Do you ever wonder what your ideal career path looks like? There’s clues to the answer in your own home.
The home is made by parents, the place where they provide for their kids. The goal of parents is to do everything to give their kids the best possible upbringing. My folks worked incredibly hard to give us this. I saw my friends’ parents in Cork and Wicklow do the same. The next generation, my sisters, brother-in-law, friends and wider family are following suit.
What is the common driver between them all?
They all have a massive connection to their kids, their family and their home.
Connection is using the best of yourself towards something greater than you. Having that sense of connection is proven to be the greatest contributor to overall happiness. The home and the family unit give us the greatest example of what connection looks like.
The challenge is how we can replicate that connection felt or seen (for us non-parents) at home in our career. There are three key considerations we each need to reflect on for finding connection in our career.
Identification:
We need to first identify what path can give us the connection we’re looking for in our working lives. Two truths exist about the identification process. Firstly, it requires time and energy to explore the possible options and identify one that can provide the type of connection that gets us closest to the strength of connection felt at home. Secondly, we need to be open to what the solution looks like. The answer may not always be what we assumed it would be.
Choice:
We have choices around career connection. We can choose that we are going to pursue it and take real action (i.e job change, further education etc.) to make it a reality. Or we can choose that the we want to place more emphasis, in terms of connection, on life outside of work.
Acceptance:
There’s imperfections with every choice we make. Taking real action to pursue connection in our career involves sacrifice. It also brings a huge amount of uncertainty. Choosing to focus more on connection outside your career is the same. This route may feel like there is a certain ‘ceiling’ in the fulfilment you can experience in work.
Here’s my advice:
- Do explore what true connection in your career looks like for you. Irrespective of what you do with the answer, it satisfies one of life’s great curiosities.
- While acknowledging that life’s priorities must always be factored in, make choices around your career that make you happy.
If you find you’re experiencing uncertainty around career choices currently, picture yourself in this scenario. It’s your 80th birthday party. You’re loved ones are around you. You’re asked to say a few words to those at the party about your life.
Make career choices that will make you happy and proud about what you can say in that moment.
P.s. I woke up on Saturday morning to the sound of pouring rain. I’d booked into a yoga class at 11am. I was seriously doubting my participation. However, I thought back to the advice from the first ‘Stories for the Soul’ earlier in the week. So I hopped on my bike in the rain to the yoga class. D’you know, that man was right. By the time I came home from yoga, I had that ‘good feeling’.
If you’d like to learn more about Inspo, please contact john@inspo.ie.
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