SELECTING a career is a momentous choice; let no-one tell you it is a minor matter.

It is probably the most important decision that one has to make and it needs thought, thought and more thought!

Choosing a career will affect your whole life - your happiness and your wealth. It's an activity at which you will spend most of your days, most of your life.

So the answer is to systemise, to think deep, to research, to make notes, to keep a 'score chart' in your mind where the plus and minus factors of an occupation are listed.

Write down on a large sheet of paper the possible careers and the plus and minus points for each.

From there, the next move must be to gather information on all the possible careers given your current educational standard.

Likely sources are careers teachers, books, the employment services, friends, relatives and your parents and careers exhibitions.

Find out just as much as you can, talk to as many people as possible, collect as much literature as is floating around at career showcases. Then you can start sifting, transferring the information onto your sheet of paper.

Obviously, most jobs will appear in more than one column and in this way you can gradually trim down the options.

Nothing is simple in the business of career selection because so many factors have to be considered.

For instance, it could well be that your educational standard is not up to the mark for a particular career which comes top in your 'jobs league'.

But it might be possible to get the qualifications required by attending either night school or day release from a similar job which is not really the one you are aiming for.

Conversely, educational qualifications may not be your forte and you never want to see a schoolbook again.

You may feel like it now, but most jobs and crafts have some sort of training and it would be wise not to be too dogmatic in your attitude.

The man or woman who is master of their craft or job is the confident person, the one most likely to succeed.

Don't forget, we are all specialists these days and self-respect comes from being able to to do a job expertly whatever it may be, from carpentry to typing, from motor mechanics to medicine, from engineering to refuse collection.

Everything requires an expertise and although we are paid varying amounts of money in salaries, the truth of the matter is that social co-operation means we all depend on each other.

Your large piece of paper by this time will be pretty well covered with possibilities and perhaps half a dozen or so likely choices are beginning to surface.

The great thing is not to be pressurised into choosing a career in which you are not really interested.