We often talk of the importance of ‘loving’ what you do. If you really think about it, isn’t this stating the obvious? I mean no one is going to tell you to be sure you do something that you dislike terribly.
It is always a pleasure to ‘Talk Story’ with my ‘conference husband’, Jeff Fisher at LogoMotives in Portland. Jeff is one of those people that approaches life with no apologies and looks to find the joy in all he does, professionally and personally. For some reason this seems to be a challenge for many. I think we try and I think we want to, but I also think we get mixed up as the world around us squelches the fire.
It seems to start with the pursuit of a livelihood at the ripe old age of 18. Most of us are influenced by parents and school counselors to look for a career in which we show aptitude. What the hell is ‘aptitude’ anyways? I have a high aptitude for mechanics and math, so I should be an engineer? I’d be miserable. Oh, but it’s a good living and you can make good money. That is a formula for misery!
If you are a parent and looking to have your kids be happy in their successes (notice I said ‘their successes’) then do this. By the time they are 14 or 15 years old, ask them what it is they want to learn more about, what interests them, what they could see themselves really getting into and studying. Don’t ask them what they want to be when they grow up. I don’t even know at 43 what I want to be when I grow up! I asked my now 18-year-old senior these very questions. She answered me, saying “You know, mom. I love archaeology and rocks and ancient Egypt and the Celts.” So that was it. From that moment on we formed her secondary education around the desire to study archaeology. She got a waiver for languages at her school and took on-line Latin. She volunteered at the Museum of History and Industry. She joined the Darfur Project at her school. When it came time to look at colleges, we had a direction. Will she become an archaeologist Indiana Jones style? I doubt it. But she will study what she loves and find her way from there.
So what do you do if you got off to a bad start? Well, I’d say switch it up. I’m not saying you need to quit your job, go back to school, start all over and foreclose on your house as a result. That’s ridiculous. Instead take a clue from Jeff, myself and others like us. Find the joy in what you are doing now and begin altering your pathway to lead down the road that truly brings you joy. Try these steps:
- What did you always love when you were a kid and what have you done in the past that made you truly happy? Chances are you knew then more about your passions then than you do now.
- What do you enjoy most about what you do now? Look past the obvious, possibly to the mundane.
- What do you wish you could do more of? Think of your favorite hobby or something you’ve never tried and always wanted to.
- Write each of these on a separate piece of paper, free form with doodles or words or whatever. Now lay these three pieces of paper in front of you, grab a highlighter and circle key words that jump out at you. Do you see a pattern?
The pattern you see is your unique roadmap to giving your existing career path a push in the right direction. Maybe even the direction you should have taken all along or maybe it just a new way to pursue an old dream. For me, it is touching lives through communicating and teaching. For Jeff, it was taking a broad-based career in design and narrowing down to creating identities for the types of organizations he loves and pushing his fears aside, tapping into his happy nature and graduating from clown school. Thanks ‘Toots Caboose’ for spreading just a little more joy and showing us that there is a clown deep down inside of each of us!
Click here for a full hour of “Talk Story with Jeni” and Jeff at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/jeniherberger or directly from my site at http://jeniherberger.com
