How to Change Your Career Path
“Don’t ask what the world needs ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” - Howard Thurman
Therefore the question becomes what makes you come alive?
My father grew up on the west side of Chicago. His father’s small grocery store barely survived. Working his way through university and law school my father became an extremely successful businessman. Yet he always quoted his father when speaking to me, ‘I don’t care if you shovel sh*t into the wind as long as you are happy’.
Where did this possible wisdom originate?
Some of you might be thinking – are you crazy? Do you know what it takes to succeed in the world? Do you know how hard you have to work? How innovative you need to be? How you have to climb the ladder to success? Maybe true.
“Midlife is when you reach the top of the ladder and find that it is against the wrong wall.” ~ Joseph Campbell
You don’t have to wait for midlife.
Back to the question, what makes you come alive? What is a reflective time for you? When you wake up? Driving? (stay alert please) Just before you go to sleep? Whenever it is, ask this question of yourself. Don’t worry if you start with a list; if you don’t know. Trust the question, the answer will emerge. And be careful to keep other people’s, your parents, the world’s opinion at a little distance.
The other half of this puzzle is the definition of maturity – being able to deal with the 3 A’s – ambiguity, anxiety and ambivalence. We think life is or at least should be one way or the other, clear, black and white. It isn’t it is both ways. How unnerving especially when we are thinking of a career change or making a leap.
Sometimes an emergency intervenes and makes us think or act a different way, For the most part we are making our way through a confusing, complex world of uncertainties and unknowns. We wait or hope for something outside ourselves to give us a definitive answer telling us the path to take, the decision to make. Rarely does this happen. It is up to us, a choice based on what we say versus a decision based on a whole bunch of reasons. Uncomfortable? Have some chocolate. It will make you feel better.
Written by: Bix Bickson, Director of Mojofication