Create both success AND happiness in your career
Have you ever noticed that some of the most awesome people to be around, including to work with, are those who seem to be having fun and not taking life or work too seriously? I’m not talking about the slacker or the person who jokes about but doesn’t actually get anything done.
I’m talking about the people who have found a way to hack through the labrynth of nettle and vines that is the professional work life, whether working for someone else or in business for yourself, while still maintaining a sense of humour and play. You could call it playing life as a game, or gamifying life.
I mean, no one is having fun all of the time but there are those people who are generally pretty happy, take situations fairly lightly, but at the same time are highly committed and genuinely good at what they do. They take risks and stretch themselves but appear to take it all easily in their stride.
They’ve found a way to create a level of success for themselves and at the same time, have what seems to be so elusive in this world: both success and happiness.
I like to think that these people are what Steven Pressfield calls ‘professionals’ or ‘turning pro’, because they’ve found the strength to identify and pursue their true calling:
What ails us [as humans] is that we are living our lives as amateurs. The solution… Is that we turn pro.
What happens when we turn pro is, we finally listen to that still, small voice inside our heads. At last we find the courage to identify the secret dream or love or bliss that we have known all along was our passion, our calling, our destiny.
Ballet. Motorcycle maintenance. Founding a clinic in the slums of Sao Paulo.
Before we turn pro, our life is dominated by fear and Resistance. We live in a state of denial. We’re denying the voice in our heads. We’re denying our calling. We’re denying who we really area.
What changes when we turn pro is we stop fleeing.
When we turn pro, we stop running from our fears. We turn around and face them.
- Steven Pressfield, Turning Pro: Tap Your Inner Power and Create Your Life’s Work
When you are responding to your true calling, and showing up for it, you can afford to take life a little more lightly because you’ve already faced the biggest obstacle: yourself.
The concept of creating both happiness and success can seem intangible because many of us don’t even know what it is that we want to do - let alone what would actually make us happy.
Happiness itself is an odd concept because it’s not something that we can experience and have for good. It is a fleeting emotion, like sadness, but like sadness or stress it can become a driving emotion in our life - and that’s what I’m talking about here. It’s the belief that we are generally happy, or that we are not.
So, how do we know what career or type of work will help us to create both success AND happiness?
This is a question that I struggled with for a long time, and spent many years working on for myself and also working with my clients to solve.
There’s no perfect career or business. There are positives and negatives to everything.
However, I know that this is possible:
Looking forward to your weeks
Working to your strengths, and feeling genuinely valued and appreciated for the work that you do
Feeling that you can’t simply be replaced (because you bring value as a person - not just because of your output)
Creating financial success and getting paid what you’re worth
Feeling a genuine sense of connection, mutual support and rapport with those you’re working with
Knowing that you are being of service in the world and making a difference
Feeling a sense of growth, development and learning
Take out a pen and paper right now and ask yourself these questions to get started:
How many of the above points are true for me right now? Where am I REALLY at?
If I’m being really honest, how do I feel about the work that I do in the world?
How do I feel about the people I’m surrounded with the most on a daily basis?
If an asteroid was heading towards the earth and I only had one year left to work, what would I spend it doing? What would I create?
What is it that I’ve always loved doing but put aside because I feel like I don’t have the time for it?
How can I start to integrate the things that I love to do into my daily life?
You don’t need to go ‘all in’ - this is going to be a journey! (I spent seven years working on passion projects on the side of full-time corporate roles before I stepped full-time into my business).
It definitely doesn’t need to take seven years for you to transition but the most important thing is the person that you become as you take the journey.
Think about where you will be in five years from now: making significant strides towards your dream life, career, and/or business, or higher up on the same ladder that’s not lighting you up?
I work with clients who are ready to take action now to find clarity on exactly what they want to do next - and to bring this to life by pivoting their careers. Whether it's changing jobs or starting a business, get in touch if you're ready to design your own work life that plays to your strengths and offers you unlimited opportunity for growth and abundance in all areas. Find out more and get in touch here.
