Why meaning isn’t enough (you have to enjoy your career journey!)
At the end of 2023 I was spending time doing reflection and goal setting for 2024. And you know what I was finding it really hard work. What normally came easy to me was now a struggle and I have to admit I found it quite distressing. To unpick what caused that resistance and distress, I need to go back and tell you a quick story…
Making meaningful career and life changes
Several years ago now I made some pretty significant changes in my life, left my corporate research job, moved abroad with my husband for the first time (hello Bahrain!), shipped a cat overseas, and decided to become self employed.
My first step into self employment was consulting as independent research consultant. Later I also chose to formalise my interest in helping others with their professional and personal development by training to become (and certifying) as a coach. Both consulting and coaching could be done online (the one thing I am grateful to the pandemic for!) which allowed freedom for me to travel and explore the new region I was living in, something important to me.
I was incredibly proud of myself at that time, to have taken the opportunity and the time to figure out what would be more meaningful in my career - and the addition of coaching filled a gap that research didn’t quite stretch to.
My mission for the coaching side of my business was simple: show others the amazing transformative power of coaching and personal development.
Why?
Coaching had been offered to me in the past but was something I had been strongly against for many years, holding a limiting belief that asking for help would be seen as a weakness. However after my personal experiences with two fantastic coaches, I did a complete 180 on that view and wanted to spread the word.
It felt incredibly meaningful to me to help others like me (self confessed perfectionists, people pleasers and hyper-achievers) to know there is an alternative to working your self to the point of burn out.
So off I trotted, trying out new things in service of my mission and a big focus on getting VISIBLE:
Posting on LinkedIn for the first time
Then posting on LinkedIn nearly every day
Putting on events that introduced the idea of coaching
Setting up and sharing regular video content on YouTube
Putting my hand up for and speaking at conferences like Quirks and ICF
My purpose served as a guiding light
It definitely was not always plain sailing. All those activities listed above were completely new to me and outside my comfort zone. Whenever I had a wobble in what I was doing or I felt resistance, I would come back to my purpose “to be the guiding light that shows others its actually a strength to get support so that you can grow personally and professionally” And most of the time this focus on my mission, those who I was hoping to serve and support got me over my own insecurities, worries or fears of judgement.
But there was something important I was not keeping an eye on... And that was whether I was even enjoying what I was doing…
While I ADORED working with my clients and seeing the amazing shifts they were making in their own careers. I also found I really enjoyed speaking at conferences, and on webinars to motivate others, and had fun putting on live events. On the other hand, I hated posting every day on LinkedIn. For over a year I struggled, and tried so many ways and methods to make it easier for me. While I had some breakthroughs, mostly I sat at my computer and a blank screen for extended periods of time and felt stressed and unhappy about my own ineptitude to do something so ‘simple’
It became a self fulfilling prophecy…
The more I toughed it out, the harder it felt and the more I beat myself up. In fact my inner saboteurs were in full force on this one, so I punished myself even by forcing myself to stay in my office (nicknamed my “box”!) for longer and longer periods of time until all my content creation tasks were done. The more I focussed on this, the less time and energy I had to focus on making an impact with my coaching clients AND enjoying the other bits that I actually did like (eg speaking / running events).
It was not the positive mindset I was trying to demonstrate to those I wanted to support or the freedom of an online business I had designed for myself initially
What’s the moral of this story?
So coming back to my goals and vision for 2024 - no wonder I was finding it hard to write anything down when I had lost a big part of my connection to what was enjoyable for me.
I’m still working through the finer points of my goals and vision, but for now I’ve chosen ENJOYMENT to be my guiding word for this year, and I’ll be asking myself regularly whether the activities and projects I am working on are delivering. I’ll be keeping a track of the fun activities I do as well as the level of enjoyment I feel each week.
Many of us want to make big changes in our work and life to have an impact, live a life of purpose and meaning. I still believe this is of huge importance, but don’t let chasing meaning (or in fact any big goal) mean you forget to enjoy the process along the way!
And if you are an email subscriber of mine - you’ll know already some of the changes I plan to make, as I dish a bit more dirt for those getting my weekly newsletter ;) and if not, sign up here - you’ll be the first to be notified about my blog each week
Until next week, have fun, enjoy the process and laugh as much as you can.