As a "soon to be" pilot, I enjoy the prospect of being part of a legacy, and having the opportunity to perhaps contribute some small portion back to honour those who have gone before us.
I enjoy the unique-ness of rotary wing, the diverse opportunities to work and touch people's lives anywhere in the world - we can go rescue people from mountain tops, ravine floors and heaving seas, we can deliver aid to villagers in Pakistan or Indonesia or PNG, place a radio tower with pinpoint accuracy, haul logs out of mountains faster than they ever could before, and remove the need for dangerous highway chases by being the "eye in the sky".
Using our skills we can fly through an hour of cloud and pop out 500 feet AGL, exactly where we intended to be.
Sure, there are some crappy jobs out there, but there are some worse ones too. People ask me how work is, I say "could be better, but it could be a whole lot worse!".