During your daily-grind-hustle, the probability of asking yourself questions like, “Self, do I love my career?”, and receiving a deep and insightful answer is probably close to nil. Because you’re always busy, rushing here and there, scrambling to keep up.
Whether you’re juggling jobs or juggling clients, your brain has to constantly pivot, process and deliver to ensure that you make it. Because you need to make it through your shift. Through the week. And so on.
However, unless you’re an essential worker (hats off to them!), there’s been a lot of time during the pandemic to think about your career. Primarily because there is nowhere to go.
During this downtime, you may have realized that, quite frankly, your career is lackluster. You may not hate your job (though if you do, check out my post on resume writing), but something is…not quite right. Others just want out of their chosen field altogether.
Don’t be afraid to raise your hand and claim these thoughts friends.
So, friends, what’s holding you back from a career that you love?
We’re really going to dig into this topic, as part of II of ‘Choosing a Career that Suits You’. So this post is going to be a bit more involved. Check out the summary here. As usual, I’m not being paid to link to any study or author (I would be psyched if Brené Brown even knew my name!). I post links because I like them and I think that they might be helpful to you. See my Terms of Use for more information.
I can tell you the moment that I realized that I was in a job and a career that I didn’t love. I was working late at the office on a big project. All of sudden (’cause of course the Earth didn’t send me a memo), the building started swaying back and forth, as if on a demented rocking chair. I clutched my doorjamb for dear life (literally), hearing things falling and people screaming.
I should have been panicking. Instead, I had a moment of incredible calm in the midst of the chaos where I could hear only one thought in my brain: “Is this how I am going to die?”, followed immediately by the clear thought that “this, this right here, can’t be it”. And I cried out to my God.
As Captain Obvious would say, I survived to tell the tale.
Since then, I have been searching for career fulfillment.
Friends, I’m still on my journey. This post is not me pretending that I have everything figured out and I have this magical secret for you to have your dream career now, or some other clickbait assertion.
Instead, this post shares some of my insights and lessons along my own career journey, which, as it turns out, were already the subject of psychological discussion (who knew? not me, of course).
In the event that you find yourself in a similar conundrum, a good place to begin your journey (in my view anyway) is in the land of psycho-babble on the concept of self.
Who are you?
Who do you think you are?
In psychological terms, our idea of ourselves is called “self-concept”.
“Self-concept is an overarching idea we have about who we are—physically, emotionally, socially, spiritually, and in terms of any other aspects that make up who we are (Neill, 2005).”
Included in this idea of ourselves (our self-concept) is our self-esteem, i.e., our perception of our worth and value. However, self-concept (and its little brother self-esteem) are different from self-acceptance (that super cool cousin we all have somewhere).
According to Leon F. Seltzer Ph.D. –
“When we’re self-accepting, we’re able to embrace all facets of ourselves—not just the positive, more “esteem-able” parts. As such, self-acceptance is unconditional, free of any qualification. We can recognize our weaknesses or limitations, but this awareness in no way interferes with our ability to fully accept ourselves.”
Self-love, on the other hand, is dynamically connected to self-acceptance and concepts like the knowledge of yourself, the freedom to be yourself, transcending the ego, connecting with others, self renewal and growth.
Note to self: This is a lot of selves. Including this note.
What does all this have to do with a career that you love? I’m getting to that.
Does our idea of self-concept match a balanced knowledge and understanding of ourselves? If not, how can we choose a career that suits us if we don’t know ourselves? If we don’t accept ourselves? And if we are not free to be ourselves in our connections with others?
My answer is simple: we can’t.
Based on my personal journey, my theory is this: self-acceptance, self-knowledge and the journey to self-love are cornerstones of the process to finding a career that you love.
There have been people who have discussed self-acceptance here and here and self-love in the context of great leadership. I’m going a bit further by suggesting that self-acceptance and self-love are key to a fulfilling career, whether you are a leader or not.
From my own journey, there are three main things that I have been working on (under professional guidance, as should you) to get to a place of self-acceptance and self-love.
1. Unresolved psychological issues.
Photo by Gaelle Marcel on Unsplash
For many of us, we may have unresolved psychological issues from things that have happened in the past, whether it be our childhood or past relationships. My theory is that we need to deal with those issues in order to move forward with our best lives, which include our best career.
Apparently, I’m not the only one that thinks this.
In a study by E.S. Kunnen, young adolescents with career choice issues were confirmed to have above average levels of psychological problems. After a career intervention, those problems generally decreased and career choice assertions increased. The career intervention was designed to stimulate identity development, exploration and decision-making skills.
This study is really interesting to me, because it validates my own experience. I have found that the more progress that I make on the inside, the clearer a career path seemed to me. Imagine if I had this knowledge as a teenager or in my twenties!
Of course, you have to be willing to delve into what is often painful to find healing. This should be done under the supervision of a professional, especially if you have experienced severe trauma in your childhood or otherwise.
Find your healing friends.
2. Negative self talk, creating low self-efficacy beliefs
Photo by Hermes Rivera on Unsplash
According to Grunert and Bodner, self-efficacy beliefs are simply “…a person’s expectation for success on a given task (Bandura, 1977; 1993; 1997; Bandura and Schunk, 1981). They are directly related to a person’s evaluation of his or her abilities and how well those abilities can be turned into useful action to accomplish an objective”.
This study and this study on self-efficacy and career indicate that a person’s choice of career is directly related to whether they think they will succeed.
Henry Ford was referring to this concept when he said “whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right”.
So now you might be thinking to yourself, but of course you would choose something that you think that you would be good at for your career. I couldn’t agree more.
Problems arise where we talk ourselves out of acknowledging our talents or trying new things to develop talents by negative self-talk.
Therefore, based on my own experience, negative self-talk drives low self-efficacy beliefs, which could be blocking a person from discovering or developing an activity that they truly excel at and enjoy. Assuming that a career that you love is built on your strengths and passions, negative self-talk could be blocking you from a fulfilling career.
By way of example, techniques for eliminating negative self-talk can be found in here and here. My personal method is to ‘catch’ the thought, acknowledge that it is not true, release it and replace it with a positive thought. These references are here as examples.
If you struggle with negative self-talk, it could be the root of a deeper problem. Please consult with a professional.
Moving on from the land of psycho-babble, we also need to understand our emotions (especially our fears) and our expectations if we really, really, really want to find a career that we love.
What do you feel?
If you’re like me, you may not realise that you have trouble processing negative emotions until you have a wake-up call, like a health scare. Don’t wait for that moment, friends.
Are you able to identify and express anger, sadness, shame, fear or frustration in a non-destructive way? Or you do suppress it, only for it to bubble up in destructive behaviour?
Based on my own experience, it seems that until a person can identify and express emotions in a healthy manner, it is improbable that she will be able to –
- discern her passions and strengths in order to choose a meaningful career; and
- function at a high level in that chosen career.
People have been recognising the importance of emotional intelligence (EI) on workplace interactions for years. And Emmerling and Cherniss beat me to punch on the impact of low EI on a person’s ability to make a fulfilling career choice. Research also shows that a person cannot achieve overall well being with emotional repression.
Basically, my experience is nothing new. But then again, very little is brand, spanking new (at least when it comes to human behaviour).
I also found some helpful articles on social-emotional intellect for adults and emotional intelligence here and here.
Consider whether you have any issues with your emotions. If you do, it might be best to seek professional counselling to resolve those issues.
What are you afraid of?
As we’re on the topic of emotions, let’s talk about the F word: fear.
Last week I discussed the biological effects of fear and anxiety in order to use that knowledge to conquer possible apprehensions about going back to the office after knockdown.
Essentially, the only way to conquer fear and anxiety is to move through it, by taking baby steps.
When it comes to career, a lot of us have a fear of failure. So we don’t try at all. This phenomenon is also discussed later on when I open up about the V word: vulnerability.
My theory is that the same concept can be applied to finding a career that we love by taking calculated risks designed to overcome the fear of failure.
For example, if you’ve figured out a career that suits you, that knowledge means little to nothing if you’re not willing to take a calculated risk to get where you want to be.
Let’s look at Christine Langstieh, who I came across quite by accident on LinkedIn. She left a corporate career to start a flower company, Bloombombs, that aims to connect Indian farms to market. That was a calculated risk. And it seems to be paying off.
No guts, no glory, according to the Galaxy Rangers.
Note to self: Listen to the theme song for Galaxy Rangers here to bask in Saturday morning cartoons again (for all millennials and 80s kids like me).
But if you fail, so what?
Your ability to learn from your failure, adapt and persist is what will make you successful. And that’s not just my view.
A recent study conducted by Wang, Jones and Wang discovered that early career setbacks can actually be a mark of future success. Whether an early setback in your career ends it or strengthens it is ultimately determined by how well you adapt in response to the failure.
Barbara Corcoran’s story of the expensive HOT (Homes on Tape) videos, as told to Entrepreneur, is an example of adapting in the face of imminent failure.
As she tells it, she had this great idea to put photos of listings, along with the real estate agent, on videotape. $71,000 later, she had video tapes that nobody had seen because a) the images played too quickly and b) agents didn’t want to show their clients listings attached to other agents.
Hearing about a new thing called the ‘internet’, she decided to try to resurrect her idea by uploading the tapes to the internet instead. The rest, as they say, is history.
There’s even an entire infographic on Entrepreneur about the number of times some of the most successful people have failed. According to that graphic, somebody even failed 10,000 times before succeeding. I kid you not.
If you’re not willing to fail, you’re not willing to succeed.
What do you expect?
Sometimes, our perspective of whether we’ve failed or whether something is worth it is shaped by our expectations. For example, if I just wanted to finish a marathon, it doesn’t matter how I finish, once I do.
This is equally true when it comes to our career. Maybe we expect that finding a career you love means that you will feel happy all the time.
If that sentence describes your expectations, pin, meet bubble.
Instead, a meaningful career should allow you to be fulfilled and content, even if you sometimes feel frustrated or stressed. Life is full of mountains and valleys, not flat highways.
Quite randomly, I found myself listening to Marie Forleo’s interview with Sheri Salata this weekend. They discussed stressing over their creative projects, which were part of their career dreams. Despite feeling stressed at different points in time, I didn’t get the impression that they lacked fulfillment in their careers. They simply made the point that getting there wasn’t all sunshine and roses, and encouraged others to keep going.
You can be fulfilled without being happy all the time, though it would be hard to say that you’re content if you aren’t happy most of the time. Lots of other people have discussed the difference between happiness and contentment in depth: check out two of those articles here and here.
Finally, friends, I think that the last key aspect that may be preventing you from finding a career that you love is an ability to genuinely connect with others.
How do you connect?
I’ve observed that the people who appear to be living their dream careers are often very successful at connecting and engaging with people. And they engage with a lot of people.
But how do they do it? What is the ‘secret’ to building strong connections with others?
Enter ‘vulnerability’, stage left.
Brené Brown is one of the foremost researchers on vulnerability, empathy, shame and courage. She states that the fear and shame of being vulnerable prevent us from connecting with others. By ‘vulnerable’, I understand her to mean each person’s willingness to step into situations with an uncertain outcome with a huge possible gain or a huge possible loss, such as pitching a cherished idea to the boss.
Interestingly, her research discovered that being vulnerable actually propels us to live life more wholly. Other studies have shown that building strong relationships (presumably by being vulnerable) makes you happier and more successful, both personally and at work.
Applying her findings, it seems to me that being appropriately vulnerable is crucial to finding a career that you love.That doesn’t mean that vulnerability is easy. It absolutely sucks sometimes. Because you might fail, like when your boss dismisses your idea and you walk out feeling like an idiot. But that’s all part of it. No guts, no glory.
Note to self: Go watch the Netflix special ‘Brené Brown: A Call to Courage’.
So that’s one part of the equation of my observations on people connections being linked to finding a career that you love. Now for the second part.
As mentioned above, these appropriate levels of vulnerability also seem to be spread out over many different types of people. People who appear to have found fulfilling careers resonate with almost everyone.
I thought that this was just my observation. Nope. Actually, there are other people who have come to the same conclusion.
I discovered that there is a new field of science called network science. One of the more interesting studies done appears to demonstrate that open networks (where you interact with a number of different people) is the best predictor of career success.
Why? Because you’re exposed to different ideas, facilitating a more accurate world view and more creative and atypical problem-solving. Check out the science more in-depth here and here.
Taking all these studies together, it seems to me that the skill of positively interacting and being able to engage with a number of different people is also critical to your career success.
Whoooo…that was a LOT. Even for me to write and research, it was a LOT. But I didn’t want to go half-@$$ed into this topic.
Just to bring it all together, these are the things that may be holding you back from a career you love:
- a lack of self-acceptance, self-knowledge and (zero attempt of) self-love;
- unresolved psychological issues;
- negative self-talk;
- low emotional intelligence;
- fear of failure;
- unrealistic expectations; and
- an inability to connect with many people.
You may also find that these articles (which give different perspectives on this topic) here and here are helpful to you.
In a previous post, I talked about the fact that this whole career thing is a journey, not a destination. To me, this explains why a career choice made earlier in life may not serve you as you grow in self-awareness, acceptance and, ultimately, self-love. And I know it’s a lot to take in. I’m still taking it in. I’m not ashamed to admit that.
However, if we never start the journey, we won’t get to where we need to be.
So, friends, what’s holding you back from a career that you love?
Seek professional help where you need to. Go forth and be awesome.
Great article. It may be that the ability to connect with people is the measure of how well the other six áreas were developed.
That’s a really interesting perspective. I could see how that perspective could be true in some cases, given the importance of our childhood experiences (founded upon our connections with our parents, siblings and childhood friends) to our overall wellbeing as an adult.