Since The Late Show is on way too late for me to watch and still make my 5 a.m. wake-up call, most days I end up having dinner with Stephen Colbert and the previous night's antics On-Demand. (He's actually a nice dinner companion since I have no other.) I was delighted a couple weeks ago (2/18/16) that one of Stephen's guests was Tea Leoni, star of "Madame Secretary," one of my new favorite shows.
Leoni was on the show just before turning 50, and she and Colbert shared a humorous look at some of her life. An interesting piece of trivia bubbled up. Leoni was educated to be an anthropologist and apparently worked in the field for a period of time. "I was good at it," she shared.
She continued to share a conversation she had with her father when she was a young woman. "Don't do something because you're good at it," he'd said to his daughter when she was a young woman. "Find something you're passionate about, and you'll learn to be good at it." Obviously, Leoni took his advice, and we are all the beneficiaries of her fine acting.
I was struck by the advice because it has special significance to me. When I am with someone with whom I feel it safe to share my displeasure with my work, almost always they will say something about how good I am at it. My field is a broad one. I seem to be stuck in one narrow band of activity, which I am good at but for which I have no passion. Frequently, the boringness of my days has led to soul-searching about whether I even like my profession any longer. Then, I remind myself that what I am doing is not my sweet spot in the field, and maybe if I was doing that work I would love it again.
Now I reflect on the advice of Leoni's father to do something you are passionate about, and you will become good at it. The truth is that I no longer know what I am passionate about. On those occasional unbounded days when I take off the constraints, I have asked myself what I would do if I won the lottery and didn't have to work for money. I know for certain that I would want to work. People in my family live to be 100 and the idea of being retired for 35 or 40 years leaves me stone cold.
What would I do? I don't have an answer, but I harken back to a contribution by a colleague at a professional meeting over 20 years ago now. He had talked about a decision-making "tool" he used when he didn't know what to do. "I ask myself 'Would it bring me to life?' or 'Would it bring life to me?'" He said just asking those simple questions almost always brought crystal clarity to him. I've used the questions a number of times in the last 20 years, and they have not failed me.
I have not won the lottery so I do need to work in something that will support me financially. There are certain parts of my profession that I think I would have passion for...if I just had the opportunity to do them again. While not totally in my sweet spot, it ends up that I have a couple of projects this spring that will at least allow me to move closer to that place where work just seems to flow through us. Maybe those experiences will provide insights.
However, there is a part of me that really believes I should be doing something completely different at this point in my life. I've been doing organization development for almost 25 years, and I feel that I'd like to travel a different path for the next 10-12. I do love coaching, but I recall that when I was coaching full-time in the 90s that I missed the contact with people that we have on our jobs. So while I would love to do more coaching, I don't think I want that for a full-time gig.
Last night I had a young woman as a guest at a dinner party who is doing international development work. I've had several friends who do that kind work, and I've also wondered if I could figure out how to segue into that kind of endeavor. When I look at the refugee crisis and other such disasters, the work really is aligned with the contribution I'd like to make in the world.
I've also noticed that I've been purchased a couple books recently and realized only after I'd made the purchases that they were categorized by their publishers as "criminal justice" and "sociology." I had a minor in sociology as an undergraduate. Perhaps they are pointing to dormant passions.
As all of you who have been reading this blog for awhile know, I love cooking, but have never seen it as a career. I love movies too, but really don't see work in it. I am allowing myself to just indulge myself in these avocations. While I love travel, it is a little more challenging to indulge myself there. I do love to write. If we go back far enough, like when I could first hold a pencil, I have always loved to write. Maybe that's really the answer to the question of what I'd do if I won the lottery, but alas I have not, and history has taught me that unless one writes the occasional bestseller, writing cost me more than it landed in my bank account.
Along the way, I have confidence that something will spark my passions and make clear to me what the next chapter in life will be. So, for now, I will be paying close attention to my "What brings me to life?" meter, knowing when I find the passion, I will be good at what it reveals.
Showing posts with label work with passion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work with passion. Show all posts
Sunday, March 6, 2016
Sunday, February 15, 2015
Looks good, feels bad
I continue to slowly work on my New Year's commitment to clear the reading stack from my bed stand before new books. I have had some success. I decided that I had no interest in reading a book that my boss had loaned me two or three years ago, but have felt duty bound to read it. I gave it back on Thursday. I have finished Richard Rohr's Falling Upward, the second half from which I found quick insights. (1/30/15) And, I am feeling some urgency to dispose of others since I have two new books that I am eager to start.
I've read another 40 pages in Creative Confidence, Tom and David Kelley's book on unleashing our creativity. Not unlike Falling Upward, I had gotten stuck on Creative Confidence just before I got to the spiritual meat. The early part of their book had looked at a design process they teach at the d.school at Stanford and use with corporate clients. Not long after I picked it up to resume reading, I found myself in a chapter, entitled "Seek--from Duty to Passion," and not far into that chapter is a section head "The 'Looks Good, Feels Bad' Trap."
Quickly, "Looks Good, Feels Bad" had my full attention. They talk about having a "safe and prestigious job that makes your parents smile, impresses classmates...or sounds good at a cocktail party...." That is the "looks good" part. The "feels bad" part comes when, no matter how impressive the job looks, the person in it just doesn't feel the job is a "fit." The thing is that we often slide into such a job without consciously visiting how it feels to us once we are in it.
The Kelleys quote Robert Sternberg, "People get so bogged down in the everyday trivial details of our lives that they sometimes forget that they don't have to be trapped."
I watched a movie over the weekend in which a man was fired from his job on Wall Street, and after much consternation, he came to understand that he has been much happier living in a small town than he ever was on Wall Street.
I recalled a number of the extremely successful executives whom I had coached who found themselves trapped in jobs they didn't enjoy simply because they'd become too successful to walk away. Some entrepreneurs had a great idea, and then they found themselves running a company, which was something they'd never wanted to do.
One extraordinary heart surgeon that I coached had never even wanted to even be a doctor, but it was "the family business." He followed in the steps of his grandfather, father, and older brothers because being doctors is what men in his family did.
Some were trapped by the cost of a lifestyle that they'd somehow slipped into--much more than they ever wanted, but now they felt obligated to their families to keep them in the style to which they'd become accustomed. Many times the family would have preferred to have them at home more than working to pay for the lifestyle.
Doing what Rohr would call "second half of life work," I have pondered the "looks good, feels bad" trap in which I find myself. Is it any different to be in a looks-good, feels-bad job out of financial necessity than to be trapped there by success? Until I honestly grapple with my shadow, that would be an easy go-to position, but I can't find any credulity in it for me when I am being honest with myself. Being in a Looks-good, feels-bad job is a trap regardless of where on the economic spectrum the job incumbent finds him- or herself. And, a trap is a trap. We can't seem to find our way to freedom.
One of the instructors in the leadership program for which I've been coaching recently told a personal story last week that reminded me of the old "Um Weg" experiments. "Um Weg" is German for "one way." There have been many "Um Weg" experiments with a range of species from earthworms to house cats to human beings. In all of them, when we feel trapped, we can't see an obvious and easy way out of our circumstance, but instead repeatedly throw ourselves at the same solution over and again, even though it never works.
As Sternberg said, "People get so bogged down in the everyday trivial details of our lives that they sometimes forget that they don't have to be trapped."
I still have 70 pages to read in Creative Confidence, and I look forward to learning if the Kelleys will share any helpful insights in getting out of my trap. I think they will not. If they had answers, then I wouldn't need to do my spiritual work. I am certain that I must remember that I don't have to be trapped. I simply need to metaphorically turn and look the other way in my life where I can find a Don't-Care-How-It-Looks, Feels-Good work situation. And, I am certain that I will find it when I tap into my passion again. Who knows? It might turn out to be a Looks Good, Feels Good role.
I've read another 40 pages in Creative Confidence, Tom and David Kelley's book on unleashing our creativity. Not unlike Falling Upward, I had gotten stuck on Creative Confidence just before I got to the spiritual meat. The early part of their book had looked at a design process they teach at the d.school at Stanford and use with corporate clients. Not long after I picked it up to resume reading, I found myself in a chapter, entitled "Seek--from Duty to Passion," and not far into that chapter is a section head "The 'Looks Good, Feels Bad' Trap."
Quickly, "Looks Good, Feels Bad" had my full attention. They talk about having a "safe and prestigious job that makes your parents smile, impresses classmates...or sounds good at a cocktail party...." That is the "looks good" part. The "feels bad" part comes when, no matter how impressive the job looks, the person in it just doesn't feel the job is a "fit." The thing is that we often slide into such a job without consciously visiting how it feels to us once we are in it.
The Kelleys quote Robert Sternberg, "People get so bogged down in the everyday trivial details of our lives that they sometimes forget that they don't have to be trapped."
I watched a movie over the weekend in which a man was fired from his job on Wall Street, and after much consternation, he came to understand that he has been much happier living in a small town than he ever was on Wall Street.
I recalled a number of the extremely successful executives whom I had coached who found themselves trapped in jobs they didn't enjoy simply because they'd become too successful to walk away. Some entrepreneurs had a great idea, and then they found themselves running a company, which was something they'd never wanted to do.
One extraordinary heart surgeon that I coached had never even wanted to even be a doctor, but it was "the family business." He followed in the steps of his grandfather, father, and older brothers because being doctors is what men in his family did.
Some were trapped by the cost of a lifestyle that they'd somehow slipped into--much more than they ever wanted, but now they felt obligated to their families to keep them in the style to which they'd become accustomed. Many times the family would have preferred to have them at home more than working to pay for the lifestyle.
Doing what Rohr would call "second half of life work," I have pondered the "looks good, feels bad" trap in which I find myself. Is it any different to be in a looks-good, feels-bad job out of financial necessity than to be trapped there by success? Until I honestly grapple with my shadow, that would be an easy go-to position, but I can't find any credulity in it for me when I am being honest with myself. Being in a Looks-good, feels-bad job is a trap regardless of where on the economic spectrum the job incumbent finds him- or herself. And, a trap is a trap. We can't seem to find our way to freedom.
One of the instructors in the leadership program for which I've been coaching recently told a personal story last week that reminded me of the old "Um Weg" experiments. "Um Weg" is German for "one way." There have been many "Um Weg" experiments with a range of species from earthworms to house cats to human beings. In all of them, when we feel trapped, we can't see an obvious and easy way out of our circumstance, but instead repeatedly throw ourselves at the same solution over and again, even though it never works.
As Sternberg said, "People get so bogged down in the everyday trivial details of our lives that they sometimes forget that they don't have to be trapped."
I still have 70 pages to read in Creative Confidence, and I look forward to learning if the Kelleys will share any helpful insights in getting out of my trap. I think they will not. If they had answers, then I wouldn't need to do my spiritual work. I am certain that I must remember that I don't have to be trapped. I simply need to metaphorically turn and look the other way in my life where I can find a Don't-Care-How-It-Looks, Feels-Good work situation. And, I am certain that I will find it when I tap into my passion again. Who knows? It might turn out to be a Looks Good, Feels Good role.
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