Do you live for the weekend or your days off?
Are you constantly complaining that it’s ‘Monday…again’ or ‘work is c*&p‘, you know, you would rather be somewhere else, doing another thing, with different people.
As a child do you remember the same conversations taking place between the adults in your life, did you ever think that would happen to you, that you would become ‘one of them’?
What was your reply as a child when an adult asked you “what do you want to be when you grow up?’’
Maybe it changed day to day:
Monday you’d be a Vet
Tuesday perhaps a Doctor
Wednesday a Truck Driver
Thursday a Film Star
Friday an Astronaut
Saturday a Ballet Dancer…
What happened to you? Are You Just Living the Dream Baby?
How much did school and university prepare your for the role of work?
Did anyone ever sit you down and talk about all the possibilities and opportunities that were available to you?
Did anyone say ‘look, you’re amazing, there is only one you in the world, so you’re unique, awesome, priceless, we need you, whatever you do’?
Or did you (like many) have a ‘quick hour’ with someone you had never met before who said: ‘you would be suited for that’ or ‘with those subjects I think you should apply for this’.
And (like a deal made with the devil) your future became sealed and dusted, you knew no better, so it’s not all your fault.
Or (like me) did you just leave.
I hated, no detested school, first chance I got, I was out the swinging door. I remember two things:
1. the wall my big sister said I was not allowed to sit on (because that’s where the swots supposedly sat, terrible I know)
2. Mr C visited the ‘smokers’ corner on a Thursday lunchtime, so best not to be there.
Beliefs About Work
I grew up in the 70’s. (Actually and the 80’s, 90’s and 00’s!)
My parents had experienced the 60’s and all it’s loving (my sister was born, so that might be true, purge the pictures in thine mind!), my grandparents experience was different: two World Wars and all it’s hatred (a granda who refused to speak of what went on or the part he played), and their parents a time of industrial revolution and all it’s world change.
And the ‘times’ the universal beliefs stated that ‘men worked hard and provided for their families, women (once married) stayed at home to bring up the children’.
The beliefs about work that were handed down were:
- ‘any job, is better than no job’
- ‘as long as you are working, you should be grateful’
- ‘always have a back up plan’
- ‘serve others first, then yourself’
- ‘have fun in your spare time, work is work’
- ’stick with what you know then you can’t get burnt’
- ‘play the hand life has dealt you’
Fast forward 30 or so years, we are now well into the 21st century with a completely new set of rules.
All around us are people telling us we are ‘underachieving’ that ‘success is possible’ that we should ‘live our passion’, ‘follow our bliss’, ‘be the dream’, ‘reach our potential’, ‘be at the top’.
There are books, seminars, events, workbooks, life coaches and career coaches aplenty, retreats! (Blogs about ‘personal development ;-)
What has this got to do with your career?
Simple really, you’ll have (whether you are aware of them or not) a set of very deep-rooted beliefs, habits, attitudes and values around ‘work and career’.
You may never have realised this before however they play an important role especially in a career change or work journey.
Many people want to change yet they become stuck because they are holding onto and living by the old beliefs, the ones that belonged to their parents.
Task: Write down all the beliefs you have about work.
Go back through the list and ask honestly is it 100% true, who’s belief is this (is it yours?), if you didn’t have this belief what would happen?
Is the belief keeping you stuck?
Is it good for you?
Do you still need it?
There is a ‘gap’: from where you want to be and where you are now. A discrepancy
Many people won’t change career, even when they know what they are doing is detrimental to their health, well-being and sanity.
Some may start and then hear the ‘adult voice’ in their head saying ‘stick with what you know, you have bills to pay, it’s too risky’ and because that is the dominate belief their journey will stop.
What’s a possible solution?
Working out your own set of beliefs about work and career is a good place to start, separating your beliefs from those who conditioned you.
That requires doing a little work on you.
From my experience some people only go so far with a career change.
They see this huge expanse in front of them: they play a little, dig a hole of personal discovery a few inches deep and a mile wide, still unfocused and not sure where the real ‘dig’ should take place. Sure, they may have a new ‘job’ but not a new career.
Others on the other hand, start digging they go down a mile and a few inches wide, they get brave and know that order to change they can no longer just scratch the surface.
What happens? They realise that that top layer is just full of dead wood, the real treasures lie underneath.
Here’s a few questions to consider:
- What do you need to do first?
- When are you going to dare yourself to be completely honest with who you are?
- You have the answers already within you, how long are you going to ignore them?
- When will you relaise that dreams always exisited before money, and money is not the short cut to happiness?
- How far are you willing to dig?
I have no doubt, that many will say ‘it’s tough out there’ and ‘we all can’t get what we want’, my reply would be ‘beliefs’…there are many people on the path to changing what they detest about what they get paid for!
Life gives us so many invites to embark upon: there are ones that appreciate that the invite that leads them to become the person they want to be.
Phot0 Credit. Many thanks to Sebastian Fritzon
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