You wouldn't believe how many people tell me, "I don't fit into corporate America," referring to the culture of time sheets, time clocks and personnel policies defining everything from drug testing and diversity to fire alarms and conflict resolution.

Most people, though, end up doing just that everyday--walking through the doors of small businesses or multi-billion dollar corporations where they follow traditional work conventions and a corporate code of conduct.

But one group of workers really means it and has no desire to try to fit in. They are a relatively small group whose job it is to temporarily distract us from the headlines--comedians.

"I remember at the age of twenty feeling very overwhelmed by the infinite gray areas of accomplishment and futility in the occupations I saw around me," says Jerry Seinfeld in the foreword of the book, I Killed: True Stories of the Road from America's Top Comics. There was nothing gray about being a standup comedian, he says, "It's a swimming-with-your-knife-in-your-teeth kind of job."

Comedian Margaret Cho said she has always been an outsider. Even in her family and the Korean community, she says, "I was always a bit too loud, a bit too awkward, a bit too fat, a bit too clumsy." she said in an interview on Talk of the Nation. "I let go of the idea of being accepted and I think that's what really gave me the ability to be an artist."

Unless it's something you really want, I am not suggesting you become a comedian. It is hard to make it, you work for free a lot and there's no health insurance. And if you think your bosses' looming "What-have-you-done-lately-to-justify-your-existence attitude is rough, consider an entire audience holding that over your head. As Seinfeld put it, the audience is thinking, "'Why should this one person be talking while the rest of us sit here quietly?' Someone better justify that arrangement real quick or there's going to be trouble."

Not to mention the potential physical dangers involved in the profession. Comedian Ant describes in I Killed, the time he flew to Arkansas for a job in a small town that posts the welcome sign, "Proud Home of the KKK." When he shared with the audience that he was gay, a huge man with "Bubba" tattooed on his left arm climbed on the stage, picked him up and carried him out of the theater. "Bubba then threw me in the back of his beat-up black Toyota pickup truck and said, "'We've gotta get you out of here, little buddy, or they're gonna kill you!'"

If you want a comedy gig enough, you may even have to pay your way there. This particular one paid Ant $200, but he had to provide his own airfare and hotel.

But like many comedians, you may feel you don't quite fit--especially when it comes to what others expect. One man I know loved tinkering with wires and taking things apart and putting them back together. He grew up in a family where he was expected to be a doctor or lawyer. He wanted to be an electrician. He tried to meet his family's expectations, failed miserably and has a dreary work history.

"Just because you have a degree in marketing doesn't mean you've got to do statistical analysis the rest of your life." shared comedian George Wallace on the Tavis Smiley Show. "You might enjoy arranging flowers or fixing refrigerators or painting cars, just as long as you're happy to go to work."

Whether you're just out of school, or like the comedian, Bob Newhart, who was an accountant who switched careers, the point is to figure out where you do fit. Don't expect anyone but you to know. As Seinfeld put it, your career "works when you're the one who gives a damn whether this is really happening or not."

© by Andrea Kay