“My feet are frozen on this middle ground
From the song “All In” – by Matthew West
The water’s warm here but the fire’s gone out
I played it safe for so long, the passion left
Turns out
Safe is just another word for regret”
Do these lyrics resonate with you when it comes to your career?
We go to school, get a degree, and when we graduate, we find a job. And we’re so happy we have a job so we can:
- Pay off school debt
- Get a car
- Move out of our parent’s house
We become busy with learning the new role, moving into our new place, going out to a nice restaurant from time to time. A year goes by. Maybe two. Perhaps you’ve been promoted or moved to a different job. It’s easy not to think about creating a career plan, or articulating your values to use as decision-making guides.
A couple of years can easily turn into decades. We feel safe with whatever job we have because we know how to do our role and we wonder if the grass is really greener elsewhere. By this time, we likely have obligations – a mortgage, a better car, and/or a family to raise.
My intention is for this article to act as your mentor. The mentor that is dedicated to seeing you succeed not only at work but in life as well. The mentor who wants you to have a satisfying life, one that when you look back years from now you can honestly say that you put your skills, talents, and experience to use to make life better in some way.
If you are not just starting out in your career and it has been a decade or two or three and you think you’ve been drifting, all is not lost. Not by a long shot. If you are just starting out but you don’t know what you want to do quite yet and you can’t articulate what role you really want is – that’s ok too. Awareness that you can direct your path is key here.
What you can do now
- Take inventory of your skills, talents and experience
- Ask yourself what you like to do, what you love to do, and what you dread doing
- Then ask yourself if your current role has you doing what you love and like to do, or mostly what you dread doing.
Also take stock of what you value. The best exercise I know of for this is to picture yourself in the future, maybe 20 years down the road. You’re at a celebration event – for you! Your friends, co-workers, and family are there. One by one they go in front of everyone and say what they appreciate about you. They tell everyone what you’re good at, what you love doing, and how you make an impact.
What do you hear them saying? These are the things you value. Use these to help you decide where you want to go with your career and next role. If you heard people say you are an expert at something, then set aside time to plan how to become the expert and then become the expert. If you heard people say you were dedicated to your family, friends, and community, then you need to determine how your actions will align with that desire. Or perhaps you excelled at your career and impacted many people through leadership.
What steps can you take today and every day to become the person you want to be?
What career and role will help you get there?
If you followed the path and became the person you envisioned, would the song lyrics from above still resonate with you?
Keep pressing on. You’ve got this!