How to Live a Remarkable Life in a Conventional World

I spent this past week in Portland on vacation with my girlfriend, Nicole. We booked our trip around the World Domination Summit, which took place this past weekend. If you want to know more about our travels in Portland, you can read detailed posts on my travel blog at http://www.barrettabrooks.wordpress.com

Chris Guillebeau created The World Domination Summit in 2011 to bring people together around the shared values of community, adventure, and service. This year’s (un)conference was the second annual, held in various locations around the city of Portland, OR. The theme of the conference was the following question:

“How do you live a remarkable life in a conventional world”

And today I want to share the 15 best answers I found to this question from an incredible weekend spent with awesome people.

1.    Be constantly vulnerable

Brene Brown drove home the point loud and clear that being vulnerable is a very good thing. In fact, it is the only way we can live an authentic life in which we truly impact others. Convention tells us to conform, become complacent, and adjust our actions to meet the image others have created for us.

Brene says no to those false ideas. Instead, “Who you are will always trump who you think people want you to be.” In opening the conference, Brene spoke of Conference Anqiety Syndrome, making several points that apply wholly to living a remarkable life.

First, we have to realize that “cool is about self-protection.” Next time I catch myself being cool, I need to remember that vulnerability trumps cool.

Second, we have to remind ourselves that “no one belongs here more than me.” Whether here applies to WDS, a great opportunity at work, traveling around the world, or anything else, I have to remember that I am there for a reason. Only then can I make my maximum contribution.

Finally, “Your experience here cannot exceed your willingness to be vulnerable.” How true that was at WDS and how true it is for my future endeavors. Authentic connection with others only comes from true vulnerability. New friendships, family relationships, deep conversations, and new projects all come more naturally from a place of vulnerability.

I have to remember that if I put myself out there and fail or receive rejection in return, I have done my best. I have been in the arena and until others have been their too, their criticism cannot move me.

To live a remarkable life, I must continue to push myself to be vulnerable.

2.    It is never too late to make a come back

Scott Harrison taught me that to live a remarkable life we must never give up on ourselves, but instead realize that it is never too later to make a comeback. Scott was a night club promoter in NYC with “every vice possible” before he woke up one day and decided to make a change.

He went from drinking, drugging, womanizing, and spending to serving, feeling, growing, and connecting. He went from club promoter to charity founder. He went from morally broke to founding one of the most inspirational and innovative charities known to man: Charity:Water.

In so many ways, Scott’s early story reminded me of my own. Raised in a good family. Smart, Christian kid. Grew up to rebel for no particular reason. Drinking, drugs, sex. Until one day I was forced to make a change or live a life of insignificance. I am still very much in the building phase, but Scott’s story shows me that a remarkable life is well within my reach.

Never give up on yourself. No matter what exists in your past, there is always a greater future to be had if you will allow yourself to dream. Those are the words my heart interpreted from Scott Harrison’s talk.

You are worthy; you are remarkable. It is never too late to make a come back.

3.    Understand who you are

Susan Cain and Jonathan Fields reminded me that knowing thyself is such an important characteristic for having an impact in the world. Susan is an introvert and proud of it. As she spoke I had this intense realization that although I have always been pegged as an extrovert, I really lie closer to the neutral line in between introversion and extroversion. In fact, if anything, I lean to the introvert side of things until I get to know someone, at which point I can settle in and really share myself.

The point made here is that we can always learn something new about ourselves. We never know everything. We never know every little corner of our souls, but we can always work towards ever-greater self-knowledge.

By understanding who I am, I can better understand how to interact with others to create the greatest impact in the world. People who know themselves and actively design their lives around that knowledge can lead remarkable lives no matter what convention is telling us.

4.    Seek adventure

Adventure is one of the shared values of those that choose to attend WDS, and Jodi Ettenberg embodied that value to a great degree. I learned from Jodi that adventure gives us a peek into our own souls, as well as the souls of others. It allows us to catch authentic glimpses of people, cultures, and locales.

Jodi seeks adventure by traveling the world and experiencing food to connect with people. She has learned many ways to eat safe, but authentic in any city and she used our breakout session to pass that knowledge along… To make adventure more accessible to each of us.

“Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” ~Mark Twain

To live a remarkable life, I must seek adventure.

5.    Kill good ideas in favor of chasing great ideas

David Fugate, founder of Launch Books Literary Agency, was the first to make this point this weekend during his “Book Concepts that Sell” workshop. And then immediately afterwards, Scott Belsky (read more under #6) reiterated the point.

Both men offered great insight. For creative types, coming up with ideas is not the problem. The problem is actually two fold with the first part being that we can often have TOO MANY ideas. The solution is to develop the ability and capacity to kill the good ideas in favor of pursuing the great ideas.

Good ideas lead to a good life. But great ideas lead to a remarkable life. To live a remarkable life, I must always remember to kill the good ideas so that I can spend my energy chasing the great ideas.

6.    Take action consistently

Scott Belsky is the author of Making Ideas Happen and he presented the second half of the two fold problem I mentioned above. When we have many ideas (both good and great), we often end up taking action on none of them.

Scott shared an equation that will lead to living a remarkable life by taking consistent and definitive action:

Making Ideas Happen

=

(Creativity & Ideas + Organization & Execution + Communal Forces + Leadership Capability)

This led to another great moment of evaluation for me. I am great at coming up with ideas and getting them started in the moment of excitement. But then my energy often tapers off and I repeat the process to renew my energy. Scott calls this habit ‘incrementalism’.

But if you look back at those we admire for having lived remarkable lives, they were not incrementalists. Neither were they just creative thinkers with lots of ideas. Instead, they executed on their ideas by combining creativity, execution, community, and leadership.

To live a remarkable life, I must push myself to take consistent action and finish projects. 1 finished project will have infinitely more impact than 100 unfinished projects. Period.

7.    Develop unique superpowers to do good

Chris Brogan is a comic nerd through and through. He was vulnerable in front of a crowd of 1,000 and I loved it. And in the process he reiterated Brene Brown’s message while adding that we have to develop our superpowers to do good.

Chris used some of our favorite superheroes to describe potential superpowers… things like synthesis, empathy, tenacity, and rage. He challenged us to name our superpower and then to test it, fail, and gain confidence from the experience.

By honing our superpowers in this way over time, we will gain the ability to do immense good in the world. In the process, we have to remember that no matter how weird we are, or how unique our superpower may be, it is needed in the world. Therefore, “the weirder you get, the more you will succeed.”

I must develop my unique superpowers by exercising them, learning about their capacity, failing, and gaining confidence. Only then can I use my superpowers to do good and live a remarkable life.

8.    Commit to serving others

Service is yet another of the shared WDS values. Daniel Noll and Audrey Scott taught me that so much can be learned in the service of others. They have been traveling the world for over five years in the name of serving others.

They taught me that an unheard voice can be made loud and clear through service. They taught me that there is more to every story than what we may see on the surface. And they taught me that only through service to others can we truly experience the world and make deep connections.

To live a remarkable life I must always remember to commit to serving others in all that I do.

9.    Leverage your skills and interests to create passion

Cal Newport taught me that many interests can be molded into a passion, a life’s work, or a calling. I didn’t always agree with everything that Cal had to say, as I tend to lean a bit more towards the fact that there is purpose in what we do and any old interest may not spark our sense of purpose over time.

But, Cal’s message did resonate with me in that developing expertise is such an important part of becoming truly passionate about a given interest. The question I encourage my coaching clients to ask themselves is this: which of my interests do I care enough about to become an expert?

When we care enough to pursue an interest until we have developed true expertise and a valuable skillset, we both become more valuable as a contributor and more passionate as a person. Passion contributors live remarkable lives.

To live a remarkable life I will have to become ever more passionate by developing expertise and skills.

10. Tell a great story

One of my close friends gave a wonderful graduation speech in which he said “Tell a great story with your life.” Sarak Peck reiterated that message in her workshop on crafting narratives.

Sarah taught me that crafting narratives and telling great stories is a way of connecting with others. Stories bind us emotionally, communicate our vision, and share our lessons with others. At the end of the day we all have stories, but to live a remarkable life we must create and tell a remarkable story.

That story cannot always be planned. It cannot be controlled. It can only be communicated as is unfolds. It can be shared passionately, as with Scott Harrison. It can be used to interweave with the stories of others. It can be used to inspire. But for it to do all of those things, we must first create it, and then share it.

To live a remarkable life, I must tell a great story with my life.

11. Build a community of support

The third and final shared value of WDSers is community. The value of community in remarkable lives repeatedly made itself clear throughout the weekend. In particular, Corbett Barr’s workshop on instant idea evaluation showed the immense value of a community of support.

Corbett’s session was like a massive mastermind session, and the value of the feedback reminded me that I must build a community of support in order to live a remarkable life. We need feedback, we need constructive criticism, and when we hit the troughs of energy we need support. Building a community provides for all of these things.

Corbett reminded me that I need a mastermind group (which I’m hopefully forming with a couple of fellow attendees). He taught me the value of open, honest feedback.

To live a remarkable life I must build a community of support that will help me and support me.

12. Keep your eyes on your own paper

I learned so much from the attendee stories that we heard on Sunday, but a common theme was keeping my eyes on my own paper. It can be so easy to look at what others are doing and want to do the same. It can be easy to envy and covet and imitate.

But what makes a life remarkable is its uniqueness. Imitators are not heralded for their remarkable copying. We should be inspired by others but “don’t compare your inside to someone else’s outside.” A remarkable life comes from a place of authenticity and vulnerability. It comes from establishing our mission and getting after it.

To live an authentically remarkable life, I have to keep my eyes on my own paper.

13. Transform yourself to transform the world

J.D. Roth is an incredible man with an incredible story of profound personal transformation. J.D. taught me the value of transforming oneself. He reminded me to concentrate on changing myself in order to inspire others to change as well.

J.D. reminded me that focusing on what others should do will not make me better and it is not the way to transform the world. Instead, I should work every day and every month and every year to become a better version of myself. This time next year, as I board the plane to Portland for #WDS2013, I hope to have transformed myself to become a better person.

I can only transform the world by first transforming myself. To live a remarkable life I must embrace and pursue constant personal transformation.

14. Courageously invest in others

Chris Guillebeau has taught me so much through The Art of Non-Conformity (book and blog), The Empire Building Kit, and The $100 Startup… But never has he taught me so much as he did at WDS.

Chris showed me that living a remarkable life means courageously investing in others. It means trusting and empowering those around you to do remarkable things themselves. It means ignoring the trolls and naysayers and critics in favor of supporting the change agents and problem solvers and doers of good.

Chris has made himself vulnerable in countless ways in order to invest in me. He has neglected his natural introversion to stand on stage repeatedly in front of 1,000 people. He has shared his journey liberally with his followers, even when receiving criticism from others. And all the while he has asked for NOTHING in return.

I know that to live a remarkable life I must courageously invest in others.

15. $100 is All it Takes

Chris has also taught me the value of $100. It stated a couple of months ago when I received an advance copy of $100 Startup. It continued when I attended his Atlanta book signing and met him in person for the first time. Through all of this he showed that a meaningful, impactful business can sprout from $100 or less.

But then Chris did something entirely unexpected at the end of the day Sunday. He made the most courageous investment of all in all 1,000 attendees.

He created his own parable of the prodigal son and will be tracking the results over the next year. Combining this year’s profits with an anonymous WDS donation from a 2011 attendee, Chris dispensed $100,000 to the 2012 attendees.

He showed absolute trust and confidence in our ability to do good with the money. He showed a willingness to be absolutely vulnerable in handing out CASH to 1,000 people, many of whom he does not know deeply. Why?

Because he knows we share values of community, adventure, and service. Because he trusted that we would each walk away and willingly bear the burden of responsibility that comes with such a generous gift. And because he wants to see what happens when you empower a group of change-makers with the tools to make it happen.

To live a remarkable life, $100 is all it takes.

#WDS2012

(To learn more about WDS and to sign up to receive notifications about #WDS2013, check out http://worlddominationsummit.com )

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Trends: Supplementary Education

One of the things I most often try to do is pick up on trends in the market place. What’s going on out there, how does it affect me (and Living for Monday), and what can we do to be sure we stay abreast of the game-changing trends.

The more I look around and read and learn about whats going on in the marketplace, the more I see this cottage industry popping up across the educational spectrum. I’ll call it supplementary education and I have to say that it intrigues me more than anything I’ve ever read of or experienced.

In the Dec/Jan issue of Fast Company, they ran an excellent, albeit short article on a company called General Assembly. If you flipped the page too fast you would have completely missed it, but luckily I was astute enough to read every word.

In the old days, the ten companies highlighted in the article would be our competitors. But today I look at them as potential collaborators and mentors in producing a generation of productive and self-aware leaders in our work force.

Living for Monday is just getting started, but I’ve got to say that the trend towards supplementary education, focused on real-world learning and personal development is encouraging. It’s a trend we are contributing to and one we will continue to contribute to over time.

We have plenty of problems to solve and obstacles to overcome, but one thing is for certain (courtesy of a text message from my mom today): “There is no such thing as impossible; only what we tell ourselves is impossible.” I am not sure to whom I should attribute that quote, but I do know we are working hard to do something some would say is impossible:

We are helping individuals discover their purpose, take intentional action by aligning with a career that they will love, and be inspired to solve the preeminent problems and seize the premier opportunities of our time.

That’s something I can believe in and something I’m proud to be a part of.

Interesting in joining us? Check out our website, and give me a shout at Barrett at LivingforMonday dot com.

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How to Build a Lasting Culture

Something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately… Building a lasting culture.

I believe in the power of culture and I believe in our power to intentionally create the environment and company we want. But it takes quite a bit of effort.

One of the aspects of our Living for Monday culture is our monthly book club. We read a book every month as a team — so far we’ve read The War of Art by Steven Pressfield and Start with Why by Simon Sinek. Both great books, and Sinek gives us the first step to building a culture that lasts in the title of his book. Let’s start there.

1. Start with Why – Why is our purpose. It’s what we exist to accomplish. As Sinek outlines in the entirety of his book, nothing matters unless and until you start with why. Why? Because that’s where motivation comes from. That’s how we draw in our clients or audience or believers or cult. Why is the reason our employees show up to work and our customers buy our products and services. Why matters most. The Living for Monday why: Drive discovery of purpose and inspire intentional action. Everything we do is with that purpose in mind.
2. Define values – Sinek describes values as the ‘How’ to your ‘Why.’ They bring to life a somewhat abstract concept and begin to distill it down into actionable principles. Values are attractors of talent. They tell people how we go about doing things, what they can expect, and whether they will align with us. They’re a differentiator. And most importantly, because they are an outpouring of our ‘Why,’ they give us a way to identify the people with whom we want to work. They tell us whether we’re a good fit. We have six values that we hold dear at Living for Monday.
3. Build values into the operations – Defining values and not putting them to use is kind of like baking a cake and throwing it away. Why would you do such a thing? Values are only powerful when they are built into the essence of an organization. They drive product development, employee growth, incentives, and ultimately the organization’s success. We live our values in every possible way. One example of how we’re building L4M around our values is by reading a book every month and incorporating our newfound knowledge into our operations, which helps us all to learn and grow (one of our core values).
4. Hire, fire, create, and make decisions based on those principles – There’s not much more to this one. This is everything. Trey and Nick align with the L4M values. They both share our why. They’re excited about what we’re up to. We look at our why and our values before we make any decision to grow the company or take on a new opportunity. It gives a sense of purpose and passion to everything we do.
5. Invest in the people – I haven’t worked in or witnessed an organization yet where the people weren’t everything. People matter – that’s one of my strongest beliefs in the world. And I wholeheartedly subscribe to the theory that focusing on the employees and their growth, development, passion, and happiness makes for happy customers and happy shareholders. Did I mention it helps create incredible culture?
6. Believe. Inspire. Act. – As a business owner or leader at any level, we’ve got to believe what we say. We have to espouse the purpose and values of the organization in our personal and professional lives. We get held to a higher standard. It’s a double edged sword in some ways. It means the camera is on us when we act out of line with what we say we believe, sure. But it also gives us leverage to inspire because we embody what the organization is all about. And inspired people take action. They change things. They make things happen that otherwise wouldn’t.

I’m no expert, and Living for Monday is only barely viable at this point. But if I had to bet on how to build a lasting culture, I’d say the six steps above are a pretty good place to start.

What do you think? How have you built lasting cultures? What should be added to the list above? Let’s toss some ideas around in the comments!

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How to Differentiate Ourselves in a World without Resumes

The Wall Street Journal recently published two articles that begin to paint a picture of the future of the job market… where resumes aren’t accepted. The links are here and here, and you can check them out if you’re interested in the background for this post.

I find the future of the market so relevant to today’s graduates and young professionals that I will be writing a four-post series on the headline of this post: ‘How to Differentiate Yourself in a World without Resumes’ over the next week. Today is part one, and it will serve as a summary outline of three steps we can all take to prepare ourselves for the day when we can no longer sit back and submit resumes to land a job.

So let’s talk about the three key ways we as career-seekers can differentiate ourselves WITHOUT ever needing a resume in order to land a career that aligns with our values, passion and long-term career dreams.

1. Shift our mindset – The default strategy for pursuing jobs these days is sitting at home behind our desk and submitting countless resumes through job board postings. According to CNN Money, “80% of today’s jobs aren’t advertised.” This means that of the total job opportunities out there, we’re probably only accessing 20% of the job market. We have to shift our mindset from one of waiting to be chosen to one of proactive strategies to make things happen.
2. Improve our toolset  – Not from a technical standpoint (although that would help too). Once we shift our mindset from waiting to being proactive, we have to have the tools to be effective. First, we need to know how to effectively communicate, both verbally and in written form. We also need to build meaningful relationships, practice listening more thank talking, and, most importantly, we need to learn about ourselves on the deepest possible level. 
3. Expand our potential job set – Many times we as upcoming college grads or young professionals become limited in the possibilities for our initial career moves. Why? Because we are either provided limited information from our colleges and connections, or because we have not done sufficient homework to understand the possibilities. With a new mindset and our brand new skill set, we can intentionally expand our potential career opportunities. There are plenty of ways in which we can apply our knowledge and training in the marketplace.  We need to make it our job to find them.

That’s steps 1, 2, and 3. On Friday I’ll expand on how we can shift our mindset from waiting to be chosen to a more proactive approach.

In the mean time, what have you done in the past to differentiate yourself outside of your resume? What kinds of strategies exist? What issues or successes have you had in conducting an intentional career search?

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A little boy, mud, and the beach

Last week I met with a friend of mine over coffee. We had excellent conversation and I want to share a piece of our conversation with you…

Have you every heard the story of the little boy playing in the mud? Well, as he plays in the mud, he is asked if he wants to go to the beach. He doesn’t know any better, so he says no… Why would he go to the beach when he could just keep playing in the mud?

 

The lesson there, of course, is that until we make ourselves take a leap of faith, get out of our comfort zone, and explore, we may never know what we are missing.

Can you imagine how much that kid’s life would change once he experienced the beach? But I want to take it a step further: How much more would his life change if he learns the principle behind going to the beach for the first time?

It is a principle after all. We may never find our true passions and purpose in life unless we can learn to love the experience and principle behind trying new things.

What is the mud you’re playing in currently? What adventure could be waiting around the corner if you just opened yourself up to the possibility? What’s stopping you from leaving the mud and going to the beach? I would love to hear about your mud vs beach right now or a similar situation from the past – please share in the comments!

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Living for Monday’s Career Kickstarter

This post is all about our February 20th launch of Living for Monday’s first official offering, Career Kickstarter. We’ve been working hard on this program for nearly six months straight, and on February 20th we’ll release it to the world.

As you can imagine, we’re extremely excited about it. We’ve given a ton of information below, but I hope you’ll take the time to read through all of it. And if it looks like the Career Kickstarter program might be for you, let me know asap – I want you to have a spot. If you have questions or want to learn more before signing up, let’s set up a meeting or phone call – email me at Barrett@Livingformonday.com.

If it’s not for you, but you know someone who might be interested or could benefit, please share this blog post with them or send me their contact information and I’ll send them this information directly.

I can’t thank you enough for your continued reading of my blog here at Living Values. The Career Kickstarter program is the culmination of hundreds of hours of work, and I could not be more excited about the upcoming launch.

Here’s the details:

The Living for Monday Career Kickstarter Program

Living for Monday is an Atlanta-based coaching, consulting, and training company whose mission is to equip individuals and organizations to do fulfilling, meaningful work.  For a more informal explanation, check out our motto:

“Don’t wait for weekends to do the work you love”

To us, this joyfully explains our core belief that work should be stimulating, purposeful, and worth waking up for on Monday morning.

Living for Monday currently offers free and paid products and services that help college students and young professionals discover and get hired for their dream jobs (and a bunch of other cool stuff, but that’s for another day).

A limited number of spots are open in our Career Kickstarter program, which begins on February 20^th, 2012. The coaching curriculum is designed for individuals or self-formed groups of 3-5. After the spots fill up, the only way the curriculum will be available is via the online self-study version.  I promise the coaching portion is worth your while (see testimonials below).  Currently, there are only 17 spots left for coaching.  Don’t take the decision lightly, but certainly take advantage of the opportunity before the spots are gone. (We won’t open the curriculum up again until the second half of 2012.)

The remainder of this post outlines the details of the “Career Kickstarter” program and it’s benefits.

Career Kickstarter

An inside-out process to discover your dream job (and get it)

Through our curriculum, our clients receive three key benefits:

(a) Transformed mindset :: stop dreading the concept of work, learn where you provide value, and figure out how to get paid for it

(b) Accessible toolset :: acquire practical means for breaking into the industry where you want to be and stop hoping a dream job just shows up

(c) Expanded job set :: “over 80% of today’s jobs aren’t advertised” [CNN Money] – learn how to access the hidden job market without destroying your professional network in the process

Through these benefits the Career Kickstarter program helps clients move from “I don’t know what I want to do in life” to having a plan to land their dream job in just 10 weeks.

Who Career Kickstarter Benefits

Let’s be real, this program isn’t for just anyone.  It’s difficult.  As a participant, you should be ready to push yourself and be pushed.  That’s simply what it takes to find fulfilling work.  

The only thing we require is a determination to succeed and a dedication to the Career Kickstarter program. We’ve worked with students getting ready to graduate, young business owners, and young professionals making career switches. Anyone who has the desire to start or move into a passionate career and is willing to put forth the effort will benefit greatly from our program.

What is Included in Career Kickstarter

Our curriculum is delivered in one of three ways: one-on-one coaching, coaching for groups of three to five individuals, or online self-study.

One-on-one Coaching – What you’ll get: One pre-coaching consult and goal setting session, eight individual coaching sessions, and one wrap up session. Also includes an 8-week email series or ebook to deliver the content, blog assignments on your very own career-oriented blog, the Strengthsfinder 2.0 book and assessment, access to online resources, access to coach in between sessions, and our guarantee.

Group coaching – What you’ll get:  One individual pre-coaching consult and goal-setting session, eight group coaching sessions, and one individual wrap up session. Groups should be formed by the interested parties – Living for Monday will not be responsible for forming groups between individual clients. Also includes an 8-week email series or ebook to deliver the content, blog assignments on your very own career-oriented blog, the Strengthsfinder 2.0 book and assessment, access to online resources, access to coach in between sessions, and our guarantee.

Online Self-Study – What you’ll get: An 8-week daily email program and ebook to deliver the content, blog assignments and your very own career-oriented blog, the Strengthsfinder 2.0 book and assessment, access to online resources, and email access to a coach for questions.

What our past clients have to say 

“Barrett and I started working together 2 months ago with the intention of aligning my values, strengths and passions with my small business. The results have been amazing. Barrett has a unique ability to ask the right questions that force me to think deeper into what my business needs and why. It has allowed me to have purpose in what I do. We have seen increases in revenues of 30% since we started coaching.” – Chris Reene, Business Owner, via LinkedIn

“There is something about having an outside, professional perspective that is truly different from what family or friends could offer you. I have learned so much about my strengths and weakness and how to be proactive with both. For the first time in my career, I have genuine, SPECIFIC direction that I can be proud of and excited to accomplish!…Every time I hang up the phone (I’m a cross-country client), I feel a surge of productivity.” – Kat Cowley, Writer, via LinkedIn

“Barrett has been stellar during our working together. His ability to relate and encourage make for productive and comfortable sessions. He can easily communicate in person, via phone, or through Skype, bringing a needed flexibility to the meeting locations. After our sessions, I feel motivated to define my future and take my career search to the next level.” – Miles Buchanan, Student, via LinkedIn

For the full reviews, check out Barrett Brooks’s LinkedIn page.

How to Reserve Your Spot Today 

Hopefully we have given you plenty of information to get you excited about Living for Monday’s Career Kickstarter. To set up a FREE 30-minute coaching session focused on the three steps to succeeding in an intentional career search and discuss pricing, details, and have your questions answered about Career Kickstarter email me at Barrett@livingformonday.com.

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The Long Term Earning Potential of Passion and Purpose

I’m in the business of helping people find their dream jobs. We like to say that we do three things at Living for Monday:

1) Change our clients’ mindsets
2) Give our clients a toolset
3) Open up new possibilities in the job set

And we do all of those with the intent of helping clients pursue passion and purpose in their personal and professional lives.

Now, as you might imagine, one of the easiest objections to this concept of passion and purpose at work is money. “Yeah, but you have to live in your car and eat ramen to be passionate about your work.” Or,”I don’t want to take a lower paying job.”

Well, I’ve got two things to say in return.

First, I would challenge naysayers to consider the units by which our life should be measured. Money provides for our needs, but beyond that it mostly contributes to materialism and clutter. Wealth of spirit, attitude, experience, and giving is what passion and purpose bring to our lives. (This is not to say that monetary wealth is bad, but that’s for another day.)

And second, the practical finance and accounting major in me feels the need to appeal on a purely monetary level as well. I would make the argument (and I intend to prove or disprove this theory over time) that finding passion and purpose in our work significantly increases our earning potential over the long term.

Why? Because energy, innovation, leadership, and growth come from passion and purpose. And you know what else? Energy, innovation, leadership, and growth have tremendous value in the market place.

So whether you like the feel-good aspect, or you’re more of a rational, analytical kind of person, I posit there is much to be gained from living a life of passion and purpose.

What do you think? What objections come to mind when considering the possibility of finding passion in your work? Have you seen passion lead to higher earning potential? Let me know in the comments!

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Rest

No matter how much work there is to be done. No matter how hard you are willing to work. No matter who you are.

Rest is required. And it is rejuvenating. And if we ignore our rest for too long, it catches up to us.

Take some time to replenish your body and enjoy this weekend. You deserve it!

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Pursuing Passion When Income is a Constraint

In my Friday book review, I asked readers to comment and leave a question related to living values, pursuing passion, dreaming big, or changing the world in exchange for a chance to win a copy of Rework.

Jimmy, a friend of mine and a guy who’s out there chasing his passion in his work, left the following comment (and ended up winning the book):

One question I have for you about pursing your passion is this: In what instances would you encourage someone to combine their passion and source of income? You recently took a committing step to fully pursue your new venture Unconventional Innovations and step aside from your previous job. From your experience thus far, would remaining with your old company limit your opportunities for success or provide needed flexibility while you establish yourself? Interested to hear your thoughts on commitment levels for pursuing your passion balanced with the realities of a required source of income.

Jimmy brings up a great point, and in today’s post I want to put forth some extended thoughts on the subject of passion vs. income. When income is a constraint, it can really throw a wrench into pursuing our passion. It creates pressure to perform, it shortens our time horizon for finding or creating viable opportunities, and it generally makes the entire process less fun.

In response to Jimmy’s question I want to highlight three key scenarios that can allow us to pursue our passion while still making enough money to pay the bills and maybe have a bit of fun.

Scenario 1: We’re not all that ready to make any major life changes, and we just want a way to get more passionate about what we’re already doing. In this post I talked about three ways to find passion in our current job, starting today. The three key points: build relationships; Do more of what we love and become an expert; and use the four words “How can I help?” as often as possible. Head over to the link above for a more detailed post on how to make things happen given our existing circumstances.

When we find passion in the work we’re already doing, we will perform better because we are more excited about showing up. We will also secure our existing source of income by adding more value to our organization.

Scenario 2: We know our passion, we want to pursue it, and we know our current job is not the answer. However, it’s not viable to up and leave our job because we need the income. So it’s time to get to work in our free time. What do I mean by that? I mean it’s time to start creating or researching our passion.

To create our passion, we should begin laying the groundwork for establishing our own business or finding a partner to go in with. In a 40-50 hour a week job, it is perfectly feasible to establish a business plan, lay the groundwork, and be ready to go into pre-launch mode. The last step is fostering the courage to take the leap.

In researching our passion, we have one main goal: figure out what jobs exist that allow us to pursue it, and what companies have that kind of job in their organization. Notice I did NOT say ‘what companies are hiring for that kind of job.’ There is a big difference. 80% of available jobs are not made open to the public for application, so looking for openings that perfectly fit our passion is a futile exercise. In my coaching curriculum, I dive in depth into researching companies and preparing to conduct an intentional career search. The tools apply here as well. We need to define our ideal job description, network to build meaningful relationships and access the hidden job market, and then nail our interviews on our own terms. That process takes a ton of research and that’s what we’ll have to do in our spare time if we want to pursue our passion without losing our income.

Scenario 3: Our job is not the answer to pursuing our passion, and we work way too dang much to be creating and researching on the side. This is the death trap. We need the money, our job is demanding, and we have little to no energy to be doing extra work outside of our normal responsibilities.

In my mind, there’s only one option here. Save, save, and save. Calculate your total expenses per month and multiply times six. That is our target. If the number seems impossible, we need to consider what expenses we would be willing to forego for a six month period in order to pursue our passion. Ideally, we do enough research to find our passion and identify the necessary expertise/certifications/effort to pursue our passion.

As soon as we have our coffers built and we’ve done our base research, it’s time to hit the road. Our full time job becomes finding a way to make our passion a viable moneymaker. We might need help, and it might be smart to build into our savings budget a little extra cushion to purchase some education materials, hire a coach, or generally dedicate to networking and personal development.

Let’s wrap it up

There are three key ways to maintain our income while still pursuing our passion and taking a big step towards doing the work we love. We don’t have to leave our job to do so, and in some cases it might be better that we don’t.

No matter what route we take, I would make the argument that pursuing our passion is the key to not only long term purpose and fulfillment in life, but also to higher earning potential due to loving our work. But that’s for another day.

If you had to choose one of the three scenarios starting today, what would you choose? Why? What is the difference between your passion and your current work? Please share in the comments!

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The Sunday Night Jitters

Sunday night. Lights off.

Can’t sleep… Tomorrow’s Monday.

The Sunday night jitters get me every time.

 

So much to do, such meaning in my work.

Like an athlete before a big game, stomach churning.

I know I need the sleep, so I drift off.

Wah, wah, wah, wah. The alarm.

Jump out of bed. It’s time to get going.

Another work week is here. Time to pursue my purpose.

 

Quick, shower, your creative genius is waiting.

Ok, eat as well, your body will need it.

But get to work fast – the world is waiting.

 

This is what it feels like when you’re living for Monday.

 

Why do you live for Monday? What is the feeling you get on Sunday night? Do you relate to today’s poem? If so, how? Please share in the comments!

 

[Photo by Library of Congress on Flickr]

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