Find something you love!

Surprise..surprise… not everyone is in love with their job. As a mentor, friend, colleague I always hear variations of:
‘meh it’s ok’
‘I just don’t love this’
‘it’s good money’
‘feeds the family’
‘it’s allright, like the people’
‘it’s just a job’
‘it’s convenient and pays the bills’
‘putting kids through college is not cheap and we are not in Sweden!’
‘ugh, got the golden cuffs on, addicted to my paycheck’
‘it’s boring but I am good at it’
…. and so on…

Reality is this: it is ok that not everyone is head over heels for their job. Yes, despite all LinkedIN articles and HBR catchy headlines, this is reality for millions of people. At some level it is ‘just’ a job and only ‘one’ part of your true life. So my response usually goes ‘ok, but find something you love to do. Not saying find a job … find something in your life that you enjoy doing’. This could be as simple as cooking, writing, jumping off planes, surfing, book club, spending time with your kids, bird watching, traveling, blogging 😉 … you get the idea.

Recently in one of these sessions tables were turned… and I was asked ‘huh ok … so what is that something that you love to do, what is that for you?’. For a moment, which felt like an eternity, I was stumped… was not expecting the question. Before I could open my mouth, visuals of my pottery studio and things I have made popped into my brain. Told her ‘I love making stuff out of clay… oh let me show you’

Here is ‘shooting star’:

Here is ‘fun’:

Here is ‘hope’:

Before boring her I stopped at showing her these 3 clay and porcelain ornaments. She got the point – and was surprised, said she expected that my thing would have been something more lofty or tied to work. Hmmm … Will probe on that next time, but for now let’s adjourn; I have a to run to the pottery studio!!!

So have you found something you love to do??