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Awards

Archive for October, 2008

A Steve Pavlina Interview on How to Build Your Career

Work Happy Now was granted an interview with Steve Pavlina, the online Personal Development King. I just gave him that title, but I think most of us can agree that no one has more online “personal development” clout than Steve.

I was nervous. I wanted everything to go perfectly. My voice was a little shaky at the start. You’ll notice this when you listen to the first podcast. I calmed down after a few minutes and I delivered a pretty good interview.

I told my wife that I probably would put Steve at the top of my list of famous people to interview.

 

“What about Obama?” she asked.

“Sure, I would love to interview Obama, but interviewing Steve meant more to me. I would probably get more readers with an Obama interview, but that doesn’t matter. I’ve been following Steve’s blog for almost three years,” I replied.

“Wow! You really enjoyed talking with him.”

“Yeah, he’s down to earth and intelligent. I couldn’t have asked for a better interview.”

“You’ve worked hard for this. I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks.”

 

I broke the interview down into five parts:

 

Building Your Career Foundation – 8:36
 

How to Overcome Fear – 7:53  
 

Why Passion is More Important Than Money – 6:21
 

Spirituality – 4:23 
 

Steve Pavlina’s Core Principals – 10:39  
 

 

The sound quality isn’t the greatest since I recorded it using Skype. I had to increase the volume on Steve’s answers so it matched my volume. It’s not a perfect recording, but I’m sure you’ll find it interesting. Steve’s answers are honest and unique.

Enjoy! I know I did.

Check out my review of Steve’s book Personal Development for Smart People.

 

Articles Related to Steve’s Brilliant Advice:

• Personal Development for Smart People – Book Review
• 50/50 Effect
• How Transitions Can Dramatically Improve Your Productivity
• Your 3 Careers – Are You Ready?

Personal Development for Smart People – Book Review

You’re a smart person, right? Of course you are or you wouldn’t be reading this blog.

The title of Steve Pavlina’s book and blog compliment the reader before they even start on the first page. Personal Development for Smart People has a ring to it that makes the reader want to pick it up and check out what’s inside.

The genius behind Steve Pavlina lies in striking the right chord at the right time. He created a personal development blog when all the personal development gurus had static sites. He wrote valuable content on a daily basis and his audience grew fast.

Steve refused to dumb it down so it would be easy to access the information. He asked you to join him on his level and this helped the readers lift themselves up out of their present cyclical thinking.

He can now boast that he maintains the largest personal development website in the world. That took strategic planning and creativity. Few people are willing to dig as deep as Steve has done to discover new personal development ideas. He understood how to stand out (weird posts), but he also understood how to connect with a mass audience (common sense writing).

Steve’s first book is filled with common sense and fresh ideas that will satisfy the most critical reader. It’s already on the best seller list on Amazon and other sites.

Foundation

Steve has learned to adjust his vibrational tuning fork to connect with millions of people. If you enjoy personal development, you have probably already visited his website. Doesn’t it seem like every other personal development blog that you read is influenced by Steve in some way? That is a tribute to a man who paved his own path.

Like his blog, Personal Development for Smart People is a well rounded book. It gives the reader the foundation to create a prosperous life.

The three main themes of the book are:

- Truth

- Love

- Power

I love how he weaves these ideas throughout each concept.

How this Book can Help Your Career

The section on careers is very useful. I’ll share two of my favorite quotes from this chapter:

“When we express ourselves creatively we are sharing what’s most important to ourselves.”

He goes on to say:

“Think of your career as a primary outlet for creative expression.”

He breaks down his thoughts in a user-friendly way to help you apply these ideas to your own life. That’s the most that you can ask for in a personal development book – easy to understand and applicable ideas that encourage the reader to take action.

I encourage you to check out his website in order to supplement the information in the book.

His website gives such gems as:

- 30 Days to Success

- How to discover your life purpose in about 20 minutes

Steve’s writing within the book is incredibly polished and easy to follow. The thoughts connect and always come back to the central themes.

I would recommend this book to anyone trying to reach a deeper understanding of themselves.

Spirituality

One of my favorite sections was the one on spirituality, toward the end of the book. We have an amazing opportunity that few people have had before this time period. We can learn from any culture with a click of the mouse. You and I can learn how Buddhists, Muslims, and Christians handle certain situations. We don’t need to look through one religious lens. We can explore many perspectives to help us gain a better understanding of our lives.

This was also one of my favorite topics that he touched on in his blog, but in his book his ideas really came together to help me gain a better understanding of how to improve my outlook.

Your Choice

It’s your choice to buy this book, but I promise it will change your life, especially if you have never read his blog. If you’ve read his blog, many of his thoughts are brought together with his book into a cohesive pattern that helps the reader understand Steve’s thinking.

Getting inside an intelligent man’s head and taking a few nuggets of knowledge to improve your life is worth $20.

Work Happy Now Interview with Steve Pavlina

Steve was awesome enough to give me an interview that I recorded over Skype. It was really amazing to have the opportunity to ask him anything I wanted. As you can tell I’m a big fan of his.

I broke the interview into five parts:

1. Building Your Career Foundation – 8:36
2. How to Overcome Fear – 7:53
3. Why Passion if More Important Than Money – 6:21
4. Spirituality – 4:23
5. Steve Pavlina’s Core Principals – 10:39

I will post all 5 Podcasts tomorrow. He answered the questions that I thought would help all of you the most. So stop by tomorrow and enjoy a fun interview.

* Update: Click here to check out the Steve Pavlina interview – enjoy.

Articles Related in Interviews and Careers:

• Pig-Headed Determination and Discipline
• Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It, Book Review
• How Toyota Became #1 and a Peek into the Short Interview with the Author

Havi of the Fluent Self and Her Duck Selma – Interview

 

I’ve been blessed to do an interview with Havi of Fluent Self and her sidekick (Selma, her duck). Don’t tell Selma that I called her a sidekick.

Havi is an expert in patterns, procrastination, and calming techniques – all qualities that many of us are looking to improve. Selma is an expert in floating in the tub. Both of them make a great team. Let’s welcome Havi and Selma.

Thanks for joining me in this interview. Let’s get right into it.

 

Work Happy Now: After reading Procrastination Dissolve-o-matic (Havi’s procrastination program for people who want to work on their internal blockage so they can get their projects done) I learned some fantastic techniques, but I’m curious – can you describe the technique that works best for you when you are putting something off?

Havi: Lately I’ve mostly been using the focusing yoga mudra that I teach in the book to turn my attention inward, and then I actively let myself NOT WANT to do the thing I think I have to be doing. 

Once I’ve softened some of that internal resistance, I check in and find out if there’s something I can do differently. I also give myself five minutes to NOT do the thing and to not want to do it at all. 

 

WHN: The perfectionism syndrome that you described in your book really resonated with me. I too want my projects to be perfect and it keeps me from actually doing the work. How did you overcome this?

Havi: Oh boy. Lots of practice. Lots of reminding myself that everything you do is in flux. Things can always be improved upon, so it’s a matter of finding out: when are you going to just let things be the way they are right now? 

Also, one of the things I’ve learned from teaching is that I actually teach much better when it’s spontaneous than when I’m fabulously over-prepared. So that’s helped me get better at releasing the need for ridiculously intense hard-core preparation

 

WHN: The idea of actually enjoying the work is a difficult concept. Many of us were raised to push ourselves to get the work done, not actually enjoy it. It’s the “work for the weekend” attitude. How do we overcome such deeply ingrained resistance?

Havi: Well, you want to make sure you’re also not guilting yourself here with the whole “how come I can’t enjoy it” thing … it’s important to figure out which parts or aspect of the work trigger your resistance so you can shift your focus. 

The work is really just a reflection of your own relationship with yourself … and as you work on that relationship, it gets easier to be a bit more playful with the work. But the truth is that sometimes work does suck. It’s not always going to be fun. The question is, how can you meet yourself where you are when you’re not getting what you need from the work, and give yourself comfort and caring and better options.

 

WHN: Learning to be a detective with your patterns is a fantastic idea. I think it will help me avoid getting too caught up in my emotions. Can you explain why it’s helpful to become a detective with your patterns?

Havi: If you’re “fighting” your patterns, you get too involved in mastering them and kicking them. But when you’re noticing them, studying and learning from them, picking up clues like a detective — you have some emotional distance from your pain. 

This (paradoxically) allows you to get closer to what’s really going on with your patterns — so you can start giving yourself what you need.

 

WHN: Many of us are hard on ourselves. I’m my own worst critic. I’m learning to become more of a inspiring coach to myself, but it’s tough. How does someone cultivate as you put it “the lover” within themselves?

Havi: Well, as I think the point I tried to get across in the book is that this is really the advanced practice. You don’t start there. No one does. 

Instead you start with noticing where you’re hard on yourself  and asking yourself whether it’s possible to maybe eventually be able to stand being around yourself some day, despite the fact that you think you’re a mess and it’s all so miserable. That is absolutely step one. 

I don’t think we need to rush into pushing towards inspiration, since that often just triggers more resistance. I think it’s all about figuring out where you are and then meeting yourself there. 

 

WHN: I thought your blog post about Planting Clues was a great tool to stay on top of our stuff. You talk about this in your book. How does someone plant clues that will encourage them to do their project or task?

Havi: I have one client who has been putting off working on her new website. She decided that she needed reminders of how meaningful her actual work is for her and how much it grounds her. So we had her take a pebble from her garden and keep it in her pocket. It’s her “meaning and grounding” pebble. It may be a bit cheesy, but it totally makes her feel better. It’s a steady reminder of why she’s doing this work to put what she does out there into the world. 

 

WHN: I grew up looking at a mountain and only seeing more mountains. It creates resistance due to futility. When you are consulting with a person with this attitude, what do you recommend that they do to reduce their avoidance and get their stuff done?

Havi: Yeah, that’s really hard and frustrating. Sometimes it seems like there’s nothing but more horrible ahead, so you just do what you can to meet yourself where you are with that. 

Notice the avoidance. Notice what triggers resistance. Allow yourself to NOT WANT to do the thing, whatever it is. You’re entitled to not want to do it. Allowing yourself to feel like it’s all a big waste of time is part of the process of getting back to the point where you can get excited about where you’re going. 

That’s what’s going to help you find some of the playfulness and … who knows, maybe even a little adventure. 

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Thank to Havi for such a great interview. I know that this will help many of my readers overcome their procrastination. If my readers want to take their career to the next level I recommend Havi and Selma’s program. It’s worth every penny. Havi also does consultations if anyone ever needs to work through any roadblocks to optimal potential.

Click here to check out my review or Procrastination Dissolve-o-matic.

Articles Related to Getting Stuff Done:

 

• Procrastination Dissolve-o-Matic Program Review
• How Transitions Can Dramatically Improve Your Productivity
• Failures You Should Either Release or Keep Pursuing

 

 

Procrastination Dissolve-o-Matic Program Review

Havi from the Fluent Self and her sidekick (Selma, her duck) have put together a fantastic “get your stuff done and stop beating yourself up about it when you don’t” program. I would give it four thumbs up if I had four thumbs. Four thumbs? I’ll just borrow yours. Believe me you’ll give this program two thumbs up.

The Procrastination Dissolve-o-Matic covers internal blocks and tried and true productivity techniques. As we all know the only way to get stuff done is to understand why we avoid it in the first place. We don’t avoid meeting our best friend at the local coffee shop. So why do we avoid that email or report?

We usually procrastinate the stuff that brings up uncomfortable feelings that we want to avoid. This program helps break these patterns down so we can change our habits.

Three A’s

Havi describes it as:

• Acknowledge
• Allow
• Act

 

The three A’s that help us overcome our emotional baggage.

We beat ourselves up when we don’t get our stuff done. We look back on the day and wonder where the time went. We know where the time went. It was sucked up by email, the phone, and meetings. It’s important to acknowledge these failures and stop trying to whip ourselves into shape.

If all we do is whip our asses into shape then we’ll just end up with sore asses.

We think that if we are hard on ourselves then eventually it will sink in and we’ll start knocking out the work. How naïve can we be? If our ass kicking hasn’t worked to this point then it probably won’t ever work.

We must feel these blockages, understand why the resistance is there, and figure out how to overcome them.

Gathering this self knowledge will lead you to make decisions that will help you use your patterns to overcome procrastination. Once you come to these informed decisions, all that’s left to do is act on them.

It Really is Up to You

It’s up to you to put yourself in a winning situation, that’s what the last half of the book is all about. This program gives you seven productivity techniques that will help you take action. My favorite was number #4 – Apply Pam’s Algorithm. Chopping down projects into smaller tasks and making them so digestible that it almost doesn’t seem like work. You can accomplish quick amounts of work and know exactly what to do next.

The program is a bit pricey at $108, but in my mind worth the effort, especially if you try these techniques and implement them. I’ve created a little preparation ritual to help me finish my ebook. It has done wonders for me. That’s all you can ask for in any knowledge based program – a few concrete ideas that you can apply to your life.

There is no magic fairy dust that will end your procrastination, although Havi does have a fairy dust method that has helped me calm my anxiety before I begin a project. I digress… It’s up to you to keep adding to your tool chest of good habits. Hopefully over time you stop beating yourself up about the stuff you don’t get done (You need some “me time” too) and appreciate all the hard work that you do for your family, your projects and your own happiness.

If you want a little sample of Havi’s program click this link here and you’ll get a little taste of her skills that will leave you wanting more.

When do you procrastinate? Why do you think you hold yourself back from just doing it?

Do you want more reviews like this? Then help me out and subscribe to my RSS feed and help me spread the Work Happy Now cause.

Check back on Sunday and I’ll have an Interview with Havi that will delight your senses. So much so that you’ll feel like floating away from your computer and doing some great work. You’ll laugh in the face of procrastination.

Related Articles that Will get Your Work Happiness Mojo Rising:

•  How Transitions Can Dramatically Improve Your Productivity
• 5 Fun and Easy Tips to Let the “Real You” Shine Through at Work, Southwest Airlines Style
• 30 Seconds of Laughing and a Few Minutes of Learning

How to Retire From the Grind and Not Get Bored

I have a friend who is only 37 and is ready to retire. He and his wife have had good jobs for 15 years and have been able to save a substantial amount of money. They aren’t rich by any means, but are getting pretty comfortable with the money they’ve saved. Enough to live simply and also pay for their children’s higher education. He did it by living below his means. Like Get Rich Slowly always tells us, “spend less than you make and invest in historically proven investments” and you’ll be retiring earlier than you thought too.

My friend’s goal is to retire in three years (age 40), and go into a new career. I would never have guessed his new career choice, but it does make sense. He wants to be a park ranger, taking care of his state’s preserved land. He doesn’t need to make a lot of money, just enough to pay a few bills and his investments will cover the rest.

When I heard this I was a little shocked. He could really set himself up for the rest of his life, retiring in style if he continued until 67, but I think he would rather be a hobo than continue to work at his present job.

Hard Look at Myself

My friend made me look at my own life and where I want it to go. I want to retire in the next five years (age 37). By “retirement,” I mean retiring from the daily grind and doing what I love to do instead: helping people work happier. This site is the seed that was planted in February 2008. I’m done messing around with my career. It’s time to pick my direction and run as if I’m being chased by a tiger.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m open to new ideas, but this is the direction in which I’m heading because it gets me excited. Believe me, I’m flexible if an opportunity comes along. It just better be in my arena of expertise. If the project keeps me excited and every day is creative then I’m all for it. As long as I can help people enjoy their work or find a career that will help them become even more successful and happy then I’m living my dream.

What About Your 3^rd Career

Just because you’ve put your time in doesn’t mean you should stop working. I believe that we all still need to give back to society. Have you thought about what you want your middle age to look like? Or if you are middle age what you want your retirement to look like? Do you want to work where you are until 67 or do you want a midlife career change? Most of us are living way into our 80’s and 90’s. You should be thinking of these things so you can plan out the best way to be happy.

Just a seed for your thoughts. What is that one thing you love? What if you started a website/blog now and posted one article, picture, drawing, report, or video a week for the next 20 years? Do you think people would view you as an expert? Do you think that you might parlay it into a third career?

Let’s discuss this in the comment section. I look forward to seeing you there.

Articles Related to Improving Your Career:

• Your 3 Careers – Are You Ready?
• Building Your Future Career Foundation
• When You Get Rich Slowly You Can Work Happier
• Lucky!

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Image courtesy of Ted.Sali

When Your Career Sucks, You Can Fix It

If you take a hard look at your career, you’ll see hundreds of failures. A failure is rarely a dramatic occurrence. Most are usually small and hardly leave a blip on our awareness. No matter how small, the blip is registered and it often builds or reduces confidence. So if we break down our work happiness psyche, it all comes down to our ability to deal with each obstacle and how we use these experiences to build our careers.

Many people encounter difficulties and they either give up or avoid the challenge, instead of pushing through their fears.

Fear has dictated many of my actions.

When I didn’t enjoy my job it was usually because I was afraid of:

• Not being able to find a job that I really liked so I kept quitting and looking for something else.
• Being fired because I didn’t want to put effort into something that wasn’t rewarding me properly.
• Trying really hard and still getting caught in a tough position so I would just coast along, doing work that was just okay.

Fear is based in assumptions. We assume that our boss doesn’t care about our hard work, so what’s the point of trying. We assume that our hard work doesn’t matter. Our fear holds us back from reaching true greatness. The funny thing is that even the greatest business people often see faults in the choices they make. The difference is that they don’t let the fear dictate their future decisions.

I’ve seen dozens of people get fired because they did not put their full effort into making their job a success. They either wanted something easier or something more challenging. They were stuck on the seesaw of emotions, flying high or low, never really knowing what they wanted. Ask yourself: are you truly happy where you are? If not, you have choices and it’s up to you to empower your career and give it a good kick it in the butt.

Help Yourself Make a Choice

When you lay out all your options it’s easier to see what you need to do to find a career that will get you excited and keep your energy level high, whether it be a new perspective on the present job or doing something completely different.  Some of you may make lists of all the pros and cons of staying at your present job, use mind mapping techniques or talk to a trusted friend who knows you almost as well as you know yourself.

The only way to do work that you enjoy is to take risks:

• Ask for new tasks at your present job
• Try a similar job at another company
• Go back to school
• Experiment with other jobs that you think will hold your interest
• Start a company

Some of you may not love your jobs, but you are okay with this because you get to do what you love on the weekends. If you do a decent job that you enjoy and it doesn’t create that much stress then don’t be afraid to keep doing it. You don’t need to conquer the world if you enjoy what you do. However, for most of you this won’t cut it, so you need to find what type of work will trigger the most happiness.

An Emotional Foundation

It’s all about being honest with who you are and what you want. If you need to wake up and get excited about what you do to earn a living then it’s time to make a plan. You need to do some soul searching and write a list of emotional needs as related to your career. When working happy, money isn’t always a powerful motivator. Your career happiness will most likely depend on two main factors: Your ability to feel productive and the people you work with.

I created a list about 5 years ago and my shortened version looks like this:

• Writing
  • Poetry
  • Marketing/business
  • Self-help
  • Novels
• Public Speaking
  • Although it made me nervous it got me excited.
• Flexibility
  • Ability to go and be where I wanted, not be stuck in an office.
• Sharing of Ideas
  • I love to share and develop ideas with other people.
• Laughter
  • I wanted a job that was fun. Nothing too serious and uptight.
• Grand Goals
  • I wanted a job that had almost infinite possibility.

I realized that there wasn’t one job out there that was able to satisfy my needs. I am building on my career to get where I want to go. I looked at my list and tried to figure out what niche would best fit my talents. I pictured myself in a whole mess of careers: advertising, copywriter, freelancer, massage therapist, chiropractor, poet, school counselor, artist, teacher, and novelist. None of them seemed practical and a solid fit for me. I knew that I wanted to write, but not sure what niche. I also knew that I wanted to speak and engage the public. The more that I kept coming back to my desires, my career came into focus.

That’s why I started Work Happy Now, my fifth blog. It fit with my degree (Business – Marketing), my passions (writing and public speaking), and it also satisfied the most crucial need for me (The ability to be creative). Practicing this work on the side makes my day job easier to go to each morning. I know that I’m building toward a greater goal.

Building Your Skills

I’m currently working for a company, but I’m also gaining valuable experience to build on my career foundation. I speak to various schools about financial literacy (public speaking), I create PR for my company (refine my business writing), and I get to design brochures and web banners for the website (creative).

When you can find ways to increase your skills at your present job then it will become more enjoyable.

You must create opportunity to help see greater possibility. That may mean doing work outside of your job details, but that’s how you get ahead.

Try building on your career foundation by:

• Asking a co-worker if they need help on a project.
• Asking your boss’s advice on a report.
• Asking your boss for a specific project that interests you.
• Develop a project that you think will help the company and when it’s got some substance – pitch it to your boss.

You have to create opportunities.

Pride + Passion = Success

Being good at a job takes pride.  We have to care about the outcome or we are never going to double check our reports or follow up with that annoying customer.

It’s harder to care about work that is monotonous. If you can’t find a reason to care about the outcome of your work then it’s up to you to take control and find out what you really need to feel successful.

You have to ask yourself why you either lost or never had pride in your job. If it’s fear then it’s your fault. If you are bored then it’s also your fault. I’m going to be honest. You are the reason that you are in this position. It’s really up to you to release that fear and do what gives you the best odds to be happy.

Find A Career that Fulfills Your Dreams

Look at your list of emotional needs and find the theme that emerges. Every list has a theme and yours will help lead you to the career that will build energy instead of sucking it away from you.

Down deep, you probably have some idea of your dream job. It’s your fear that keeps you from pursuing this career. The easiest way to release your fear is to imagine yourself doing what you love. Allow yourself to feel these emotions. Let them build passion. Visualization is a great technique to build motivation, but you must also act on these feelings to encourage change.

If you want to change career paths then start taking little steps toward that goal:

• Talk to people who have a similar career and find out how they created their path
• Go to night school
• Create a website
• Join a club
• Join a network online

Every time you add new tools to your skill set, your fear will likely regress. Start small and keep on taking baby steps.

If you only have a general idea of what you would love to do then create a list of steps to accomplish. As you mark off your progress your confidence will grow and the apprehension will wither away. Before you even reach your dream career you’ll be enjoying the foundation that will make it happen. That’s what it means to work happy NOW. You have to appease the “present you” to keep yourself motivated to improve your career.

So go take a baby step and surround yourself in an environment that will make you happy. If you like to organize then join a club and make contacts. If you love writing then create a blog. If you like sports then volunteer at your local college and start making contacts that will help you develop this passion.

Your skills will take time to build, but I promise if you stick with it you’ll see progress. You’ll slowly add new friends in the industry. These new friends may one day help you find a job that will make your dream career a reality.

Now go get started and add a new skill to your foundation and see what happens.

Here are a few articles from my fellow bloggers that will help you gain a better understanding of what direction to take:

• Escape from Cubicle Nation: Stop searching for the perfect job and start finding your life’s work
• Seth Godin: Get to vs. have to
• Get Rich Slowly: How Do You Turn Passion into a Career? (And Should You?)

If you haven’t found your perfect job (like most of us) then what are you doing to find a career that fits your emotional needs? Let’s discuss in the comments so we can learn from each other’s choices.

Articles Related to Making Your Career So Cool that You Almost Pee Yourself:

• Your 3 Careers – Are You Ready?
• Trapped in a Job You Hate? How to Take that First Step Toward Career Bliss
• You Should be Celebrating Your Average and Tiny Successes

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Images courtesy of orphanjones and Walsh

The Magic of Allowing Employees to Do What They Love

What would you do if you heard from your boss that you could do anything you wanted for two hours every week? The catch: as long as it was related to work?

Would you hug her?

That could mean designing a new logo, creating a company year book, writing a company theme song, or creating a customer appreciation program. Whatever would make you happy, you get to do it for two hours every week. I know that I would love to do something completely different to help my company.

I’ve had good ideas that I was afraid to pursue, but this would take some of the pressure off because it wouldn’t be under your job description. It would allow you to be creative and probably come up with something valuable.

Company benefits:

-        Boosts employee morale

-        Improves employee retention

-        Co-workers collaborate

-        Shows the employees strengths to the employer, so the manager will be encouraged to change the employee’s job description if an idea is successful

Bla, bla, bla. All of you know that doing extra work for the good of the company helps them, but how does it help you?

Employee benefits:

-        Looks good on the resume (In this high turnover age we have to expect that employees want jobs that benefit their careers.)

-        Allows for complete creativity

-        Employee will enjoy work more

-        No pressure to be perfect

For any company worried about wasted hours, I’ve read several articles indicating that most employees only work between 4 – 6 hours a day. They are just putting in their time until they get home, but if a company would empower them to create something new then they would work harder than they had ever worked before. Both the company and employee wins. Workers become happier and the company becomes more successful.

So my question to you is, why don’t more companies utilize this type of program? Would you like this or would it only add to your workload?

Articles that are cool like that:

• How Transitions Can Dramatically Improve Your Productivity (One of my favorites!)
• Trapped in a Job You Hate? How to Take that First Step Toward Career Bliss
• The Mirror of Difficult People

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Image courtesy of John Calnan

Connecting Our Work Happiness – 25 Words

Your work happiness

is my work bliss.

 

Because

without you

there is no me.

 

Your joy is mine and it is why I go on.

 

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Idea courtesy of Liz Strauss

Your 3 Careers – Are You Ready?

You will probably have 3 distinct career phases by the time you are done (it starts with your first job and ends when you kick the bucket). Many people are living into their 80’s and 90’s. The children born today may live to an average of 100 years old. Our medicine is getting scary good.

That may mean that we could have 70 or more working years before we feel like stopping. That’s a lot of time to be prosperous. I don’t know about you, but I can’t see myself sitting in a rocking chair, sipping lemonade and waiting for death. I want to be productive for as long as my mind and body will allow.

A professor emeritus of biochemistry and biophysics, Britton Chance says, “Most of the people who work on cognitive deficits realize that it’s better to use it than to lose it.” – Emily Brandon of U.S. News

Understanding your career time-frame will allow you to pick and choose the skills that are needed now to make the rest of your life successful. Paul Newman (1925 – 2008) is my favorite example. He started out in the Navy, wanting to be a pilot. His physical revealed that he was colorblind. He went on to be a radioman and a gunner for the Navy. He finished his tour in WWII and went on to study acting. His second career was acting and directing and he starred in films such as Cool Hand Luke (1967), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), and The Color of Money (1986). For his third career he decided to give back by creating a non-profit organic line of food, Newman’s Own. He has donated over $250 million to charity as of February 2008. It’s this activity, I believe, that gave him the strength to fight cancer as long as he did and continue his great work. Without a cause to there is no reason to live. I wish him all the best in his next life.

When you are at the beginning of each career you must ask yourself “Why?” before you do anything. If you are going to school for art, then why are you doing it? If you are doing it for fun then so be it, but you must always be aware of how it fits into the “present you” and “future you.” You must appreciate the choices that you make now so it builds on the foundation you have already established. You may think you want to be a famous sculptor, but if all you do is ride your mountain bike every weekend then you must take a hard look at what you think you want compared to what really interests you.

Every choice becomes a part of who you are. From your friends to your hobbies, they all influence your decisions.

1^st Career Phase – Discovery

The 1^st job is usually in the late teens, which is about getting your feet wet. There will probably be plenty of jobs between the first and the one that actually allow you to optimize your talents.

My first job was with my father as an electrician’s helper. I ran wire, wired in fans and did what I was told. Next, I moved on to K-mart as a cashier. Then back with my father and mushroom mongering (picking wild mushrooms and selling them to local restaurants). Then I took a job in media buying. Next, I tried telemarketing miniature leather saddles to a list of old buyers. (Yep, it was as bad as it sounds.) After that I was a marketing coordinator for “high pressure” valve company. Then I worked as a teacher and in the summers I managed a cyber-café. My next job was a front desk receptionist at a Yoga Studio. Then a part-time handyman. Finally, a marketing coordinator for a credit union. Now…

2^nd Career Phase – Optimization

The 2^nd career is about hitting your stride. It’s when you know you’ve found that job that you are good at, pays well, or feels exciting. Of course we want the second career to provide all three of these, but that’s not always the case if we get lazy about making our career fit our needs.

My 2^nd career is just beginning. I’m trying to leverage myself into the career development industry, making myself an expert in the field. At 32 I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on how I can accomplish this. As you can see this website has already helped me declare my commitment to career development for people who love their lives.

3^rd Career Phase – Giving Back

The 3^rd career is about giving back to the things and people you love. That may mean giving your grandchildren the love and attention that they deserve. It may mean counseling businesses to optimize their talent. Whatever it is, it’s all about giving back to show appreciation for the life that we’ve enjoyed.

My 3^rd career is still foggy. I know that I want to retire in my late fifties and hopefully live a simple life with a nice little plot of land. I’m going to give back by helping people with their careers. I hope that they can be as happy and successful as I feel right now and expect to be in the future.

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Your career success depends on leverage. It’s the most important aspect to building your foundation. Without leverage you’ll most likely receive terrible pay and work awful hours. That’s why a lot of college students are stuck working at Pizza Hut. They haven’t mastered the skills to leverage their work and enhance their career.

A college degree isn’t always a necessity and you can leverage your career in many ways. Some of you will be creative and others will take advantage of the family business already in place. Others will learn how to build a network to help get a job out of college that fits your needs.

Use Leverages to Build Your Career Foundation

Family Name

Your family members may have already built a network that you can feed off of if they let you. My brother went into business with my father – electrical contracting. They work hard, but make a good living. My brother will eventually take over the business and he’ll have all the client relationships that have been built up for the past 40 years.

Build a Network

You’ll need patience and persistence to build your network, but if your passion is strong enough this won’t feel like work. I’m working on building my network by trying to help as many people on-line and off-line as I can. I’ve created a brand for myself and every day it helps me bring more awareness to my site and my potential business.

Love

Emotions are what transforms a product that is “just useful” into a breakaway success. Look at your favorite artists – you probably love them more than most of your friends. For example (let’s have a little fun) if your favorite musician was drowning out in the middle of the sea along with your 7^th favorite friend (the one that you sometimes enjoy being around, but a lot of times they get really annoying). All you have is a little kayak. You can only save one; who would it be? You don’t have to tell me in the comments, but I think that we all know who you would pick. When you can create a product or service that people love, then you can even mess up a customer’s order and still come out smelling like a new iPhone. Although I don’t think you’ll make mistakes on purpose to prove my point, but if you do and they truly love you, they’ll just keep coming back for more.

Education

If you graduate from Yale compared to West Chester University you’ll have a lot more doors open to you. It’s up to the individual to work hard and make a difference, but it’s a lot easier to succeed when the company knows that you are smart enough to graduate from such a prestigious university.

How You Look (Sex Appeal)

We are a society based around sex. Taller men often get the CEO positions. Prettier women may get pushed up the ladder because we want to be around beautiful people. If they don’t have what it takes, it will eventually come out and they’ll crash and burn, but if they can leverage themselves to the top and learn the skills necessary to be successful then they’ll probably able to build a pretty solid career.

Talent

Having talent is the least important factor on this list. You may have all the talent in the world, but if you can’t finish projects then it doesn’t matter. In the end what matters is producing the results. I’ve seen talented young kids come into an organization and they just don’t have what it takes to make a sale. They talk a big game and can make some pretty cool PowerPoint presentations, but that’s it. Talent is the weakest leverage, but one we still need. When you can use your network to build your rapport and your passion to push toward your goals then your talent will allow you to shine when you need to “wow” the customer.

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Plan of Attack

You must gain an understanding of who you are and what you want to accomplish to make your dreams come true. That’s why you should use your first career as a way to discover what you like and how you want to go about accomplishing your goals. I had a friend who planned his retirement at age 25. He went to a personal financial advisor, was open and honest about his finances and his potential earnings, and decided that with intense self-discipline that age 48 would be his retirement goal. A retirement lifestyle that would fulfill his needs was within his grasp if his plan was properly executed.

If you aren’t this anal then please don’t feel stressed that you don’t have every year of your career planned out. But you do need to have a plan of attack that will allow you succeed. Hitting certain age milestones can feel painful if a system was never put in place to ensure achievement that will meet your goals.

1^st Career: Use this time to understand what you want out of life.

When starting your first career, don’t worry about sticking around to build that 401k. If your company has one please contribute in to this plan, but don’t force yourself to stay with the company for another year just so you can get 20% more invested in your return. Your knowledge and network is so much more important than a few thousand dollars. So try working in retail, an office, surf shop, and maybe even a small side business to see what owning your own business is like. Do whatever it takes to help you discover your hidden talents and passions.

I could have gone into business with my father and brother or stayed at the valve company and I probably would have been ready to retire by age 50 if I was careful with my money, but it wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to explore new career horizons. There is such a wide range of careers to be discovered and enjoyed.

2^nd Career: Use this time to optimize your talents and connect with as many people in your field as time and energy will allow.

When have had the opportunity to try many different jobs, hobbies, and possibilities then start to take note of what you enjoy and how you may fit it into a career. Maybe 10% of you will find that perfect job right out of school, but most of you will continue to explore and you’ll never stop discovering until your needs are fulfilled.

Many of you may want to take the conventional approach to finding a career, but I know a lot of you will want to carve your own niche out. I’m in the process of creating my network so I can use it to leverage my writing and speaking career. This may seem like too much of a hassle or just silly, but to me it makes sense. I don’t want to go back for my Master’s degree. I want to open doors with my persistence, talent, and network.

3^rd Career: Use this time to slow down and give back to the community that has helped support you.

Eventually you will hit a point when you’ll feel tired of doing the same thing every day. Well most of you will. Some of you may work all the way to your grave, and that’s okay too. However, many of us will move on to that third career to take life a little slower, smell the roses if you want an overused expression to help make my point.

I’ve talked to dozens of people and they want their 2^nd career to gradually come to a close. They don’t want to be working 50 hour weeks then suddenly one day just stop and piddle around in their garage. They want to ease out slowly and transition into retirement. If you are close to this position then you must be willing to talk to your employer about this (This is where owning your own business has it’s perk. It’s your choice to keep working if that’s what you would like). My friend’s grandfather, 85, still works with his son in the furniture business. He doesn’t just want to sit around all day and do nothing. He wants to help his son build the business even larger. He works four hours a day from 10 – 2 and still makes sales, contacts, and money that he doesn’t even need. The mornings and evenings are slow and lazy and that’s just the way he likes it.

I truly believe a happy 3^rd career is about giving back to the community and people you love and respect. There is just too much knowledge and love in most of us to just give up and sit in front of the TV. It’s up to each of us to create this for ourselves. This won’t fall in our lap.

Your 3 Careers

If you can plant the seed now you can create a life that will fulfill you way into your 90’s. That’s my prayer to you for today. I actually have a personal prayer that I send out to all of my readers every day. Yesterday’s was, “I pray that you are having a more enjoyable day than me.”

Praying for future happiness is good, but planning it out and taking action to make it happen will make all three of your careers flourish.

Articles related to Career fulfillment:

• 5 Fun and Easy Tips to Let the “Real You” Shine Through at Work, Southwest Airlines Style
• Never Stop Expanding Your Network
• Give Employees the Power to Impress Customers
• Lucky You!

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Image courtesy of Ferdi’s World

A Cold, My Focus, Shout Out to My Wife and Lucy

I’ve had a cold all last week and I’m still struggling to keep my head above my work. Every time work tries to drown me I find this reserve of energy that pushes me back up. Looking back on the week I’ve gotten almost as much done as a normal week when I’m healthy and I can breathe without blowing my nose every five minutes.

I worked on the most important stuff first and everything else waited. We’ve all heard that we need to do our most important stuff first then bother with the knick-knack crap. It actually works.

My work isn’t as high quality, as you can see from my last post. I caved in. I wrote a quick piece, hoping to create reader interaction. It sputtered and tripped over itself. I forgave myself and hopefully you’ll forgive me too.

But besides that sub par post I got a lot done and only working at about 50% capacity. Yes, I know only 50% capacity! You’re wondering how I’ve found the strength.

Focused Mindset

I’ve been forced to focus as hard as I can without letting my ADD kick in and take over. Usually it takes me ten to fifteen minutes to get started on anything. I’m the work happy now guy, not the get it done fast guy. During my cold my start-up time has been reduced to ninety seconds. I created a little exercise to help me jump right in to my work. It really helped me avoid my procrastination. I’ll explain what I did in a little bit.

My cold has bottomed out and I’m on the mend, but my strength is only at 60% and I’m still working my full time job and pumping out some entertaining and informative posts. That was a little pat on the back from myself, but that’s what I needed and I gave it to myself. You should be patting yourself on the back too. Sometimes we just don’t get it from other people, so we need to fill in the gaps ourselves.

Making sure that you stay motivated helps keep your focus on task.

You can find this “focused” mindset too. Next time your energy is waning try this little technique:

Step 1: Take sixty seconds to feel everything that is going on within yourself. Do a body scan and check for weak spots and possible pockets of hidden energy.

Step 2: Gently pull on the bottom of both earlobes for five deep breaths. Remember to keep your eyes open, otherwise this might make you sleepy. This will have a calming effect and should help softly rise that energy back up.

Step 3: Then with that last deep breath decide what you want to get done and just do it for ten minutes. Promise yourself to work for ten straight minutes before you stop.

Once I got going I didn’t want to stop.

Shout Out to My Wife

My loving wife has taken care of me during this crisis. All right it wasn’t really a crisis, but I really appreciate her love and compassion. Even though she still made me wash the dishes after dinner. Our trade was that she would edit a few of my next posts. Believe me you wouldn’t want to read my writing without her help.

Lucy

I met Lucy at Blockbuster while renting “Iron Man.” Shh. Don’t tell me what happened I’m staying in tonight and watching it with my wife. A sick man needs his rest.

Lucy was working happy at it’s best. She asked me how my day was. Complimented my movie choice and tried to offer me an up sell, but not in a pushy way.

Great Article – Rock Your Day

I read this excellent article How To Get Through Damn Near Anything from Rock Your Day. Dave has such high energy. It’s a must read if you want to get your stuff done.

Wrap-up

Still enjoying my work while having a cold is a new experience. Usually I’m a big grump. It goes to show what passion (Work Happy Now) will do to find a little energy when you thought you were drained.

Sometimes we need to have a wrench thrown in the mix to mess everything up. It shows us that we can still be happy if everything isn’t perfect. This cold gives me another piece to my happiness puzzle. The next time I’m tired from a long day of work and I still need to post an article for all of you I’m going to do my “focused mindset” relaxation then jump right into my work, no hesitation, knocking it out for all of you.

How has your week been? Anything crazy? Any little pieces to the puzzle to help you see a more clear picture of your personal development?

An Uncle, Cousin or any other Related Family Member to Productivity is Right Below:

• Imagination Isn’t Just for Kids
• 6 Things You Should Never Say to Your Boss
• You Should be Celebrating Your Average and Tiny Successes
• Yes, I’m a Lucky Person – Then Click Here You Lucky Son of a Gun

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Images courtesy of Pescod, Jiva, and Serrator