Visit any business and you will find a host of the employees plodding through
their work day. Clearly, they lost all energy and excitement about their work
years ago, but instead of seeking a better job elsewhere, they put in their
time day after day and wonder when someone will come and save them from the
monotony. Truth be told, this is never going to happen. No one is going to come
and take them away from their dull and pointless careers.
The fact is, the only person who cares about your career is you. If
you don’t
take the initiative to reach out and find something better, no one will. Your
managers, your company and your peers can’t care about your career. They
are too busy thinking about their own concerns to add yours to the mix. You
can’t sit around waiting for the career equivalent of the big lottery
jackpot, I can guarantee you that it will never arrive.
Find some energy
Part of the reason people get trapped in unfulfilling jobs is that
they allow it to sap their energy and their spirit. They simply feel
too tired to pursue
anything but the input-only entertainment of television or video games. Energy,
though, is exactly what they need to find. They need to conserve one small bit
of energy every day so that they can seek out one small, yet fulfilling opportunity
or idea. Like exercise, the more you do it, the more you feel like doing it.
You just have to locate that small kernel of energy that let’s you start
the ball rolling.
Where do you find this energy? In most cases, you simply need to let
go. Even when a job is unfulfilling we still carry a certain, inborn
sense of responsibility.
We still worry about the bureaucracy, the politics, the chances of layoffs or
bankruptcy. It is one of the few times when we can care too much about the fate
of our company. We allow these worries to drag us down and sap all our energy,
even though we might be telling ourselves that we don’t care about our
job at all.
So, disconnect from your job to find the energy you need to grow.
Now, I am not telling you to stop doing your work. That would be
foolish. I want you to
disconnect from the petty, childish and demeaning parts of your job that are
sapping energy you could be investing elsewhere. Do you and your peers spend
your breaks and lunches complaining about the company? Are you carrying around
anger, disgust or even hatred of your company? Let it go! You have better
things to do with your time.
Investment
Once you start engaging in these damaging behaviors, you will suddenly
find that you have more time, more energy for more enjoyable activities.
Maybe that
news story from today’s paper will entice you out to a new park or store.
Perhaps you’ll feel like cooking that new dish you wanted to try. It is
in these small ways that you’ll first see improvements. Then, as you gain
more and more energy, the effects will spill over into other aspects of your
life. Like a snowball rolling downhill, the energy grows and grows of its own
accord.
Oddly enough, you might even find yourself enjoying and engaging in
your current job more. Once you disconnect from those destructive
behaviors, you might find
out that your job isn’t quite as bad or quite as hopeless as you might
have imagined. Sometimes, you’ll find that your new found energy is best
re-invested in making your current job better, instead of moving somewhere else.
So what behaviors can you disconnect from today? What is sapping
your energy and keeping you trapped in your job and your life?
Despite what you may think
today, you DO have the power and the energy to change your life. You may not
feel like it today, but if you can find that one small kernel of energy, however
you find it, you will see that life need not be an endless succession of despair
and disappointment and your job need not be a trap.
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Career
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