How To Have A Successful Working Career

Living A Determined Professional Life 

Mark Sutherland, a business coach in New Zealand and former Olympic Gold Medal coach, says there are three components to a successful work career ── enjoyment in what you do, being productive and doing something meaningful.

Since a great many people spend the vast majority of their waking hours either working or thinking about work, having these three key components front and center will certainly enhance the chances of developing a successful and satisfying working career.

We have reached a juncture in the development of the world where it is time to question whether too much attention is paid to economic growth and commerce. Many years ago, the line "It's the economy, stupid" helped Bill Clinton win the United States Presidency. Today, one almost feels like a presidential candidate should be shouting "It's society and our people" at his or her opponent. But until that day is reached, your professional life is likely to remain utmost among your concerns and short-term desires.

So how do you do something meaningful that you enjoy while being productive? The first step is to always bring your A-Game with you. A true professional is one who can do their best even at times when they do not particularly feel like it.

The second step is to be people focused. Far too many organizational leaders focus on tracking the outcomes of profit and customer satisfaction scores. These measurements, however, are actually byproducts of staff development, reliable products and quality customer service delivery. 

As Henry Ford said, "A business that only makes money is a poor business." A good business is one that raises the skill levels of its employees and makes pertinent contributions to its community or society at large.

The third step in meeting the success criteria laid out by Sutherland is to port your personal life characteristics and personal values into your professional life. Research shows that those whose working lives mirror or encapsulate their personal values are generally more productive and happiest with their professional lives.

For, as author and leadership trainer Steven Howard notes, "When people go to work they should not be required to leave their values at home." 

If the values of your working environment clash with your personal values, removing yourself as quickly as feasible from that working environment is mandatory for your spiritual, physical and emotional health (and growth). You are not likely to find enjoyment, be productive or consider your work to be meaningful in an environment where the values are not in sync with your personal values.

Additionally, if you cannot live your passions through your work, then you absolutely must find a way to pursue your passions on the side. Allowing your professional life to bury your personal passions is neither spiritually healthy nor rewarding. 

Living your passions through your work. Now that's the definition of Living A Determined Professional Life. 

Lastly, beware of the evil trap of, as Jackson Browne eloquently put it, "going in search of the legal tender." 

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

Working To Live A Determined Professional Life

Do You Love What You Do? 

Your life's work is not necessarily your employment work. The latter is how you put food on the table, clothes on your back and shelter over your head.

It is interesting that the workplace has so many Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) tracking a variety of areas in order to measure organizational success and improvement. And yet, very few people use the one solitary KPI of determining their own career success that makes the most sense ── do you love what you do?

If you do not love what you are doing in your employment chances are you are working to live ── generating an income to meet your financial obligations and some of your wants and desires. Hopefully some of these wants and desires are aligned with your Determined Life goals and desired outcomes.

You can leverage your income generating activities one of two ways:

1) continue to climb the income and status ladders in your organization or industry and focus on career success as a key metric for your life, or

2) use your employment income to fund your dream fulfillment and achieve your Determined Life goals.

The first alternative makes your personal revenue scalable, but often results in the postponed pursuit of your dreams, goals and life's purpose. 

The second alternative leverages your ability to produce sufficient (though perhaps not maximum) income while making your Determined Life dreams and goals scalable by reserving the majority of your time and energy for pursuit of your goals and life's purpose.

Albert Schweitzer understood the linkage between success and doing what you love: "Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful." 

That's what we would call Living A Determined Professional Life. 

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

Me Time

The Importance of Putting "Me Time" on Your Personal Calendars

What is at the top of your personal To Do list right now? Do you spend the majority of each weekend running errands and handling personal and family chores? When was the last time you scheduled Me Time?

We are not machines, though we often push ourselves like mechanical beasts. We all need to take breaks and relax. We all need time alone to ourselves, even when it seems like there's no spare time to do so (which, in fact, is the exact time when we most desperately need a break from the world, other people, and all the commitments and tasks facing us).

Me Time should be exactly that. Time for just you, or just you and someone you don't see very often that you want to share some special time with. Me Time is not a time for running personal errands. It is a time to be alone with yourself, catch your breath, and regain your internal harmony.

If you will block off a couple of hours once or twice a month for Me Time, you will feel rejuvenated and reinvigorated. 

Here are some wonderful activities and pursuits to consider for your periodic Me Time blocks:

·         Commune with nature. Walk on a beach. Hike in the woods or forest. Stroll through a public park, feed the birds and enjoy your own tasty snack.

·         Treat yourself to a spa treatment, massage or Reiki session.

·         Go to a game, concert, play, or movie by yourself, or with a friend or family member you haven't seen in awhile.

·         Eat outside. Tip: many hotels have snack bars and cafes at their outdoor pools. Or, if you live near the ocean, try one of the outdoor restaurants at any of the resorts overlooking the water. Breakfast overlooking the beach can be quite the personal treat!

·         Visit a museum, science center or historical building. This can be an enjoyable way to spend a couple of hours, especially if you are traveling alone on business. And it certainly beats sitting in your hotel room reading email.

·         Plan your next vacation by visiting travel agencies and tourism promotion offices. Grab a few brochures, find an enjoyable spot for a relaxing cup of coffee, and draft out your own itinerary.

How can you find the time to do these things? Well, for one, eliminate as many of these time wasters and energy destroyers as you can:

·         Watching the news or ESPN Sports Center every night (with the constant repetition of major stories you won't miss much information if you skip these shows twice a week).

·         Reading the daily newspaper or watching the morning news each and every day (again you won't miss any major stories if you skip this activity twice a week).

·         Mindlessly watching television in the hopes that doing so will re-energize your tired body (it won't, but a brisk 15-20 minute walk will).

·         Likewise mindlessly surfing the Internet in the hopes of finding something interesting to occupy your already overloaded mind.

·         Worrying about possible negative consequences of something that has not occurred and may not actually happen.

·         Spending time consciously regretting the past or worrying about the future.

·         Over-analyzing data and options before making a decision.

·         Gossiping about others.

·         Spending time with negative people who drain your own energy reserves.

·         Playing electronic games on your smart phone, tablet or computer.

Just putting an end to a few of these activities will easily reward you with four to five hours of extra time a month that you think you do not currently have.

Lastly, a tip of huge importance. You must put Me Time onto your calendar and do your best not to let anything cause you to cancel this commitment to yourself. It is best to schedule these sessions 4-5 days ahead of time. The anticipation will build inside you as your appointment with yourself nears. 

Also, to help get you motivated, we have hundreds of motivational quotes in our book Project You: Words of Wisdom. It is available at Amazon in paperback ($6.45) and Kindle ($3.88) formats.

Please give Me Time a try. We would love to hear about your experiences with Me Time. Let us know in the comment box below. 

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is also available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

Recovering From Tragedy

Let Tragic Events Spur Positive Outcomes 

At the upper end of the loss scale are the big major tragedies that occasionally hit us or someone we know closely.

While the steps above will help get you through the worst of these, there may be some other tactics worthwhile employing that are a bit harder and require more effort, including: 

• Accepting your loss or situation and simply letting go of whatever you once had. In extreme circumstances this may require the same purposeful memory suppression techniques discussed in the previous blog post More Thoughts On Handling Grief and Loss.
• Leverage the duality of change. Every ending or loss is the start of a new beginning, provided you force yourself to see it that way. It may not be the fresh start you had planned or anticipated, but it is the one presented to you. It is up to you to decide what to do with this blank slate. 
• Set boundaries and time limits for your grieving. This may sound cold and calculating, but it is the best way to ensure that your grieving process does not devastate other aspects of your life. You do not need "time to heal" as much as you need to be getting on with your life. 
• Focus relentlessly on the fact that not only is healing possible, it is probable. Unless you stubbornly refuse to allow yourself to move on (in which case someone should seek professional intervention for you), you will heal. Nature provides this outlet for you, but it is up to you to determine how long it will take you to open the door to healing. Knowing that the door is there precedes taking the first step. 
• Accept and embrace the changes that a major loss brings. No matter how devastating the loss, you can turn the resulting changes into something positive: a new direction for your life, a new vision of your life's purpose, finding a new soul mater, or even coming to a fuller and more complete understanding of yourself. 

There is no single, solitary path for coping with a major loss or a tragedy. However, you probably know someone, or heard about someone, who has fully recovered from a tragic event by embracing the fresh start the event provided. Examples include:

·         Divorcees who start dating, develop new relationships and wind up with a more suitable spouse.

·         Parents who adopt after losing a child, providing comfort and a home to a child in need.

·         People who re-build destroyed homes that are more environmentally friendly and require less fossil fuel for heating or cooling.

·         Those who start new business ventures after an existing one collapses.  

·         People who fund major medical research or start support groups after a family member falls victim to a critical illness or disease.

In each example a tragic event spurred a positive outcome. 

And that should be the goal for everyone who has the unfortunate experience of a tragedy in their life. 

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is also available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

More Thoughts On Handling Grief And Loss

How You Manage and Handle Grief Determines How Long It Lasts 

As we wrote in the previous blog on Handling Grief and Loss, loss is intrinsic in life. 

We must learn to accept that it will happen repeatedly throughout our lives. As such,there is no sense in trying to deny or avoid losses. 

The important thing is not to let the natural grief you feel after a significant loss turn into despair, gloom, depression, or hopelessness. You do not so much overcome grief as you learn how to manage and handle it.

The key here is to remember that events have no meaning. Any meaning given to an event (good or bad) is simply the meaning that you give to it. So whether an event is tragic or character building, sad or happy, helpful or restraining is solely dependent upon the meaning that you assign it.

In the previous blog post we provided four methods you can use to handle grief and loss, and continue to live a meaningful life. Here are four more methods: 

1)  Talk about your feelings and emotions, either with trusted family members or professionals. Even the most private person can benefit from discussing an overwhelming loss in the safe and supportive environment of a trained grief counselor. If you don't feel comfortable talking with others, then find time and space away from everyone else and have a meditation session or dialog with your spirit. Your soul can be quite the comforting aide when given the opportunity. 

2)  Avoid alcohol and self medicating yourself. A walk in nature will do you more good than a couple of shots of booze. Realize that you are in a weakened state, and therefore more susceptible to alcohol and drug abuse than normal. 

3)  After an appropriate period of grief, turn your thoughts from what you have lost to positive memories of what you once had. Express gratitude for what you had, and for what you still have. Whenever feelings of grief start to rise, force yourself back into thoughts of gratitude and appreciation. 

4) Refocus on all that is good, positive and right in your world. Refocus on your personal hopes, dreams, goals, and desires. Refocus on the future you want to create and let the past, even the immediate past that resulted in a significant loss for you, slip away as you move back onto your Project You Life Journey path.

Fortunately, feelings of loss and grief are usually temporary and diminish over time. So, even if time does not heal all wounds, it does help to lessen and reduce the painful emotions that come with a significant loss. 

Eventually, we all heal and move on with our lives as best we can; and knowing this in advance can be of comfort to us when we are in the throes of the grieving process.

Lastly, simply knowing that it is foolish and futile to seek a life free of loss, sorrow and grief, you are better positioned to accept loss, sorrow and grief as fundamental elements of life. 

It is said that "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" and thus the person who anticipates that loss, sorrow and grief will make an appearance in their life is likewise a person who can use loss, sorrow and grief to make herself or himself stronger.

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is also available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

Handling Grief and Loss

Personal Grieving is a Process Which You Can Manage and Handle 

Loss is intrinsic in life. Accept that it will repeatedly happen to you throughout your life, in one form or another. There is no sense in trying to deny or avoid losses.

The key thing is not to let the natural grief you feel after a significant loss turn into despair, gloom, depression, or hopelessness. You do not so much overcome grief as you learn how to manage and handle it.

There is no doubt that the debilitating effects of grief, pain and sorrow can be tremendous, especially in the aftermath of a major loss such as:

·         death of a loved one, family member or close friend

·         divorce

·         losing one's job or business

·         ending of a meaningful relationship

·         major illnesses

·         an incapacitating accident

·         major property loss due to accident, storm damage or a natural disaster

·         loss of bodily functions or mental capacity in self or a loved one

The key here is to remember that events have no meaning. Any meaning given to an event (good or bad) is simply the meaning that you give to it. So whether an event is tragic or character building, sad or happy, helpful or restraining is solely dependent upon the meaning that you assign it.

The silver lining in these dark clouds of the human experience is that billions of others before you have suffered big loss grief and survived to live meaningful lives. Which simply means that so can you. 

Here are four methods for doing so is: 

 1) Be prepared to handle disaster or a big loss grief by acknowledging that extremely bad things and losses will be encountered at some point in your life. Acknowledge and fully understand that even the worst imaginable disasters or losses are not likely to kill you. 

2)  Identify you strengths and what fuels your resilience in tough situations. Know in advance how to trigger those internal stores and how to replenish them. 

3) Allow yourself to grieve and embrace the feelings of bereavement. Attempting to repress natural feelings, even for a short period, will often make you feel worse. There is little advantage to be found trying to "tough it out" or "put on a strong face for others" when you are hurting inside. 

4)  Cry if you need to. Crying is a natural body reaction that helps to eliminate the harmful toxins and stress hormones created by grief and sorrow. This applies equally to men as to women. Psychologists and grief counselors will be the first to tell you that crying is a vital aspect of tacking and meeting your grief head-on and speeding up your healing process. 

We will give you four more methods in the next blog post.

Grieving is a process, one that can be shortened and its impact lessened through careful and conscientious management. 

Without proper management, however, excessive grief can cause feelings of "I cannot handle any more" or "I cannot cope with this." When those feelings ring harsh and true, and are not temporary bursts of despair, it is best to seek professional help. 

As we wrote above, the key thing is not to let the natural grief you feel after a significant loss turn into despair, gloom, depression, or hopelessness. You do not so much overcome grief as you learn how to manage and handle it.

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is also available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon. 

Learning From Setbacks

Failure Should Be Your Teacher, Not Your Undertaker 

All situations in life teach us something, particularly the ones we label failures and setbacks. The key to understanding these lessons is to treat failures and setbacks as learning opportunities and nothing more. Here is advice from motivational speaker Og Mandino on how to do this:

Whenever you make a mistake or get knocked down by life, don't look back at it too long. Mistakes are life's way of teaching you.

Your capacity for occasional blunders is inseparable from your capacity to reach your goals. No one wins them all, and your failures, when they happen, are just part of your growth.

Shake off your blunders. How will you know your limits without an occasional failure? Never quit. Your turn will come.

Many people have written about bouncing back and learning from setbacks. Here are six pertinent quotes you may want to refer to the next time you think you have failed at something:

Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently. ~ Denis Waitely

I am not judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times I succeed: and the number of times I succeed is in direct proportion to the number of times I can fail and keep on trying. ~ Tom Hopkins

No man ever became great or good except through many and great mistakes. ~ William E. Gladstone

When you make a mistake, don't look back at it long. Take the reason of the thing into your mind, and then look forward. Mistakes are lessons of wisdom. The past cannot be changed. The future is yet in your power. ~ Mary Pickford

All adverse and depressing influences can be overcome, not by fighting, but by rising above them. ~ Charles Caleb Cotton

I have always believed, and I still believe, that whatever good or bad fortune may come our way we can always give it meaning and transform it into something of value. ~ Hermann Hesse 

However, the best comment on this subject is this anonymous one: "Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker."

Remember, just as one solitary success does not make you a successful person, one failure or setback does not make you a failure.

No matter how many attempts it takes you to achieve a dream or a goal, as long as you exude continuous persistence in pursuit of your desires you will attain success in your life. 

We have more thoughts on personal growth and development, plus hundreds of motivational quotes, in our book Project You: Words of Wisdom. It is available at Amazon in paperback ($6.45) and Kindle ($3.88) formats. 

This article is partially excerpted from our top-ranked personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, which is also available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon.