brought them to their present condition."

And perhaps, with the power of hindsight, you can put the blame on them but everyone makes decisions with the best information available at that time. How does hindsight apply to the airline biz? Perhaps I shouldn't have chosen airline 'X' since 'Y' is now booming and 'X' is "asking for sacrifices"?
'X' looked great 5 years ago...

How many people are happy or confident right now at AA? Would you really have guessed that 15 years ago?

 

Nope!
It seems that 15 years ago American and United were the number one places for my peers to be getting jobs at when they moved on from the military. Hindsight is a terrible/wonderful thing.
That holds true in the hindsight required in the housing meltdown too. Real Estate seemed to be a very popular market for spouses to dive into because it seemed to be a portable job; but I know many who are now out of it or struggling over the last few years.

USMCFLYR

 

And the fact is... it HAS ALWAYS BEEN THAT WAY. For every "Nirvana" remembrance of airline pilots from your youth there are stories that are polar opposites. I 100% believe you when you talk of the CAs you knew in your youth, I knew some to. I also knew FEs and FOs who because of bad timing spent YEARS in the 70s and 80s on furlough.. our had airlines crash around them. Of CA's retiring at TWA with only their last 5 in the left seat....10 in the right... and 15 or more sitting sideways.

I for one am happy you are happy where you are in your life, I have read most of what you have written on this subject and seriously SKY I doubt what the situation would be you would not be Happy in this business... Oh you might tolerate for the money, but you would never truly be happy in aviation as a career.

Keep up the good work Sky... everyone you turn, opens a slot for perhaps someone who really wants in this crazy business. Like I have said before, I agree with your message, but, at least in the past, I have disagreed with your delivery.

Cheers.

 

You took my quote out of context, I don't blame anyone for their choices, but if you had watched Eastern go under taking friends with it, Pan Am, etc., you might have a different vision of the future.

Perhaps you get a little insight, much like early pioneers seeing their family gutted like fish, scalped or roasted over an open fire.

It isn't hindsight, it is happening now, and your choice is to react or not.

I never blame anyone for their choices, but it is best to keep recent and current history in mind. Pax airlines have had a very rough ride for a very long time.

I did not guess that 15 years ago, it was based entirely on history.

 

Sky,
You bring up excellent points about the drawbacks to pursuing a career as an airline pilot. There are too many pilots and not enough good jobs, and a number of HR hoops to jump through, and it all requires excellent timing and luck to end up in the cockpit of a legacy airline. As you pointed out, once you get there, sitting for ten hours in the seat to the right of Mr. Personality at the front of an aluminum tube pushing through the thin air seven miles up may not be your idea of having "arrived".

But as Jungle pointed out, you made the decisions. We all do. If it doesn't work out and we don't reach the destination, or it looks like too great of a sacrifice to reach it, we assess the facts and alter course for what appears to be a fruitful path towards a new goal.

What bothers me about your posts is a sense of powerlessness and passivity. We don't live at the whims of others unless we choose to. We choose to move to an armpit city and live on poverty wages because we hope flying for that regional airline will lead to greater rewards later. We walk willingly into that noose. No small number break free of the noose and reach the majors.

Many take the military route, and there are drawbacks there too: The guy I took my formation checkride with in USAF pilot training has been pushing up daisies for over two decades now. Another guy, the best pilot and without doubt the smartest person I've had the pleasure of knowing (he flew in my T-38 fini-flight) died during a routine touch-and-go landing. There are year-long deployments to Middle East garden spots now, and the deployment cycle doesn't look like it will let up (hey, it's "The Long War").

Very few follow a path that does not pose major obstacles, and for many the path they have chosen will prove, in the end, impassable as a means to reach that goal of a right seat at a legacy airline.

As Jungle said, the pioneers faced a very risky path to a great reward. They were told wonderful stories of the Oregon Territory. Many died enroute. Many settled somewhere short of their destination and carved out a life there as best they could. A lucky few reached your neck of the woods, and built a new life in paradise (sort of). It required something other than passivity even to attempt the journey. It took gumption.

I'm not a huge fan of the way Robert Pirsig led his life, but his novel Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance was truly profound. He had some good words on gumption:

“A person filled with gumption doesn’t sit around dissipating and stewing about things. He’s at the front of the train of his own awareness, watching to see what’s up the track and meeting it when it comes. That’s gumption.

If you’re going to repair a motorcycle, an adequate supply of gumption is the first and most important tool. If you haven’t got that you might as well gather up all the other tools and put them away, because they won’t do you any good.”

I was disappointed that if Alaska called, you said you would have no choice but to go. Just tell them "no". It's not worth the "5%". You've made your decision, and I think it was correct. Don't doubt yourself. Press on full speed on the alternate (and hopefully fruitful) route.

Best of luck.

 

Jungle,
Excellent words. I don't think you are speaking of compromising personal values here, but of adapting to reality as you face the daily decisions of life. I believe the name for that "internal fitting" and adaptation is the process leading to maturity.

We have some control over the circumstances of our lives, and how events play out. But we have total control over our minds, and how we choose to thnk about how our life plays out - how we react to those events.


Sometimes that reaction to events will be to change course, because we've learned something about ourselves and/or reality in the process. Or the reaction might be a steeled mind and renewed effort because we still perceive the goal as worthy of our best efforts. Depending on the individual, either path could be a proper course...whether Real Estate or Right Seat.

Since I have Pirsig open, here's a few more "Zen and the Art" quotes. I think he paraphrases your posts well:

“The real cycle you're working on is a cycle called yourself...
...The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there...
...“Is it hard?'"
"Not if you have the right attitudes. Its having the right attitudes that's hard".”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values

Cheers,
Fluglehrer

 

“The real cycle you're working on is a cycle called yourself...
...The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there...
...“Is it hard?'"
"Not if you have the right attitudes. Its having the right attitudes that's hard".”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values
------------------------------------------------------------------------

One of my favorite books, must have read it ten times or more over the last thirty years. It really doesn't have much to do with zen or motorcycles, but it is very valuable information.

 

I choose to be a pilot for Alaska Airlines not to be an abused regional airline pilot or humiliated corporate/135 guy. The reality is that most of us are destined for those ends. There is just not enough good jobs to go around.

It is one thing to fill out an application to be a fire fighter and get turned down. All that is lost is the hour it took to put together the application. Just getting to the point where one can fill out an application for a major airline involves most of a decade, or more, and hundreds of thousands in education, training and lost wages. Few lay out the facts to young pilots. Like lambs to the slaughter they are fed lies about pilot shortages and false dreams of a fast trip to the left seat at SWA.

Why else would rational people invest so much unless they expected an equitable return? In the end the choices are bleak. Quit what you have so much invested in and start over in a new path while still carrying the debt load of their dead aviation dream or stay with the sinking ship. The setback of a failed aviation career is hugely painful and effects ones life for decades.

Had someone honestly laid out the facts to me as a young person I swiftly would have chosen a different path. I believe that most others would do the same, however there is no profit in selling the reality. The system is designed to create false hopes to keep the flight school busy.

SKyhigh

 

Fixed it for you, hope that helps. Just trying to give you a more balanced outlook.

 

Hey Jungle, I have respect for you through your posts... so don't take this in the wrong way..
Robert Persigs book on Zen etc. etc. is crap. It is a self indulgent musing of self love and narcissism. I kinda started to get the idea when he continually hammered his mechanically inept motorcycle partner. More so, his emotional abandonment of his son on the trip. Drivel,,, nothing but drivel.
Now, may I suggest a very good book that actually has value and a few motorcylces?
"Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work " by Mathew B. Crawford.