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If you’re contemplating or mid-way through a career change, you’re probably putting a lot of pressure on yourself to “get it right” this time around. So you might not want to hear that you may be back this way again.
But fear not (!), I think this is a GOOD THING.
For we are not the same people throughout our lives.
At about 8, I identified a type of shoe that pleased me. I recall they had little holes all over them, punched in a pretty pattern. I stuck loyally to my hole-y shoe style through many size upgrades. How my mother must have cheered on the rare occasions when I would swap from red to blue.
At 14, I was a devoted member of the Star Wars Fan Club. My walls were plastered with posters. My favourite was one of Han Solo. But I was worried. Adulthood was fast approaching, and I knew grown-up taste ran to proper framed pictures. A world of sensible landscapes, faithfully depicted fruit bowls or obscure abstract art - not film star posters. How could I ever relinquish Harrison Ford?
In my early thirties, when struggling to define what “helping people” really meant to me (which demographic, helping in what way?), there was at least one thing of which I was totally sure. I did not mean children or “old people.”
Yet more recently, that has changed. Since having my daughter Elsa, I feel passionately about helping children think independently, and develop the confidence to stick to their guns in going for what’s important to them. I’m not yet inspired by issues that relate to older people, but I imagine that could change as my parents age, and as I grow older myself.
As we have new experiences, meet new people, acquire new interests and reach different life stages it’s only natural that what constitutes happiness for us in terms of work and life will likewise evolve.
The lesson I take from this is to dial down on the pressure. We don’t need to identify the perfect job or business, to be pursued relentlessly until the day we retire. We can just think about what would make us happy for where we’re at in our life right now. And be confident that with each adjustment, we bring with us a rich smorgasbord of experiences, skills, knowledge - not to mention increased maturity - that is eminently transferable to the next phase of our lives.
In the meantime, I wonder where that poster got to?
I’ve just taken a look at the first answers back on my Summer Newsletter Reader Survey. I realise I forgot to place the link on my blog , so here it is if you would like to take part: Click here to take survey
I’ll post a full breakdown of your responses and what I’m going to do as a result of your feedback in a week or so. But for now I want to pick up on a theme I noticed emerging.
Many of you asked for more information about personality tests and how they can help in the search for work that’s right for you. So here’s a short list of my favourite assessments, all of which I’ve taken myself and found useful….but please keep reading to the end, where I mention an important caveat!!
1.http://www.self-directed-search.com
This questionnaire measures interests and abilities, and as well as making job/career suggestions, also sheds some light on the work environment that suits you best. You can take it yourself online for $4.95.
For more info and a quick and dirty version of the test that you can do for free see this old post.
2. Strengthsfinder
Another do it yourself test. This one identifies your top 5 strengths/traits (e.g. empathy, positivity etc) and describes how you could use them in the world of work.
Each book comes with a unique code that you then enter online to take the questionnaire. You can buy the book through Amazon here
3. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
This is (in my view) the “gold plated” personality assessment indicator. The MBTI establishes your preferred way of taking in information and making decisions and indentifies your personality “type” (out of 16 possibilities). There is a lot of research you can access which describes the types of role and environment to which someone of your personality type is usually drawn.
I took the MBTI shortly after leaving commerical law and immediately understood why that world had not been a good fit for me. It was a huge relief to know it wasn’t my personal failure, but a misfit that would have been shared by many others of my “type”.
There are various websites that offer the MBTI, at quite a range of prices. Just be aware that the lower the fee, by and large the more automated the process. It’s worth paying more to ensure you get one to one feedback with a trained practitioner. More on how I run the MBTI here
4. Ask friends, family and colleagues.
Ok this isn’t a scientific test but it’s a very good way to get some free and instant feedback on what others see as your greatest strengths and skills….which should provide reassurance on existing career ideas and/or give you some new ones. See this former post for details.
CAVEAT!!
Personality assessments are excellent for feeding back to you in a clear, intelligible, manageable format, key aspects of your personality. If you’re feeling in a muddle, they can help enormously in identifying the wood for the trees.
But there is a danger that we expect too much from them. No personality assessment will tell you categorically that you should be a brain surgeon, or a gardener (or at least, no good one!).
Yet in the midst of career uncertainty, we often hope for these sorts of simple answers.
Here are 2 approaches I’d recommend when embarking on “self discovery”:
1. Don’t spend too long on the theory
I’d use one or more of the tools above to get a general picture, and then refine this with action.
There’s no substitute for actually trying stuff out to know if it’s for you not.
2. Get comfortable with a degree of not knowing
During a discussion on our organisation’s emerging corporate strategy, my fun focussed former boss once startled me by declaring: “I’m very comfortable with ambiguity”.
It had never occured to me that it was POSSIBLE - let alone desirable - to feel no pressure to dot all Life’s i’s and cross its t’s.
His words have swum into my brain on many occasions since. It’s a cliche, but viewing our winding path through life as a journey rather than a series of goals we must execute with unfailing precision does seem to me to be the wiser and happier perspective.
So I’ll leave you with this passage by Kahlil Gibran from the Prophet:
“And a man said, ‘Speak to us of Self-Knowledge.’
And he answered, saying:
Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and the nights.
But your ears thirst for the sound of your heart’s knowledge.
You would know in words that which you have always know in thought.
You would touch with your fingers the naked body of your dreams.
And it is well you should.
The hidden well-spring of your soul must needs rise and run murmuring to the sea;
And the treasure of your infinite depths would be revealed to your eyes.
But let there be no scales to weigh your unknown treasure;
And seek not the depths of your knowledge with staff or sounding line.
For self is a sea boundless and measureless.
Say not, ‘I have found the truth,’ but rather, ‘I have found a truth.’
Say not, ‘I have found the path of the soul.’ Say rather, ‘I have met the soul walking upon my path.’
For the soul walks upon all paths.
The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.
The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.”
Occasionally, something lands in your in box which really makes your day. Here’s an extract from one such email, the inspiration for this recording:
“Dear Sarah
It has been just about a year since we met, briefly, last summer. I wanted to let you know of the big change I’m about to undergo, and thank you for your role in convincing me to pursue it.
A lot has happened since then, and the bottom line is that my partner and I have decided to give up on Beijing and the appeal of a steady income, and instead are buying a five-star inn and restaurant in New Zealand that has just hit all the right buttons with us in every possible way.
We leave Beijing on Aug 1 and have been walking on air in the 7 days since the word of our visas’ issuance came through from New Zealand. The place we’re buying is called Pen-y-bryn, and is located in Oamaru on the South Island. Here’s its website: www.penybryn.co.nz
I figured that life is too short to keep doing something that I don’t enjoy in the hope of one day being able to do what I do enjoy, and have decided that I’d rather enjoy what time I have here on earth rather than just keep accumulating money that does no one all that much good.
I think that I shall really enjoy my time in New Zealand, and hope to make it home for the rest of my days.”
Listen to James and me talk more about his dream, how he made it happen and how you can bring your own dreams to fruition too.
A real quickie to let you know about this free event on the topic of dreams that I just found out about. I’ve no idea what it will be like and I’m not affiliated with it in any way - but I wanted to pass it on as it’s on the subject of recent posts and there are some big names including Jack Canfield (of chicken soup fame) featured. Plus it’s free, so nothing to lose!
P.S. You’re likely to be emailed about other paying events after this but you can always unsubscribe if future emails aren’t relevant.
Personally I’ve found it useful in the past to get on a few lists to see what’s out there and whose messages resonate, and then after a while if I don’t want to carry on receiving emails I just unsubscribe. Any big name will be very careful of their data protection/email policy and I’ve never had a problem with spam as a result.
Happy Sunday everyone! Glorious day here in Bristol.
Whatever it is, I bet you’ve found a million reasons why it’s just not sensible.
But the fact is that these ways of life exist. Other people are living your dream right now.
Even the most quirky ideas can be made into profitable ventures. Just look at the huge trend for glamping - luxury camping - featuring stays in tipis, yurts and “ecopods”:
If other people can make a success out of a dream that isn’t sensible, why not you?
I think the real issue isn’t the viability of the idea per se, but our faith in our ability to pull it off.
I don’t want to be glib. It’s easy to say that whatever your dream, you can find a way to make it happen and I do believe that in the vast majority of cases that’s true.
But let’s look at that unspoken fear. After all, life can be brutal. You might indeed find you just don’t have the talent, or meet the necessary requirements.
Let me show you why, even if that proves to be the case, it still doesn’t matter. I’ll use every boy’s one-time dream - being an astronaut - as an example.
Here’s something I pulled off the internet :
Astronaut requirements
1. Bachelor’s degree (engineering, biological sciences, physical sciences, mathematics) from an accredited college or university
2. Three years of related experience - A master’s degree equals one year of experience, and a doctorate equals three years.
3. Passing a NASA space physical examination
4. More than 1,000 hours experience as pilot-in-command of a jet aircraft (pilots only)
5. Height of 64 to 76 inches (162.5 cm to 193 cm) for pilots
If you’re very short, not in top health or not sufficiently academic, you can wish all you like but it doesn’t look like you’re going to make it as an astronaut.
Which would you rather do:
- Squash that dream and do something sensible instead. With the unrealised dream remaining as an undercurrent “what if?” throughout your life.
- Go for the dream, and even if you miss it, have a ball getting a close to it as you can.
It’s a great truism that if you shoot for the moon, even if you miss you will land amongst the stars.
With approach 1, you’re maybe an estate agent (no disrespect intended to any estate agents reading this).
With approach 2, you’re NASA ground crew. You have a job where every day you are right at the heart of innovation in space travel.
Back to your dreams…
I love this quote by Carrie Fisher’s character in When Harry Met Sally (just substitute the man for the life you’d like ).
All I’m saying is that somewhere out there is the man you are supposed to marry. And if you don’t get him first, somebody else will, and you’ll have to spend the rest of your life knowing that somebody else is married to your husband
How about putting a small stake in the ground now….please comment below to share your unsensible off-the-beaten path dream!
I’ll start with an unrealised one of my own:
Spending every late summer/early autumn writing and relaxing in a log cabin in Canada….very On Golden Pond.
…not too sure where I have been to not have watched this before now, but for those of you that have also not seen it, here is the powerful and touching Last Lecture - on Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams - by Randy Pausch, Professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon.
Randy Pausch gave this lecture after being diagnosed with pancreatic liver cancer, 7 months before he died.
I love in particular his reference to brick walls -
“brick walls are there for a reason. To show you how badly you want something. They are there to stop the other people.”
A great attitude which I will try to adopt the next time I hit a stumbling block.
Do find a quiet hour - it’s worth it - and soak in the humour and wisdom in this very special talk.
An aside:
The themes in Randy’s speech tie in very well with my embryo thoughts from this earlier post on childhood dreams - about helping children think independently and creatively about what matters to them in life.
Following encouraging feedback (thank you, readers!) I’m getting together a small group of people in the next month or so for an initial brainstorm session on how to take this forward. If you live near Bristol and are interested in being a part of this please email me on sarah@cowsfrommywindow.com
And all of you, please do keep your thoughts coming via the comments!
One of my former bosses had a peculiar but endearing habit. I’d be working away at my computer one so-so afternoon, marooned in my depressing office-for-one at the very end of an interminably long corridor.
Suddenly I’d hear a rapid foot shuffle and a head would appear round the doorway:
“Are you having FUN?” the head would enquire with a slightly manic, but highly infectious grin.
Barely waiting for an answer, he would vanish as quickly as he had appeared.
I was always cheered by these odd interruptions, as in truth I was NOT having fun. I was on an internal secondment in a role where frankly I was a little out of my depth. Plus as a natural extrovert I was dying a death of a thousand cuts stuck by myself in a dusty hole far away from human company (the charity I worked for operated out of a row of Victorian terraced buildings…tiny rooms opening randomly off a maze of interlocking corridors).
Now looking back I wonder how - and more importantly WHY - I stuck it out for so long. I guess because
- I blamed myself for the job not working out. if I could do it better, be smarter, work harder, I would be happy.
- I was afraid that people (chiefly the senior management team I reported to but also my peers, not to mention myself), would think I was a failure if I asked to go back to my old job.
- Although I’d been happier in my permanent role, I knew it wasn’t what I ultimately wanted to do either, and I didn’t know exactly what I DID want instead…
I wish now that I’d had the gumption to draw a line under the whole experience earlier on, instead of clinging on and watching my confidence shrink day by day - to the point where I was rushing to the toilet after meetings to hide my panic attacks.
Perhaps some of you reading this are having a bad time of things work-wise at the moment. Perhaps it’s gone on so long you’ve sort of got used to it…lowered your expectations.
Let’s remind ourselves. Work isn’t supposed to be something we endure. It isn’t supposed to be something that makes us feel bad about ourselves.
Ask yourself: are you having FUN?
And if you’re not, don’t wait any longer.
Identify what needs to change and DO NOT give yourself a hard time for desiring these changes.
“When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don’t blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce.” – Thich Nhat Hahn
If there’s any chance of moving to a better environment within your current organisation, speak to your boss/other supportive person in a position of influence.
If you think a bigger move is needed, seek out that more fertile environment elsewhere.
Stand up for your inner lettuce! And good luck with your transplant….
Over the last few weeks I’ve been mulling over how to take Cows to a different audience.
My clients, usually now halfway through their lives and careers, often recall their childhood dreams. For whatever reason - poor careers advice, absence of a suitable role model, lack of confidence, parental or societal pressure to do something “more sensible” - their dream remained just that.
So I’ve been thinking - wouldn’t it be great to work with today’s children. Encouraging them to think independently, to dream, to believe - to understand that they have choices and the power to direct the course of their lives as they wish.
I’m right at the beginning of exploring this idea. This is where I’ve got to so far:
1. I want to focus on the children who need it most.
My first thoughts turn to children in care, children living in poverty, children in struggling schools.
But I’m not ruling out taking it wider than that. Certainly I had a fairly privileged upbringing, but my academic independent girls school, whilst delivering stunning exam results like a well-trained battery hen, did little to foster individuality or creative thinking.
2. I’d like to develop a model that can be replicated nationally - and beyond.
…using my new home city of Bristol as a testing ground
3. I want to draw on my strengths.
I admire the outward bound approach, art therapy and so on. But I’ve no training or skill in those areas. So I’m thinking more along the lines of group workshops, possibly with some one to one follow ups. Very like the work I do now with adults, but adapted to a younger audience: informal, fun but with a serious purpose underneath.
4. It’s essentially a not-for-profit exercise….but.
There’s real value in a child knowing that someone is there for them, purely to draw out that child’s own aspirations, with nothing in it for themselves. I want this work to be a Cows contribution…making the world a better place and all those well-worn but important cliches.
BUT is there a model where those that can pay do so, funding those that can’t?
Would you, as a parent, pay for this kind of thing - say via a summer camp, or as an optional add on after normal school hours? i.e could this work more along social enterprise lines?
Other questions:
What age range would work best? I’m drawn to the 10-13 age as a very formative stage…a time when positive, self-affirming messages could help bridge the awkward transition to adolescence.
What do you think?
I would welcome your thoughts….please leave a comment!
Fred Ecks is the Newsletter Editor volunteer for The Simple Living Network, an organisation which offers resources, tools, examples and contacts for living a more outwardly simple but inwardly rich life.
One of the network’s recommended resources is a 9 step programme called, aptly enough, Your Money Or Your Life. Following the principles in this programme Fred, at the age of 35, was able to ask his employer to stop paying him - he had enough money to live on for the rest of his life.
Find out why Fred chose to refuse a salary, as well as:
The origins of the 9 step programme and where you can access it, totally free of charge
The massive transformation Fred experienced as a result of following the programme and the key milestones in that journey
The quality that Fred has noticed is shared by everyone who has used the programme successfully
What to do if the prospect of achieving financial independence seems daunting.
Listen to Fred’s remarkable story by clicking here or use the player below:
If you’d like to find out more about simple living and/or the 9 step programme, visit www.simpleliving.net
(*if you live in a country which often blocks content, you may need to use a proxy network to access some of the resources mentioned in the interview).
I know many of you are interested in social entrepreneurship so I’m very happy to introduce Richard Alderson, an expert on this topic.
Richard is the founder of 3 socially-oriented organisations:
UK-based Careershifters, an online community for career changers; Unltd India, which provides funding and support for budding social entrepreneurs in India; and Journeys for change, which fosters innovation and entrepreneurship in today’s leaders.
Highlights from Richard’s talk:
1. What is a social enterprise and what is a social entrepreneur?
2. Can you make an impact AND earn a decent living?
3. Some of Richard’s favourite examples of social enterprises in the UK and US
4. The 2 stage process Richard took to transition from the corporate world to setting up on his own
5. How to overcome the psychological and practical obstacles involved in taking a salary cut
6. They key quality and key skill a social entrepreneur needs to succeed.
Listen to Richard’s passionate argument for social entrepreneurship and doing what you love by using the player below or click here to download the MP3.
More information on what a social enterprise is and the different legal structures it can take can be found here
Recommended resources:
The Careershifters Guide, a 70 page e-book filled with advice, inspiration and exercises for discovering what you’d love to do and making it happen. Find out more here
I’m so excited to have just finished recording the latest podcast in the 20×20 Your Money Or Your Life series. 
One of my former bosses had a peculiar but endearing habit. I’d be working away at my computer one so-so afternoon, marooned in my depressing office-for-one at the very end of an interminably long corridor. 
Over the last few weeks I’ve been mulling over how to take Cows to a different audience.
Fred Ecks is the Newsletter Editor volunteer for 
