Develop yourself # 2

Transformation Truth #2: Either you're doing work you truly enjoy or you aren't.

"All of the animals except man know that the principle business of life is to enjoy it."
--Samuel Butler
Most of us know that our life's purpose is more than just a paycheck, and that a life of meaning is not limited to a life of means.

Yet many of us suffer the self-imposed misery of doing unfulfilling work simply to make ends meet. We take jobs we don't love by rationalizing to ourselves that we "have to." In this society, though, there are very few have-tos. You can choose to do anything you want to with your time. I ask you, is what you are choosing to do with it something that you truly enjoy? Do you get happily lost in your work on a regular basis? Does time seem to slip by because you are completely immersed in doing something you love? If you look at your life and cannot answer with a resounding, wholehearted "Yes!" to these questions, then you know it's time for a change. It's time you ask yourself a question you've been avoiding for too long: Is what I'm doing what I really want to be doing?

Of course, this is a tough question for most people because they don't know whatthey want to be doing. Worse yet, they have stopped actively looking. They've settled into a job and told themselves the biggest lie in working America: "I'll just stay here for a year or two until I figure out what I really want to do." People who say this always end up a year or two down the road still scratching their head. They may have a better résumé, but they still haven't got a clue.

Here's my advice to you: If you're not in your dream job or career right now, you should be actively and urgently looking for ways to get into it. And if you don't know what your dream job or career is, don't waste a lot of your precious time in any job or career that is clearly not it. There's nothing worse than squandering years of your life doing something simply because you don't know what else to do.

If you are bored, restless, depressed, angry, underutilized, unrewarded, unrecognized, or unchallenged in your current job or career, it's time for you to admit it--and change it. I recommend that you open your calendar right now, look forward exactly six months, and schedule in a secret code: QMJT. That meansQuit My Job Today! What I'm suggesting is that if you don't LOVE your job, you make a commitment to yourself RIGHT NOW, an internal resolution that you'll bust your butt for six months to find a new career -- that no matter what, in six months you'll be moving on and starting something you care about. Isn't your time, and your life energy, worth it?

Of course, maybe you are one of the three in ten Americans who report being passionate about their jobs. Maybe you are passionate about your work, you believe in the purpose of what you're doing, and you enjoy the tasks and the relationships you have at work. In that case, here's my question to you: Are you showing up as "passionately present" as you can each day, and are you lighting up your coworkers with energy and excitement and passion for what you are doing together. In my mind, leadership has a lot to do about firing ourselves up about a cause or mission, and firing other people up about it as well as you work collaboratively to make it happen. I talk a lot about leadership at my events and it's something I've dedicated a lot of my life to.

To think more deeply about how you feel about work, grab your journal and complete the sentences below.
Transformational Turning Points:
□ The way I really feel about what I'm doing is...
□ The real reason I'm doing what I'm doing now is because...
□ If I continue doing what I'm doing, five years from now I'm going to be the type of person who...
□ Whenever I talk about the way I spend my time, I always wish I'd spend more time...
□ The things that completely absorb my attention and interest when I get into them are...
□ To truly enjoy my work and lead other people more effectively, I would have to...

Next week's Transformation Truth will likely rattle you. (It's about who you are being). Stay tuned. Until then, stay focused on taking action on this week's Truth.

As you move forward, may the gates to possibility always swing wide open for you.

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